A Taste of Honey (song)

For other uses, see A Taste of Honey (disambiguation).

"A Taste of Honey"
Cover of the 1967 single
Single by Herb Alpert's Tijuana Brass
from the album Whipped Cream and Other Delights
Released	1965
Recorded	1965
Genre	Jazz instrumental pop
Length	2:43
Label	A&M
Writer(s)	Bobby Scott, Ric Marlow
Producer(s)	Herb Alpert, Jerry Moss
Herb Alpert's Tijuana Brass singles chronology
"Mae" (1965) "A Taste of Honey" (1965) "3rd Man Theme" (1965)
Whipped Cream and Other Delights track listing "A Taste of Honey" (1) "Green Peppers" (2)

"A Taste of Honey" is a pop standard written by Bobby Scott and Ric Marlow. It was originally an instrumental track (or recurring theme) written for the 1960 Broadway version of the 1958 British play A Taste of Honey (which was also made into the film of the same name in 1961). Both the original and a cover by Herb Alpert in 1965 earned the song four Grammy Awards. A vocal version of the song, first recorded by Billy Dee Williams (and released in 1961 on the Prestige label), was covered by the Beatles in 1963. However Barbra Streisand had been performing the song as part of her cabaret act during 1962 and recorded it for her debut album "The Barbra Streisand Album" on Columbia, which was released February 25, 1963 and which would go on to win a Grammy for Album of the Year (1963).

Instrumental versions

The original recorded versions of the song "A Taste of Honey", "A Taste of Honey (refrain)" and "A Taste of Honey (closing theme)", appeared on Bobby Scott's 1960 album, also titled A Taste of Honey, on Atlantic 1355. The composition won Best Instrumental Theme at the Grammy Awards of 1963.

• Martin Denny and the Victor Feldman Quartet each scored minor hits in 1962 with their covers.
• Acker Bilk released a version in the UK in January 1963, reaching number 16 in the UK Singles Chart.
• Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass recorded the most popular instrumental version of the song with a cover on their 1965 album, Whipped Cream & Other Delights. This recording won four awards including Record of the Year at the Grammy Awards of 1966. The instrumental spent five weeks at number one on the easy listening chart, reached number seven on the Billboard Hot 100.
• Harry James recorded a live version in 1966 on his album Live At The Riverboat (Dot DLP 3728 and DLP 25728)

Vocal versions

"A Taste of Honey"
Song

The Beatles

The Beatles performed Lenny Welch's adaptation, slightly changing the lyrics in the chorus, as part of their repertoire in 1962 and as the instrumental version by Acker Bilk was popular in the United Kingdom at the time, the song was chosen to be recorded for their 1963 debut album, Please Please Me. A version from this time was released in 1977 on the album Live! at the Star-Club in Hamburg, Germany; 1962

In the US this song first appeared on the VeeJay Records album Introducing... The Beatles. They also performed "A Taste of Honey" seven times for BBC radio shows, including Here We Go, Side by Side and Easy Beat. In 1967 McCartney was inspired to compose “Your Mother Should Know” based on a line taken from the screenplay.

Personnel

• Paul McCartney - lead vocals, bass
• John Lennon - acoustic guitar, backing vocals
• George Harrison - lead guitar, backing vocals
• Ringo Starr - brushed drums

Engineered by Norman Smith

Other artists

Lenny Welch recorded an early vocal version. It was released as a single in September 1962 on the Cadence Records label and included on his 1963 album Since I Fell for You. This version also credits Lee Morris as a writer but it is not known if it was he who provided the lyrics. This credit does not appear on any covers of the song, with only Marlow/Scott credited.

Controversy

Reprise Records, pretending to be Liberty Records, sent fraudulent telegrams to disk jockeys to convince them to play Eddie Cano's version of the song instead of Martin Denny's version.

In Top One Hundred

• Tony Bennett reached #94 in the US with a vocal version for his album The Many Moods of Tony in 1964.

Television and film

• The song is used for the theme of the UK comedy series Hardware.
• The cover version of Herb Alpert is used to ID "Tutto il calcio minuto per minuto" (All the football minute by minute), an historical live commentary on sports events broadcast by the Italian radio RAI since the 1960s. The tune has begun to be used since the 1990s.
• The song is used in the 2000 Australian film The Dish, a partially fictionalised account of the role that the Parkes Observatory played in relaying the live television feed of man's first steps on the moon, during the Apollo 11 mission in 1969.

See also

• List of number-one adult contemporary singles of 1965 (U.S.)
• List of songs covered by the Beatles

References

• The Billboard Book of Top 40 Hits, 6th Edition, 1996