Aretha Franklin - This Bitter Earth (Columbia Records 1964) video free download

"This Bitter Earth" is a 1960 song made famous by rhythm and blues singer Dinah Washington and written and produced by Clyde Otis.

Aretha's rendition as well as many other can be found on 'Unforgettable: A Tribute to Dinah Washington' which is a studio tribute album dedicated to the recently deceased singer Dinah Washington whom passed away in December 14, 1963. This album was recorded in less than two months after Dinah's death on February 7th to 10th, 1964. Aretha would later recant, "I first heard Dinah when I was just a kid," she said, "back around the time she made 'Fat Daddy.' I never got to know her personally in those days, though she and my father were good friends.

"The idea of recording a tribute to her grew out of the way I've always felt about her. I didn't try to do the songs the same way she did them, necessarily - just the way they felt best, whether they happened to be similar or different."

The sessions were recorded in New York. A few tunes were cut with strings in order to bring out the essential ballad character of the songs (with the help of Bob Mersey's arranging); most of the tracks, though, were made with the assistance of a small and sympathetic accompanying group for which Mersey supplied minimal written guidance.

This bitter earth

What fruit it bares

What good is love

That no one wants to share

And if my lifem my life is like the dust

That haunts the glow of a rose

Tell me what good am I

Heaven, heave, heave, heaven only knows

Ooh this, this bitter earth

Well I found it can be, be, be so cold

Today you're young

And before you know it

Too soon you've grown old

But while a voice within me cries

Someone, someone may answer my call

And this bitter earth

This bitter, bitter earth

May not, may not be so bitter after all

While a voice, while this voice

Within me cries

Someone, someone may answer my call

And this, this bitter earth

This real cold earth

Mmm... may not be so bitter after all

Mmm...