Singing Easter Parade

All week long, for obvious reasons, I have been attempting to remember and then flubbing the words of Easter Parade (from the movie Easter Parade (1948), but earlier in the Broadway musical revue As Thousands Cheer (1933) and repeated in Holiday Inn (1942)). I sang something like this, heavy on the words I knew -





hmm the Easter bonnet
with the flowers on it
hmm hmm hmm hmm hm hmm hmm hmm
East - er parade.

It turns out that the great Irving Berlin did in fact write words for this song:

Easter Parade

Music: Irving Berlin
Lyrics: Irving Berlin
Book: Moss Hart
Premiere: Saturday, September 30, 1933

Never saw you look quite so pretty before
Never saw you dressed quite so lovely what's more
I could hardly wait to keep our date this lovely Easter morning
And my heart beat fast as I came through the door
For

In your Easter bonnet, with all the frills upon it
You'll be the grandest lady in the Easter parade

I'll be all in clover and when they look you over
I'll be the proudest fellow in the Easter parade

On the Avenue
Fifth Avenue
The photographers will snap us
And you'll find that you're
In the rotogravure

Oh, I could write a sonnet about your Easter bonnet
And of the girl I'm taking to the Easter parade

The video of the song from the movie with Judy Garland, Fred Astaire and the chorus singing is embedded below (set to start at 7:20 the start of the song, or skip to 9:20 when the full chorus joins in as they walk in the Easter Parade):




(via STLyrics and youtube)