I'm Sitting on Top of the World

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I'm Sitting on Top of the World (Just Rolling Along) is a song written by Ray Henderson (music) and Sam M. Lewis and Joe Young (lyrics) and published in 1925.

History of origin

The song, written by the successful songwriting team Ray Henderson, Sam M. Lewis and Joe Young in F major and in the typical form of the Tin Pan Alley song, has the form AABA. According to Marvin E. Paymer and Don E. Post, I'm Sitting on Top of the World is "one of the most optimistic songs ever written"; "The lyrics work with expressive passages such as just rolling along and just like Humpty-Dumpty, I'm going to fall , and the music with bouncing melodic lines and simple harmonies."

Alice and Humpty Dumpty, illustration to Alice Behind the Looking Glass by John Tenniel , 1871

For Don Tyler it is one of the typical anti- depression songs of the time; according to the refrain, the singer is "on top of the whole world"; he leaves the gloom of the world behind by singing a song. He had just called his pastor to remind him that a wedding was coming up: like Humpty Dumpty (a literary figure by Lewis Carroll in Alice in Wonderland ) he had just fallen in love. The song was first introduced by Al Jolson ; In 1928 the singer also presented him in the Warner Brothers production The Singing Fool .

I'm Sitting on Top of the World (Just Rolling Along) is not with the by Howlin 'Wolf famous Blue Song Sitting on Top of the World to be confused, that of Walter Vinson and Lonnie Chatmon was written.

First recordings

The orchestras of Sam Lanin ( Banner ), Fred Rich (Harmony), Ross Gorman ( Columbia ), Roger Wolfe Kahn ( Victor ) and Isham Jones ( Brunswick ) were among the first musicians to record the song from 1925 . In London on February 2, 1926, the women's duo Helen and Josephine Trix, born Yeiser, sang the title for British Columbia.

Later cover versions and use in films

The discographer Tom Lord lists a total of 47 (as of 2015) cover versions in the field of jazz , including a. by Glenn Miller , Bob Crosby , George Girard , Johnny Guarnieri , Enoch Light , Lurlean Hunter , Woody Herman , Alex Welsh , Papa Bue Jensen , Dizzy Gillespie and the Dutch Swing College Band . Even Brenda Lee , Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis coverten I'm Sitting on Top of the World ; Les Paul & Mary Ford entered the US charts with their version in 1952. Al Jolson reinterpreted him in 1946 (as a vocal double for Larry Parks ) in the biopic Al Jolson Story ; In 1955 he was sung by Susan Hayward in I'll Cry Tomorrow and by Doris Day in the Ruth Etting biopic Love Me or Leave Me .

Notes and individual references

  1. ↑ a b c d e f Marvin E. Paymer, Don E. Post: Sentimental Journey: Intimate Portraits of America's Great Popular Songs . 1999, p. 77 f.
  2. ^ A b The Musical Frameworks of Five Blues Schemes, 2008, p. 155
  3. ^ Don Tyler, Hit Songs, 1900-1955: American Popular Music of the Pre-Rock Era . 2007, p. 145.
  4. ↑ a b Tom Lord: Jazz discography (online)
  5. ↑ Columbia 3915 (mx. A 2809) The Trix Sisters, with piano. Label shown. at discogs.com , to be heard on youtube