Mr. Warren and Mr. Freed wrote “This Heart Of Mine” for a 1944 Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM) musical called the ZIEGFELD FOLLIES which starred Fred Astaire.
I think I first heard it sung by Judy Garland, who recorded it the following year for Decca Records.
Arthur Freed also wrote the lyrics for a bunch of other hit songs — such as “Singing In The Rain,” “You Are My Lucky Star,” and “Make ‘Em Laugh.”
I haven’t read any biographies about him (yet) but according to Wikipedia, he lived a fascinating life.
Composite Images of Arthur Freed by Diane Yoder
He was born in South Carolina in 1894, and ended up attending a very prestigious prep school in New Hampshire — Phillips Exeter Academy. I am guessing he was probably one of very few Jewish students on campus — and according to Wikipedia, he became interested in writing poetry there.
After prep school Mr. Freed ended up in Chicago and performed with early versions of the Marx Brothers act (!!!) in vaudeville.
He also wrote special material for them, which led to co-writing enough successful songs that Hollywood beckoned…and he was hired to write songs for early MGM musicals.
After many years at MGM, Freed transitioned from songwriter to producer, working (as an uncredited associate producer ) on THE WIZARD OF OZ and then officially producing his first movie, BABES IN ARMS.
Both of these films, as you probably know, starred Judy Garland.
Mr. Freed went on to produce many more of Garland’s movies including LITTLE NELLIE KELLY, FOR ME AND MY GAL, THE CLOCK, and MEET ME IN ST. LOUIS — which is where she met her second husband, the director Vincente Minnelli, whom Freed had brought from New York City to work at MGM.
According to Wikipedia, Freed hired great talent and then gave them free rein to do their thing — whether it was choreography, costumes, set design, songwriting, direction, etc.
He also gave himself free rein to do some very odd and abusive things, such as exposing his penis to a young Shirley Temple when she came for a visit to discuss doing a movie at MGM — and making sexual advances towards her mother as well.
Temple wrote about this incident in her autobiography — and apparently Mr. Freed experienced no censure as a result of his horrible behavior…
Spring has finally arrived — in fits and starts — here in the northeast United States.
And we have two days of (much-needed) rain forecast to start later this morning!
I’ve been sitting on this blog post for weeks because I want my posts to be uplifting.
Yet so much of what is happening here on planet earth continues to be the opposite.
I find myself returning to recent elections in Hungary for hope.
If I understand correctly, Hungarians had a president/dictator for 16 years who did his best to hamstring/contaminate/eliminate their democratic institutions such as freedom of the press and judicial independence.
And yet, after MUCH courageous struggle, their president/dictator was defeated in April with a record 80% voter turnout.
Hurrah!
Deep breath in.
Deep breath out.
I wrote the song included at the beginning of this blog post several years ago.
One of my favorite signs of spring is the hopeful sound of horny. peeper frogs who are looking for a mate and establishing their personal breeding territories.
In fact, I like this sound so much that I included it at the beginning and ending of “Boil A Frog Slowly.”
As readers of my blog are well aware, one of my main musical allies is pianist/composer/producer Doug Hammer, who lives with his beautiful French artist/graphic designer wife in a ranch-style dwelling on a suburban street in a city north of Boston.
Hidden in his basement is a recording studio with an impeccably maintained Schimmel grand piano and all sorts of recording equipment which Doug is constantly upgrading and updating, bless him.
And hidden behind his house is a little wetland which still manages to exist even though is has been surrounded by houses over the past few decades.
In the spring, melting snow and falling rain fill up the wetlands so that geese, ducks — including two wood ducks this year! —and other water-loving animals can do their thing.
And at a certain point, the peepers emerge from the earth/mud and start peeping!
It is such a lively sound — kind of like the aural equivalent of fireflies blinking on a summer night…
I spent a week in upstate NY last month, and most evenings I went for a long walk on country roads wearing a safety vest with ever-changing, multi-colored lights on it.
Whenever I passed a damp area — a pond or a stream or a drainage ditch — the sound of peepers filled the night air!
Somehow they manage to survive a changing mix of sun, rain, snow and hail with temperatures fluctuating from the 20s (overnight) to the 60s (during the day).
Peepers “prefer permanent ponds due to (their) advantage in avoiding predation; however, (they are) very adaptable with respect to the habitat (they) can live in.”
I was happy to read that they are not currently considered to be an endangered species — perhaps due in part to their adaptable natures (mentioned above).
I also learned that “in northern regions, the frog is able to endure below freezing temperatures due to the capacity of its liver to exude and flush the bloodstream with a glucose cryoprotectant which acts both as an anti-freeze in its blood, and allows organs like the heart to enter into a state of protected dormancy.”
Wow!
That certainly helps to explain their resiliency during our weather/temperature swings.
