In the Wee Small Hours

Just heard the story today how this song got into Frank Sinatra's hands and became a hit.  The writer of the song was at a party with some other divine gentleman of that time, in New Jersey. One of the men, being a songwriter as well, told Bob Hilliard, who was getting ready to go back home to his apartment in Manhattan,  "dont leave yet, let's not waste the night. Let's write a song" So he sat down and started to play the piano. Imagine it like the old movies portray it. Two men with their suit jackets on, smoking their cigarettes, drinking  scotch or whiskey,  whatever they drank then, talking so properly decide to write a song about what they knew best in that era, romance. As the piano plays the tune, Bob writes, "in the wee small hours of the morning,..." as it was the wee small hours at the piano. He jots it all down on a paper, and takes a cab home to the city.

Next day, as he is taking a cab to the recording studio where he was meeting record execs for other songs he was working on, he sees a cab in front of him at the light. the light was turning red, and as we know cab drivers nowadays, they would speed right through it. Not then.  The cab stopped. And out stepped one gentleman followed by Frank Sinatra himself. Bob gave the cab driver money, and jumped out of the cab.  He followed into the record company where he was planning on meeting someone else. They go to the studio, discuss what Frank is working on, and Frank asks him, "are you working on any new songs?" and Bob answers, "actually yes. I just wrote something last night." He reaches into his pocket and hands him the paper. Frank could not read music and didn't know the tune, but when he read the words he said, "thats my kind of song." And so it was, Frank took the song, made it his own, and we still listen to it today. A couple weeks later, Bob got the phonecall, "Frank is not only putting your song on his album, he is titling the album after it"

Think about it.  Had the cab not stopped at the red light, none of that would have happened. Bob had no intentions of giving that song to Sinatra. But when he saw him get out of the cab, he ran to meet him. To talk about OTHER songs. He was in the right place at the right time. It's all about timing. I found out about how to time things to be successful. I will not post it on here, but if interested my email contact is on my website.

I love this song and the way it makes me fell when I hear it. Now I experienced a glimpse into that time and I love it even more!

Herbie!

Logan's Niece

this is the nursery we wanted to match






original photo

painting.