You Belong to Me (1952 song)
Encyclopedia
"You Belong to Me" is a pop music
ballad from the 1950s. The singer reminds his/her lover that, whatever exotic locales and sights he/she experiences, "you belong to me." It is credited to three writers: Pee Wee King
, Chilton Price
, and Redd Stewart
. Miss Price, a songwriting librarian at WAVE Radio Louisville, had written the song in its virtual entirety as "Hurry Home to Me" envisioning the song as an American woman's plea to a sweetheart serving overseas in World War II
. Afforded songwriting credit on the song mostly in exchange for their work in promoting it, King and Stewart did slightly adjust Price's composition musically and lyrically, shifting the focus from a wartime background "into a kind of universal song about separated lovers" and changing the title to "You Belong to Me". Price had previously had success with another hit which she had written, "Slow Poke
", under a similar arrangement with the two men.
The original version of the song was recorded by Sue Thompson
on Mercury
's country label. It was soon covered
by Patti Page
, whose version was issued by Mercury as catalog number
5899, with "I Went to Your Wedding
" (a bigger Patti Page hit, reaching #1) on the flip side. It entered the Billboard chart on August 22, 1952, and lasted 12 weeks on the chart, peaking at #4.
A cover version by Jo Stafford
became the most popular version. Issued by Columbia Records
as catalog number 39811, it was Stafford's greatest hit, topping the charts in both the United States
and the United Kingdom
(the first song by a female singer to top the UK chart). It first entered the US chart on August 1, 1952 and remained there for 24 weeks. In the UK, it appeared in the first ever UK chart of November 14, 1952 (then a top 12) and reached number 1 on January 16, 1953, being only the second record to top such chart, remaining in the chart for a total of 19 weeks. Another cover version, by Dean Martin
, released by Capitol Records
as catalog number 2165, was also in play at that time. This version first entered the chart on August 29, 1952, and remained on the chart for 10 weeks, reaching #12. All the versions were combined in the rankings on the Cash Box
charts, and the song reached #1 on those charts as well, lasting on the chart for more than half a year.
In 1958 the song crossed over into rock for the first time on the Capitol album "Gene Vincent
Rocks and the Blue Caps Roll." A later version of the song, by The Duprees
, also made the Billboard Top 10, reaching #7 in 1962. It was recorded by many other pop vocalists, including Patsy Cline
and Bing Crosby
. A solo acoustic version was recorded by Bob Dylan
for the 1992 album Good as I Been to You
but was eventually left off as an outtake, the recording only surfacing two years later in the soundtrack for the 1994 movie Natural Born Killers
.
A loop of Jo Stafford's introduction was used by Caviar in The Good Times Are Over repeatedly throughout the song.
The song has also appeared on many soundtrack
s. Vonda Shepard
's cover was used frequently on the TV series Ally McBeal
alongside romantic scenes of Ally McBeal and Billy Thomas. A version by Jason Wade
was part of the soundtrack to the 2001 animated film Shrek
. Rocker Tori Amos
also sang the classic for the Julia Roberts
film Mona Lisa Smile
in 2003. Actress Rose McGowan
sang it on the soundtrack for the Planet Terror segment of the 2007 movie Grindhouse. While onscreen, Bette Midler
sings a fragment of the song (to Nick Nolte
) in the 1986 comedy Down and Out in Beverly Hills
.
On February 1, 2007, a short rendition of the song was sung by 64-year-old Sherman Pore as an audition piece for the television show American Idol
, as a tribute to his wife who had died from cancer two days before.
Mary Higgins Clark references the song throughout her novel of the same name which was published by Pocket on April 1, 1999.
Popular music
Popular music belongs to any of a number of musical genres "having wide appeal" and is typically distributed to large audiences through the music industry. It stands in contrast to both art music and traditional music, which are typically disseminated academically or orally to smaller, local...
ballad from the 1950s. The singer reminds his/her lover that, whatever exotic locales and sights he/she experiences, "you belong to me." It is credited to three writers: Pee Wee King
Pee Wee King
Julius Frank Anthony Kuczynski , known professionally as Pee Wee King, was an American country music songwriter and recording artist best known for co-writing "The Tennessee Waltz"....
, Chilton Price
Chilton Price
Chilton Price was a songwriter, primarily known for country music songs which became pop music hits as well....
, and Redd Stewart
Redd Stewart
Henry Ellis Stewart , better known as Redd Stewart, was an American country music songwriter and recording artist who co-wrote "The Tennessee Waltz" with Pee Wee King in 1948.-Biography:...
