Helen Merrill - Success Abroad

Success Abroad

After recording sporadically through the late 1950s and 1960s, Merrill spent much of her time touring Europe, where she enjoyed more commercial success than she had in the United States. She settled for a time in Italy, recording an album there and doing live concerts with jazz notables Chet Baker, Romano Mussolini, and Stan Getz.

Parole e Musica: Words and Music was recorded in Italy in the early 1960s while Merrill was living there. The LP features the unusual additions preceding each song, of spoken translations of eloquent Italian word lyrics, complementing the ballads and torch songs. The album has an atmospheric edge in the style of a street busker, provided by a solo musician backing up Merrill's performance, which is brooding, smoky, increasingly foreboding, regretful, mournful, desolate, and finally, melancholy yet hopeful. Included on the album is the iconic song on track 4 Why Don't You Do Right?, made famous to modern audiences in the 1988 film Who Framed Roger Rabbit, memorably performed by the animated character Jessica Rabbitt. The many standard songs are elevated to classic status by Merrill’s perfect phrasing, sublime high notes, and emotionally flawless renditions.

Merrill returned to the U.S. in the 1960s, but moved to Japan in 1967 after touring there. Merrill developed a following in Japan that remains strong to this day. In addition to recording while in Japan, Merrill became involved in other aspects of the music industry, producing albums for Trio Records and hosting a show on a Tokyo radio station.