Lew Brown, “Five Foot Two, Eyes of Blue”
Today is the birthday of the great Tin Pan Alley lyricist Lew Brown (1893-1958), most famous as one third of the team of Henderson/ Brown/ DeSylva. Now here’s a 1926 recording of one of their most popular songs “Five Foot Two, Eyes of Blue” by Gene Austin. It shows off Brown’s playful lyrical abilities to great effect:
To find out more about the variety arts past and present, consult No Applause, Just Throw Money: The Book That Made Vaudeville Famous, available at Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and wherever nutty books are sold. And don’t miss Chain of Fools: Silent Comedy and Its Legacies from Nickelodeons to Youtube, to be released by Bear Manor Media in 2013.
December 10, 2012 at 10:12 am
My grandmother, who was born in 1900, loved that 20′s song because she really was “five foot two, eyes of blue.” Wish a song team like that still existed and could write one for me about being “five foot one, eyes of green!”