. Miss Price, a songwriting librarian at WAVE Radio Louisville, had written the song in its virtual entirety as "Hurry Home to Me" envisioning the song as an American woman's plea to a sweetheart serving overseas in World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
. Afforded songwriting credit on the song mostly in exchange for their work in promoting it, King and Stewart did slightly adjust Price's composition musically and lyrically, shifting the focus from a wartime background "into a kind of universal song about separated lovers" and changing the title to "You Belong to Me". Price had previously had success with another hit which she had written, "Slow Poke
Slow Poke
"Slow Poke" is a popular song. It is credited to three writers: Pee Wee King, Redd Stewart, and Chilton Price. Actually Price wrote the song in 1951, as she thought the song described her friend, King, very well. King recorded the song and Stewart did the vocal...
", under a similar arrangement with the two men.
The original version of the song was recorded by Sue Thompson
Sue Thompson
Sue Thompson is an American pop and country music singer. She is best known for the million selling hits "Sad Movies " and "Norman", both pop hits for her in the 1960s.-Early life:...
on Mercury
Mercury Records
Mercury Records is a record label operating as a standalone company in the UK and as part of the Island Def Jam Motown Music Group in the US; both are subsidiaries of Universal Music Group. There is also a Mercury Records in Australia, which is a local artist and repertoire division of Universal...
's country label. It was soon covered
Cover version
In popular music, a cover version or cover song, or simply cover, is a new performance or recording of a contemporary or previously recorded, commercially released song or popular song...
by Patti Page
Patti Page
Clara Ann Fowler , known by her professional name Patti Page, is an American singer, one of the best-known female artists in traditional pop music. She was the best-selling female artist of the 1950s, and has sold over 100 million records...
, whose version was issued by Mercury as catalog number
Catalog numbering systems for single records
This article presents the numbering systems used by various record companies for single records.- Capitol :...
5899, with "I Went to Your Wedding
I Went to Your Wedding
"I Went to Your Wedding" is a popular song written by Jessie Mae Robinson and published in 1952.The song is a report of a wedding, attended by the ex-lover of one of the parties being married, who obviously is still in love with the person it is addressed to...
" (a bigger Patti Page hit, reaching #1) on the flip side. It entered the Billboard chart on August 22, 1952, and lasted 12 weeks on the chart, peaking at #4.
A cover version by Jo Stafford
Jo Stafford
Jo Elizabeth Stafford was an American singer of traditional pop music and jazz standards and occasional actress whose career ran from the late 1930s to the early 1960s...
became the most popular version. Issued by Columbia Records
Columbia Records
Columbia Records is an American record label, owned by Japan's Sony Music Entertainment, operating under the Columbia Music Group with Aware Records. It was founded in 1888, evolving from an earlier enterprise, the American Graphophone Company — successor to the Volta Graphophone Company...
as catalog number 39811, it was Stafford's greatest hit, topping the charts in both the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
and the United Kingdom
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
(the first song by a female singer to top the UK chart). It first entered the US chart on August 1, 1952 and remained there for 24 weeks. In the UK, it appeared in the first ever UK chart of November 14, 1952 (then a top 12) and reached number 1 on January 16, 1953, being only the second record to top such chart, remaining in the chart for a total of 19 weeks. Another cover version, by Dean Martin
Dean Martin
Dean Martin was an American singer, film actor, television star and comedian. Martin's hit singles included "Memories Are Made of This", "That's Amore", "Everybody Loves Somebody", "You're Nobody till Somebody Loves You", "Sway", "Volare" and "Ain't That a Kick in the Head?"...
, released by Capitol Records
Capitol Records
Capitol Records is a major United States based record label, formerly located in Los Angeles, but operating in New York City as part of Capitol Music Group. Its former headquarters building, the Capitol Tower, is a major landmark near the corner of Hollywood and Vine...
as catalog number 2165, was also in play at that time. This version first entered the chart on August 29, 1952, and remained on the chart for 10 weeks, reaching #12. All the versions were combined in the rankings on the Cash Box
Cash Box magazine
Cashbox magazine was a weekly publication devoted to the music and coin-operated machine industries in the USA which was published from July 1942 to November 16, 1996...
charts, and the song reached #1 on those charts as well, lasting on the chart for more than half a year.
In 1958 the song crossed over into rock for the first time on the Capitol album "Gene Vincent
Gene Vincent
Vincent Eugene Craddock , known as Gene Vincent, was an American musician who pioneered the styles of rock and roll and rockabilly. His 1956 top ten hit with his Blue Caps, "Be-Bop-A-Lula", is considered a significant early example of rockabilly...
