Monday, June 10, 2019

Judy Garland Songs From the Movies

Today would mark the 97th birthday of the lovely and extremely talented Judy Garland. I have not been shy about how big of a Judy fan I am. So to celebrate the birthday of this wonderful performer let us look at a few of her songs from the movies. 

First up is Judy performing For Me and My Gal with Gene Kelly from the movie, For Me and My Gal (1942). This film was important to both Judy and Gene's careers. This marked Judy's first real "grown-up" role, and was Gene Kelly's film debut. They quickly became good friends and Judy helped Gene get used to making movies. The would appear in together in two more movies, The Pirate (1948) and Summer Stock (1950). Their chemistry together is perfect as you will see in this song number. Like all of the songs from this film the song was not written originally for the movie. As a movie that took place in the 1910's all of the song numbers come from then. Next comes one of Judy's all time liveliest song performances, Mack the Black from The Pirate. This very fun and energetic song was written by Cole Porter and the movie was directed by Judy's husband Vincent Minneli. Next comes a 16 year old Judy performing Meet the Beat of My Heart from the movie, Love finds Andy Hardy (1938). This song was written by Mack Gordon and Harry Revel, the team behind the classic song, Did You Ever Seen a Dream Walking. Mack Gordon would also be a cowriter of the famous song, You Make Me Feel So Young. We end with one of the most famous Christmas songs of all time. This is Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas. This song was originally written for the movie, Meet Me in St. Louis (1944) by Hugh Martin and Ralph Blane. The lyrics weren't going to be as happy as they are here. They were going to include "Have yourself a merry little Christmas, it may be your last, next year we may all be living in the past" However Judy and director Vincent Minneli, felt these lyrics were to depressing for a scene when a character is trying to cheer another up.













-Michael J. Ruhland 


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