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Let’s Do It

Cole Porter in the 1930s

Today’s blog post is made possible by our copyright laws.

Cole Porter’s terrific song “Let’s Do It” entered the public domain last year.

So my friends Carole Bundy, Molly Ruggles and I can now share a very fun version which includes some updated lyrics (by Molly and Carole) as well as an entirely new section of the song — written in the style of Cole Porter — by Molly.

Molly created the first draft of this song for a performance with her friend Kate Stringer at Club Cafe in Boston during which I sang some harmony.

Then — after Kate moved to London — the song evolved a bit when Molly, Carole and I added it to our repertoire.

Adding new sections to pre-existing songs is one of Molly’s many creative super powers.

But it can create copyright challenges — unless one is able to get permission from whomever owns the rights to the song.

But now, because “Let’s Do It” (which was first published in 1928) has entered the public domain, we are allowed to take creative liberties with it.

Molly, me and Carole in Maine

“Let’s Do It” was one of several hit songs from Cole Porter’s first big Broadway success — a show called PARIS.

He had been writing songs for a couple of decades — starting in Peru, Indiana (where he grew up the only surviving child in a very wealthy family) and continuing in Massachusetts (where he was valedictorian of his class at a prep school, Worcester Academy) and in Connecticut (where he attended Yale).

According to Wikipedia, he wrote hundreds of songs at Yale — two of which continue to be sung at football games.

He also wrote the songs for four entire musicals which were performed in New Haven and also on tour at college clubs during vacation breaks.

After he graduated from Yale, Mr.Porter pretended to study law at Harvard (to satisfy his very wealthy grandfather, who was paying for his education) while actually studying music and writing songs — and rooming with future a Secretary of State, Dean Acheson, who was then an avid law student.

Cambridge borders East Arlington (where I live), and I love walking through Harvard Law School — which happens to be next to Harvard’s music department — and thinking about Mr. Porter treading the same streets a hundred years ago.

Although he lived an extravagant life, the second half of it was filled with chronic pain due to a horseback riding accident on Long Island.

This accident (the horse he was riding fell and rolled on top of him) left him with multiple leg fractures which never healed well…

Molly, Carole and I leading a service at the UU Church in Milton, MA

He endured many corrective surgeries over the following decades and eventually had the lower part of one of his legs amputated.

Argh!

Deep breath in.

Deep breath out.

Although some of his earlier songs had been interpolated into other shows, Mr. Porter did not have his own hit show until he was 36 years old.

But — in the midst of much revelry and travel — he could be a very disciplined person.

He continued working on music during his 20s and early 30s while simultaneously leading a life of extraordinary luxury — renting historic palazzos in Venice during the summer and hiring entire ballet companies to entertain at his parties.

He even wrote a jazz-inflected music score for a ballet production in Paris which pre-dates George Gershwin’s much more famous Rhapsody In Blue.

You can click here to skim his WIkipedia bio — it is full of fascinating details about his personal and professional lives.

Carole, Molly and I are not living lives of extraordinary luxury, but we ARE acutely aware of how fortunate/privileged we are to be able to devote time and energy to making music during this very challenging — and at time horrifying — time on planet earth.

A deep breath of gratitude in.

And a deep breath of gratitude out.

Thank you to Cole Porter for writing “Let’s Do It.”

Thank you to our copyright laws for allowing creative material to go into the public domain after a certain number of years.

Thank you to Peter Kontrimas for recording us.

Thank you to Doug Hammer for helping us fix, mix and master this recording.

Thank you to Rada Ruggles and Owen Hartford for taking photos of us.

Thank you to Pixabay for their talented and generous photographers.

Thank you to CD Baby for releasing our music — and for paying us (very modest) royalties each month.

Image by Anrita from Pixabay

And a special THANK YOU to everyone who has been streaming, liking, and playlisting our “Molly, Will & Carole” music!

We’re up to 2500 total streams on Spotify and 6500 total streams on Pandora (which are the only two music-listening platforms I currently keep tabs on…)

I have recently learned that streaming activity on the very first day of a song’s release strongly influences the future algorithmic behavior of that song on that platform — ie: whether a song is recommended to other potential listeners.

So if you might be willing to click here to stream “Let’s Do It” on the platform of your choice — and maybe even “like” it and add it to a playlist — we would be very grateful.

I will end with one final THANK YOU to you for reading and listening to yet another one of my blog posts!

Deep breath in.

Deep breath out.

24 thoughts on “Let’s Do It”

  1. What a supportive post, Will!It brings back memories of the fun I had with you and Carole pulling together this song, recording it, and sharing it in performances. I’m going to go now and log into Spotify and click the link…..

    Reply

    • Sweet! And maybe add it to a playlist of MW&C songs? And/or make a new playlist with a few other favorite Cole Porter songs? Let’s give Spotify’s algorithms as many positive data points as we can during the next few days…

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    • Yes! Royalties, no matter how meager, are both fun and satisfying to receive. One of the challenges, however, of the music business in the 21st century is that there are MANY different companies and organizations which each collect a different slice of one’s (potential) total revenue. I haven’t been paid a cent yet by SoundExchange, for example, which is an organization to collect royalties for non-interactive streams of music (like on Pandora — where I have achieved almost 100,000 streams over the past four years…) So I have lots of ongoing work to be done learning about — and then staying on top of — the ever-changing business details crucial to making any money as an independent musician. THANK YOU for reading and listening!

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    • Thank you, Audrey, for reading, listening, enjoying and commenting! Molly has a chameleon-like gift of being able to add new musical sections to pre-existing songs. We will be releasing another classic from the Great American Songbook which she “Molly-fied” — “I Can’t Give You Anything But Love” by Dorothy Fields and Jimmy McHugh — later this year.

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    • Thank you, Michele! I need to learn more about the history of our creative copyright laws. My vague memory is that the length of the term (of how long a song remains copyrighted, for example) was extended at least once or twice during the 20th century — perhaps inspired/lobbied by songwriters such as Irving Berlin, who lived to be over a hundred years old and wanted to protect his significant copyright assets as long as possible. And I think copyright laws may be challenged right now by AI-related technological/economical interests. Some — if not all — AI companies have been training their algorithms on copyrighted materials in recent years without getting permission to do so or compensating those copyright holders, I think…)

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  8. Delightful, Will! I especially enjoyed Cole Porter’s backstory, as well as imagining you walking through both the law and music schools at Harvard.

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    • Thank you, Jennie! That corner of the Harvard campus (as you may know) is quite nice — and one can walk parallel to Mass Ave for a couple of blocks and savor Harvard’s landscaping and buildings. I also like to imagine the Obamas walking around the law school campus (he was head of the Law Review, I think, which is located in a lovely house right next to the gym on Mass. Ave.) And I also look around at the law students on campus and wonder who might become the NEXT inspiring leader(s) of our country/planet…

      Reply

    • Molly is quite gifted in many ways. Maybe she and I will get to do a performance together at NC (she adds harmonies to a lot of songs in addition to playing the piano…)

      Reply

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