Morning (Clare Fischer composition)


"Morning" is a Latin Jazz standard written by American pianist/composer/arranger Clare Fischer, first heard on his 1965 LP, Manteca!, Fischer's first recording conceived entirely in the Afro-Cuban idiom, which, along with the Brazilian music he had explored at length over the previous three years, would provide fertile ground for Fischer's musical explorations over the next half-century.

Form

"Morning" was Fischer's first - and, to this day, his most famous - contribution to the then recently evolved cha-cha-chá genre. Its structure is the standard A-A-B-A, 32 measures in length. In practice, however, the song's debut recording does take one significant detour, paying unashamed homage to one of its composer's primary musical influences in the process, when, halfway through trombonist Gil Falco's solo, instead of proceeding to the bridge, "Morning" morphs into a 16-bar development of the principal 2-measure motif of "Spring Rounds," the fourth section from Stravinsky's The Rite of Spring.

Lyrics

It remains unclear exactly when Fischer's lyrics to "Morning" were written, but they were not unveiled until the debut of 2+2, the vocal group with which Fischer supplemented his fledgling Latin jazz combo, Salsa Picante, in 1980. Long before that, however, he had been upstaged, at least throughout the Spanish-speaking world, by José José's eponymous 1969 debut LP, which featured a "Morning" cover employing José's own lyrics. Head start aside, the magnitude of José's stardom all but guaranteed that any Spanish-language version supplied by the composer was doomed to obscurity, a situation still lamented by Fischer almost thirty years later. Fischer's own lyrics, however, have - at least in their original language - gained some traction since their 1981 debut in Clare Fischer & Salsa Picante Present 2+2, with subsequent recordings by Lisa Rich, Meredith D'Ambrosio, Jeanie Bryson, Dianne Reeves, Alex & Nilusha, and, most recently, on Roseanna Vitro's album Clarity, Music of Clare Fischer. Moreover, near the end of Fischer's life, two versions of the song, one featuring the approved Spanish-language version of his lyric, the other, the Portuguese, were recorded by the Clare Fischer Voices, under the direction of the composer's son, Brent Fischer, on ...And Sometimes Instruments.

Selected recordings