"Mañana (Is Soon Enough for Me)" is a popular

song A song is a musical composition performed by the human voice. The voice often carries the melody (a series of distinct and fixed pitches) using patterns of sound and silence. Songs have a structure, such as the common ABA form, and are usu ...

that was written by

Peggy Lee Norma Deloris Egstrom (May 26, 1920 – January 21, 2002), known professionally as Peggy Lee, was an American jazz and popular music singer, songwriter, and actress whose career spanned seven decades. From her beginning as a vocalist on local r ...

and her first husband

Dave Barbour David Michael Barbour (May 28, 1912 – December 11, 1965) was an American jazz guitarist. He was married to singer Peggy Lee and was her co-writer, accompanist, and bandleader. Biography Barbour was born in Long Island, New York, United States ...

and published in 1947. Peggy Lee recorded the song on November 25, 1947, with Dave Barbour's orchestra as backing. Released by

Capitol Records Capitol Records, LLC (known legally as Capitol Records, Inc. until 2007), and simply known as Capitol, is an American record label owned by Universal Music Group through its Capitol Music Group imprint. It was founded as the first West Coast-base ...

(catalog number 15022), it became her biggest chart hit. For the week ending January 23, 1948, the single entered

Billboard A billboard (also called a hoarding in the UK and many other parts of the world) is a large outdoor advertising structure (a billing board), typically found in high-traffic areas such as alongside busy roads. Billboards present large advertis ...

's Best Sellers chart, where it spent 21 weeks, nine of those at number one.

Background

''Mañana'' is Spanish for "tomorrow" (though it also means "morning"). The theme of the humorous song is the singer wanting to put off urgent tasks until the next day. The song is typically performed with stereotypical Hispanic accents, and with a Latin flavor to the backup band. Lee's autobiography emphasized that the song was her portrait of a single happy-go-lucky individual, written during a relaxing Mexican vacation, and she regretted that some listeners perceived it as cultural mockery.

Notable covers

The following artists have covered the song: *

The Mills Brothers The Mills Brothers, sometimes billed The Four Mills Brothers and originally known as Four Boys and a Guitar, were an American jazz and traditional pop vocal quartet who made more than 2,000 recordings that sold more than 50 million copies and g ...

recorded the song on December 31, 1947 for Decca Records (catalog No. 24333). They recorded it again for their album ''Great Hits - Vol. 2'' (1960). *

Billy May Edward William May Jr. (November 10, 1916 – January 22, 2004) was an American composer, arranger and trumpeter. He composed film and television music for ''The Green Hornet (TV series), The Green Hornet'' (1966), ''The Mod Squad (TV series), T ...

, on his 1955 album '' Arthur Murray Cha Cha Mambos'' * Gary Crosby on his album ''The Happy Bachelor'' (1960). *

The Four Freshmen The Four Freshmen is an American male vocal quartet that blends close and open harmony, open-harmonic jazz arrangements with the big band vocal group sounds of The Modernaires, The Pied Pipers, and The Mel-Tones, founded in the Barbershop music, ...

, on the 1961 album ''Voices in Fun''. *

Dean Martin Dean Martin (born Dino Paul Crocetti; June 7, 1917 – December 25, 1995) was an American singer, actor, and comedian. Nicknamed the "Honorific nicknames in popular music, King of Cool", he is regarded as one of the most popular entertainers of ...

for his album '' Dino Latino'' (1962)

In popular culture

Olga San Juan Olga San Juan (March 16, 1927January 3, 2009) was an American actress and comedian. Born in Brooklyn, she began her brief film career with Paramount Pictures after being scouted at Copacabana. She performed in several Hollywood musicals in the ...

(1956 on ''The

Rosemary Clooney Rosemary Clooney (May 23, 1928 – June 29, 2002) was an American singer and actress. She came to prominence in the early 1950s with the song "Come On-a My House", which was followed by other pop numbers such as "Botch-a-Me (Ba-Ba-Baciami Piccin ...

Show'') *In

Jack Kerouac Jean-Louis Lebris de Kérouac (; March 12, 1922 – October 21, 1969), known as Jack Kerouac, was an American novelist and poet who, alongside William S. Burroughs and Allen Ginsberg, was a pioneer of the Beat Generation. Of French-Canadian ...

's novel ''

On the Road ''On the Road'' is a 1957 novel by American writer Jack Kerouac, based on the travels of Kerouac and his friends across the United States. It is considered a defining work of the postwar Beat and Counterculture generations, with its protagoni ...

'', the narrator, Sal Paradise, describes the shack where his Mexican girlfriend's family lives and quotes some of the lyrics: "The window she is broken and the rain she is coming in". He also mentions how his girlfriend's brother is always "putting off everything till ''mañana''." *In "The Merchant of Korea" (episode 14, season 6 of ''

M*A*S*H ''M*A*S*H'' (an acronym for Mobile Army Surgical Hospital) is an American media franchise consisting of a series of novels, a film, several television series, plays, and other properties, and based on the semi-autobiographical fiction of Richa ...

''),

Winchester Winchester (, ) is a City status in the United Kingdom, cathedral city in Hampshire, England. The city lies at the heart of the wider City of Winchester, a local government Districts of England, district, at the western end of the South Downs N ...

sings "Mañana" after playing poker all night (and losing). *In the ''

Seinfeld ''Seinfeld'' ( ) is an American television sitcom created by Larry David and Jerry Seinfeld that originally aired on NBC from July 5, 1989, to May 14, 1998, with a total of nine seasons consisting of List of Seinfeld episodes, 180 episodes. It ...

'' episode "

The Blood The Blood may refer to: * The Blood of Christ * The Blood (band), an English punk rock band * The Blood (Seinfeld), an episode of the American sitcom Seinfeld * The Blood (album), a 2007 album by Kevin Max * The Blood (film), a 1922 German silen ...

", Kramer and Newman listen to jazz organist

Jackie Davis Benjamin Jackson Porter "Jackie" Davis (December 13, 1920 – November 2, 1999) was an American soul jazz singer, organist and bandleader. He is notable for his contributions in bringing the Hammond organ to the forefront of jazz and pop, preced ...

' instrumental version of the song while making sausages in Jerry's apartment, and again while driving Kramer's blood to the blood bank. *In

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...

in the early 1990s, a version of the song was used as a jingle in commercials for

banana A banana is an elongated, edible fruit – botanically a berry – produced by several kinds of large treelike herbaceous flowering plants in the genus '' Musa''. In some countries, cooking bananas are called plantains, distinguishing the ...

s, as "Bananas Are Good Enough For Me". *In the 1990 movie '' The Shrimp on the Barbie'', "Mañana" is the song in the closing credits, performed by The Herbs.

References

External links

* Number-one singles in the United States 1947 songs Songs written by Peggy Lee Songs written by Dave Barbour {{pop-song-stub