Black was born as Solomon Schwartz on 14 June 1913 in Whitechapel, England. His parents were Polish and Romanian Jews. He began piano lessons at the age of seven. He was aged only 12 when his first composition was broadcast on BBC Radio and continued his early success by winning a Melody Maker arranging competition aged 15.
In the early 1930s he was employed as a jazz player and composer and had worked with Howard Jacobs, Joe Orlando, Lew Stone, Maurice Winnick and Teddy Joyce by the time he joined Harry Roy in 1936. He had also broadcast and recorded with several American musicians, including jazz saxophonist Coleman Hawkins, who had first heard Black on late night radio shows with Lew Stone's band. When the two eventually met in London, the reviewer Edgar Jackson suggested they record together, and a notable collaboration is a duet version of Honeysuckle Rose.
During World War II, Black joined the Royal Air Force, and became involved in managing the entertainment of servicemen based at Wolverhampton. In 1944 he was appointed conductor of the BBC Dance Orchestra, and remained in the job for almost nine years, broadcasting as many as six nights a week.
By this time he had also begun recording under his own name for Decca. Now well involved with the film industry, he went on to compose, arrange and direct music for about 200 more films, notably after being appointed music director at Elstree Studios in 1958. He was also principal conductor of the Associated British Picture Corporation Orchestra and musical director composer of that organisation from 1958-1963.
Stanley Black's radio work kept him in contact with a large listening audience through his incidental music for shows such as Much Binding in the Marsh and the first two series of The Goon Show. He later presented his own programmes on radio and television, including Black Magic and The Marvellous World of Stanley Black.
In the early 1950s he regularly topped the Melody Maker lists of the most-heard musicians on radio. He was chosen to be included on Decca's first release of long-playing records in the UK in June 1950. This enabled him to continue his conducting, arranging and performing and resulted in a large number of albums. He was particularly popular in United States, as evidenced by his inclusion in the Billboard best-sellers lists.
During his life, he conducted many of Britain's major orchestras, and until the 1990s he was still directing regular broadcast sessions at the BBC studios, despite the onset of deafness in later life.
Stanley Black is remembered for writing numerous scores for radio, television and cinema, including the theme-tune for The Goon Show.
Other films he composed scores for include Laughter in Paradise (1951), The Naked Truth (1957), Blood of the Vampire (1958), Too Many Crooks (1958), The Long and the Short and the Tall (1961), West 11 (1963), The System (1964), Crossplot (1969), and the Cliff Richard musicals The Young Ones (1961) and his orchestral backing for Richard's follow up, Summer Holiday (1962), which won him an Ivor Novello Award. His work also became familiar to millions of cinema audiences as a consequence of his theme tune and music library for Pathé News, written in 1960.
He also recorded many classical works, including collections of Tchaikovsky and George Gershwin. In 1965 he won a Gramophone Award for his version of Rimsky-Korsakov's Capriccio Espagnol. In addition, he arranged and conducted many commercially successful albums on LP and later CD like Tropical Moonlight, Cuban Moonlight, Black Magic, and series of Film Spectacular and Broadway Spectacular for Decca Records.
love is in the air
Stanley Black Lyrics
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A beautiful theme of every
Dream I ever knew.
Down deep in my heart I hear it play.
I feel it start, then melt away.
I hear music when I touch your hand,
A beautiful melody
Down deep in my heart, I hear it say,
Is this the day?
I alone have heard this lovely strain,
I alone have heard this glad refrain,
Must it be forever inside of me,
Why can't I let it go,
Why can't I let you know,
Why can't I let you know the song
My heart would sing?
That beautiful rhapsody
Of love and youth and spring,
The music is sweet,
The words are true
The song is you.
The opening lyrics of Stanley Black's Love Is In The Air communicate a sense of euphoria that radiates through the singer when they are with the subject of their affection. Music serves as a metaphor for this intense feeling; when they look at the person they are in love with, they hear a beautiful theme of every dream they ever knew. The melody is so powerful that it deeply resonates with them and starts to melt away everything else.
The second stanza describes an even more intimate connection between the two people. The singer explains that when they touch the hand of the person they love, they hear another beautiful melody from some enchanted land that speaks to their heart. The singer can't help but wonder if this is the day they have been waiting for, the moment when their love can finally be fully expressed. Despite this, the singer is apprehensive about sharing their feelings with the person they love, and the final stanza establishes this reluctance further.
The singer has heard this lovely strain alone and is conflicted about letting go of the feeling that the melody brings. They question why they can't let the person they love know the song their heart would sing. The music is sweet and the words are true, and the song is a representation of their love that is undoubtedly one of the most beautiful things in their life.
Line by Line Meaning
I hear music when I look at you,
Every time I look at you, I feel an internal melody spring up that is like a beautiful theme from all the fantasies or dreams I have had, all wrapped up in one.
A beautiful theme of every
Dream I ever knew.
That melody that springs up is a representation of every wish, hope, longing, or fantasy that I have ever had.
Down deep in my heart I hear it play.
This melody I hear is a deep yearning that springs up from inside of me.
I feel it start, then melt away.
Yet it is so fleeting that it seems to start and stop melting away at any moment.
I hear music when I touch your hand,
Whenever I touch you, it evokes a melody in my heart.
A beautiful melody
From some enchanted land.
This melody that springs from touching you comes from a magical place, unearthly, like it is a special gift or enchantment.
Down deep in my heart, I hear it say,
Is this the day?
Deep inside, I can sense the hope that maybe, just maybe, today is the day that magic will happen, that we will finally come together.
I alone have heard this lovely strain,
I alone have heard this glad refrain,
This magical melody is something unique and personal to me that no one else can really understand.
Must it be forever inside of me,
Why can't I let it go,
Why can't I let you know,
Why can't I let you know the song
My heart would sing?
This melody is so precious and personal to me that it feels like it will always be locked away inside of me, because I fear letting it be known or risking the rejection it might bring.
That beautiful rhapsody
Of love and youth and spring,
Playing in my heart is a beautiful, impassioned love song that captures the essence of our young love and everything that spring represents: new beginnings, energy, and growth.
The music is sweet,
The words are true
The song is you.
This song- this melody I hear deep in my soul- is only inspired by you. The sweetness of the melody and the truth of its words all come from you- the only one who can inspire such a rhapsody of love in my heart.
Lyrics © Universal Music Publishing Group, Warner Chappell Music, Inc.
Written by: Jerome Kern, Oscar II Hammerstein
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind