 One Streisand project that never saw fruition was "Life Cycle of a Woman". Started in 1969 in collaboration with Michel Legrand and the Bergmans, it has been referred to in various articles as "Between Yesterday and Tomorrow", and "The Life and Death of a Young Woman".
Barbra talked to writer Larry Grobel about the project in 1977:
Q: You've been preparing an album called "Life Cycle of a Woman" for six years. It’s supposed to be the first musical drama attempted on record. Why is it taking so long?
STREISAND: I'm already not going to make it. Sounds too impressive. I must pick that up, though. I did one session with three songs and they're quite beautiful. I have more of them.
Q: How often do you just record songs and then forget about it?
STREISAND: A lot.
Streisand's "Life Cycle of a Woman" sessions contain some of the songs that fans have been longing to hear "official" versions of for years. Two songs were included on "Just for the Record": "Between Yesterday & Tomorrow" and "Can You Tell The Moment?".
Barbra, in her liner notes, referred to the project/album as "Between Yesterday & Tomorrow."
Another song, unreleased from those sessions is "Mother and Child".
Michel Legrand referred to the project (in a 1982 interview with Guy Abitan) as "The Life And Death of a Young Woman." He also spoke about it again in his 2003 BBC interview:
Legrand: One day when I started to work with Alan and Marilyn Bergman, one day I said – because, you know I’d been doing orchestrations for Barbra – I said, “Why don’t we write for Barbra a concept album? For instance, what about the idea of the life of someone, a woman? So she’ll be born, baby, young, teenager, first love, marriage, mother, grandmother, and dead.”
“So why don’t we write a cycle of twelve, fourteen songs?” So they loved that idea very much and we wrote it together. The first song is one note, one syllable. Then you wait a few seconds, another syllable. It’s like the heart starting to beat. Two syllables. Three. Four. First phrase. This is exactly the contrary phrase, shorter, shorter. Four syllables. The way people are born and die. At the end, three then two, one, nothing.
We played it for Barbra, she loved it very much but she said to us, “I can’t sing birth and death songs. It’s too deep, it’s too – I mean I can’t talk about death, I can’t talk about …” She says to me, “I will do the album if you cut out the birth and death songs.” I said no.
Author Shaun Considine reported that work resumed on the album in 1985 when Barbra found the tapes and called the Bergmans and Legrand. "The Smile I've Never Smiled" and "Once You've Been In Love" were thought to have been included at that point. Both songs were recorded in the 70's but were unreleased. The song "Wait" [which ended up on A LOVE LIKE OURS] was written at that time for the project.
"Once You've Been in Love" was actually the title tune for the 1972 film "One Is A Lonely Number". A seriocomic film, a 27 year-old wife, in the middle of a divorce, is advised by a feminist to "get a job, get a lawyer and get laid." Her dive into the new world of being single is illustrated as she takes a job as a lifeguard. Interestingly, the film is known under the alternate title "Two is a Happy Number" ... a more positive spin, I guess.
The most beautiful song from the "Life Cycle" sessions is "Mother and Child". It is another Streisand-duet-with-herself. Imagine Michel Legrand's gorgeous melody, Streisand's supple voice, and these Bergman lyrics ...
MOTHER AND CHILD
lyrics by Marilyn & Alan Bergman
music by Michel Legrand
MOTHER:
For a little face, that's the biggest yawn
Look at teddy bear yawning too
All those animals sleeping in your bed
Do you really think there'll be room for you?
Time to tuck you in, warm and cozy-like
Are you comfortable little lamb?
Such a sleepy smile you must surely know
All the lovely things you'll be dreaming of
Swinging tree top high, sliding belly down
Eating jelly beans to your heart's delight
In a fairy tale in a wonderland through the night...
CHILD:
I hope that she forgets and leaves my door open
So I can have a little light from the hallway
If I can hear them talking, If I can hear them laughing
I know I won't be frightened, maybe
At night I know that's just my chair, the nice red one
But it looks different than it looks in the daytime
Sometimes I think it's moving, a big enormous monster
A dinosaur or dragon maybe
I close my eyes and there are ghosts and witches
I'm scared a wicked witch will eat me
Oh, how I wish it wasn't always dark at night...
BOTH SING SAME PARTS, DUETING
hear a sample:
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