When You're Smiling

Listen to When You're Smiling

I grew up in Scotch Plains, New Jersey, and on Friday afternoons My Uncle Frank (actually my Grandmothers brother) he would pick me up in his 1964 Buick and we would ride to the beach, to my grandmothers house, where I spent almost every weekend of my life. Along the way we would listen to 8 -track tapes of singers like Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin and Jerry Vale. And all the big bands: Glenn Miller, Tommy Dorsey, PaulWhiteman and others. He would tell me stories about going to the Cotton Club as a teenager, and hearing Louis Armstrong and other Jazz players of the day in little clubs in Harlem. I listened with rapt attention and loved the stories he told as much as the great music we heard.

By the time I was seven I could sing almost every song Frank Sinatra recorded before 1940. Then I saw the Beverly Hillbillies and fell in love with the sound of the banjo. And when I heard Alan Munde play "Marie" , "How High the Moon" and "I Saw Your Face in the Moon" so beautifully on the banjo, I was hooked. Alan has taught me everything I know about arranging Standards and Showtunes for the banjo, and has graciously shared many of his arrangements with me.

Here is a very playable version of "When You're Smiling". Happy Trails.
Beth Mead
347 Harrison Avenue
Elkins Park, PA 19027
bigbandjo@yahoo.com
When You.re Smiling
Fisher & Goodwin
Arranged by Beth Mead