Whose Version of “I Love Paris” Is the Best?

“I Love Paris” has been performed and recorded by dozens of musicians. Written by Cole Porter in 1953, the song has been interpreted by artists ranging from Bing Crosby and Ella Fitzgerald to Michel Legrand. What’s striking is not just the number of versions, but how differently each musician renders the song.

Running at about four minutes, the lyrics are relatively simple, leaving performers considerable interpretive freedom through tonal variation, pacing, and choices of instrumentation. Most recordings, however, make the same fundamental mistake: they approach Paris through a tourist’s gaze, treating it as an abstraction or postcard rather than a vibrant city full of energy and contradictions. They offer sophistication, instead of feeling, grandeur instead of authenticity.

Esther Phillips’s 1970 live recording (appearing on her album “Confessin’ the Blues”) was the first version I heard, and that initial encounter probably affected my perception. However, unlike other situations where the primacy effect might be at play, I believe that my preference for her approach is rooted in the deliberative musical choices she made. Another important factor to consider is that it is a live performance in front of an audience versus a studio version. Let’s briefly look at other singers’ versions.

Frank Sinatra’s 1960 rendition, for example, is supported by lush string arrangements and appears unnecessarily slow. Each carefully placed pause, each swelling orchestral phrase, reminds you that you’re watching a performer rather than hearing someone express genuine affection.

For Sinatra and others (Bing Crosby, Doris Day, etc.) Paris is treated as an abstraction, a symbol of culture and refinement rather than a lived place. These versions of the song probably belong in a luxury hotel lobby, not in the streets of well-traveled neighborhoods where daily life unfolds.

Ella Fitzgerald’s version has similar challenges. The orchestration is busy. But this time it’s not the string section that is doing the work, but the brass and rhythm ones. In this context, the song’s intimacy vanishes entirely. Similar to the Sinatra version, the listener is forced to admire a performance rather than experiencing emotion.

Even the upbeat versions often miss the mark. For example, Peter Cincotti’s performance captures remarkable energy, but the arrangement features an extended piano instrumental that functions more as a showcase for his jazz virtuosity. As a result, the song becomes a vehicle for displaying musicianship rather than conveying a genuine attachment to Paris and the way it resonates with the performer.

Phillips strips all of this away. Her recording opens with a solitary bass line before she begins singing. This puts her voice front and center. When she sings “I love Paris… in the springtime,” she sets the song up as a playful take and interpretation of the city in the way that Sinatra and others don’t.

All in all, Philips delivers the message as if she’s confiding in something true. The faint sound of audience applause in the background only reinforces that sense of intimacy.

The tempo is moderate but purposeful, and the performance builds organically. Phillips’s distinctive phrasing sounds relaxed and unforced. By the second verse, the tempo, with the addition of the rhythm guitar and drums, subtly increases. The backing band does not overwhelm the vocal, but supports it with a growing sense of momentum. When she reaches “I love Paris in the fall,” there is genuine warmth in her voice, as though she is recalling specific moments rather than performing a standard. The line, “I’ve got to have it every morning,” is a playful, slightly cheeky double entendre. Phillips conveys the city’s romance, sensuality, rhythm, and pleasure. Her performance sounds spontaneous, and this makes the performance feel lived rather than from a distance.

Not only does Phillips’s rendering sound as if she has visited Paris, but like a skilled urban ethnographer, she’s experienced it numerous times. And that visit is not confined to the touristy neighborhoods.

This is why Phillips’s version captures something essential about Paris that other renditions miss. Phillips’s performance, with its intimacy and warmth, its building energy and conversational phrasing, conveys the experience of being in the city rather than admiring it from afar.

Would another version resonate as deeply if I had heard it first? Perhaps. First encounters shape our relationships with music in lasting ways. But when this song surfaces in my mind, especially during moments when I want to imagine being elsewhere, it is Phillips’s version that appears. It’s not simply because it was first, but because it performs a type of emotional labor that the song demands. It makes Paris feel like a place where one could actually live and work, not merely admire from a distance.