Song 104 - Smile by Charlie Chaplin

"Humour heightens our sense of survival and preserves our sanity" Charlie Chaplin. 

Monday morning again and I am staying with the theme of smiling.  As everyone needs a reason to smile on a Monday I am going to turn to a song written by Charlie Chaplin for his 1936 film Modern Times, Smile. However, so I don't get caught out by musical historians, Charlie Chaplin is only responsible for the tune and the lyrics (and title) were added to the music in 1954 by John Turner and Geoffrey Parsons. After adding lyrics, the legendary Nat King Cole released the song and it reached number 2 in the UK chart in the same year.

Where can I possible start with Charlie Chaplin? He is one of my heroes of stage and screen. When the 1992 film of his autobiography was released, I don't think I even appreciated the Chaplin was British, but the brilliant Robert Downey Jr in the lead part, under Richard Attenborough's direction soon meant that I would fall in love with Chaplin. Smile is just one example of the music that Chaplin produced and if you have ever watched one of his films, you will know how important  musical scores are throughout his pictures.  Chaplin  wasn't a trained musician and he couldn't read music so everything he composed would come straight from his head through his fingers to the piano. Does this method of composing work? Yes because in 1973, Chaplin would win his only competitive Oscar for the best original score of the re-release of Limelight. 

The premise for composing the tune for Smile was to accompany the plot of Modern Times, which tackles issues about the Great Depression and was a satire on industrial life. Still unconvinced about sound in his film, the tramp remains silent throughout the film apart from singing a song. It is only The Great Dictator do we hear the voice of the tramp, which happens to be the last film the tramp appears in.

My favourite version of Smile is sung by Robert Downey Jr., as he brought Chaplin to life for me:

Smile by Robert Downey Jr.

To watch and hear the instrumental in the original film
Smile, instrumental in Modern Times

Tune written by Charles Chaplin, 1936
Words written by John Turner & Geoffrey Parsons, 1954

Song 103 - Smile - David Gray

This is a lovely number for a cheeky Sunday morning by David Gray. Taken from his fourth album Sell Sell Sell, Smile is a intimate track where Gray's voice is quite gravelly and you feel that you are sharing a road trip with him as he is watching someone he loves in their every day movements. It is intimate because explaining why you smile at certain things that people do, especially if its someone you love, can be really difficult to explain to anyone outside a relationship. For me, there is something about this song and the lyrics that embraces the connection between two lovers; which makes it a gem of a song.

Sell Sell Sell is David's Gray's third album released in 1996 and before White Ladder brought him the internationally and commercial success; and I found the album only after buying White Ladder, but I am so glad I did. We are so lucky with the amount of great male song writers in the UK.

To hear David Gray's Smile
Smile by David Gray

Written by David Gray
Album: Sell, Sell, Sell
Released: 1996.