The Influence of Helen Merrill on Laura Nyro

[JSngry]

http://www.songfacts.com/detail.php?id=2251

</h1>

<h1>Wedding Bell Blues

by

The 5th Dimension

Laura Nyro wrote this song when she was just 18, and released it on her first album in 1967. The song finds the singer letting her boyfriend (Bill) know that although she loves him, she's becoming frustrated waiting for him to propose to her (Beyonce updated this theme with her hit "Single Ladies (Put a Ring on It))."

So, was there really a "Bill"? Alan Merrill would know - the son of Jazz singer Helen Merrill, he grew up with Laura, and they thought of each other as cousins, since her uncle married Alan's aunt. Alan, who became a Rock Star in England with his band The Arrows, explains:

Around 1958 or so my mom was dating a married man named Bill Carter, a b-film actor. He was married to Trink Wiman, heiress to the John Deere fortune. My mom and Bill co-owned a jazz club named The Night Owl (not the Greenwich Village rock venue) and were having a very passionate and public relationship. The club was quite possibly funded by Ms. Wiman's money. The affair was so serious in fact that Trink had private detectives invade our apartment at 1040 Park Avenue in '59, I was there and remember it. The ensuing newspaper scandal was the reason we left to reside in Europe for many years.

This was big family gossip of course, and Laura listened to it as a child and later wrote about it. My mother could never marry Bill, and didn't. Her timing was bad. Seeing a married man was a big deal in the '50s, but that the wife was such a wealthy heiress upped the ante. The affair ultimately cost Carter his marriage in 1960, with Wiman divorcing him, I guess Carter blamed my mom for his losing his grip on Wiman's fortune, and their relationship soured. He met and married actress Elaine Stewart, that is after breaking up with my mom in Europe sometime around in 1961 while I was in boarding school. My mother seethes at the mention of his name now and refuses to discuss him, although she did confirm the story of the affair (and Laura admitting to her that it was the inspiration for the song) when interviewed in Michele Kort's book about Laura's life - Soul Picnic.

My mom was not amused at Laura's incisive lyric, but in fact Laura was an investigative journalist as an artist and got the story spot-on in the song. A zinger from my mom's perspective, but a big winner in terms of sale for Laura!

[AllenLowe]

amazing story.

[Chuck Nessa]

Indeed.

[jazzbo]

Wow. Let's keep it on the downlow or it will end up a joing "Dateline" and "48 Hours" Friday night prime time special.

[AllenLowe]

I did think for a minute about Helen, whom I do not know well but who is a very nice lady who just lost her husband (Torrie Vito) - but I guess this story is not likely to get heavy national attention since it's not about one of the new cute young things.

[JSngry]

Hell, it's not really a "scandal" at all afaic. "Lives and Loves" are pretty much part of everyday life.

The real point of interest for me in the story is Laura Nyro...that's one of those songs that sounds really light on the surface, but the more you dig into the lyrics, it becomes a lament of the "Peter Pan syndrome" so prevalent, I guess, always. It could have been Helen Merrill, Helen O'Connell, or Helen Wheels for I care. The Helen Merrill bit is an interesting "jazz diversion" to a much more interesting tale, namely an 18 year old girl being prescient enough to take a very "adult" (or lack thereof) situation and comment on it in a way that was both "poppy" and dead-on serious.

Or maybe I'm stupid - it just now dawned on me that the line about "I look at you and see the passion eyes of May" only makes sense if you realize that May is the month before June, which is of course the traditional month for weddings. That and the part about "in your voice I hear a choir of carousels. Oh but am I ever gonna hear my wedding bells?", how the contrast between a choir, a massive, giddy, ephemeral choir of child's play is always there, always attractive and tempting, but there's no indication that it will ever mature into something adult...I mean, yeah, ok, it's must a pop song. Big scheme of things, life goes on. But outside of that, pretty strong stuff, becuase let's face it - many, many men either don't grow up or else do so only with a life-long struggle to resist and revert.

It's a pretty damn serious song, really. That it was inspired by Helen Merrill's life is really only relevant to jazz geeks like us. What it says is relevant to the lives of a helluva lot of people, then, now, and forever.

Edited May 31, 2010 by JSngry

[Christiern]

Isn't that thread header just a bit misleading?

[JSngry]

No.

[Larry Kart]

I did think for a minute about Helen, whom I do not know well but who is a very nice lady who just lost her husband (Torrie Vito) - but I guess this story is not likely to get heavy national attention since it's not about one of the new cute young things.

Torrie Zito, no?

[JSngry]

Yes.

[mikeweil]

Were there any chances at the time that anybody would get the idea?

[Chuck Nessa]

I would guess only the involved parties.

[AllenLowe]

yes, whoops, Torrie Zito (referring to Larry's correction) -