Rocks and the Blue Caps Roll." A later version of the song, by The Duprees
The Duprees
The Duprees is an American musical group of doo-wop style which had a series of hit records in the early 1960s.-Career:The group originated in the early 1960s in Jersey City, New Jersey, and comprised William L. Dickinson High School students Michael Arnone, Joe Santollo, John Salvato, Tom...
, also made the Billboard Top 10, reaching #7 in 1962. It was recorded by many other pop vocalists, including Patsy Cline
Patsy Cline
Patsy Cline , born Virginia Patterson Hensley in Gore, Virginia, was an American country music singer who enjoyed pop music crossover success during the era of the Nashville sound in the early 1960s...
and 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....
. A solo acoustic version was recorded by Bob Dylan
Bob Dylan
Bob Dylan is an American singer-songwriter, musician, poet, film director and painter. He has been a major and profoundly influential figure in popular music and culture for five decades. Much of his most celebrated work dates from the 1960s when he was an informal chronicler and a seemingly...
for the 1992 album Good as I Been to You
Good as I Been to You
Good as I Been to You is singer-songwriter Bob Dylan's 28th studio album, released by Columbia Records in November 1992.It is composed entirely of traditional folk songs and covers, and is Dylan's first entirely solo, acoustic album since Another Side of Bob Dylan in 1964...
but was eventually left off as an outtake, the recording only surfacing two years later in the soundtrack for the 1994 movie Natural Born Killers
Natural Born Killers
Natural Born Killers is a 1994 crime/black comedy film directed by Oliver Stone about two victims of traumatic childhoods who became lovers and psychopathic serial killers, and are irresponsibly glorified by the mass media...
.
A loop of Jo Stafford's introduction was used by Caviar in The Good Times Are Over repeatedly throughout the song.
The song has also appeared on many soundtrack
Soundtrack
A soundtrack can be recorded music accompanying and synchronized to the images of a motion picture, book, television program or video game; a commercially released soundtrack album of music as featured in the soundtrack of a film or TV show; or the physical area of a film that contains the...
s. Vonda Shepard
Vonda Shepard
Vonda Shepard is an American pop/rock singer. She appeared as a regular in the television show Ally McBeal from seasons 1-5 in which she played a resident performer at the bar where the show's characters drank after work. She plays piano, guitar, and bass.-Biography:Vonda Shepard was born in New...
's cover was used frequently on the TV series Ally McBeal
Ally McBeal
Ally McBeal is an American legal comedy-drama series which aired on the Fox network from 1997 to 2002. The series was created by David E. Kelley, who also served as the executive producer, along with Bill D'Elia...
alongside romantic scenes of Ally McBeal and Billy Thomas. A version by Jason Wade
Jason Wade
Jason Michael Wade is the lead vocalist, main songwriter, and guitarist of the American alternative rock band Lifehouse.-Biography:...
was part of the soundtrack to the 2001 animated film Shrek
Shrek
Shrek is a 2001 American computer-animated fantasy comedy film directed by Andrew Adamson and Vicky Jenson, featuring the voices of Mike Myers, Eddie Murphy, Cameron Diaz, and John Lithgow. Loosely based on William Steig's 1990 fairy tale picture book Shrek!...
. Rocker Tori Amos
Tori Amos
Tori Amos is an American pianist, singer-songwriter and composer. She was at the forefront of a number of female singer-songwriters in the early 1990s and was noteworthy early in her career as one of the few alternative rock performers to use a piano as her primary instrument...
also sang the classic for the Julia Roberts
Julia Roberts
Julia Fiona Roberts is an American actress. She became a Hollywood star after headlining the romantic comedy Pretty Woman , which grossed $464 million worldwide...
film Mona Lisa Smile
Mona Lisa Smile
Mona Lisa Smile is a 2003 romantic drama film produced by Revolution Studios and Columbia Pictures in association with Red Om Films Productions, directed by Mike Newell, written by Lawrence Konner and Mark Rosenthal, and starring Julia Roberts, Kirsten Dunst, Maggie Gyllenhaal, and Julia Stiles...
in 2003. Actress Rose McGowan
Rose McGowan
Rose Arianna McGowan is an actress and singer. She is known for her role as Paige Matthews in The WB Television Network supernatural drama series Charmed. She played Ann-Margret alongside Jonathan Rhys Meyers as Elvis Presley in the CBS mini-series Elvis...
sang it on the soundtrack for the Planet Terror segment of the 2007 movie Grindhouse. While onscreen, Bette Midler
Bette Midler
Bette Midler is an American singer, actress, and comedian, also known by her informal stage name, The Divine Miss M. She became famous as a cabaret and concert headliner, and went on to star in successful and acclaimed films such as The Rose, Ruthless People, Beaches, and For The Boys...
sings a fragment of the song (to Nick Nolte
Nick Nolte
Nicholas King "Nick" Nolte is an American actor whose career has spanned over five decades, peaking in the 1990s when his commercial success made him one of the most popular celebrities of that decade.-Early life:...
