Published 1959 Lyricist(s) Oscar Hammerstein II | Composer(s) Richard Rodgers Language English | |
"My Favorite Things" is a 1959 song, originally from the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical The Sound of Music.
Contents
The song was first performed by Maria (played by Mary Martin) and Mother Abbess (Patricia Neway) in the original 1959 Broadway production.
Julie Andrews performed the song for the first time on the Christmas special for The Garry Moore Show in 1961, and then in the 1965 film.
Background
In the musical, the lyrics to the song are a reference to things Maria loves, such as "whiskers on kittens, bright copper kettles and warm woolen mittens". These are the things she selects to fill her mind with when times are bad.
The original Broadway musical places the song in the Mother Abbess's office, just before she sends Maria to serve Captain von Trapp's family as governess to his seven children. However, Ernest Lehman, the screenwriter for the film adaptation, repositioned it so that Maria would sing it with the children during the thunderstorm scene in her bedroom, replacing "The Lonely Goatherd", which had originally been sung at this point. Many stage productions also make this change, shifting "The Lonely Goatherd" to another scene.
The first section of the melody has the distinctive property of using only the notes 1, 2, and 5 (tonic, supertonic, and dominant) of the scale. By using the same melody-pattern, Rodgers harmonized it differently in different stanzas, using a series of minor triads one time and major triads the next.
The song ends with a borrowed line of lyric and notes from Rodgers' earlier composition with Lorenz Hart, "Glad to Be Unhappy", a standard about finding peace in the midst of unrequited love. Using the same two notes for the phrasing of "so sad" in the original song, Rodgers brings the gloom of the song to a similar upbeat ending – "and then I don't feel so bad."
In 2004 the movie version of the song finished at No. 64 on AFI's 100 Years...100 Songs survey of top tunes in American cinema.
John Coltrane version
Jazz artist John Coltrane did an extended, close to fourteen-minute version in E minor on his 1961 album taken from the title of the song. It became a jazz classic and a signature for Coltrane in concert, also appearing on Newport '63 released in 1993, Live at the Half Note: One Down, One Up and New Thing at Newport in 1965, Live at the Village Vanguard Again! and Offering: Live at Temple University in 1966, and The Olatunji Concert: The Last Live Recording in 1967.
Christmas
The lyrics in "My Favorite Things" are composed of Winter time imagery. Which has made the song popular for the Winter & Holiday season. The song has been performed by numerous artists, including: