Carter was born Lillie Mae Jones on 16th May 1929 in Flint, Michigan and grew up in Detroit, where her father led a church choir. She studied piano at the Detroit Conservatory. She won a talent contest and became a regular on the local club circuit, singing and playing piano. When she was sixteen, she sang with Charlie Parker. She later performed with Dizzy Gillespie and Miles Davis and toured with Lionel Hampton (from whom she received the nickname "Betty Bebop"), when she perfected her scat singing of bebop.
Her career was eclipsed somewhat during the 1960s and 1970s, though a series of duets with Ray Charles in 1961, including the R&B-chart-topping "Baby, It's Cold Outside", brought her a measure of popular recognition. She recorded for various labels during this period, including Peacock, ABC-Paramount, and Atco, but was rarely satisfied with the resulting product. An episode in which a record company A&R man tried to abscond with a set of her master recordings led her to establish her own record label, Bet-Car, in 1970. Some of her most outstanding recordings were first issued on Bet-Car, including the double album The Audience with Betty Carter (1980). She was well-received at the Newport Jazz Festival in 1977 and 1978. In 1987 Carter signed with Verve Records. She won a Grammy in 1988 for her album Look What I Got! and sang in a guest appearance on The Cosby Show in that year.
She died on 26th September 1998.
Two Cigarettes in the Dark
Betty Carter Lyrics
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He strikes a match 'til the
Spark clearly traces
One face is my sweetheart.
Two, two silhouettes in a room
Almost obscured by the gloom
We were so close yet so far apart,
It happened that I stumbled in
I heard my sweetheart whispering
"I love you, I love you, you know that I do."
Two, two cigarettes in the dark,
Gone is the flame and the spark
Leaving just regrets and two cigarettes in the dark.
The lyrics to Betty Carter's song "Two Cigarettes in the Dark" paint a vivid picture of a heartbreaking discovery. The song describes the moment during which the singer finds her sweetheart in the arms of someone else - they are smoking cigarettes in the dark, surrounded by shadows. The striking of a match illuminates their silhouettes just enough for the singer to see what is happening. She stands there, close yet so far from her love, as they exchange whispered words of affection. In the end, the cigarettes burn out and all that's left are regrets and aching hearts.
The lyrics convey a sense of sadness and betrayal, as the singer witnesses something that breaks her heart. But they are also a celebration of the power of music to express complex emotions, and of the talent of singers like Betty Carter to capture those emotions in song. The music and lyrics work together to create a haunting image of a moment frozen in time, two lovers caught in the act of betraying the one they once loved.
Line by Line Meaning
Two, two cigarettes in the dark
Two people smoking cigarettes in a dark room.
He strikes a match 'til the spark clearly traces
A man strikes a match to light his cigarette, illuminating their faces in the dim room.
One face is my sweetheart.
One of the faces illuminated by the match is the singer's lover.
Two, two silhouettes in a room
Two indistinct shadows cast by the weak light in the room.
Almost obscured by the gloom
The lack of light causes the people in the room to almost blend into the darkness.
We were so close yet so far apart,
Although physically close, the singer feels emotionally distant from their lover in this moment.
It happened that I stumbled in upon their rendezvous.
The singer accidentally walked in on their lover meeting with someone else.
I heard my sweetheart whispering 'I love you, I love you, you know that I do.'
The singer overhears their lover confessing love to the other person in the room.
Two, two cigarettes in the dark,
The symbolic act of smoking cigarettes in a dark room represents the hidden, secretive nature of the situation.
Gone is the flame and the spark
The cigarettes burn out and the light fades away, leaving the singer alone with their thoughts.
Leaving just regrets and two cigarettes in the dark.
The singer is left to contemplate their regretful feelings and thoughts about the situation, with only the remnants of the cigarettes as a reminder of what happened in the dark.
Lyrics © Universal Music Publishing Group, GUY WEBSTER/WEBSTER MUSIC
Written by: LEW POLLACK, PAUL FRANCIS WEBSTER
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind