Bodies and Souls

If "Stardust" is the most recorded song of all time, then surely "Body and Soul" is; Gary Giddins claims it has been recorded more than 3000 times.  Composed by Johnny Green in 1930, with three lyricists credited, the song almost didn't make it into the final production of the musical, Three's a Crowd, for which it was written.  In a 1980 essay, "Fifty Years of Body and Soul," Giddins described the song as "an unusually difficult example of the 32-bar AABA song, with three key changes in the chorus (and three more in the rarely performed verse), intricate major/minor circuitry, and a wide range ... Jazz musicians favor [it] ... because they like the tune."

Louis Armstrong recorded one of the memorable renditions of the song the year it was written.




What is probably the definitive jazz version of "Body and Soul" was recorded at the end of the '30s by tenor saxophonist Coleman Hawkins.  Giddins described this version as "a gauntlet tossed at every other saxophonist in jazz."  Hawkins version, which was considered significant enough to be included in both the Smithsonian Collection of Classic Jazz and Ken Burn's compilation from his Jazz video series, is almost pure improvisation.  Below are reproductions of the sheet music along with a transcription of Hawkins' solo.

Billie Holiday took several vocal liberties with the melody in her 1940 recording.  The muted trumpet solo is Roy Eldridge.



Frank Sinatra recorded a "straight" version in 1947.  The trumpet solo here is Bobby Hackett, who would later be featured soloist on many of the "make out" albums recorded by the Jackie Gleason orchestra in the 1950s and '60s. An abbreviated version of Hackett soloing from Gleason's 1960 album Music for Lover's Only follows Sinatra.





Also in 1960, a very different, but still pretty straight ahead recording, was made by John Coltrane and his quartet.
 



In the 1970s Ella Fitzgerald put her unique take on the song on a Frank Sinatra TV show.



Finally, "Body and Soul" has lived on into another century.  The next video is bass and vocal prodigy, Esperanza Spalding live in Copenhagen.  It's time for another essay: "Eighty Years of Body and Soul."