Once again, I am featuring an album I love from about twenty years ago, Red Hot + Blue. It featured the music of American musical theater legend Cole Porter and some of the top acts of the day, all to raise money and awareness for AIDS research. The album contained 20 cuts, and I found 17 videos for those cuts, and for the next several weeks, will be running them in this Monday night spot. The album was thought of as a fundraising tool, it also allowed the artists involved great freedom with their interpretation of Porter’s music, making for a wide variety of styles on the album. We shall go through the album in the order that is on my CD, which I did purchase at the time.
Porter was an amazing talent, and some consider him one of the best LGBT songwriters, if not THE best. He started his Broadway career in 1915, when one of his songs appeared in a Broadway Revue. He was just 24 years old. He went on to write songs for the theater like Lets Do It, Let’s Fall In Love, What Is This Thing Called Love, and Anything Goes. Despite having a wife of 35 years, most believed him to be gay, and the marriage one between two dear friends who gave one another space and freedom, while gaining both wider acceptance in the greater world at large.
Annie Lennox has a voice so expressive, so amazing, there seems to be to be little that I can say, other than to crank up the volume and give a listen to her version of Ev’rytime We Say Goodbye.
U2 were the superband of the 80s, and continue to be a force in music today. Bono & the boys were also known to take a stand, and voice their thoughts on politics and raise money for good causes. But with Night + Day, they proved to have the music under control, and record an amazing cover.
For more of the music from Red Hot + Blue, check out Soundtrack to my Day here, here and here.
