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Harry Warren

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For other people named Harry Warren, seeHarry Warren (disambiguation).
Harry Warren
Warren promoting songs on Tin Pan Alley, 1920
Warren promoting songs
onTin Pan Alley,1920
Background information
Birth nameSalvatore Antonio Guaragna
Born(1893-12-24)December 24, 1893
New York City,U.S.
DiedSeptember 22, 1981(1981-09-22)(aged 87)
Los Angeles,California,U.S.
GenresPopular music
Occupation(s)Composer
Instrument(s)Piano

Harry Warren(bornSalvatore Antonio Guaragna;December 24, 1893 – September 22, 1981)[1]was an American composer and the first major American songwriter to write primarily for film. He was nominated for theAcademy Award for Best Original Songeleven times and won threeOscarsfor composing "Lullaby of Broadway","You'll Never Know"and"On the Atchison, Topeka and the Santa Fe".He wrote the music for the first blockbuster film musical,42nd Street,choreographed byBusby Berkeley,with whom he would collaborate on many musical films.

Over a career spanning six decades, Warren wrote more than 800 songs. Other well known Warren hits included "I Only Have Eyes for You","You Must Have Been a Beautiful Baby","Jeepers Creepers","The Gold Diggers' Song (We're in the Money)","That's Amore","There Will Never Be Another You","The More I See You","At Last"and"Chattanooga Choo Choo"(the last of which was the firstgold recordin history). Warren was one of America's most prolific film composers, and his songs have been featured in over 300 films.

Biography[edit]

Early life[edit]

Warren was born Salvatore Antonio Guaragna, one of eleven children of Italian immigrants Antonio (a bootmaker) and Rachel De Luca Guaragna, and grew up inBrooklyn,New York. His father changed the family name to Warren when Harry was a child. Although his parents could not afford music lessons, Warren had an early interest in music and taught himself to play his father'saccordion.He also sang in the church choir and learned to play the drums. He began to play the drums professionally by age 14 and dropped out of high school at 16 to play with his godfather's band in a traveling carnival. Soon he taught himself to play the piano and by 1915, he was working at theVitagraph Motion Picture Studios,where he did a variety of administrative jobs, such as props man, and also played mood music on the piano for the actors, acted in bit parts and eventually was an assistant director. He also played the piano in cafés and silent-movie houses. In 1918 he joined theU.S. Navy,where he began writing songs.[2][3]

Career[edit]

Warren wrote over 800 songs between 1918 and 1981, publishing over 500 of them.[4][5]They were written mainly for 56 feature films or were used in other films that used Warren's newly written or existing songs.[2]His songs eventually appeared in over 300 films and 112 ofWarner Bros.Looney TunesandMerrie Melodiescartoons.[6]42 of his songs were on the top ten list of the radio program "Your Hit Parade",a measure of a song's popularity. 21 of these reached number 1 on Your Hit Parade.[5]"You'll Never Know"appeared 24 times.[7]His song "I Only Have Eyes for You"is listed in the list of the 25 most-performed songs of the 20th Century, as compiled by the American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers (ASCAP).[8]Warren was the director of ASCAP from 1929 to 1932.[3]

He collaborated on some of his most famous songs with lyricistsAl Dubin,Billy Rose,Mack Gordon,Leo Robin,Ira GershwinandJohnny Mercer.In 1942 the Gordon-Warren song "Chattanooga Choo-Choo",as performed by theGlenn Miller Orchestra,became the firstgold recordin history. It was No.1 for nine weeks on theBillboardpop singles chart in 1941–1942, selling 1.2 million copies.[9]Among his biggest hits were "There Will Never Be Another You","I Only Have Eyes for You","Forty-Second Street","The Gold Diggers' Song (We're in the Money)","Lullaby of Broadway","Serenade In Blue","At Last","Jeepers Creepers","You're Getting to Be a Habit with Me","That's Amore",and" Young and Healthy ".[2]

Early hits and film years[edit]

Warren's first hit song was "Rose of the Rio Grande" (1922), with lyrics byEdgar Leslie.[10]He wrote a succession of hit songs in the 1920s, including "I Love My Baby (My Baby Loves Me)" and "Seminola" in 1925, "Where Do You Work-a John?" and "In My Gondola" in 1926 and "Nagasaki" in 1928. In 1930, he composed the music for the song "Cheerful Little Earful" for theBilly RoseBroadwayrevue,Sweet and Low,and composed the music, with lyrics by Mort Dixon and Joe Young, for theEd WynnBroadway revueThe Laugh Paradein 1931.[2]

