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BIG BANDS DATABASE PLUS
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TUNESMITHS
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Ralph learned to play the piano at an early age, and was teaching himself composition and theory from various texts at age 13, -while still in a Newark, NJ, high school. Rainger won a scholarship at New York's the Damrosch Institute of Music. His father, a merchant, wanted his son to be a lawyer. So after just one year of study, Rainger left the Institute and worked his way through Law School as a truck driver; door-to-door salesman and farm laborer. After graduating, he worked as a $25.00 per week law clerk during the day, and at night, played piano in various dance orchestras. In 1926, Rainger decided to devote his career to music, and began taking jobs as piano accompanist for vaudeville entertainers. He also formed a team with Edgar Fairchild for a few Broadway musicals, and they co-led an orchestra in the 1928 production, 'Cross My Heart'. Rainger's first big hit, "Moanin' Low", was in the 1929 revue The Little Show, starring Clifton Webb. Webb had gotten him a job as pianist in the pit orchestra. During one of the rehearsals, they felt that a song was needed, and Rainger, with a lyric by Howard Dietz, provided "Moanin' Low". In addition, Rainger and Adam Carroll also worked as a piano duo for the show. In 1930, Rainger had another hit song featured in the Broadway revue 'Tattle Tales'. "I'll Take An Option on You", which had a lyric by Leo Robin. This was the beginning of a great team -'Robin and Rainger', they would go on to write over fifty hit songs, mostly for Hollywood films. Rainger had also written two of 1929s biggest hits; "Louise", a huge Maurice Chevalier hit, and 1929s "I Have to Have You". In 1930, he left for Hollywood and United Artists, where he gave Fanny Brice the torch song "When a Woman Loves a Man." Between 1930 and 1939, Rainger worked for Paramount Pictures, where he wrote such hits as:
Among his other songs are:
In 1939 He left Paramount and joined 20th Century Fox Films. In addition to working with Leo Robin, Rainger also collaborated with Howard Dietz, Sam Coslow and Dorothy Parker. Ralplh Rainger died in an airplane crash near Palm Springs, CA, in 1942, -he was just 41 years old, A Songwriter's Hall of Fame member.
At just age 12, while still attending Central high school in Philadelphia, David led his own dance band, He gained his music degree at the University of Pennsylvania, where he financed his education by playing in, and arranging for dance bands. One his teachers was Arnold Schoenberg, who would remain a huge influence in his career. After graduation, David became a sideman in various local 'society' bands, as well as occasionally working at Philadelphia's famed radio station WCAU. He relocated to New York city and found work as a singer and conductor in the radio studios. While working with the radio groups, he met famed pianist/actor/wit Oscar Levant who introduced him to George Gershwin. In turn, Gershwin recommended David Raksin -(photo source unknown) to the publishing firm of Harms/Chappell, who in turn put him in touch with Broadway producers. In 1925 (age 23), he found work in Hollywood where Charlie Chaplin employed him to do the score for "Modern Times" (perhaps the last great Silent film). Chaplin would hum or whistle his suggestions which Raksin would then work into the score. In 1936 he joined the composing staff at Universal studios, then headed by Charles Previn (kinsman of Andre), where he would regularly write film scores in a matter of days. He then become assistant to conductor Leopold Stokowski. From Universal Studios, he moved on to Columbia Pictures, who asked him to give composer Igor Stravinsky some lessons in synchronisation. Stravinsky demurred saying he would not take lessons from anybody, and decided not to work in Hollywood after all. However, Stravinsky later used the music he had intended for the film in his "Four Norwegian Moods". Raksin treasured his meeting with Stravinsky, and later produced the original 1942 circus band scoring for Stravinsky's "Circus Polka (For A Young Elephant)". From there, Raksin went on to write scores for more than 400 films and television shows. One of his most notably was for the film-noir mystery 'Laura' (1944). The theme song "Laura" has since become one of the most-recorded songs of all time. Cole Porter once told an interviewer that it was the tune he would have most liked to have written. Actress Hedy Lamarr, one of Hollywood's leading ladies, had turned down the part eventually taken by Gene Tierney. When asked why she had done so, Hedy replied: "They sent me the script, not the score." In the early 1950s, his career came very close to ruin, when he was invited to testify before the infamous "House Un-American Activities Commission", then chaired by Senator Joseph McCarthy. He had to explain his membership in the American branch of the Communist Party, and under extreme pressure, named 11 other Party members, being careful to choose only those who were dead or already known to the commission. He was not proud of his behavior, but felt that with a family to support, and with a contract with MGM to retain, his action was the best he could do given the circumstances. Fortunately, a few years later, when the Communist 'witch hunt' furor subsided, Raksin quietly resumed his film and TV work. Raksin worked as a Co-Composer for such 1930 and 1940 films as:
From about 1944 on, Raksin more and more became the sole composer for the film scores.