Wikipedia continues: “The peeper earns its name from its chirping call, which marks the beginning of spring.”
And its formal name, Pseudacris crucifer, “is derived from the Latin root meaning “cross-bearing”— a reference to the cross-like pattern on the spring peeper’s (back).”
Their “chirping calls are significant for communication…as females choose their mates based on the frequency and volume associated with them.”
Yes, indeed… the passionate songs of spring.
Chirp, peepers, chirp!
I released “Boil A Frog Slowly” two springs ago, and I have been collecting information since then about how out of balance, out of touch, and out of control our billionaire class —what some are now calling “The Epstein Class”— has become.
For example, the Americans For Tax Fairness Action Fund recently reminded me that:
“The United States was founded on a rejection of monarchy ie: no tiny elite ruling over everyone else. However, our current president “has embraced a governing philosophy that rewards extreme wealth and concentrates power in the hands of the richest people in the country: America’s roughly 1,000 billionaires” — which includes himself as well as many of his friends and family members.
Deep breath in.
Deep breath out.
This statistic is particularly shocking to me: “During (our current president’s) first year back in office, U.S. billionaires increased their wealth by an astonishing $1.5 trillion, pushing their combined fortunes to more than $8.2 trillion.“
As I am sure most of us are well aware, billionaires and giant corporations hold enormous influence over our economy AND over our political system…
It was this emerging realization which inspired me to write this song.
But now as I listen to it, I am also reminded about our ongoing climate challenges which our current president plus all of the greedy and cowardly media/entertainment conglomerates (which continue to provide an awful ot of people with theira daily dose of “news”) are now downplaying and/or ignoring even more than in recent years.
Recently I watched a weather report on the CBS morning news/entertainment show.
As part of their reporting of record-breaking levels of heat in the west and southwest of the USA, there was NO mention of steps each and every one of us could take to decrease our carbon footprints.
Instead there were many segments on things to buy, places to fly (the most carbon-intensive way to travel) and ways to continue to consume more than our fair share of the natural resources on this amazing little planet which we all call home.
The message seemed to be “Keep living your consumerist lives exactly as you have been doing for the past few generations” — which, of course, is how we have ended up in our current terrifying environmental disaster situation.
Yet another deep breath in.
And deep breath out.
But back to the billionaires…
As I wrote above, I do not want my blog posts to increase anyone’s daily burden of hopelessness.
So I will end with two bits of positive news.
In 2022 Massachusetts voters — of which I was one — approved a “millionaire’s tax,” and since then it has added more than a billion dollars per year to our state budget.
Revenue from this surtax is mandated to go toward education and transportation initiatives — including more free lunch programs, implementing “clean energy” in schools, making community college free for students 25 and older, and increasing the number of child care slots for low-income families.
And rather than decreasing the number of millionaires and billionaires wanting to live in MA — as nay-sayers and their lobbyists had warned — that number continues to rise..
Adding an extra 4% tax on annual income exceeding one million dollars CAN be accomplished!
And in New York City, newly elected mayor Zohran Mamdani — along with governor Kathy Hochul — has recently proposed a pied-à-terre tax which would target luxury secondary homes worth over $5 million which are NOT primary residences.
This annual surcharge would raise $500 million annually to fund public services and bridge budget gaps.
And it would also begin to chip away at our much-lobbied tax code which currently allows super rich individuals and corporations to pay few — or no! — taxes while using all sorts of public services such as public education, drivable roads, tunnels and bridges.
Although “Boil A Frog Slowly” was written from a place of concern and despair, I do find ways to experience little patches of hope and optimism these days (such as the recent election in Hungary mentioned above).
The most recent “No Kings” day lifted my spirits and reminded me that there are millions of other human beings in the USA — and abroad — who are stepping up to help tip the balance of power/life back in a more healthy direction.
And the smaller political races around the country — in which Democratic candidates continue to over perform when compared with our most recent presidential election results — also give me hope.
People ARE daring to step up!
May each of us continue to find (and re-find) a healthy balance of active engagement — demonstrating in person, writing postcards/letters, giving money, volunteering on phone banks, etc. etc. etc. — with restful, rejuvenating, joyful activities.
And may the resiliency of the spring peepers give us hope and inspiration!
Thank you for reading this blog post.
We’ll see if I can increase the frequency — and upbeat tone — of them in the weeks/months to come.
Although I have not been very active as a writer, I DO continue to read many of my fellow bloggers’ posts.
And people continue to visit my site in increasing numbers — although my rising traffic statistics may be the result of bots having invaded WordPress?
If you have time/energy/willingness to play “Boil A Frog Slowly” on your favorite music platform — and then “like” it — that will help increase the likelihood of it being shared with new listeners by the mysterious algorithms which influence/control more and more of our online lives.
amusicalifeonplanetearth 