Love is when music stops being background music.
Let’s focus a little. We have two match-ups before the final. “The Good Life” by Nancy Wilson vs. “Shaman’s Blues” by the Doors and this one—“It’s All In the Game” (Tommy Edwards) against “Danville Girl” (Peter Seeger).
Final Four contestant, “It’s All In the Game,” tune written in 1911 by Calvin Coolidge’s Vice President Charles Dawes, with lyrics added in 1951, opens with: “Many a tear has to FALL, but it’s ALL in the game,” a hack rhyme, some might think, but “fall” and “all” both fall at the end of an anapest—da da DA.
Carl Sigman’s lyrics:
(C) Many a tear has to fall (Am) but it’s all (F/G) in the game, (C)
All in the wonderful game that we know (F/G) as love. (C)
You have words with him and your future’s looking dim
But these things your hearts can rise above (G7)
Once in a while he won’t call but it’s all in the game.
Soon he’ll be there at your side with a sweet bouquet.
And he’ll kiss your lips and caress (Em) your waiting fingertips (D)
And your hearts will fly (F/G) away (C)
Musically, we notice the following: According to a popular chord chart site, “It’s All In the Game” opens in C with “Many a tear has to,” switching to A minor on “fall,” and as the lyric lands on “all” the F chord is played, letting us know we are in the key of C major (the A minor detour—appropriately on the word “fall” had us in doubt) and then, to be doubly sure, G comes in immediately after, just as “all” is leaving the singer’s lips—making the rhyme “all” even more important, since the music establishes the key for the first time in the song—first with the F (the 4th) and then, even more conclusively, with the G (the 5th).
F is mischievous and all-important in the song, since with C and A minor (the first two chords) F could have belonged to the key of A minor—and it feels right that the word “fall” is with an ambiguous chord.
But it is the G which follows quickly on the F which confirms for the listener (whether they are aware of it or not!) that the F belongs to the key of C major; the 1-4-5 of the song = C-F-G.
The second line of the song (which repeats the same chord sequence) now does something marvelous. “All in the wonderful game, that we know as love.” The word “know” receives the crucial F-to-G chords, the chords which let us “know” the key of the song! We “know” the true harmony (“love”).
The song’s bridge “You had words with him and your future’s looking dim, but these things your hearts can rise above” ends on G7—a G chord with an added F. The “all” rhyme in the beginning of the song greeted us with an F chord followed by a G chord (establishing the key of the song) and the song’s first variation re-visits the F and G, but this time with the G7 chord. Brilliant.
The part of the song which goes “And he’ll kiss your lips, and caress your waiting fingertips” moves to E minor after the A minor and then back to A minor—luxuriating in the minor which was hinted at in the beginning of the song when we first heard the A minor. After all, the song plays with sadness (“many a tear has to fall”) even as happiness prevails.
With “fingertips,” we get a D chord, which has 2 of the same notes as the G chord—plus our friend the F note—but as an F sharp, which contributes to the gently rising finale of the song and that lovely trope—“And your hearts will fly away” returning to the sequence which began the song: C/Am/F/G/C.
Frankly, I don’t know if Carl Sigman, the lyricist, was consciously aware of these things (probably not) but I’m willing to bet it’s one of the reasons “It’s All In the Game” was a no.1 hit when it was released in 1958.
The singer of “It’s All In the Game” is not the lover; he observes the action of the lovers, like T.S. Eliot in “The Waste Land,” which adds to the classic perfection of the song, whose lyrical/musical profundity is largely hidden from us in the form of a ‘mere pop number.’
Can “Danville Girl” hope to beat a recording as good as “Its All In the Game”? The chords of “Danville Girl” are simple; it uses the common pop chord sequence 1-4-5. The pattern is: 1-4-1/1-4-5//1-4-1/1-4-5-1. The “Danville Girl” story, unlike “It’s All In the Game”—featuring a love-tension which resolves—spotlights a first-person hobo pursuing a survival life—stoicism is paramount, so the simple chord structure is appropriate. Pete Seeger, with just the right vocals, and banjo, sings a self-made version (1950) of the Woody Guthrie song.
Who wins?
#marchmadnesssongs