1944 was significant for Raksin; he composed the score for director Otto Preminger's murder mystery film 'Laura'. The haunting theme song, which when later completed with a lyric by Johnny Mercer, became Raksin's first hit. It was popular with many orchestras and especially for the Freddie Martin Orchestra, as well as for such vocalists as Dick Haymes and Johnny Johnston. It has since become something of a 'standard'. In 1945, Raksin worked on still another Preminger film, 'Fallen Angel', which included the song "Slowly", a hit for Kay Kyser's band. Included among his other 1940's film work are:
Throughout the 1950's and '60's, he worked on many films:
The Magnificent Yankee'
During the 1970's and '80's, more and more Raksin worked in TV:
Over his 50 year career, Raksin was an influential 'triple-threat' man, working as composer, lyricist, and arranger for film background music. David also wrote several serious musical works. Among them 3 ballets, - 'Volpone', 'Mother Courage' and 'Noah', and for the Broadway stage he score 'If The Shoe Fits', and 'The Wind In The Willows'. Among his songwriting collaborators were Sammy Cahn, Johnny Mercer, Jay Livingston, Ray Evans and Paul Francis Webster. He was also a professor of film music at the University of Southern California, and enjoyed the distinction of being the first film composer invited to establish a collection of his manuscripts in the music division of the Library of Congress. He was age 92 on his demise.
Ca. 1956 he started working with RCA Records as a staff arranger. His old friend, Leonard Bernstein hired him to do the orchestrations for his new musical "West Side Story". Ramin won a Grammy for the soundtrack album of the play, and an Academy Award for the movie version score. He followed that with a suite for symphony orchestra that used the most memorable numbers from the musical. It is still often performed by Pop concert orchestras. With the success of "West Side Story,", Ramin found himself in demand on Broadway. The shows for which he contributed arrangements include for the musicals "Gypsy!", "Wildcat," "I Can Get It For You Wholesale," and "A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum." In the early 1960's, he was again working in the TV Studios. He was the musical director for "The Patty Duke Show" and "Candid Camera." In the '60's, Ramin not only composed the original score for a movie version of Harold Robbins' 'Stiletto', but was also a successful advertising Jingle writer. For Tab Diet Cola, he wrote " Music to Watch Girls By". (It became a Top 10 hit for the Bob Crewe Generation.) For Pepsi Cola, he wrote the "Come Alive!" jingle. His Recordings include:
Among Razaf's lyricist credits are:
In 1929, he wrote the lyrics for a Broadway Supper Club show called:
'Connie's Hot Chocolates of 1928'.
Also in 1929,
Among Razaf's other lyrics, are
Instead of practicing law, Ram moved to New York city, and found work with 'Irving Mills Music', a major publishing house. Working primarily as an arranger, he supplied scores to such well known bands as Duke Ellington (a band managed by Mills), Count Basie, and the Dorseys. Mills also had him writing special material for the Cotton Club, and other top New York nightspots. He was now writing songs in his spare time. (One of his tunes, "At Your Beck and Call," was recorded by Ellington. ) While still with Mills Music, he, and fellow lyricist Al Stillman provided lyrics to music by pianist/composer/actor Oscar Levant. In 1943, Ram co-wrote "I'll Be Home for Christmas," a huge hit for crooner Bing Crosby. Then, following Stillman and Levant's lead, they were now working in the Hollywood studios, he moved to Los Angeles. In 1945, he co-wrote (with Artie Dunn, Al and Morty Nevins) "Twilight Time," for 'The Three Suns', a well known Los Angeles based group. It was one of their biggest hits. In the late 1940s, ill health overtook him, and then at the start of the 1950s, he suffered a nervous collapse. In 1952, Ram was able to return to the music business where he found many changes. Hoping to put his 20 years of experience in the music business to use, he formed a management company, 'Personality Productions', to guide the careers of some new acts. By 1954, without proper capitalization, the venture was basically just meeting expenses. Then, life took a change for the better. Ram 'discovered' (accounts vary as to who actually did "discover") a group called 'The Platters', and he subsequently became their manager. It was a serendipitous event. His musical expertise would transform the Platters into an international success, and their act would earn a fortune for Ram. It was his musical expertise that transformed their fairly non-descript sound making them an interesting vocal group. He also turned them from a male quartet into a mixed quintet when he added singer Zola Taylor, further distinguishing them from other R&B quartets of the day. Still, their work for the 'Federal' label, didn't produce much success, and they were eclipsed by Federal's efforts to push a rival R&B group; 'Hank Ballard and the Midnighters'. At that time, the Mercury label was eager to sign one of Ram's other groups, the Penguins. Ram risked killing the entire deal by asking Mercury to take the Platters as well, a group in whom they had no interest. This proved to be a stroke of incredible good luck for Mercury as well as for Ram and the Platters. The Penguins never enjoyed a major hit on Mecury, while the Platters went on to score a huge international hit in 1955 with "Only You," (Ram's own composition). They proved they were not a 'one hit phenomenon' when they followed that with a series of million-seller hits (all composed, or arranged, by Ram) including "The Great Pretender," "My Prayer," "Twilight Time", and "(You've Got) The Magic Touch". (Ram himself soon became known around the record industry as the man with the "magic touch.") In promoting the group (he owned 'The Platters' name), Ram resisted 'dumbing down' their sound by having them do conventional "doo wop" type material. Instead he had the group record tunes such as "Smoke Gets in Your Eyes", which could appeal to parents and teenagers alike. In the following years, after the original group had split up, Ram was able to license the "Platters" name to other groups. When Ram died at the age of 73, he had proved himself to be a prodigiously gifted composer, arranger, manager, and producer.
