Listening Blog #8 - "C'est si bon" - Eartha Kitt

Instrumentation: Voice (Kitt and background male vocals), Drums, Bass, Horn Section (Trumpet), Saxophones, Clarinet

Texture: The song has a fairly varied texture, given the variety of musical lines going on at one time. In general, the song consists of Kitt’s solo line and backup accompaniment. Kitt’s voice has an unusual texture: it’s slightly raspy, but memorable in its delivery: and at the higher vocal range, her voice shows a completely different texture, approaching a belted, Broadway-style sound.

Range: The instruments generally stay in safe middle ranges, since they are background. The horns sometimes play higher at the end of verse phrases, and they have a short feature at the song’s introduction. Kitt herself sings mostly in a low range, in order sound coquettish and alluring, except for near the end, when she belts at the high vocal range to signify the song’s finale.

Tempo: The tempo is constant throughout the song, with the bass playing a steady plucked rhythm underneath the song to keep the tempo.

Meter: The song is in duple meter: again, the bass’ presence enforces this metric structure.

Volume: Throughout most of the song, Kitt sing-speaks pretty softly, sometimes in almost a purr or whisper: this creates an intimate and flirtacious aspect to the song. However, at the song’s finale she belts out the higher notes loudly: while part of this is related is simply because singers naturally sing louder as they get higher, Kitt creates additional volume to make the finale more dramatic.

Form: The song starts off strophic, with typical verses and chorus, and then transforms to Kitt speaking over the repeating background of “c’est bon, c’est bon”, then ends with a dramatic return to the strophic form with a sung final “c’est tellment bon”.

Lyrics: The lyrics are largely French, with a few American phrases thrown in (“Cadillac car, “yacht”, and “mink coats”). Translated to English, the song details a girl talking about how life is good and carefree walking with her lover. She then talks about how she’s looking for a millionaire who can give her all these riches, but at the song’s end she seems to dismiss these dreams, saying it doesn’t matter when this occurs: it seems that she is willing to simply enjoy the present.

Mood: The song has elements of jazz in it, but the focus is on Kitt’s sultry delivery of the words. Like Billie Holiday, the emphasis is not so much on what she says or the quality of her singing, but in the power of her delivery. Kitt’s voice seems pretty sexually suggestive, which is a big departure from what we’ve heard previously.