Dame Shirley Bassey rights Goldfinger 'wrong notes'

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Sean Connery and Shirley Bassey back in 1964Image source, Getty/BBC
Image caption,

All gold - Sean Connery as 007 and Shirley Bassey with a hit back in 1964

It is enough to leave James Bond - like his vodka Martini - shaken or a little stirred, but Dame Shirley Bassey has admitted there are two wrong notes in Goldfinger.

Now the Cardiff-born singer has re-recorded the hit 007 movie theme 50 years later as part of her new album.

"Everyone's going to be listening for those two wrong notes in the original," she said.

"For me they always sounded wrong and I could never get it right in my head."

She told BBC Radio Wales presenter Wynne Evans: "My musical directors through the years said there was nothing wrong with it.

"It was probably me. But now with my voice we've lowered the song, and I can't hear those wrong notes any more - and it sounds so right, I'm so glad we got to do it again."

Image caption,

Dame Shirley talked to Wynne Evans about how her voice had changed over the years

Dame Shirley is marking 61 years in the business with the album Hello Like Before.

"All the songs I'd wanted to sing when I heard them - I was too young, I'm at the right age to do it," she said.

"I'm really happy because I chose all the songs. It's the first time I've chosen all the songs on an album.

"The recording companies always had ideas of the albums they wanted. I had a say but this is the first time I've got complete control."

HER THREE FAVOURITE SONGS

Diamonds Are a Girl's Best Friend, a duet with Paloma Faith: "We met after her show in Monte Carlo we got on really well, like we'd known each other for years. It was wonderful doing it, she's so natural - I love her."

An Englishman in New York: "I liked it from the first time I heard Sting do it. Why I can't I sing that? Years ago they'd say 'you're a woman, you can't sing that' but now anything goes."

MacArthur Park: "I broke down rehearsing it - I got to a part and there was something there, something deep in the dark recesses of my mind that was there and came out. I got half way through and I blubbed. When I first heard Richard Harris doing it, it did something to me then."

Wynne Evans's Big Welsh Weekend, is on Friday 21 November at 13:00 GMT.

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