- published: 27 Mar 2011
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Benny (Bennie) Fields (born: Benjamin Geisenfeld) (June 14, 1894 – August 16, 1959) was a popular singer of the early 20th century, best known as one-half of the Blossom Seeley-Benny Fields vaudeville team
Born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, Fields began his career in Chicago, as a singer in Al Tierney's cafe on 22nd Street. The tall young man had a gentle, easygoing way with a song, and held the listeners' rapt attention with tunes like "Melancholy Baby." Singer Blossom Seeley, touring in vaudeville, found Fields and hired him to sing—offstage—in accompaniment to her solo numbers, Fields's voice gradually got more attention until he became a partner in the act. Fields's laid-back stylings complemented Seeley's vivacious beltings beautifully, and Seeley and Fields became very successful on stage and in recordings. In the late 1920s Warner Bros. filmed their songs and comic patter for Vitaphone short subjects. On radio, Fields was heard on The Ziegfeld Follies of the Air and other shows.
Fields launched a solo career in New York in 1933. He appeared occasionally in films, most notably in The Big Broadcast of 1937, but remained a New York-based performer. He filmed four songs (including two of the Big Broadcast numbers) for Soundies in 1941.
All and all I guess that there's so many things
That we don't say and it's
What makes us sad I think sometimes
That makes us close but I don't mind, I don't mind
In the alleys and the bonefields of Arkansas
Past the piles of tyres and the
Smell of hot tar you threw your papers
In the rain under your hat you had a world, a world
There ain't no father
There ain't no mother
There ain't no sister
Ain't got no brother
Running to no one
Running for cover
In the valleys and the twilight of Illinois
Under the new moon I write in my book
And I walk the streets where no one lives not even you but
You don't mind, you don't mind
And all and all I guess that there's so many things
That we don't say
Today you think that I don't even like you
But don't you know you are my world, my world
There ain't no father
There ain't no mother
I don't see my sister
Ain't got no brothers
Running to no one
Left to each other
There ain't no father
There ain't no mother
I don't see my sister
Ain't got no brothers
Running to Jesus
Running to lovers
Running to strangers
Running for cover
Running to no one