Elvis Costello covers three Burt Bacharach songs at Gramercy

Elvis Costello opened his 10-night run at New York’s Gramercy Theatre on Thursday with a tribute to his longtime collaborator Burt Bacharach, the legendary composer who died Wednesday at 94.

Costello, 68, lined three of the important Sixties pop composer’s songs: “Baby, It’s You,” which was recorded by the Shirelles and the Beatles; Dionne Warwick and lyricist Hal David’s “Anyone Who Had a Heart,” which Costello and Ron Isley every lined; and Bacharach’s early hit “Please Stay,” which was recorded by the Drifters in 1961.

The salute additionally got here as Costello readies to launch the four-CD field set “The Songs of Bacharach and Costello” in March, highlighting the musicians’ decades-long oeuvre and friendship.

According to Variety, Costello promised the sold-out crowd that he could be delving into their songbook of collaborations later within the Gramercy run when his longtime pianist Steve Nieve joins.

“It’s been a tough day,” mentioned Costello, in keeping with fan footage from the present. “You know, a really great man left us yesterday. And people say, when somebody leaves you who’s a great age, they say, well, it was a good ending. Yeah, [but] it’s never time to say goodbye to somebody if you love ’em. And I’m not ashamed to say I did love this man. And for everything he gave.”

In January, upon saying the field set, the British musician mentioned on Twitter and Instagram that he first heard Bacharach’s songs when his household “was still living in a basement flat near Olympia” in London within the late Nineteen Fifties.

“Never would I have imagined that my admiration for him would grow into a 25-year collaboration and friendship,” he wrote on the time. “I can’t wait to share our entire story with the world on March 3rd.”

Costello lined a few of Bacharach’s songs early in his profession earlier than he began straight working with the composer within the Nineteen Nineties. He recorded “Baby, It’s You” as a duet with Nick Lowe within the Eighties, then recorded “Please Stay” for his 1995 covers album “Kojak Variety.”

He teamed up with Bacharach to write down “God Give Me Strength” for Allison Anders’ 1996 music movie “Grace of My Heart.” After that, they labored on the 1998 album “Painted From Memory,” which resulted within the duo successful a Grammy for pop collaboration with vocals for his or her tune “I Still Have That Other Girl.” The three-time Oscar-winning Bacharach informed The Times in 2020 that his collaboration with England’s erstwhile offended younger man was “one of the best things I ever did.”

The “She” and “Alison” hitmaker informed the viewers on Thursday that he at all times preferred the chance to play Bacharach’s music and requested the group to sing together with “Baby, It’s You,” which he described as a “gentle song” that he realized from the Beatles.

The acerbic singer-songwriter additionally made a dig about an “extraordinary” however “not tremendously insightful” obituary he learn within the New York Times about Bacharach, which he mentioned made the “strange claim that Burt Bacharach, the man who wrote the music for ‘What the World Needs Now Is Love,’ was apolitical.”