# Jimmy Webb MacArthur Park by Richard Harris



## fiestared (Jun 28, 2018)

Do you remember this MASTERPIECE "Richard Harris MacArthur Park" a song of the great Jimmy Webb... it was in 1968




"EDIT" I edited the title


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## Jaap (Jun 28, 2018)

Yes!!! Still on my playlist. I so love this song, such an emotion, beautiful strings, intense music and tempo changes and of course the best line ever! "Someone left the cake out in the rain, I don't think I can't take it cause it took so long to bake and I never have the receipe again..oh no!"

How lovely you brought this up! Good old Dumbledore could sing


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## devonmyles (Jun 28, 2018)

Yeah, great stuff. I love that tune.
Will Lee does a decent version on The Letterman Show (Jimmy Webb joins the band).


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## fiestared (Jun 28, 2018)

Jaap said:


> Yes!!! Still on my playlist. I so love this song, such an emotion, beautiful strings, intense music and tempo changes and of course the best line ever! "Someone left the cake out in the rain, I don't think I can't take it cause it took so long to bake and I never have the receipe again..oh no!"
> 
> How lovely you brought this up! Good old Dumbledore could sing


Oh yes and the orchestration... the harmony... the lyrics...


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## Rasmus Hartvig (Jun 28, 2018)

Oh man, that's indeed a masterpiece! I only knew it in this very 90ies version and didn't even know it was a cover:


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## fiestared (Jun 29, 2018)

fiestared said:


> Do you remember this MASTERPIECE "Richard Harris MacArthur Park" a song of the great Jimmy Webb... it was in 1968



Glen Campbell Wichita Lineman an other masterpiece from Jimmy Webb


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## C.R. Rivera (Jun 29, 2018)

Lovely song, and the DS extended version, imvho, is quite beautiful.
However, the song reveals a different "idyllic" age of the Park.
I went there in 1982, and was very disappointed.
The park was horrible after drugs and the dis-possessed took over.
It has become a place of violence.
I suspect Jimmy Webb will never ever write such a song about such a place today :(


devonmyles said:


> Yeah, great stuff. I love that tune.
> Will Lee does a decent version on The Letterman Show (Jimmy Webb joins the band).


That has got to be a few years ago, right?


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## devonmyles (Jun 29, 2018)

C.R. Rivera said:


> That has got to be a few years ago, right?



Yes, it was. It was Will's birthday, I believe. There is a great piece of theatrical amusement at the end of the tune, with Will and a large cake.


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## MaxOctane (Jun 29, 2018)

Maynard Ferguson's classic take:



The whole thing is wonderfully over-the-top, and then at 1:45 is a beautiful quiet trombone solo, with a lovely sax section coming in at 2:02. There is some really great orchestration through the entire piece. 

If you happened to be a high school trumpet player in the late eighties, you lived off this.


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## jaddne (Jun 30, 2018)

Ok, 1 more version!:


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