He started working forWarner Brothersin 1932, paired with Dubin to write the score for the first blockbuster film musical,42nd Street,and continued to work there for six years, writing the scores for 32 more musicals.[6]He worked for20th Century Foxstarting in 1940, writing with Mack Gordon.[11]He moved toMGMstarting in 1944, writing formusical filmssuch asThe Harvey GirlsandThe Barkleys of Broadway,many starringFred Astaire.He later worked forParamount,starting in the early 1950s, writing for theBing CrosbyandJane WymanmovieJust for Youand theMartin and LewismovieThe Caddy,the latter containing the hit song "That's Amore".He continued to write songs for several moreJerry Lewiscomedies.[2]

Warren is particularly remembered for writing scores for thefilmsofBusby Berkeley;they worked together on 18 films. His "uptempo songs are as memorable as Berkeley's choreography, as [sic] for the same reason: they capture, in a few snazzy notes, the vigorous frivolity of the Jazz Age."[12]

Warren won theAcademy Award for Best Songthree times, collaborating with three different lyricists: "Lullaby of Broadway"with Al Dubin in 1935,"You'll Never Know"with Mack Gordon in 1943, and"On the Atchison, Topeka and the Santa Fe"with Johnny Mercer in 1946. He was nominated for eleven Oscars.[2]

Last years[edit]

In 1955, Warren wrote "The Legend of Wyatt Earp", which was used in theABC/Desilu Studiostelevision series,The Life and Legend of Wyatt Earp.He also wrote the opening theme, "Hey, Marty" (lyrics byPaddy Chayefsky), for the filmMarty,which won the Academy Award for Best Picture in 1955.[13]The last musical score that Warren composed specifically for Broadway wasShangri-La,a disastrous 1956 adaptation ofJames Hilton'sLost Horizon,which ran for only 21 performances. In 1957, he received his last Academy Award nomination for the song "An Affair to Remember".He continued to write songs for movies throughout the 1960s and 1970s but never again achieved the fame that he had enjoyed earlier. His last movie score was forManhattan Melody,in 1980, but the film was never produced.[3]

Warren composed a Mass, with Latin text, in 1962. This was performed a decade later atLoyola Marymount University,but it has yet to be recorded commercially.[14]He also wrote nearly three dozen short piano vignettes. The sheet music was first published by Warren's Four Jays Music Co.[15]A dozen of these were released on a 1975 album titledHarry Warren's Piano Vignettes,played by Hugh Delain.[16]Several pianists have recorded the vignettes, including Warren himself.[17]

Personal life[edit]

Warren married Josephine Wensler in 1917. They had a son, Harry Jr. (1919–1938), and a daughter, Joan (b. 1925). His wife died in 1993.

Warren died on September 22, 1981, inLos Angeles.[1]He is interred in theWestwood Village Memorial Park Cemeteryin Los Angeles. The plaque bearing Warren's epitaph displays the first few notes of "You'll Never Know".[18]

Reputation and legacy[edit]

According toWilfrid Sheed,quoted inTimemagazine: "By silent consensus, the king of this army of unknown soldiers, the Hollywood incognitos, was Harry Warren, who had more songs on the Hit Parade than Berlin himself and who would win the contest hands down if enough people have heard of him."[12]William Zinssernoted: "The familiarity of Harry Warren's songs is matched by the anonymity of the man... he is the invisible man, his career a prime example of the oblivion that cloaked so many writers who cranked out good songs for bad movies."[11]At least three episodes of theLawrence Welk Showwere devoted entirely to Warren's music: Season 18, Episode 5, October 7, 1972;[19]Season 25, Episode 10, November 24, 1979;[20]and Season 27, Episode 17, January 2, 1982[21]Susannah McCorkle's debut album wasThe Music of Harry Warren(1976).

In 1980, producerDavid Merrickand directorGower Championadapted the 1933 film42nd Streetinto aBroadway musicalthat won theTony Award for Best Musicalin 1981, ran for 3,486 performances and has had several major revivals.[22]The score incorporated songs by Warren and Dubin from various movie musicals, including42nd Street,Dames,Go Into Your Dance,Gold Diggers of 1933,andGold Diggers of 1935.[23]

A theatre inGravesend, Brooklyn,New York, the Harry Warren Theatre, was named for Warren in 1982.[24][25]

Songs[edit]

Music by Warren, unless noted:

Academy Award nominations and winners[edit]

Winners
Nominations

No. 1 hits[edit]

78 recording of "Chattanooga Choo Choo" by theGlenn Miller Orchestrawith vocal solo byTex Beneke

Other selected songs from films[edit]

"Dance of the Dollars" production number launched the song "We're in the Money"inGold Diggers of 1933

American songbook songs[edit]

