Images of the Mississippi in flood lead me into some odd musicial musings:





I'm reminded, somewhat inexplicably, of contrasting versions of the 1926 song "Ol' Man River", with music by Jerome Kern and lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II, from the musical SHOW BOAT.

The song is one of the few that works outside the context of the musical, as demonstrated by Charlie Rich in 1975. Rich was always more of a blues and jazzman, marketed as country because of the accident that paired him with the legendary over-the-top producer Billy Sherill at Epic Records. Rich performed the song as a nervous, skittery, churning jazz, rather reminiscent of the river at flood stage.

But that's not the one I'm hearing on the soundtrack in my head as I watch the levees breached and the civilian brigades desperately sandbagging stretches of river while waiting for assistance from the National Guard, being called out in more than one state--at least, such as are not deployed overseas. What I hear is the bleak majesty of the incomparable Paul Robeson, for whom the song was originally written, and who sang it onscreen in the 1936 movie version of SHOW BOAT:

I gets weary an' sick o' tryin'
I'm tired of livin' and scared of dyin'
But Ol' Man River, he just keeps rollin' along. . .

That voice as deep and inexorable as the great river itself, resigned to the vagaries of weather and the indifferent power the river wields against our puniest efforts.

I think the Old Man would sing like Paul Robeson, if he sang with words instead of the ominous roar of rising water.