It's Been A Long, Long Time

Words & Music by Sammy Cahn & Jule Styne
Recorded by Harry James Orchestra, 1945, Kitty Kallen vocal*


C                 C/B              Am7          Am7/G
Kiss me once and kiss me twice and kiss me once again 

      G     C     Edim   G7
It's been a long, long time.

Dm                 Dm+7                Dm7            Dm6
Haven't felt like this, my dear, since can't remember when 

            Dm7    G9     C
It's been a long, long time.

        G     Em7           Em7-5              A7sus4      A7
You'll never know how many dreams I've dreamed about you,

    Dm7           Dm7-5             G7sus4         G7
Or just how empty they all seemed without you,

     C              C/B               Bm7-5          A7
So kiss me once and kiss me twice and kiss me once again 

            Dm7   Fdim Em7-5  A7                                            
It's been a long, long time,  

            Dm7   Fdim  C                                            
It's been a long, long time,

*Thanks and a very large tip of the trivia hat to recent visitor Steve Richmond for the following:

There was a second #1 version of this song in 1945 - credited to Bing Crosby and with a secondary credit on the label to The Les Paul Trio. Yes, *that* less Paul.

Crosby was a big fan of Les's playing since they'd first worked together in the early 40s. But beyond that, Bing was fascinated by his technical wizardry, and sensed its huge commercial potential. So Bing urged Les to build his own studio,which the guitarist did.

As they say, the rest is history. Les Paul , along with wife Mary Ford, had one hit after another in the 50s for Capitol Records which featured Les's "New Sound" technique of multiple recording.

(The above information was taken from a booklett enclosed in a box set of four cassette tapes put out by Capitol Records entitled: "Les Paul - The Legend & The Legacy.)

The lyric and guitar chord transcriptions on this site are the work of The Guitarguy and are intended for private study, research, or educational purposes only. Individual transcriptions are inspired by and and based upon the recorded versions cited, but are not necessarily exact replications of those recorded versions.