But how do you thank someone, who has taken you from crayons to perfume?It wasn’t the only career he considered. For a brief period, the young Don Black trod the boards as a stand-up comedian, at a particularly inauspicious time. “Variety was dying,” he has recalled. “I blame myself.” [1]
Don Black wrote the lyrics to “To Sir, With Love” and Mark London the music. Black revealed to the Sunday Times August 10, 2008: "It's one of the very, very few songs that I've worked on where I've written the words first. Normally, I may give the composer a title or suggest a couple of lines, but I don't like to write the whole lyric first. If you write the lyric first, you tend to ramble. You want the structure there to work against it."
In his biography, Wrestling With Elephants, Black identified a certain glint in the eye which is common to the great composers he has known and worked alongside and now he has another term for them too.
“I have called them professional dreamers and I think they are,” he says. “That’s certainly what I do – I walk around parks and sit on buses and think of these things. It doesn’t strike you at the time, but as I look back, that is what I have spent most of my life doing. And if you compound that, year after year after year, hopefully it is good for you.” [2]
To Sir With Love
Those school girl days of telling tales and biting nails are gone,
But in my mind I know they will still live on and on,
But how do you thank someone who has taken you from crayons to perfume.
It isn't easy but I'll try
If you wanted the sky I'd write across the sky in letters
that would soar a thousand feet high,
To Sir, With Love.
Those awkward years, have hurried by why did they fly away.
Why is it Sir children grow up to be people one day,
What takes the place of climbing trees and dirty knees in the world outside?
What is there for you I can buy?
If you wanted the world I'd surround it with a wall I'd scrall
These words with letters ten feet tall,
To Sir, With Love.
The time has come, for closing books and long last looks must end,
And as I leave I know that I am leaving my best friend,
A friend who taught me right from wrong, and weak from strong.
That's a lot to learn.
What can I give you in return?
If you wanted the sky I'd write across the sky
If you wanted the world I'd surround it with a wall
If you wanted the moon I would try to make a start
If you wanted the sky
If you wanted the world
If you wanted the moon
If you want to try
Don Black won an Academy Award, received five Academy Award nominations, three Tony nominations, five Ivor Novello Awards and a Golden Globe. He's written songs such as "Born Free", "Ben" (as recorded by Michael Jackson), "To Sir With Love" (as recorded by Lulu) “Sam“ (as recorded by Olivia Newton-John), and a quintet of James Bond theme songs - "Thunderball", "Diamonds Are Forever", "The Man With The Golden Gun", "Tomorrow Never Dies" and "The World Is Not Enough". He's written over a hundred songs for movies such as The Pink Panther Strikes Again, True Grit, Dances With Wolves and Out Of Africa. He was awarded an *OBE in the Queen's Birthday Honors list and awarded with an Honorary Degree of Doctor Of Arts by the City Of London University. He's worked with the leading composers of our time, including Henry Mancini, Quincy Jones, Marvin Hamlisch, Jule Styne, Elmer Bernstein, Michael Legrand and Charles Aznavour.
Don Black's official website: www.donblack.co.uk
1. Music Week: “Don Black” 2007 June by Adam Woods
http://www.musicweek.com/story.asp?sectioncode=2&storycode=1031246
2. Classic Bands.com: The Don Black Interview by Gary James http://www.classicbands.com/DonBlackInterview.html
