The song voted in at number nine is a song that usually makes female fans go weak at the knees, especially the French lyrics. Yes, it’s the second song from Trust to feature in the fan’s favourite Alfie Boe song, If You Go Away:
If You Go Away first featured in this poll in 2014 where it was voted in at number 8 although the following year, in a shift towards the more classical side of Alfie’s recordings, it disappeared altogether. It’s fitting then that this song makes a return in a poll that is heavily skewed to the less classical.
Written in 1959 by Jacques Brel, it has been recorded by many artists, usually using English lyrics written by American songwriter Rod McKuen. As with Alfie’s version, these lyrics are interspersed with the original French. There are a huge number of videos to choose from on YouTube but I’ve chosen Celine Dion’s French version:
Counting down the top ten begins here which means that we are officially counting down to the Alfie Boe Michael Ball Together tour which starts in ten weeks! Lots to look forward to in the run up, including the chance for your very own concert review to appear here but first, here is the song you voted in at number ten:
Forever Young, from Alfie’s 2013 album, Trust, appeared in the top ten for the first time in 2015 at number nine and is the first of four songs from that album in the 2016 top ten. Penned by Bob Dylan for his son in the 1960’s, the opening lines of
May God bless and keep you always, may your wishes all come true
reflect perfectly the dreams we have as parents for our children. To me, these lines also make the song a fitting one for a remembrance concert; Alfie has performed this at National Memorial concerts in both the USA and UK, although with slightly different arrangements.
In last year’s best ever song count down, I included the original version and vowed never again as I really find it hard to listen to Bob Dylan’s voice. However, this year I found Dylan singing Forever Young with Bruce Springsteen, another Alfie favourite, so here they are:
Obviously there are people out there who prefer the original but compared to Alfie, I mean, come on! No contest, for this blogger at least.
Alfie and Michael go on tour in November, click here for tickets and you can pre-order the signed album here:
There are just four songs that survived from the 2014 poll and of these four, just two have been voted into the top ten in all three polls so far.
In 2015, the top ten looked like this:
Addio Sogni Di Gloria
Keep Me In Your Heart
A Gaelic Blessing
Bring Him Home
A Living Prayer
Nessun Dorma
My Heart is Yours
Rank Strangers
Forever Young
Je Crois Entendre Encore
The first thing that jumps out is that the top two don’t even feature this time which means my favourite song isn’t there…although another favourite, Dimming of the Day has made it for the first time.
The second thing to note is that there is a distinct move away from the more classical side of Alfie’s repertoire, as Trust makes a strong return with four songs featured. The remaining six songs are one each from Storyteller, Serenata, Onward, Classic Quadrophenia, Bring Him Home and Alfie. If You Go Away is the only song to return to the top ten, having missed out in 2015 and Bring Him Home stays as the only musical theatre choice.
The top ten will start counting down from next week and will lead us right up to the start of the UK tour – anyone excited yet?
After a break of six months, the Friday Round Up is making a brief return appearance as Alfie has been rather busy lately.
Last Friday of course saw the release of more Alfie Boe and Michael Ball: Together tickets and then came the news that Alfie would appear in this year’s Proms in the Park (London). Tickets are on sale but it’s been confirmed that Alfie will sing just one song, with Michael, who will be hosting this year.
Friday also saw Alfie posting his dance prep for the forthcoming tour (click on Alfie to view):
This was my favourite song as a teenager and the first album I ever bought – will I always associate it with Alfie from now on?
And finally, Alfie treated us to a beautifully moving Forever Young at the US Memorial Day Concert:
Thanks Marcia for sharing – and here is the same song at the UK Festival of Remembrance, 2013:
If you haven’t yet ordered a signed copy of Alfie and Michael’s new album, click here.
Forever Young features on Alfie’s album Trust, available here:
Alright, alright, it’s actually International Happiness Day but I got the title idea from my 9yo who looked at the 2015 Happy International Day of Happiness Alfie Boe Fans and said “it’s not really Happy Alfie Boe Day is it”? We don’t exactly see eye to eye on our musical tastes although he has been known to sing along to Alfie songs before and even uttered the immortal line (on hearing Elvis sing If I Can Dream) “this is Alfie’s song, why is Elvis singing it”.
To celebrate, these are some of my favourite Alfie tracks from each of his albums:
E Lucevan Le Stelle (Classic FM Presents) – video from first series of BBC Maestro
The song recently voted the favourite Alfie Boe recorded song, A Living Prayer (Onward) – from Songs of Praise
Funiculi Funicula (La Passione) – this was a hard choice as I could easily have chosen the whole album!
On The Street Where You Live (Bring Him Home) – from QVC, picked because my son’s choir used to sing this:
In My Daughter’s Eyes (Alfie) – for all parents and children everywhere:
Angie (Storyteller)- loved the original, this is better:
My all time favourite Alfie song (so far) is Keep Me In Your Heart (Trust) – something to do with those buttons…
Addio Sogni di Gloria (Serenata) was my favourite in the Serenata review and it hasn’t changed:
The eagle eyed amongst you will have noticed that Love Was A Dream is missing – as far as I’m aware we don’t have video of Alfie singing my favourite song from that album. Maybe one day…
What are your songs from all Alfie’s albums? Let us know below:
…God Give Me Strength on the Alan Titchmarsh show:
This was part of the promotion for Alfie Boe the actor (Mr Selfridge was airing at the time) and Trust as well, which had been released the previous November and was still doing well at that point.
