Boulevard of Broken Dreams (song)
Encyclopedia
"Boulevard of Broken Dreams" is a 1933 hit song by Al Dubin
Al Dubin
Alexander "Al" Dubin was an American lyricist. He became known through his collaborations with the composer Harry Warren.-Life and works:...

 (lyrics) and Harry Warren
Harry Warren
Harry Warren was an American composer and lyricist. Warren was the first major American songwriter to write primarily for film. He was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Song eleven times and won three Oscars for composing "Lullaby of Broadway", "You'll Never Know" and "On the Atchison,...

 (music), set in Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...

. The narrator says "I walk along the street of sorrow/The Boulevard of Broken Dreams/Where gigolo and gigolette/Can take a kiss without regret/So they forget their broken dreams."

The song appeared in the 1934 film
1934 in film
-Events:*January 26 - Samuel Goldwyn purchases the film rights to The Wonderful Wizard of Oz from the L. Frank Baum estate for $40,000.*February 19 - Bob Hope marries Dolores Reade...

 Moulin Rouge
Moulin Rouge (1934 film)
Moulin Rouge is a 1934 film starring actress Constance Bennett. It contained the songs Coffee in the Morning and Kisses in the Night and Boulevard of Broken Dreams with music by Harry Warren and lyrics by Al Dubin. Lucille Ball is an uncredited show girl in the film...

and was sung in the film by Constance Bennett
Constance Bennett
-Early life:She was born in New York City, the daughter of actor Richard Bennett and actress Adrienne Morrison, whose father was the stage actor Lewis Morrison , a wealthy performer of English and Spanish ancestry...

. However, Bennett never made a recording of the song. It was originally recorded by Deane Janis with Hal Kemp
Hal Kemp
James Harold "Hal" Kemp was a jazz alto saxophonist, clarinetist, bandleader, composer, and arranger. He was born in Marion, Alabama and died in Madera, California following an auto accident...

's Orchestra on October 31, 1933 in Chicago before the release of the film and was issued on the Brunswick
Brunswick Records
Brunswick Records is a United States based record label. The label is currently distributed by E1 Entertainment.-From 1916:Records under the "Brunswick" label were first produced by the Brunswick-Balke-Collender Company...

 label as catalog number 6734.

Covers

  • Ted Weems
    Ted Weems
    Wilfred Theodore Weems was an American bandleader and musician. Weems' work in music was recognized with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.- Biography :...

     and His Orchestra recorded the song with vocals by Elmo Tanner
    Elmo Tanner
    William Elmo Tanner, known as Elmo Tanner was an American singer, whistler, bandleader and disc jockey, best known for his whistling on the chart-topping song “Heartaches” with the Ted Weems orchestra...

     on December 5, 1933 in Chicago on the Bluebird
    Bluebird Records
    Bluebird Records is a sub-label of RCA Victor Records originally created in 1932 to counter the American Record Company in the "3 records for a dollar" market. Along with ARC's Perfect Records, Melotone Records and Romeo Records, and the independent US Decca label, Bluebird became one of the best...

     label as catalog number 5288.
  • Jan Garber
    Jan Garber
    Jan Garber was an American jazz bandleader.-Biography:Garber was born in Indianapolis, Indiana. He had his own band by the time he was 21 . He became known as "The Idol of the Airwaves" in his heyday of the 1920s and 1930s, playing jazz in the vein of contemporaries such as Paul Whiteman and Guy...

     and His Orchestra recorded the song with vocals by Lee Bennett on December 14, 1933 on the Victor
    Victor Talking Machine Company
    The Victor Talking Machine Company was an American corporation, the leading American producer of phonographs and phonograph records and one of the leading phonograph companies in the world at the time. It was headquartered in Camden, New Jersey....

