Into Each Life Some Rain Must Fall - the Ink Spots and Ella Fitzgerald
Be still, sad heart! and cease repining; Behind the clouds is the sun still shining; Thy fate is the common fate of all, Into each life some rain must fall, Some days must be dark and dreary.
Thus ends the poem "The Rainy Day" by American poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow published in 1842. Which supplied the title for this collaboration between the Ink Spots and Ella Fitzgerald which was the US number one 102 years later in 1944.
Along with the Mills Brothers, the Ink Spots were the other great influence on the early doo-wop groups. Although there's a heaven-sent lead vocal by tenor Bill Kenny, which is in turn upstaged by the effortless Ella Fitzgerald, who always seems to give everything and yet paradoxically sing well within herself, the bit that nearly steals the show is the fabulous talky bit by bass singer Hoppy Jones. And who is that with the light but oh-so funky piano fills?
Highlights are Ella:
"into each life some rain must fall
but too much too much is falling in mine"
and Hoppy Jones:
"into each and every life some rain has got to fall
but too much of that stuff is falling in mine
and into each heart some tears gotta fall
and I know that some day that sun is bound to shine"
Here, on one 7 inch piece of vinyl there's more poetry than the whole Longfellow oeuvre. Except maybe "My Lost Youth":
"....a verse of a lLapland song
is haunting my memory still
a boy's will is the wind's will
and the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts."