Cass Elliot – Dream A Little Dream Of Me

Cass Elliot performing ‘Dream A Little Dream Of Me ‘ on British TV show ‘It’s Lulu’ aired on July 25, 1970.

“Dream A Little Dream Of Me” is a widely recorded standard originally published in 1931. When Cass Elliot recorded it in 1968, it became her signature song and the best-known version. It was written by the famous lyricist Gus Kahn with music by two lesser-known composers: Fabian Andre and Wilbur Schwandt.

Cass Elliot was a member of The Mamas & the Papas, who were on the verge of breaking up when she recorded this song with backing vocals from her bandmates. The idea came from the other Mama, Michelle Phillips. As she explained to NPR, Phillips met one of the song’s composers, Fabian Andre, when she was 6 years old. When the band was rehearsing, they got word that Andre had died from a fall down an elevator shaft. This sparked the memory of her meeting him, and they decided to record his song.

Dream a Little Dream is a single from the debut solo album by American singer Cass Elliot immediately following the breakup of The Mamas & the Papas, though she was still billed as “Mama Cass” for this release. Capitalizing on the success of her first solo song as the album’s title, it was released in October 1968 by Dunhill Records.

Cass Elliot had agreed to a three-album deal as a solo artist with Dunhill Records less than a month after her split with the Mamas & the Papas.

Elliot’s original title for the album was going to be “In the Words of My Friends,” called this because most of the songs she chose were written by friends and family.

The album itself is very much a concept album. While working with the Mamas & the Papas, Elliot felt severely limited in her desire to try different musical styles and took this album as that opportunity. The album contains touches of country, blues, rock, jazz, gospel, and bluegrass. When interviewed about the split, she told the Los Angeles Free Press, “I have a lot of things inside me to sing and I can’t expect the others to wait around until I have got things out of my system. It’s not that I wanted to leave the group, it’s just that I wanted to do some things on my own.”

The musicians on this song were many of the same West Coast session pros (later known as “The Wrecking Crew”) who backed The Mamas & the Papas on songs like California Dreamin’. Here’s the lineup:

Keyboards – Larry Knechtel
Bass – Joe Osborn
Drums – Hal Blaine

In addition to Cass’ bandmates Denny Doherty, John Phillips and Michelle Phillips, Jill Gibson and Scott McKenzie also sang backup. McKenzie, who had a hit with “San Francisco (Be Sure To Wear Flowers In Your Hair),” was good friends with John Phillips.

To promote the single, Dunhill Records placed ads in trade magazines showing Elliot lying naked in a bed of daisies, a shocking image at a time when there was no such thing as a plus-size model. According to her daughter Owen, who became her biographer, Cass “was determined to be the most famous fat girl that ever lived, and she absolutely did that.”

“Dream a Little Dream of Me” – single by Mama Cass from the album Mama Cass
Released October 1968
Composers Fabian Andre, Wilbur Schwandt
Lyricists Gus Kahn
Producer John Simon
Charted No.11 UK; No.12 US