Thoughts Of Her – Cecil McBee & Verena McBee

Cecil's gorgeous classic instrumental ballad Song Of Her now has a wonderful lyric by his wife Verena McBee. Although Verena's recording uses the song's original title, the lyric title is "Thoughts Of Her," but when sung by a female singer, as Verena has recorded on her album "U-Phoria" it actually would become "Thoughts Of Him." Verena has a big range, so she recorded in Cecil's original instrumental key of F major. Our vocal lead sheet includes the piano voicings and bass line on separate staves.

Our excerpt of Verena's recording starts two measures before her vocal entrance on the melody. Her recording actually starts with an extended introduction: first, Cecil's original four-measure rhythm section intro with piano voiced chords over a descending fifths bass ostinato figure (also in Cecil's instrumental introduction). To add to the suspense before the vocal melody starts, the rhythm section repeats the four measures for the soprano sax to solo over. As you will hear, Verena is very passionate in her powerful performance of her lyric, and her lyric works perfectly with Cecil's original simple melody as notated in our vocal lead sheet. For dramatic effect, Verena adds a hold on the last chord of the bridge, before singing the pick up to the last A section (which is letter C on our lead sheet).

This lyric could also be sung in a very delicate and simple way: either holding out each downbeat as indicated, or, if a singer is concerned about controlling long sustained notes, the A section lyric could be sung in a slightly spoken manner (with silence or space after every two words, except for the hyphenated "sun-beam's" that starts the second A section). There are many ways to interpret this beautiful ballad.

The key is labeled F because of the final chord. If another key would be better for you, send the key you'd like to don@secondfloormusic.com and we'll post the transposition on the website for purchase. If you're not sure which key is best, send us your range and we'll work with you to figure out the best key.

Lyric Description: It's a beautiful exploration of memories of a love affair.