If You Knew Susie Like I Knew Susie
If You Knew Susie Like I Knew Susie is a song written by BG DeSylva and Joseph Meyer and published in 1925.
History of origin
The song, written in B flat major in the form AA'BA, is generally associated with Eddie Cantor , although it was first tried by Al Jolson on his show Big Boy , but was then discarded. Cantor included the song on his Kid Boots show and had great success with it. Cantor then made If You Knew Susie his signature tune. The lyrics “set the tone, with Oh! Oh! Oh! What a girl! In the ragtime style , a slightly syncopated rhythmic motif appears in the chorus. "
First recordings
Cliff Edwards hit the US charts with If You Knew Susie ; Among the musicians who covered the song from 1925 were Red Nichols and Miff Mole (as Gennett's studio band Bailey's Lucky Seven ), Abe Lyman (Brunswick), the Varsity Eight (another studio band around Tommy and Jimmy Dorsey , Adrian Rollini and Irving Brodsky ), Ella Shields , Ben Bernie and Jack Shilkret's Orchestra with Billy Murray , in Berlin Béla Dajos and in London Jean Wiener & Clément Doucet .
Later cover versions
The discographer Tom Lord lists a total of 48 (as of 2015) cover versions in the field of jazz , u. a. by Jack Jenney , Tiny Hill , Fernand Coppieters , Kurt Widmann , Lou Stein , Frank Froeba , Carmen Mastren , Francis Bay , Luckey Roberts , Enoch Light as well as numerous European and American revival bands. John Gordy covered him in the field of pop (RCA, 1956). The song was also used in numerous films; Bobby Doyle presented him in The Great Ziegfeld (1936), Gene Kelly and Frank Sinatra sang him in Anchors Aweigh (1945), Eddie Cantor in If You Knew Susie (1948, directed by Gordon Douglas ). He was also heard in 1855 in the biography The Benny Goodman Story . In 1966 Dean Martin interpreted him in The Silencers