CAIRO - “So these are the Oscars and what have they done? The ceremony is over and we all know who have won.” I know that this sounds a bit similar to the opening bars of John Lennon's 1971 hit ‘Happy Xmas (War Is Over)', released as a John & Yoko/Plastic Ono Band song. Never mind! I thought I would write about Academy Award winning songs over the past decades. Of course, due to space limitation, I can't mention all nominees and not even all winning songs. To cut it short, let's start with the 1950s. Definitely music then was beginning to sound similar to what we know today. Still we can't review each and every winner, so we will choose some of them… or rather many. I also have to say that usually Oscars and credits go to songwriters, but most people associate these tracks with their performers, which is exactly what I'm going to do! In 1951 one of the songs I hate the most won ‘Mona Lisa' by legendary crooner Nat King Cole. I do like his singing and love some of his other numbers, but definitely not this dull boring one. Four years later, a song performed by another crooner, called Frank Sinatra, won the award. It was the title track ‘Three Coins in the Fountain'. Nice one. The 1956 winner was ‘Love is a Many Splendoured Thing', which was performed by a choir. This has got to be one of my favourites because it was used as the opening track in my all time favourite movie ‘Grease' in 1978. A song that is still popular today was the 1957 winner ‘Whatever Will Be, Will Be' (Qué Será, Será) by Doris Day. It is mainly popular among girls and the opening bars explain why. “When I was just a little girl I asked my mother what will I be?” What kind of man would sing such words? Great news everyone ‘Gigi' won an Oscar. Wasn't this the best thing ever? Sure, but who on Earth was Gigi? It was the 1959 winner and the title song performed by Louis Jourdan. Now we can all rejoice. Enough of the 1950s and let's move on a decade closer to today to see how many Academy Awards did the Beatles win… in 1961 they didn't receive any… at least ‘Never on Sunday', or on any other day for that matter because their first official single was released on the 5th October, 1962. As for Melina Mercouri, her song ‘Never on Sunday' won the award and later she became Greece's first female Minister of Culture. In 1962, ‘Moon River' sung by the beautiful Audrey Hepburn was the winner. It was of course taken from the classic motion picture ‘Breakfast at Tiffany's'. Ironically, a song was named after that movie and became a hit for Deep Blue Something. Mary Poppins must be an irritating character to some. Who needs a nanny with a flying umbrella? Still that didn't stop Julie Andrews, who played the lead role, from winning the Oscar in 1965 with ‘Chim Chim Cher-ee', which she sang with Dick Van Dyke. Of course, it wasn't they who won because they didn't write it themselves. Let me remind you that I earlier said that awards go to songwriters. I just wanted to imagine that Julie won because as a child I loved her movie ‘The Sound of Music'. In 1966 ‘The Shadow of Your Smile' was the big winner. Performed by Jack Sheldon, this song is still played in every hotel lobby and piano bar, as well as elevators! Who was born in 1967? Many people I guess and I hope they were all ‘Born Free', just like the title of Matt Monro's hit and winner of the year. It was taken from a movie with the same name about a lion. In the following year animals were still big in the film industry. Do I have to tell you that the award was given to ‘Talk to the Animals' from ‘Doctor Dolittle'? Of course this doctor had the gift of ‘talking to the animals'! He did it so naturally just ‘like a circle in a spiral, like a wheel within a wheel never ending or beginning on an ever spinning wheel, like a snowball down a mountain or a carnival balloon, like a carousel that's turning running rings around the moon'. It was so easy for him ‘like a clock whose hands are sweeping past the minutes on its face and the world is like an apple whirling silently in space, like the circles that you find'. Where can you find these circles? In the ‘Windmills of Your Mind', which is the title of the 1969 champ, sung by Noel Harrison. The opening notes were taken from Mozart's ‘Symphony Concerto for Violin, Viola and Orchestra'. Well, Noel himself was ‘taken' from actor Rex Harrison Noel is the son of Rex. So it was the final year of the 1960s and the Beatles didn't win any Oscars! This is kind of weird… The most popular and successful band ever released its own movies, which featured zillions of songs and never won an Academy Award! The same happened with the Bee Gees in the 1970s. In the first year of that decade ‘Raindrops Keep Fallin' on My Head' by B. J. Thomas was the winner. It was written by two legendary songwriters ‘Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid'… I mean Paul Newman and Robert Redford. Come on… you know that they starred in that movie the song was taken from. It was actually written by David and Bacharach. Some music genres were popularised or even invented in the 1970s. The proof is the winning song of 1972, ‘Theme from Shaft' by Isaac Hayes, who also wrote this soul/funk epic. Without a doubt Barbra Streisand is an exceptional singer. The year 1974 saw her win the award for ‘The Way We Were', from the movie of the same name. Without a doubt, I have already told you that Barbra Streisand is an exceptional singer. The year 1977 saw her win another award for a song which she personally composed ‘Evergreen' (love theme from ‘A Star is Born'). Lebanese-American songwriter Paul Jabara wrote Barbra's hit ‘The Main Event' and her smash duet with the Queen of Disco Donna Summer ‘No More Tears (Enough is Enough)'. Our last song this week couldn't have had a more appropriate title the 1979 winner, “Last Dance', which was written by Paul and performed by Donna. Next week we'll finish the list… I hope.
