Take Me Along -- the songs

Okay, as I mentioned a few days ago, I was going to post of a few songs from the musical, Take Me Along, written by Bob Merrill.  It's such a charming, evocative score -- and so little known -- that I thought it deserved the extra attention.  Anyway, we got a little detoured with a story about the show's source, but now back to the musical part of the evening.

This first one today is sung by Walter Pidgeon, who played Nat Miller (the character portrayed by Will Rogers in the original stageplay version, Ah, Wilderness! by Eugene O'Neill).  He plays the father of a young teenager, and the father of the boy's girlfriend has come over to have it out with Nat, as the relationship has been heating up more that he cares for, in that time of 1910 Connecticut.  After the girl's father leaves, Nat is left alone to stew and then lead in to his lovely ballad, "Staying Young."

Walter Pidgeon above with his son in Take Me Along, Richard, played by Robert Morse -- who in a couple years would become a star of his own in How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying, and today, 54 years, later, plays Bertram Cooper, one of the founders of the Sterling Cooper ad agency on Mad Men.