Blame It on My Youth

Blame It on My Youth is probably my favourite jazz standard. I heard it first in the Bamboo Bar in Bangkok - an amazing place for live jazz, like stepping back in time. The singer Cynthia Utterbach explained how the song had blown her away when she first heard it, and then she sang it beautifully, and it blew me away as well.

It was written in 1934 by Oscar Levant and Edward Heyman. Since then it has been recorded numerous times, but I don't think it could ever get old. This is my attempt to do it as a solo piano piece:

It has beautiful lyrics too (so long as I don't try to sing them):

If I expected love when first we kissed,
Blame it on my youth.
If only just for you I did exist,
Blame it on my youth.

I believed in everything,
Like a child of three.
You meant more than anything,
You meant all the world to me.

If you were on my mind all night and day,
Blame it on my youth.
If I forgot to eat and sleep and pray,
Blame it on my youth.

If I cried a little bit,
When first I learned the truth...
Don't blame it on my heart,
Blame it on my youth.