By Scott Barbarino***Actor-singer Bob Ader’s Harry Who? (The Songs of Harry Warren), performed at Don’t Tell Mama, answers his question and solidifies the truth of the phrase “they don’t write ‘em like that anymore!”
Bob Ader is classic old school in the very best way. Effervescent on stage, his shtick worked from top to bottom and sideways. Back in the day his personality could have seen him cast as a character on the 1950s Phil Silvers TV show, “Sergeant Bilko” (or the 
1996 film of the same name based on the show). Ader could have easily been in a crap game with the boys behind the barracks. He’s a real character with a big resonant voice, which worked very well for the Harry Warren songs he delivered. He’s also a very apt, vigorous tapper and aces at his impersonations of old Hollywood royalty—something tells me he’s got a million of them. All were spot-on good and all recognizable to me as a person of a certain age. His pianist, Elliot Finkle, who tickles a mean ivory, is clearly like Ader, a big fan of Warren’s songbook. Their mutual respect for Warren’s music was so clear as they took particular care to meticulously include every intro verse to every song.
Bob Ader, with direction from Marilyn Spanier, did a wonderful job of bringing Warren’s songbook to the stage. If you don’t know who Harry Warren was, you’ve more than likely heard his music. Collaborating with many of the greats of the early years of The Great American Songbook, he wrote over 800 songs that defined the era, while at the same time remaining timeless. If you know who Harry Warren was and know his music, watching any future show with old-school song and dance man Ader will be very satisfying.
Here’s a partial list of the iconic songs we’ve been blessed with by the incomparable Harry Warren. “I Only Have Eyes for You,” “You Must Have Been a Beautiful Baby,” “Jeepers Creepers,” “The Gold Diggers’ Song (We’re in the Money),” “That’s Amore,” “There Will Never Be Another You,” “The More I See You,” “At Last” and “You’ll Never Know.” Warren worked with the best lyricists of the time, including Al Dubin, Ira Gershwin, Johnny Mercer and Leo Robin. With Mack Gordon, their 1942 “Chattanooga Choo-Choo” became the first gold record in history. But why the title “Harry Who?” Warren was notoriously low-key about a gigantic career; he was, for example, nominated for eleven Oscars (he won three of them). He himself joked about seldom being recognized, even on the film sets he provided the music for.
So, truly Mr. Warren, “There Will Never Be Another You.”