) in the 1986 comedy Down and Out in Beverly Hills
Down and Out in Beverly Hills
Down and Out in Beverly Hills is a 1986 American comedy film based on the French play Boudu sauvé des eaux, which had previously been adapted on film in 1932 by Jean Renoir. Down and Out in Beverly Hills was directed by Paul Mazursky, and starred Nick Nolte, Bette Midler and Richard Dreyfuss...
.
On February 1, 2007, a short rendition of the song was sung by 64-year-old Sherman Pore as an audition piece for the television show American Idol
American Idol
American Idol, titled American Idol: The Search for a Superstar for the first season, is a reality television singing competition created by Simon Fuller and produced by FremantleMedia North America and 19 Entertainment...
, as a tribute to his wife who had died from cancer two days before.
Mary Higgins Clark references the song throughout her novel of the same name which was published by Pocket on April 1, 1999.
Recorded versions
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(performed by The Marshall Crenshaw band in
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(Natural Born KillersNatural Born KillersNatural Born Killers is a 1994 crime/black comedy film directed by Oliver Stone about two victims of traumatic childhoods who became lovers and psychopathic serial killers, and are irresponsibly glorified by the mass media...
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(#1 on Billboard charts, Gold Record, UK Number 1 Single) - Ringo StarrRingo StarrRichard Starkey, MBE better known by his stage name Ringo Starr, is an English musician and actor who gained worldwide fame as the drummer for The Beatles. When the band formed in 1960, Starr was a member of another Liverpool band, Rory Storm and the Hurricanes. He became The Beatles' drummer in...
- Rod StewartRod StewartRoderick David "Rod" Stewart, CBE is a British singer-songwriter and musician, born and raised in North London, England and currently residing in Epping. He is of Scottish and English ancestry....
- Ben TaylorBen Taylor (musician)Benjamin Taylor is a musician and actor. He is the son of folk rock artists James Taylor and Carly Simon. His sister, Sally Taylor, is also a musician. Ben Taylor bears a striking resemblance to his famous father and has a singing voice akin to him as well...
- Sue ThompsonSue ThompsonSue Thompson is an American pop and country music singer. She is best known for the million selling hits "Sad Movies " and "Norman", both pop hits for her in the 1960s.-Early life:...
- Tommy TuneTommy TuneThomas James "Tommy" Tune is an American actor, dancer, singer, theatre director, producer, and choreographer. Over the course of his career, he has won nine Tony Awards and the National Medal of Arts.-Early years:...
- Gene VincentGene VincentVincent Eugene Craddock , known as Gene Vincent, was an American musician who pioneered the styles of rock and roll and rockabilly. His 1956 top ten hit with his Blue Caps, "Be-Bop-A-Lula", is considered a significant early example of rockabilly...
- Jason WadeJason WadeJason Michael Wade is the lead vocalist, main songwriter, and guitarist of the American alternative rock band Lifehouse.-Biography:...
(soundtrack from the film ShrekShrekShrek is a 2001 American computer-animated fantasy comedy film directed by Andrew Adamson and Vicky Jenson, featuring the voices of Mike Myers, Eddie Murphy, Cameron Diaz, and John Lithgow. Loosely based on William Steig's 1990 fairy tale picture book Shrek!...
2001) - WintergreenWintergreenWintergreen is a group of plants. Wintergreen once commonly referred to plants that continue photosynthesis throughout the winter...
- Steve TranSteve TranSteve Tran is a French Vietnamese film and television actor. He has appeared in numerous titles, and in 2009, he recorded the soundtrack 'We Can Make It' for the film Tricheuse.-Filmography:* Beur sur la ville...
- Ervinna, SingaporeSingaporeSingapore , officially the Republic of Singapore, is a Southeast Asian city-state off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, north of the equator. An island country made up of 63 islands, it is separated from Malaysia by the Straits of Johor to its north and from Indonesia's Riau Islands by the...
-based female singer
See also
- List of number-one singles from the 1950s (UK)
- List of number-one singles of 1952 (U.S.)