In 1935, at age 26, he began to work full time as a composer and started to collaborate with other composers such as Sammy Cahn, and Saul Chaplin, who, like Raye, collaborated with the alto saxophonist Jimmie Lunceford leader of one of the Swing era's best 'hot' orchestras. One of his songs, "Rhythm In My Nursery Rhymes", became a hit for Lunceford's band. (Sidenote: It was Sammy Cahn and Saul Chaplin who brought great fame to the Andrew Sisters with their English language version of the Yiddish song "Bei Mir Bist Du Schon (Means That You're Grand)", originally composed by Sholem Secunda and Jacob Jacobs for the 1933 Yiddish show "I Would If I Could". ) In 1936 "Swing Me A Lullaby" (w and m. Don Raye, Hughie Prince & Tom Waring) was a hit for Connie Boswell, with Bob Crosby's band. In the late '30s, Raye worked for a New York City music publishing house. In early 1939, the 'Andrews Sisters' recorded his "Well All Right! (Tonight's the Night), which was a hit for the girls. Then in 1940, Raye relocated to Hollywood, where he and fellow composer Hughie Prince were commissioned to write the songs for Argentine Nights, a film in which the 'Andrews Sisters' made their screen debut. The team of Vic Schoen (the 'Andrew Sisters' arranger), Hughie Prince, and Raye wrote "Hit The Road" and "Oh! How He Loves Me", while Raye and Prince, composed "Rhumboogie", the first of a series of 'boogie woogie' numbers destined for great popular success. (Other 'boogie' tunes included "Beat Me Daddy, Eight to the Bar", and "Down the Road a Piece". Some were hit releases for the 'Andrews Sisters', and some for pianist Freddie Slack's Orchestra, and for Will Bradley And His Orchestra. But boogie woogie wasn't his only forte. One of Raye's biggest hits was the beautiful ballad "I'll Remember April" (co-composed with Gene de Paul). Raye composed the tune after meeting and falling in love with a lady named Pat Johnson. In 1941, he enlisted in the U. S. Army and served during World War II. After the War, Raye returned to Hollywood, to Universal Studios, and to songwriting. Argentine Nights was the first of some 47 films that Raye would work on for the Hollywood studios, during which time Raye only ever made one acting appearance on screen. Starting in late 1941, Raye and composer Gene de Paul, began working with each other at Universal Studios. They also wrote original numbers for such movies as Samuel Goldwyn's production of A Song Is Born, and Walt Disney's So Dear to My Heart, and Ichabod and Mr. Toad. In 1949, Raye retired from full-time movie work, and did only some occosional songwriting, though his songs did continue to be used in movies well into the 1960s. His "Well, All Right", written in 1959 with Frances Faye, and Dan Howell, was a hit for the 'Andrews Sisters', and was later interpolated into the 1978 bio-pic, The Buddy Holly Story. A friend and visitor to our site, Mr. Joseph Adams, has fondly recalled that another of Raye's wonderful tunes was the 'Yiddish' inspired "I Love You Much Too Much", which he co-composed with Chaim Towber and Alexander Olshanetsky (original Yiddish title: "Ich Hob Doch Tzufil Lieb", from the show The Organ Grinder). Another Olshanetsky composition was "Romania", a huge hit in the Yiddish Theatres, which he co-wrote with Chaim Towber (aka: Tauber - composer/singer/lyricist). Towber was similarly a composer of Yiddish tunes, and perhaps his best may have been "Shein Wie Die Lewoneh" ("Pretty as a Moonbeam" - sometimes "Shein vi de l'vone"), co-composed with Yosef J. Rumshinsky. The tune was recorded by the Barry Sisters. Rumshinsky in turn often co-composed with famed Yiddish actress/composer Mollie Picon (married name: Kalich); one example being their song "Deine". However, Rumshinsky did compose quite a few songs by himself. Towber and Olshanetsky were part of a larger group of composers of Yiddish language tunes writing, during the 1920s and 1930s, for the Yiddish Theatre district on New York City's Second Avenue area. Other composers in that group -they all knew each other and often worked together - included Isidor Lillian, N. Stutchkoff, Moishe Oysher, Louis Gilrod, Jacques Levy, Chana and Zalmen Mlotek, Moishe Rosenfeld, and Boris Tomashefsky, to name a few. But, the story of New York's 1920s-'30s Yiddish theatre is a tale for another day. Some other originally Yiddish songs that made it big in American (World) Pop charts include "Momele", a huge hit as "Momma" sung by Connie Francis, and "Donna Donna", made popular by the later Joan Baez recording. In addition to the tunes mentioned above, Raye also worked on:
"This Is My Country", co-composed with Al Jacobs.
CAUTION: Do not confuse with composers David Raksin (b. 4 August 1912, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA, d. 9 August 2004, Van Nuys, California, USA. (heart failure), or with composer Ruby Raksin.
Among the other TV shows for which he composed music are
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