God Give Me Strength was the result of the collaboration between Burt Bacharach and Elvis Costello and until Trust was released, I’d never heard it before. Written for the 1996 film, Grace of My Heart, here they are:
Notable for the performance of Burt Bacharach, I’m sure you’ll agree!
…my favourite song from Trust, Keep Me In Your Heart at the Royal Festival Hall, December 2013 – thanks Linda W for sharing:
As you might realise by now, this song gives me spine tingles, especially the “buttons on your blouse” and I’m sure I’m not the only one! I’m also absolutely sure that we all keep Alfie in our hearts as this song came in at number two in the Alfie Boe Best Ever Song poll 2015!
…Glory, Glory Hallelujah, from his 2013 album, Trust, on the last night of his UK Winter tour.
Thanks to the ever lovely Linda W for sharing.
This was a bittersweet concert for most of us as we were delighted to see Alfie and share the moment with everyone but we also knew that we would not be seeing him again in concert for a while. It was while in Cardiff that Linda and I bought our tickets for Scarborough – and of course, Alfie has just announced he’ll be back there in 2016.
We’ve made it to the top three of the second annual Alfie Boe Best Ever Song poll and if you’ve been following this far, it’s safe to say that the major shock came last week with the news that Alfie’s best known dropped down to number four from top of the heap last year. Yes, Bring Him Home no longer reigns. So, which will be the top?
Before we get there, number three is the second offering from Onward, A Gaelic Blessing. Written by renowned British composer, John Rutter, in 1978 as a commission from an American Methodist church, the piece is often used as part of hatched, matched and despatched ceremonies as well as being sung by choirs all over the world. The video features Aled Jones before Alfie’s version:
Interestingly, despite composing almost exclusively religious music, John Rutter describes himself as an “agnostic supporter of the Christian church”.
Number two is something completely different, being from Alfie’s 2013 Trust album. Keep Me In Your Heart is the highest non-classical sounding song in the top ten and is one of my all time favourites (it’s the buttons on your blouse that does it for me) and I’m obviously in good company!
The song was written by US musician and songwriter, Warren Zevon in response to receiving a terminal diagnosis of asbestos related cancer although it was the last song to be recorded for 2003’s The Wind, Zevon’s final album. Zevon survived the album release by only a few weeks although he did manage to see it achieve a top 20 chart position, his highest position since his critically acclaimed earlier album,Excitable Boy.
Love this song but the original doesn’t do it for me I’m afraid – the buttons on my blouse are quite safe! Now for Alfie’s version:
Adore this video with lots of my friends in – are you in there? Let us know!
So we come to the final position, which is you’ve been following avidly, you will know goes to a Serenata song, Addio Sogni Di Gloria. To my knowledge, he’s only sung this live once and I was one of the lucky ones there at the time. Classic FM Live was the occasion and we were also lucky enough to grab a few minutes at the stage door that evening.
All I can say is that the recording does not do it justice – absolutely blew us all away.
The song was originally recorded by Italian singer Luciano Virgili and written by Italian Carlo Innocenzi who write music for many Italian films from the 1940’s onward. Translated, the title means Goodbye, Dreams of Glory and the poignancy of the song sits effortlessly against the glorious soaring melody.
Thank you for accompanying me on this musical journey of discovery and thank you for choosing a song from Serenata as your 2015 Best Ever Alfie Boe Song – it will be interesting to see if Serenata remains on top in 2016!
Onward, Trust and Serenata are all available here:
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So what did you think of the all new top ten in the Alfie Boe Best Ever Song poll? Any surprises? Did your favourite make the cut? Don’t worry if not – I’m already planning the third annual poll!
Now, down to business. The song in at number 10 is Je Crois Entendre Encore which made it to number 4 in 2014: click here to read more.
Number 9 is the first of our two entries from Trust, Forever Young. Written and recorded by Bob Dylan for his 1974 album, Planet Waves, it has been recorded and performed by countless others down the years; my favourite version is that by Joan Baez:
Alfie is a Dylan fan, so much so that he bunked off Cosi Fan Tutte rehearsals in Strasbourg in order to take Sarah to a concert. That being so, and only for Alfie would I do this, here is Bob Dylan singing:
Sorry Alfie, I know Dylan’s a genius but I just can’t listen to him sing! Much prefer your version, sung at the Royal Festival Hall in 2013. I’ll let Alfie tell you the story about the recording:
Number 8 in the top ten is another survivor from 2014 and the only representative from Storyteller, Rank Strangers. Click here to read more about this lovely song before we move swiftly on to number 7 in our countdown.
Number 7 is in fact the first song from Serenata to feature and Alfie’s first song as a lyricist. My Heart is Yours puts Alfie’s beautiful lyrics (I think we can all agree that he’s a talented lyricist which can only bode well for the future) to the music from the Italian film Il Postino and the result is this magic:
In the many interviews Alfie gave around the release of Serenata, he said that the lyrics were for his daughter, Grace but the lyrics work just as a well as a love song.
The next instalment in the countdown will be next week!
Trust (click here) and Serenata are both available here:
