Here’s a wonderful oddity.
A few days ago, I heard Brian Setzer performing the “Jet Song” from “West Side Story.” Unlike in Leonard Bernstein’s original, it really rocks, complete with a guitar solo. I looked it up and discovered the track is from a 1996 album, “The Songs Of West Side Story,” compiled by something called The Ultimate Theater Experience. Whoever that is, they’ve done similar compilations of pop stars covering songs from “Oklahoma,” “Rent,” “Phantom Of The Opera,” and other Broadway musicals.
On this album the artists included Phil Collins (“Somewhere”), the trio of Natalie Cole, Patti LaBelle, and Sheila E (“America”), Trisha Yearwood (“I Have A Love”), and Kenny Loggins dueting with Wynonna (“Tonight”).
After listening to the whole thing, the only one besides Setzer’s I really enjoyed was “I Feel Pretty,” sung by Little Richard. He had so much fun (complete with his trademark “woo!!”), gender-swapping some of the lines to make himself even more the focus of the tune. For instance, instead of “For I’m loved by a pretty wonderful boy,” Richard sang “I’m in love like a pretty wonderful boy.” Also, at one point, after the backup singers said, “Have you met my good friend, Maria? / The craziest girl on the block / You’ll know her the minute you see her / She’s the one who is in an advanced state of shock,” Richard responded with “Shut up!”
Somehow, Stephen Sondheim left that out of the original libretto.
The whole thing reminded me of hearing Bob Dylan singing “This Old Man,” which I occasionally used as punishment music during The Harris Challenge trivia game on my radio show.
There’s no video of the recording sessions for “The Songs Of West Side Story,” but someone did a very clever mashup of Richard’s version of “I Feel Pretty” with footage of Natalie Wood et al performing the song in the original 1961 movie. It’s not perfectly in sync, but it’s fun to watch.
Ear Worm Caveat: once you hear this, you may have trouble getting it out of your head.