Judy Garland

New York, Sunday, April 23, 1961; Carnegie Hall is packed to the last seat, the audience buzzing with anticipation for the entrance of the woman the press has dubbed The World's Greatest Entertainer. In her dressing room, Judy Garland studies herself in the mirror as she does her makeup, a routine that's now as much a part of her life as the bouquets of flowers decorating the room or the bottle of amphetamines always in her bag. Tonight's show is being recorded in full, since Capitol is demanding another album as per contract, but in truth it hardly changes anything for Judy; in thirty-nine years of life, stage and reality have long since fused into one, and she defends herself by automatically giving everything she has, even at the cost of her own health. Success and the audience's applause, then the private scorn and drama: an emotional baggage that's by now impossible to put back in order, so she might as well carry on. The light comes on, the audience is seated, the orchestra has tuned up, conductor Mort Lindsey stands ready, baton in hand: it's time to go on stage.

It's hard not to romanticize the life of Judy Garland, born Frances Ethel Gumm in Grand Rapids, Minnesota on June 10, 1922, the third of three sisters, openly unwanted and put to work on stage almost immediately by a couple of performer parents. What's most striking is the tyrannical figure of her mother, Ethel Marion, who behind the breezy air of a vaudeville pianist was in fact a ruthless, unloving woman, whose presence loomed over her youngest daughter's life like a grey eminence steering her every move.

The only times I felt loved, as a kid, were when I was performing on stage... [my mother] would stand off to the side, and if I didn't feel well or didn't feel like it, she'd say things like 'if you don't get up there I'll tie you to the bed and beat you until you stop growing.'

In the Gumm household, the show business put bread on the table, to the point that the family moved from Grand Rapids to Los Angeles in search of new opportunities. The pressure on the daughters grew over time, first with the arrival of the Great Depression of 1929, then with the declining health of their father Frank, which progressively worsened until he could no longer work. From the age of ten, Judy was therefore given an amphetamine in the morning, to give her the energy to get through the day, and a barbiturate at night to put her to bed — as absurd as it may sound today, the use of such medication was fairly common in America at the time.

At first, the trick works: having left behind amateur shows with her sisters in favor of a far more promising contract with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, Judy Garland soon became one of Hollywood's most prominent stars. Audiences learned to love her through an intense string of productions in which the young woman displayed both her peculiar sense of humor and a rare vocal and acting talent — her roles in "The Wizard of Oz" (1939) and "Meet Me in St. Louis" (1944) remain unforgettable. But the price to pay for such success is simply beyond our comprehension.

For one thing, the young woman was subject to a punishing contractual regime, which had her working non-stop without putting a dime in her pocket, since no one at the time thought a woman needed to manage her own finances. So, between film studios run by crooks, five husbands of varying degrees of competence, tax troubles and bankruptcy, Judy spent her life broke and forever bound to the will of whichever man was in charge — she would barely manage to take care of her three children, namely Liza (from her second husband Vincente Minnelli) and then Lorna and Joey (born from her third marriage to Sidney Luft).

And speaking of children, there's the harrowing episode of a horrific, illegal first abortion at just nineteen years old, forced on her by both her mother and MGM with the blessing of her then-husband David Rose — and it's precisely this lack of humanity within the entertainment world that would emotionally afflict Judy from adolescence onward.

The studio boss, Louis B. Mayer, had no qualms about openly calling her "the little hunchback," in reference to her petite stature, which didn't fit the mold of the big-screen blonde bombshells like Jean Harlow and Mae West. The result was a crushing lack of self-esteem and self-worth as a woman, along with an unhealthy diet regime fueled by digestive pills, which combined with the amphetamines and barbiturates mentioned above to form a debilitating addiction.

For much of her life, Judy had the impression of living in a parallel universe, dazed and separated from reality by an invisible pane of glass through which she couldn't make herself heard, even by pounding on it with her fists. Within the space of a decade, the punishing work schedule caused erratic behavior and notorious lateness on set, costing her important roles and — eventually — her contract with MGM itself.

Soon her life swung back and forth like a pendulum, between loneliness, hospital stays and moments of remarkably intense artistry, fueled by that very romantic despair. It's striking to watch her as Vicky Lester in the 1954 version of "A Star Is Born," since it's clear that Judy wasn't so much acting a part anymore as recounting fragments of her own existence to an enthusiastic audience that nonetheless still believed it was all just fiction.

The one constant outlet in Judy's life was therefore performing on stage, the only place where she could express herself through song. Like a bird in a cage, Judy watched the world outside with such burning longing that she could feel it as real, and then she'd interpret it with that contralto voice of hers, vibrating with raw emotion, reaching unusually energetic, theatrical highs before plunging with pure chamber melodrama into the murkiest, most desperate jazz.

There is, in short, a precise moment in which Hollywood's aestheticized, papier-mâché fiction, the famous tunes of the Great American Songbook, and an intense human drama collide violently within a single person who has no choice but to perform it all with a volcanic passion bursting from her chest: "Judy At Carnegie Hall" is far more than just a concert. Where all that energy comes from, God only knows, but on the evening of April 23, 1961, this tiny woman, barely five feet tall, poured everything she had onto the audience like a river in flood, across twenty-six songs including four encores, for a thunderous two hours of performance.

The 2001 double-CD reissue presents, for the first time, the complete recording, complete with comedic bits, anecdotes, mistakes and interactions with the audience and orchestra — an absolutely essential item in any music lover's collection.