     label as catalog number 24498. Their recording remained on the U.S. Billboard chart for 11 weeks and reached number six in 1934.
  • Ed Lloyd's Rhythm Boys recorded the song with vocals by Helen Ward
    Helen Ward
    Helen Ward may refer to:* Helen Ward , American singer of swing ballads* Helen Ward , London-based divorce lawyer...

     on February 2, 1934 on Conqueror Records
    Conqueror Records
    Conqueror Records was a United States-based record label, active from about 1926 through 1942. The label was sold exclusively through Sears, Roebuck and Company.The record sleeves state that the proper playing speed for Conqueror Records is 80 rpm....

     as catalog number 8261.
  • Bing Crosby
    Bing Crosby
    Harry Lillis "Bing" Crosby was an American singer and actor. Crosby's trademark bass-baritone voice made him one of the best-selling recording artists of the 20th century, with over half a billion records in circulation....

     sang the song with Jimmie Grier and His Orchestra on April 16, 1934 on his radio show Bing Crosby Entertains (the Woodbury series).
  • Connee Boswell
    Connee Boswell
    Constance Foore "Connee" Boswell was an American female vocalist born in Kansas City but raised in New Orleans, Louisiana. With her sisters, Martha and Helvetia "Vet" Boswell, she performed in the 1930s as The Boswell Sisters and became a highly influential singing group during this period via...

     recorded the song on April 27, 1934 on the Brunswick
    Brunswick Records
    Brunswick Records is a United States based record label. The label is currently distributed by E1 Entertainment.-From 1916:Records under the "Brunswick" label were first produced by the Brunswick-Balke-Collender Company...

     label as catalog number 6871 and as catalog number 01783 with the flip side "Carioca
    Carioca (song)
    " Carioca" is a 1933 popular song with music by Vincent Youmans and lyrics by Edward Eliscu and Gus Kahn, as well as the name of the dance choreographed to it for the 1933 film Flying Down to Rio...

    ."
  • Bert Ambrose and His Orchestra recorded the song with vocals by Sam Browne
    Sam Browne (musician)
    Sam Browne was an English dance band singer, who became one of the most popular British dance band vocalists of the 1930s. He is remembered for singing with Jack Hylton and with Ambrose and his Orchestra, at the Mayfair Hotel and Embassy Club, with whom he made many recordings from 1930 to 1942,...

     in 1934 on the Brunswick label as catalog number 01721.
  • It was one of the first records for Tony Bennett
    Tony Bennett
    Tony Bennett is an American singer of popular music, standards, show tunes, and jazz....

     in 1950; Bennett made a more Latin sounding recording of the song in 1952 and it was a hit. He recorded it again in 1990 and 2007. Bennett recorded a duet of the song with Sting for his 2006 Duets: An American Classic
    Duets: An American Classic
    -Personnel:* Tony Bennett, guest artists - vocals* Bill Charlap - piano* Pinchas Zukerman - violin* Lawrence Feldman - flute* Chris Botti - trumpet* Paul Langosch - double bass* Gray Sargent - guitar* Harold Jones - drums* Johnny Mandel - arranger, conductor...

    album.
  • It was covered by No Wave
    No Wave
    No Wave was a short-lived but influential underground music, film, performance art, video, and contemporary art scene that had its beginnings during the mid-1970s in New York City. The term No Wave is in part satirical word play rejecting the commercial elements of the then-popular New Wave genre...

     artist James White
    James Chance
    James Chance, also known as James White , is an American saxophonist, songwriter and singer....

     on his 1983 album Flaming Demonics.
  • Marianne Faithfull
    Marianne Faithfull
    Marianne Evelyn Faithfull is an award-winning English singer, songwriter and actress whose career has spanned five decades....

     also covered it in her Hal Willner
    Hal Willner
    Hal Willner is an American music producer working in recording, films, TV and live events. He is best known for assembling tribute albums and events featuring a wide variety of artists and musical styles...

     produced weary/lush album Strange Weather
    Strange Weather (Marianne Faithfull album)
    Strange Weather is a 1987 studio album by British singer Marianne Faithfull.This album is the first complete studio work recorded by Marianne Faithfull after recovering from a 17-year addiction to heroin in 1986...

