“Stay” performed on the Dinah Shore show in 1976

Bowie’s Christmas duet with Bing Crosby has become famous, in part because it became one of the Christmas songs that gets played every year, but also because it’s such an odd pairing. In one sense, it must have seemed stranger back in 1979 when it happened— Crosby was not just at the very end of his long career and life but he really represented a bygone age, whereas Bowie represented the new, the edgy, the future. A few years before Let’s Dance, it was also one of the first hints that Bowie was edging toward the mainstream.

Anyway, I mention this because this video of Bowie on the Dinah Shore Show is a feint in that direction. He doesn’t sing with Dinah, and if he did, that would have been as weird as his collaboration with Bing. As a child, I knew of Dinah Shore for this show— my grandmother would watch it seemingly every day. What I didn’t appreciate was that she became famous as a singer in the 40s— she actually got her start in 1939 (which puts some perspective into her comment about Bowie adopting a retro-30’s look). So there’s a scenario where she could have done a song with Bowie, and that would have been strange.

As it is, Bowie’s performance of one of my favorite songs is very strong. “Stay” was new at the time— he must have been promoting the album, Station to Station. Interestingly, he initially seems very disappointed by his own performance. He tells Dinah that he wished he could have done it over again, and she says she knows how he feels. That little moment of connection is a fascinating insight into what must be a common type of perfectionism among performers. Bowie snaps out of it and greets the audience after seeming to be in a period of self reflection for the opening minute or so of the interview portion of this clip.

Also, if you ever wanted to see David Bowie discuss the nature and meaning of love with Henry Winkler, here is your chance. It turns out that Bowie was a fan of the Fonz. I recently came across a picture of John Lennon brining his son to the set of Happy Days. He took a picture with the cast. It’s clear from the picture that the cast was thrilled to be with John Lennon, but his son was thrilled to be next to Fonzie.

The one downside to this clip is that the video is a little scratchy and the audio skips in parts. But it’s worth watching.

Oh, stick around for the king fu lesson at the very end. Its brief, but its the most surreal part of the whole clip.