Landesman, Fran
Fran Landesman, songwriter, poet and performer, was born in New York City in 1927. She grew up on the Upper West Side with Central Park as her front garden, went to art school in New York and hung out in the bars and on the fire escapes of Greenwich village, looking for love, danger and excitement. Around 1949 this appeared in the shape of a young writer, magazine editor and bon vivant Jay Landesman.
They married in 1950 and shortly afterwards and initially, much to Fran’s chagrin, moved to Jay’s home town of St Louis. Once in St Louis, with the help of Jay’s elder brother, painter and art collector Fred Landesman, they opened what was to become one of the hippest night spots in the Midwest, the legendary Crystal Palace. The piano player at the Crystal Palace was a young St Louis musician called Tommy Wolf. In 1956 he wrote about his first encounter with the Landesmans…
“…I was playing background piano music at the Jefferson Hotel in St Louis one cold October evening in 1952 when a group of people wearing European imitations of American clothing entered the Rendezvous to listen to a speech by Adlai Stevenson on the giant-size 7 inch TV screen. I took them to my heart immediately because although they also weren’t paying any attention to me, at least they had a different reason: and when, during one of the Democratic commercials, they requested a few tunes that I not only despised but hadn’t even heard of they became my friends for life, and invited me to become Musical Director of a bar they were about to open …of course I still had to play the piano but the TITLE was costing me only $100 a week so I thought….what the hell. That was the beginning of the Crystal Palace and my association with a fabulous family…… the Landesmans.”
Fran and Tommy soon began writing songs which he would sing nightly to the drinking masses at The Crystal Palace. One night the British born piano player George Shearing came into the club and was particularly taken with a song whose title Fran had come up with while speculating on how a hip jazz musician might express the T.S. Elliot line “April Is The Cruelest Month….”. The song was called ‘Spring Can Really Hang You Up The Most’. Shearing left St. Louis with a tape of a number of Landesman/Wolf songs which he enthusiastically played to singers and musicians he knew. Amongst of the first to take the bait was the bebop vocal duo Jackie and Roy. Jackie Cain and Roy Krall were to become life-long friends and fans of both Fran and Tommy, enthusiastically championing their songs throughout their long career. When Shearing first played them the songs, Jackie and Roy were preparing for a stint at Max Gordon’s New York cabaret spot The Blue Angel and were looking for new hip material…they seized on songs like “Season In The Sun” and “You Inspire Me” which soon became part of their set and subsiquently Landesman/Wolf song cropped up with increasing frequency on their regular album releases. Around the same time singer Jerry Winter got the ball rolling for the Landesman/Wolf song “Spring Can Really Hang You Up The Most” which she recorded on her album ‘Winter’s Here’.
Tommy and Fran were now writing together at what was to become Fran’s modus operandi…a furious pace. In 1956 Tommy went to Chicago to record an album of their songs ‘A Wolf At Your Door’ and soon after a musical began to emerge. The Nervous Set began life at the now flourishing Crystal Palace cabaret theatre. Fran Landesman wrote the lyrics, Tommy Wolf wrote the music and Jay Landesman wrote the book based on his experiences as publisher of Neurotica magazine. A wicked satire on the Beat Generation, the show included an embarassment of riches in the song department: “Spring Can Really Hang you Up The Most”, “The Ballad of the Sad Young Men”, “Night People”, “How Do You Like Your Love” and many more. The show’s success with St Louis audiences soon attracted the attention of New York producers and the ‘The Nervous Set’ opened on broadway in 1959. Tommy Wolf lead the on-stage band and the cast included Del Close and a young Larry Hagman playing a character based on Jay’s old friend and associate Jack Kerouac. The critics acknowledged the emergence of a powerful new songwriting team but on the whole remained luke warm and in some cases downright hostile to the show. However audiences including some of New York showbiz alumni (Richard Rogers for one) gave their blessing to what everyone assumed to be the first flowering of a great new partnership in the history of American music theatre.
They married in 1950 and shortly afterwards and initially, much to Fran’s chagrin, moved to Jay’s home town of St Louis. Once in St Louis, with the help of Jay’s elder brother, painter and art collector Fred Landesman, they opened what was to become one of the hippest night spots in the Midwest, the legendary Crystal Palace. The piano player at the Crystal Palace was a young St Louis musician called Tommy Wolf. In 1956 he wrote about his first encounter with the Landesmans…
“…I was playing background piano music at the Jefferson Hotel in St Louis one cold October evening in 1952 when a group of people wearing European imitations of American clothing entered the Rendezvous to listen to a speech by Adlai Stevenson on the giant-size 7 inch TV screen. I took them to my heart immediately because although they also weren’t paying any attention to me, at least they had a different reason: and when, during one of the Democratic commercials, they requested a few tunes that I not only despised but hadn’t even heard of they became my friends for life, and invited me to become Musical Director of a bar they were about to open …of course I still had to play the piano but the TITLE was costing me only $100 a week so I thought….what the hell. That was the beginning of the Crystal Palace and my association with a fabulous family…… the Landesmans.”
Fran and Tommy soon began writing songs which he would sing nightly to the drinking masses at The Crystal Palace. One night the British born piano player George Shearing came into the club and was particularly taken with a song whose title Fran had come up with while speculating on how a hip jazz musician might express the T.S. Elliot line “April Is The Cruelest Month….”. The song was called ‘Spring Can Really Hang You Up The Most’. Shearing left St. Louis with a tape of a number of Landesman/Wolf songs which he enthusiastically played to singers and musicians he knew. Amongst of the first to take the bait was the bebop vocal duo Jackie and Roy. Jackie Cain and Roy Krall were to become life-long friends and fans of both Fran and Tommy, enthusiastically championing their songs throughout their long career. When Shearing first played them the songs, Jackie and Roy were preparing for a stint at Max Gordon’s New York cabaret spot The Blue Angel and were looking for new hip material…they seized on songs like “Season In The Sun” and “You Inspire Me” which soon became part of their set and subsiquently Landesman/Wolf song cropped up with increasing frequency on their regular album releases. Around the same time singer Jerry Winter got the ball rolling for the Landesman/Wolf song “Spring Can Really Hang You Up The Most” which she recorded on her album ‘Winter’s Here’.
Tommy and Fran were now writing together at what was to become Fran’s modus operandi…a furious pace. In 1956 Tommy went to Chicago to record an album of their songs ‘A Wolf At Your Door’ and soon after a musical began to emerge. The Nervous Set began life at the now flourishing Crystal Palace cabaret theatre. Fran Landesman wrote the lyrics, Tommy Wolf wrote the music and Jay Landesman wrote the book based on his experiences as publisher of Neurotica magazine. A wicked satire on the Beat Generation, the show included an embarassment of riches in the song department: “Spring Can Really Hang you Up The Most”, “The Ballad of the Sad Young Men”, “Night People”, “How Do You Like Your Love” and many more. The show’s success with St Louis audiences soon attracted the attention of New York producers and the ‘The Nervous Set’ opened on broadway in 1959. Tommy Wolf lead the on-stage band and the cast included Del Close and a young Larry Hagman playing a character based on Jay’s old friend and associate Jack Kerouac. The critics acknowledged the emergence of a powerful new songwriting team but on the whole remained luke warm and in some cases downright hostile to the show. However audiences including some of New York showbiz alumni (Richard Rogers for one) gave their blessing to what everyone assumed to be the first flowering of a great new partnership in the history of American music theatre.
Alternate Title
An Extravagant Love Song
Composer
Dorough, Bob
Lyricist
Landesman, Fran