The energy is palpable right from the moment the orchestra kicks off with the instrumental introductory medley, which then bursts into a wave of applause as Judy makes her entrance, and the show immediately launches into high gear with a sparkling rendition of "When You're Smiling (The Whole World Smiles With You)": the Lady is in fine form tonight.

Other moments of exquisite escape from reality come when Judy delights in belting out the husky, booming "San Francisco," the exquisite "You Go To My Head," all trumpets and Latin-tinged rhythms, and a fired-up "That's Entertainment!," which sounds particularly pointed given the performer. Congas and drums build momentum on the cinematic sketch of "Come Rain Or Come Shine" as Judy soars amid brass and strings — the audience's applause, at the end of the song, lasts almost a full minute.

At one point the nine musicians of the orchestra's jazz section are called to the front of the stage for a quartet of classic show-stoppers: the sparkling “Who Cares (As Long As You Care For Me)”, the celebrated “Puttin’ On The Ritz”, the sultry, slinking “How Long Has This Been Going On?”, enriched by a sweet acoustic guitar solo, and the brief interlude “Just You, Just Me”.

Throughout the evening, Judy charms the crowd with warm, easy humor: at one point she all but threatens a striptease, then regales the audience with hilarious anecdotes – a Parisian hairdresser who puffs up her hair with lacquer, a safety pin that jabs her in the backside, and a thoroughly bitchy London journalist who showers her with compliments in person only to call her fat, double-chinned and crooked-toothed in the resulting article. And this from a woman who habitually handles her own lighting and costumes in concert, precisely to hide what she jokingly calls “a multitude of sins.”

The entire setlist of “Judy At Carnegie Hall” is built on a masterful see-saw of rhythm, released tension and moments of rare lyrical intensity, retracing more than forty years of American popular tradition. The pure orchestral romanticism of “The Man That Got Away” is offset by an “I Can’t Give You Anything But Love” delivered in a near-whisper, riding a vibrato that never wavers. “Do It Again” is truly luxurious, with strings and oboe weaving chamber-exotica filigrees, while the famous “Stormy Weather” is sung with a curious blend of sensuality and melancholy despair. But “Alone Together” reaches heights of pure drama, starting slow and hushed before climbing to a spine-tingling finale.

There's also a trio of shadowy torch songs: “You’re Nearer”, “A Foggy Day” and “If Love Were All”, performed perched on the edge of a stool over the barest thread of piano – Judy goes straight to the heart of these songs, dissects them and loses herself inside them as if, in that precise instant, nothing else existed in the world, and the audience hangs on her every word.

The concert heads towards its close with the vaudeville turn of “Rock-A-Bye Your Baby With A Dixie Melody”, and then drops the bombshell in the first encore: sung in a cracked, trembling voice, “Over The Rainbow” is no longer the song of innocence she had sung over twenty years earlier – at times Judy hardly seems present in the room at all, but rather seems to be traveling alone through memory in search of that last glimmer of a childhood ended too soon – the way she draws breath to launch into the final line is simply staggering.

The same melody, taken up again by the orchestra, should mark the definitive end of the evening and give Judy the chance to take her bows. But the audience won't hear of it, so she returns to the stage to sing the bouncy double-bass-and-bass-drum number “Swanee” – energized by the crowd, her voice shines brighter than ever, and at the close she lands a spectacular, terrifying high note after two hours of a show sustained at such heights.

Once again the audience calls her back, and so, over the same orchestral cue meant to send her home, Judy takes a poll and gathers requests shouted down from the balcony. The choice finally falls on the delightful swing of “After You’ve Gone”, performed here with the orchestra at full tilt and the audience presumably on their feet, dancing on chairs and in the aisles. But even once that's over, no one wants to go home.

Do you really want more? Aren't you tired?

Of course not, and so at last comes the charming rendition of “Chicago”, which Judy sings with the playful air of a little girl pulling faces in the mirror, giving her audience one final farewell with a smile. When she finally manages to leave for good, the listener can't help but feel that particular emptiness of someone who senses they've just witnessed something unique and unrepeatable.

Released in July 1961, “Judy At Carnegie Hall” was a huge success that restored the singer's image in the eyes of the public; Billboard logged thirteen consecutive weeks at the top of the album chart between September and December of that year, and it soon added four Grammy wins, including “Album Of The Year” – the first woman in history to win in that category. Once again, Judy wouldn't see a penny from record and ticket sales, and she would keep performing until the end of her days, through nights of brilliance and others where the toll of drug dependency became sadly more and more visible.

What remains of this recording is the achievement of being, at once, both a rich collection of American standards and the astonishing document of a dazzling talent brimming with overflowing humanity. “Judy At Carnegie Hall” has often been called by the press “the greatest night in the history of show business” – which is obviously debatable, but the symbolic value of that concert remains priceless: despite having a thirty-six-piece orchestra behind her, Judy stands utterly alone and exposed in front of the microphone, without a single backing singer to help her out, and yet she carries the show forward, pouring out everything she has left in her. In its own way, it's a metaphor for her life: tragic, thrilling, infinitely tender and terribly bleak.

Ride the wave of great music

Add OndaRock to your favorite sources on Google Discover. Don't miss our reviews, milestones and latest news straight in your feed.

Follow on Google

18/04/2021