Sunday, October 01, 2006

Autumn Leaves Number Two

Here's another of the more spectacular specimens from my collection of vintage ties featuring autumn leaves. This is a fairly recent addition to my collection, which means, as it generally does, that I've added it within the last 2 or 3 years. Unfortunately, neither my wife nor I can remember just where we picked it up, or where it came from.

The tie does have one label which reads:
Haband
Peterson, N.J.
Typing the words "autumn leaves" naturally made me think of the song by that same name, and most especially, when I think of that song, I think of the version by Roger Williams, which apparently spent a month at #1 on the pop charts back in 1955, when I was a mere toddler.

Much later, my freshman year in high school in fact, I sang in the men's chorus. The men's club always put on the fall talent show, and the men's chorus always sang "Autumn Leaves" as the "title song" so to speak.

Later on, probably my junior or senior year, we had this remarkable pianist on campus named Bob Silverman (so far as I know, no relation to the well-known classical Canadian pianist of the same name) who could play virtually anything in any style, and who could imitate the Roger Williams version of the song to perfection. Later he went on to play for the Heritage Singers, an Adventist gospel singing group. I haven't seen or heard of him in years.

Anyway, that song still evokes bittersweet romantic emotions whenever I hear it. To me it's the perfect evocation of the autumnal season. What's that got to do with this tie? Not much, except that this tie, too, provides a welcome reminder of autumn.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I recognize this tie from the cover of the book 'Fit To Be Tied.'