Whitney Houston and Gordon Lightfoot

[johnfowles]

I understand that Whitney Houston died the other day.
Over the weekend before last we found ourselves surrounded by the funeral because the memorial service on Saturday was televised from Newark and the burial on Sunday was in Westfield both locations being within about a 6 mile radius of our house
Yes we watched the full 4 hours of the funeral.For me the highlight if there can be such a thing on such an occasion was Kevin Costner's emotional speach.
If you did not see it here it is (highly recommended watching)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2wjh0N1EzPI
I was doing some related reading on wikipedia and somehow found myself on:-
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gordon_Lightfoot
where I read something that I had long forgotten about:-
"In April 1987, Lightfoot filed a lawsuit against composer Michael Masser, claiming that Masser's melody for the song "The Greatest Love of All"—recorded by George Benson(1977) and Whitney Houston (1985)—stole 24 bars from Lightfoot's 1971 hit song "If You Could Read My Mind." The transitional section that begins "I decided long ago never to walk in anyone's shadow" of the Masser song has the same melody as "I don't know where we went wrong but the feeling's gone, and I just can't get it back" of Lightfoot's song. Lightfoot later stated that he did not want people thinking that he had stolen his melody from Masser."
the story is in fact repeated on corfid at:-
http://www.corfid.com/gl/biography.htm
the relevant section starts at about 1:15 in this youtube video
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IYzlVDlE72w&ob=av2e
The biggest surprise I had over this period was the revelation at the Grammy's that Jennifer Hudson when not believing (as in her current television commercial) that she can watch her weight can really sing rather well. Her tribute to Whitney through a rendition of I Will Always love You showed that she is far more than a failed American Idol as I had previously thought.
there is also a nice video of her Grammy's performance on youtube 　
　

[charlene]

Kevin Costner spoke very eloquently about Whitney Houston..I am glad the whole thing was not a 3 ring circus as was Michael Jacksons funeral.

I also recalled the lawsuit but at times when I tried posting the links here and online the site was down and then I forgot about it..lol and I could never find the end result of the lawsuit..

[johnfowles]

Kevin Costner spoke very eloquently about Whitney Houston..I am glad the whole thing was not a 3 ring cirucs as was Michael Jacksons funeral.

I also recalled the lawsuit but at times when I tried posting the links here and online the site was down and then I forgot about it..lol and I could never find the end result of the lawsuit..
after some threads that seem to be being mostly ignored (my thread on a new bootleg has been viewed 455 times with just a single response and that was my own!!
I was inordinately pleased to see that somebody had resonded to my thread on Whitney Thank you Char
I did some googling and found
http://www.mylespaul.com/forums/cellar/131886-biggest-song-rip-offs-2.html
In response to which a Mr Moff from Vancouver Island said just about year ago
"I believe Gordon Lightfoot was successful in his lawsuit against Michael Masser who stole 24 bars from "If You Could Read My Mind" for "The Greatest Love of All", which had been a hit for Whitney Houston.
and I read from
http://zedequalszee.com/2008/10/01/coverage-johnny-cash-if-you-could-read-my-mind/
"If You Could Read My Mind." If you’ve never heard the song before, and part of it sounds familiar, you might be familiar with Whitney Houston’s "Gretest Love of All." Lightfoot sued its songwriter, Michael Masser, alleging that Masser lifted part of the melody ("I don’t where we went wrong, but the feeling’s gone, and I just can’t get it back" in the Lightfoot song lines up with "I decided long ago, never to walk in anyone’s shadow" in the Houston version). They settled out of court and Masser publicly apologized.
Needless to say, the Johnny Cash version (and even the Lightfoot original) blows the Whitney Houston song out of the water."
Hear Hear!!

[charlene]

aha - thanks for the update.
As far as replies... I post mostly for myself. It takes days to write up and post reports/reviews/videos/pics etc. Less than a handful of people reply. That's how it is.

[jj]

oh, i thought the Greatest Love of All plagiarism topic had been discussed over the years here and wayne's ng board for years and there was nothing let to discuss

what is the update that i am missing?

there was also a Whitney death thread thread previously but I can't find it anymore...did the board maintenance blow away some topics? not a big deal

even when topic recur it's still new news to many folks i imagine...any activity on the board is good activity...Corfid Forward :)

[charlene]

I was aksed via PM if I had deleted some threads/posts. I haven't. Dont' know if some tinkering in the last week or so done by Florian had anything to do with it or not. I didn't do anything tho.


I had never read, or perhaps forgot the conclusion to the lawsuit...

yep - old news to some is new to others...lots of lurkers out there and when news like Songwriter Hall of Fame stuff pops up folks start searching the web...some end up here and start reading posts/threads..

[charlene]

you just reached your 4,000 post James!
there is NO prize or cake.. Just a hearty thanks for participating!
LOL
;)

[jj]

They settled out of court and Masser publicly apologized[SIZE=3]

but Gord sent back the cheque, right? with a note saying he just wanting to prove a point...i got a chuckle out of that...i hope that was true

oh, thanks char....if i had a penny for every post, that would just about fill the fridge with Molsons for an afternoon jam:)

[Borderstone]

Act5ually,those bars of music from Gordon's song were "stolen" long before Whiteny entered music.

Most people don't know or have forgotten the song song (written by Michael Masser and Linda Creed ) was originally recorded by George Benson for the 1977 Muhammad Ali biopic "The Greatest."

Benson's 1977 version was an R&B hit, reaching #2 on the R&B chart. It was a moderate pop hit, making #24 on the Billboard Hot 100.

I guess no one really noticed the similarity back then. Benson can barely carry a tune on that one by the way,he was better with the 1980 hit "Give Me the Night". Closer to jazz.

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By the way,"The Greatest Love Of All" also re-entered the lower top 40 after her passing (from people paying to download these songs like crazy.)

"I Wanna Dance With Somebody" (from 1987) also made the top 40.

"I Will Always Love You" made it all the way back to #3,one week later.


Had "I Will always Love You" gone back to #1, she (and Chubby Checker) would have been the only acts to go to #1 twice with their biggest hit,ever.