If You Could See Me Now is a 1946 jazz ballad and standard composed by Tadd Dameron with lyrics by Carl Sigman. Dameron wrote it specifically for vocalist Sarah Vaughan, who introduced the tune in 1946 with a Musicraft Records release, making it one of Vaughan’s signature songs. The lyrics express a lover’s melancholy, imagining how the beloved would see how blue the narrator is if only they could see him now. Since then it has become a jazz staple with many celebrated versions, including Dameron’s own 1962 recording on The Magic Touch, and notable covers by Bill Evans, Chet Baker and Wes Montgomery, among others; Vaughan’s 1981 Send in the Clowns with the Count Basie Orchestra also features the tune. The composition is widely performed as a ballad and is regarded as a classic in the jazz repertoire, and it was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1998.
