Autumn Leaves was written in 1945 – in French. The original poem was written by Jacques Prévert and the music by Joseph Kosma (thank you Wikipedia). Even though it was sung by Yves Montand – yes, you remember him – it wasn’t until Johnny Mercer wrote the English words that it really took off. It’s still being recorded by the upcoming artists today and has become a popular jazz standard, not bad for a song that is pushing 68 this year. I wonder how many of today’s ‘wun rap wunders’ will be remembered in seventy years? To be fair, of course, there was a lot of terrible music around in the ’40s too – thankfully it’s mostly gone and luckily completely forgotten.
Bananas, like leaves are only green because their skins are laced with chlorophyll and like leaves as the chlorophyll breaks down the yellow shows up better and better and they start to look ripe and appetising (if you like bananas).
The leaves of other trees don’t seem to have as appetising an appearance – but they do look pretty.
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Track and Hedge 
Nice post on a lovely song – and thanks so much for the pingback!
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Thanks for the comment – loved your blog! – it makes my ‘walk round the block’ with The Dog (and sometimes my wife too) seem a little tame.
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