Main article:Great American Songbook

In his bookAmerican Popular Song,Alec Wilder notes that Warren "wasn't in the category as the best theater writers, but he certainly was among the foremost pop song writers." He discusses songs he likes: "Would You Like to Take a Walk?"(1930, withMort DixonandBilly RoseforSweet & Low), "I Found a Million Dollar Baby (in a Five and Ten Cent Store)"(1931, with Dixon and Rose forCrazy Quilt), "You're Getting to Be a Habit with Me"(1932)," Summer Night "(1936),"There Will Never Be Another You"(1942),"Serenade in Blue"(1942),"At Last"(1942),"Jeepers Creepers"(1938), and"The More I See You"(1945).[34]

Other popular songs

Notes[edit]

  1. ^abHolden, Stephen(September 23, 1981)."Harry Warren, Songwriter, Is Dead".The New York Times.p. A1.
  2. ^abcdefPBS biography entry for Harry Warren.Archived2013-01-03 at theWayback MachineAccessed February 2009
  3. ^abcJenkins, David.BiographyArchived2012-04-24 at theWayback Machineat HarryWarrenMusic, accessed April 3, 2009
  4. ^List of Warren songs at HarryWarren.orgArchived2009-03-05 at theWayback Machine
  5. ^abJenkins, David."Harry Warren – Hollywood's Unknown Composer"Archived2006-04-26 at theWayback Machine,HarryWarren.org
  6. ^abWalls, Robert."Who is Harry Warren????"GuideToMusicals, accessed April 3, 2009
  7. ^Forte, p. 265
  8. ^Zinsser, pp. 137 and 251
  9. ^"Chattanooga Choo Choo: The #1 Hits",allmusic, accessed March 31, 2009
  10. ^Harry WarrenArchived2012-02-24 at theWayback Machineat Composers and Lyricists Database (1988)
  11. ^abZinsser, p. 137
  12. ^abCorliss, Richard."That Old Feeling: We Need Harry Warren",Time,October 5, 2001
  13. ^Holloway, Ronald."Marty",Variety,March 22, 1955
  14. ^Feinstein, p. 243
  15. ^Thomas, Tony(1975).The Hollywood Musical: The Saga of Songwriter Harry Warren.Citadel Press. p. 341.ISBN0-8065-1066-8.
  16. ^"Harry Warren's Piano Vignettes",Discogs, 1975, accessed December 6, 2014
  17. ^"Harry Warren: Piano Vignettes",AllMusic,accessed December 6, 2014
  18. ^Warren, Westwood VillageSeeing-stars, accessed March 30, 2009
  19. ^"Season 18: 1972–73",Welk Musical Family, accessed June 24, 2013
  20. ^"Season 25: 1979–80",Welk Musical Family, accessed June 24, 2013
  21. ^"Season 27: 1981–82",Welk Musical Family, accessed June 24, 2013
  22. ^"Westchester Broadway Theater Presents42nd Streetwith Galantich, Stanley and More ",BroadwayWorld, September 8, 2009, accessed October 7, 2014
  23. ^"42nd Street",Tonyawards, accessed May 27, 2014
  24. ^"Harry Warren Biography",NJ Theater.Retrieved December 24, 2023
  25. ^"Harry Warren Theatre",Time Out,July 12, 2010
  26. ^abcdefg"Songs J to M"ArchivedJanuary 21, 2013, at theWayback Machine,HarryWarren.org, accessed February 25, 2012
  27. ^abcdefghijkl"Songs UtoZ"ArchivedJanuary 21, 2013, at theWayback Machine,HarryWarren.org, accessed February 26, 2012
  28. ^abcdefg"Songs N to R"ArchivedMarch 7, 2015, at theWayback Machine,HarryWarren.org, accessed February 26, 2012
  29. ^abc"Songs D to H"ArchivedFebruary 24, 2013, at theWayback Machine,HarryWarren.org, accessed February 25, 2012
  30. ^abcdefghij"Songs A to C"ArchivedJanuary 21, 2013, at theWayback Machine,HarryWarren.org, accessed February 25, 2012
  31. ^abcdefghi"Songs I"ArchivedJanuary 21, 2013, at theWayback Machine,HarryWarren.org, accessed February 25, 2012
  32. ^abcdefgh"Songs T"ArchivedJanuary 21, 2013, at theWayback Machine,HarryWarren.org, accessed February 26, 2012
  33. ^abcdef"Songs S"ArchivedJanuary 21, 2013, at theWayback Machine,HarryWarren.org, accessed February 26, 2012
  34. ^Wilder, pp. 395–404

References[edit]

Further reading[edit]

External links[edit]

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