    .
  • Monsieur Camembert
    Monsieur Camembert
    Monsieur Camembert is a five-piece Gypsy fusion band formed in Sydney, Australia in 1999. They have won three ARIA Music Awards for Best World Music Album in 2002 for Live on Stage , in 2003 for Absynthe and in 2005 for Monsieur Camembert...

     featured it one their ARIA award-winning self-titled album, Monsieur Camembert
    Monsieur Camembert (album)
    Monsieur Camembert is the fourth album from Australian Gypsy fusion band Monsieur Camembert. Released in March 2005, it won the 2005 ARIA Award for Best World Music Album.-Disc one:#"Fiddler Feidman Medley"...

    , sung by Jacqi Stoddard.
  • It was performed by Diana Krall
    Diana Krall
    Diana Jean Krall, OC, OBC is a Canadian jazz pianist and singer, known for her contralto vocals. She has sold more than 6 million albums in the US and over 15 million worldwide; altogether, she has sold more albums than any other female jazz artist during the 1990s and 2000s...

     on her All For You album devoted to the music of Nat King Cole
    Nat King Cole
    Nathaniel Adams Coles , known professionally as Nat King Cole, was an American musician who first came to prominence as a leading jazz pianist. Although an accomplished pianist, he owes most of his popular musical fame to his soft baritone voice, which he used to perform in big band and jazz genres...

    . It was also re-arranged and covered by Diana Krall for her 2006 album From This Moment On
    From This Moment On (album)
    From This Moment On is the tenth album by Canadian jazz pianist and vocalist Diana Krall, released in 2006 on Verve Records. The album debuted at number one on the Canadian Hot 100, making it Krall' third consecutive number-one album. This album was nominated for Best Jazz Album at the 2007 Grammy...

    and released as a bonus track on iTunes
    ITunes
    iTunes is a media player computer program, used for playing, downloading, and organizing digital music and video files on desktop computers. It can also manage contents on iPod, iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad....

    .
  • This song was featured on a BBC
    BBC
    The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...

     Apprentice advertisement in 2010. It also feature all of the five concerts for Amy Winehouse
    Amy Winehouse
    Amy Jade Winehouse was an English singer-songwriter known for her powerful deep contralto vocals and her eclectic mix of musical genres including R&B, soul and jazz. Winehouse's 2003 debut album, Frank, was critically successful in the UK and was nominated for the Mercury Prize...

    's return tour in 2011, in Brazil.
  • It was covered by the Progressive Rock
    Progressive rock
    Progressive rock is a subgenre of rock music that developed in the late 1960s and early 1970s as part of a "mostly British attempt to elevate rock music to new levels of artistic credibility." John Covach, in Contemporary Music Review, says that many thought it would not just "succeed the pop of...

     group Cafe Jacques on their 1978 album International.
  • The song was sung live on the ABC
    American Broadcasting Company
    The American Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network. Created in 1943 from the former NBC Blue radio network, ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Company and is part of Disney-ABC Television Group. Its first broadcast on television was in 1948...

     show Dancing with the Stars in 2010 (Season 11, episode 4) by the show's band during an Argentine Tango
    Argentine Tango
    Argentine tango is a musical genre of simple quadruple metre and binary musical form, and the social dance that accompanies it. Its lyrics and music are marked by nostalgia, expressed through melodic instruments including the bandoneon. Originated at the ending of the 19th century in the suburbs of...

     dance featuring Anna Demidova
    Anna Demidova (dancer)
    Anna Demidova is a Russian-American professional ballroom dancer. She is the winner of the professional dancer competition of Dancing with the Stars, Season 8, which guaranteed her a spot as a professional dancer in Season 9...

    & Andrey Begunov.
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