“Mira”
Bob
Merrill, Carnival!, 1961
Performer:
Anna Maria Alberghetti, 1961
Bob
Merrill, Carnival!, 1961
Performer:
Joni James, 1961
One of my very
favorite joys in the early 1960s was listening to the score of Carnival!, a gentle musical based on the
1953 film Lili with Leslie Caron in
the lead role. The 1961 Broadway musical, with book by Michael Stewart and music
and lyrics by Bob Merrill (previously of “How Much Is That Doggie in the
Window” [a Patti Page song] and “Mambo Italiano” [sung by Rosemary
Clooney]-fame). The musical was filled with notable singers and performers,
including Kaye Ballard, Jerry Orbach, Pierre Olaf, James Mitchell, and Henry
Lascoe. But it was its star, young opera singer Anna Maria Alberghetti, who
made it so special for me.
Her lovely lyrical voice, particularly in
the song in which introduces herself and her background, “Mira,” was such a
delight that I even learned its lyrics and probably could sing along even
today. But it’s the song’s utterly guileless simplicity that makes it so very
special as a plea for knowing the world in which you live, with the hope,
particularly, that everyone will know your name. Even chairs become something
that might come to know you. It seemed to harken to another time and a peasant
culture that was surely already impossible in 1961.
I come from the town
of Mira
Beyond the bridges of St.
Claire
I guess you’ve never heard
of Mira
It’s very small but still
it’s there
They have the very greenest
trees
And skies as bright as
flame
But what I liked the best
in Mira
Is everybody knew my name
Can you imagine that
Can you imagine that
Everybody knew my name
The musical, which also included memorable tunes such as “Yes, My Heart” and “Love Makes the World Go Around,” was one of producer David Merrick’s many hits, running for 719 performances, with several revivals in the years since.
I could hardly believe
my luck when a traveling company decided to visit Cedar Rapids, near where I
lived, to present the musical at Coe College. It was perhaps my very first
professional musical viewing—although by that time I knew theater drama and
musical theater better than anyone else in town. After all I had lived it
through my imagination. Being somewhat a sentimentalist, I’m sure while
watching it, I bawled my eyes out.
Years
later, I met Anna Maria Alberghetti at an art opening, and couldn’t resist a
blushing thank you for the joys she’d given me as a young man.
Los
Angeles, August 25, 2017
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