So kicking off a new year with The Jazz Standards Project. The aim is to listen to as many versions of the jazz standards as possible using the book The Jazz Standards: a guide to the repertoire by Ted Gioia (Oxford University Press, New York, 2012) as a guide and @Spotify as the source for the music.

The first of the standards is After You’ve Gone, composed by Turner Layton, with lyrics by Henry Creamer.

Gioia recommends versions by Marion Harris (the 1918 original), the Charleston Chasers, Bessie Smith, Louis Armstrong, Benny Goodman (Trio), Roy Eldridge, Gene Krupa, Jazz at the Philharmonic with Charlie Parker in 1946, Sonny Stitt and Nicholas Payton.

On @Spotify I also came across versions by Tommy Dorsey, Bing Crosby, Ella Fitzgerald, Frank Sinatra, Ben Webster, Judy Garland, Wynton Marsalis, Dinah Washington, Ray Brown, Django Reinhardt and Stephane Grapelli, Nina Simone, Art Tatum, Sidney Bechet, Coleman Hawkins, Al Jolson, Hugh Laurie and Woody Allen. Some other names can be found at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/After_You’ve_Gone_(song)

Overtime the versions tend to pick up a faster tempo but it strikes me the slower versions work better.

The lyrics are as follows:

Now won’t you listen honey, while I say,
How could you tell me that you’re goin’ away?
Don’t say that we must part,
Don’t break your baby’s heart

You know I’ve loved you for these many years,
Loved you night and day,
Oh! honey baby, can’t you see my tears?
Listen while I say

After you’ve gone and left me cryin’
After you’ve gone there’s no denyin’
You’ll feel blue, you’ll feel sad
You’ll miss the dearest pal you’ve ever had

There’ll come a time, now don’t forget it
There’ll come a time when you’ll regret it
Someday, when you grow lonely
Your heart will break like mine and you’ll want me only
After you’ve gone, after you’ve gone away

After you’ve gone and left me cryin’
After you’ve gone there’s no denyin’
You’re gonna feel blue, and you’re gonna feel sad
You’re gonna feel bad
And you’ll miss, and you’ll miss,
And you’ll miss the bestest pal you ever had

There’ll come a time, now don’t forget it
There’ll come a time when you’ll regret it
But baby, think what you’re doin’
I’m gonna haunt you so, I’m gonna taunt you so
It’s gonna drive you to ruin
After you’ve gone, after you’ve gone away.