Jennifer Warnes
Can Who Hum A Few Bars Of That With Jennifer Warnes?
Just over a year old, I published Famous Blue Raincoat By Jennifer Warnes: Audiophile Addendum, a post which discussed the outstanding engineering and sound quality of the Famous Blue Raincoat album performed by Jennifer Warnes.
That post also included my response to the following query, posed by the guy who has installed, revised, and cajoled sound and TV systems for me over the past decade, about one track on that recording :
When listening to Bird on a Wire with a very high resolution sound system you can hear what sounds like a deep guttural humming along with Warnes’ vocals. On anything less than that is does not turn up at all, or sounds like a partially blown woofer. Is that Leonard Cohen humming along?
A few straightforward web searches revealed substantial information about the technical aspects of the recording, a summary of which is available at the Audiophile Addendum post. At that time, however, those web sites did not identify, as far as I was able to determine, the singer of the extraordinarily low tones on the Warnes version of Bird On A Wire.
Since there was a tie-in with with Leonard Cohen, I sent a few emails to members of the Cohen cognoscente. I only received one positive response; on the other hand that same source had been correct about obscure details on a handful of other queries. So, …
I wrote that I had received
… information from that usually reliable source1 that the referenced hum in Jennifer Warnes’ Bird on a Wire is the sound of Leonard Cohen’s voice doubling behind and an or octave below Warnes.
For the click-abhorrent, that footnote, which was part of the original post, reads:
This source has been 100% correct about such matters in the past, but I have no way to double-check this tidbit so if anyone has information that confirms or conflicts with the answer I’ve reported, I’d appreciate an email.
A Year Passes
And Then, The Email Arrives
Hi Dr. Hguy;
While doing some research on Jennifer’s behalf, I came across your column from Aug 6 of last year in which your usually reliable source named Leonard Cohen as the source of low humming on Jennifer’s version of “Bird on a Wire”.
I sent the article to Jennifer; she asked me to send you the true details, straight from the diva’s keyboard:
“Will you write back for me and say that this low voice is Willie Greene Jr. He sings also on Ry Cooder’s records. His bass can reach lower than the lowest note on an acoustic piano. We proved it. Ask Billy Youdelman who was the recordist or my co producer, Roscoe Beck, for proof. Leonard’s voice dropped down after many years chanting during Zen practice.”
I hope this is helpful.
Matt Kramer
There you have it. The ultra-low voice belongs to Willie Greene Jr. Searches for Willie Greene Jr. turn up batches of credits, including work with Lyle Lovett and the afore mentioned Ry Cooder, but, alas, no photos in which he is unambiguously identified. I did find this brief but compelling mention of Mr. Greene at the July 28, 2008 entry in Jack Bog’s Blog in a description of a Lyle Lovett performance:
But all of the side men were upstaged by the background singers who stood to the star’s immediate right. What to my wondering eyes did appear — two of them were from the earth-shaking front line of Was (Not Was), who knocked our socks off (as we knew they would) at the Wonder a while back. Sure enough, it was Sweet Pea Atkinson and Sir Harry Bowens! Next to them was bass singer Willie Greene Jr., whose voice knows no bottom and whose bottom, along with the rest of him, moved smooth as silk in synchronicity with Sweet Pea and Sir Harry. (Emphasis mine)
I extend my apologies to Mr. Greene and Mr. Cohen for the error and my thanks to Mr. Kramer and Ms Warnes for the correction.
Credit Due Department
The photo of Jennifer Warnes atop this post is from StarPulse. The animated clock was found on several web sites. I am unaware of its original source.
Footnotes
_____________________- This source has been 100% correct about such matters in the past, but I have no way to double-check this tidbit so if anyone has information that confirms or conflicts with the answer I’ve reported, I’d appreciate an email.↩
