“Choucoune” (Haitian Creole: Choukoun) is a 19th century Haitian song composed by Michel Mauleart Monton with lyrics from a poem by Oswald Durand. It was rewritten with English lyrics in the 20th century as “Yellow Bird.” One of Oswald Durand’s most famous works is the 1883 “Choucoune,” a lyrical poem praising the beauty of a Haitian woman of that nickname. Michel Mauleart Monton, an American-born pianist with a Haitian father and an American mother, composed music for the poem in 1893 appropriating some French and Caribbean fragments to create his tune; the musical piece “Choucoune” was first performed in Port-au-Prince on 14 May 14 1893. The song became a popular slow méringue (mereng) song in Haiti and was prominently showcased during the bicentennial celebrations of Port-au-Prince in 1949.

The English rendering of “Choucoune”: “Yellow Bird”, first appeared on the album Calypso Holiday, a 1957 release by the Norman Luboff Choir, Norman Luboff having arranged the song in the calypso style which had become popular in the English speaking world in the mid-1950s. The lyrics for “Yellow Bird” by Alan and Marilyn Bergman have no connection with the narrative of the Durand poem other than that poem featuring the words “ti zwazo” (little birds) in its refrain on which account the original Haitian song is sometimes called “Ti Zwazo” or “Ti Zwezo”. The song became a minor hit at #70 on the Billboard Hot 100 for the Mills Brothers in 1959; its most successful incarnation came in the summer of 1961 when the Arthur Lyman Group reached #4 with their Hawaiian flavored instrumental version which bested a rival instrumental single release by Lawrence Welk (#61). “Yellow Bird” has also been recorded by Keely Smith, Roger Whitaker, Roger Williams, Johnny Tillotson and Paul Clayton. The song continues to be popularly associated with calypso and the Caribbean and is often performed by steelpan bands but some versions, such as Chris Isaak’s from Baja Sessions, evidence a Hawaiian flavor. “Yellow Bird” was sung by Vivian Vance on a two-part Here’s Lucy episode, “Lucy Goes Hawaiian,” which aired February 15 and Feb. 22, 1971. Vance sang it in a high falsetto, with a calypso beat, dressed in yellow and sprouting feathers like a canary (including a long tail feather) perched on a swing decorated as a nest, that lowered her in the beginning of the song and lifted her at the end. A long spoken-word mid-section features Vance riffing on the types of male birds she’d like to hook up with. A clip of this version is on YouTube. The 23 October 1989 broadcast of the CBS TV series Murphy Brown entitled “Miles Big Adventure” ends with guest star Yeardley Smith serenading her unwilling object of desire Miles Silverberg with a snippet of “Yellow Bird”. This song was played by an African percussion band in a Full House episode, “The House Meets the House – Part 2” at Walt Disney World. The Wiggles sing this song on their “Let’s Eat” album and DV.D “To Bowl or Not To Bowl,” an episode of The Looney Tunes Show that first aired on July 27, 2011, featured an uptempo, ska-like version of “Yellow Bird” during the Merrie Melodies song segment of the same name performed by Holland Greco. Harry Belafonte had a 1957 single release entitled “Don’t Ever Love Me” which set different English lyrics (written by Lord Burgess to Michel Mauleart Monton’s setting for “Choucune”, initially the B-side of “Mama Look At Bubu” (#11), “Don’t Ever Love Me” itself entered the Billboard Hot 100 at #90.  This song can also be found on the CD album “Harry Belafonte – All Time Greatest Hits Vol. I” (track #2).

By The Mills Brothers

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bBbgZauYL1Q

By The Brothers Four

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QlcPGKhIQaU

Choucoune by Desandann

Lyrics