Dave's Music Database Hall of Fame: Music Maker Inductees (December 2019)

Originally posted 12/22/2019; last updated 5/21/2021. January 22, 2019 marked the 10-year anniversary of the DMDB blog! To honor that, Dave’s Music Database announced its own Hall of Fame. This fourth batch of music maker inductees celebrates the top 10 music makers who made their names primarily as songwriters in the pre-rock era. See the full list of music maker inductees here.

Harold Arlen (1905-1986) Inducted December 2019 as a “Top 10 Songwriter.”

A highly regarded contributor the Great American Songbook. He composed more than 500 songs, most notably with lyricsts Ted Koehler (“Get Happy,” “Let’s Fall in Love,” “Stormy Weather”), E.Y. “Yip” Harburg (“Over the Rainbow,” “I’ve Got the World on a String”), and Johnny Mercer (“Blues in the Night,” “That Old Black Magic,” “Ac-Cent-Tchu-ate the Positive,” “One for My Baby”). Read more.

Irving Berlin (1888-1989) Inducted December 2019 as a “Top 10 Songwriter.”

Russian-born composer and lyricist. George Gershwin called him “the greatest songwriter who ever lived.” Jerome Kern said, “Irving Berlin has no place in American music – he is American music.” A 2001 Time magazine article estimated Berlin wrote around 1250 songs (“Alexander’s Ragtime Band,” “Always,” “Blue Skies,” “God Bless America,” “White Christmas”). 25 have reached #1 on the pop charts. He wrote 17 complete scores for Broadway musicals and revues including Call Me Madam and Annie Get Your Gun. List of Berlin songs here. Read more.

George Gershwin (1898-1937) Inducted December 2019 as a “Top 10 Songwriter.”

Brooklyn-born composer and pianist who wrote popular and classical music (“Swanee,” “Rhapsody in Blue,” “I Got Rhythm,” “Summertime,” “Someone to Watch Over Me”), often with his brother, lyricist Ira Gershwin. Wrote more than a dozen Broadway shows (Porgy and Bess) and had work featured in movies (An American in Paris). Read more.

Ira Gershwin (1896-1983) Inducted December 2019 as a “Top 10 Songwriter.”

New York-born classical and musical theater composer (“Someone to Watch Over Me,” “I Got Rhythm,” “I Can't Get Started,” “Summertime”). Often worked with his brother, George Gershwin, including the Broadway show Porgy and Bess and the movie An American in Paris. Read more.

Oscar Hammerstein II (1895-1960) Inducted December 2019 as a “Top 10 Songwriter.”

New York-born musical theater composer who co-wrote 850 songs, most notably with Jerome Kern (“Ol’ Man River,” “All the Things You Are”) and Richard Rodgers (“Oh, What a Beautiful Mornin’,” “You’ll Never Walk Alone,” “Some Enchanted Evening”). He won eight Tony Awards and two Academy Awards for Best Original Song. Co-wrote musicals Show Boat, Oklahoma!, Carousel, South Pacific, The King and I, The Sound of Music. Read more.

Lorenz Hart (1895-1943) Inducted December 2019 as a “Top 10 Songwriter.”

New York-born musical theater lyricist (“Blue Moon”, “Isn’t It Romantic?”, “My Funny Valentine,” “The Lady Is a Tramp”, “Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered”, “My Funny Valentine”). Often worked with Richard Rodgers (Babes in Arms, The Boys from Syracuse, Pal Joey, On Your Toes). Read more.

Jerome Kern (1885-1945) Inducted December 2019 as a “Top 10 Songwriter.”

New York-born musical theater composer of more than 700 songs (“They Didn't Believe Me,” “Ol’ Man River,” “Smoke Gets in Your Eyes,” “The Way You Look Tonight,” “All the Things You Are”) used in more than 100 stage works. Collaborated with many of his era’s greatest lyricists, including Ira Gershwin, Oscar Hammerstein II, Otto Harbach, Yip Harburg, and Johnny Mercer. Created dozens of Broadway musicals (Show Boat) and Hollywood films over a career lasting more than four decades. Read more.

Johnny Mercer (1909-1976) Inducted December 2019 as a “Top 10 Songwriter.”

Singer (“On the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe,” “Ac-Cent-Tchu-ate the Positive,” “Zip-a-Dee-Doo-Dah,” “Baby, It’s Cold Outside”) songwriter (“Blues in the Night,” “That Old Black Magic,” “One for My Baby,” “Moon River”) who wrote lyrics to more than 1500 songs and more popular songs than any other songwriter in history. Worked in the legendary Brill Building, known for housing some of pop music history’s most famous songwriters and publishers. Received 19 Academy Award nominations. Also a co-founder of Capitol Records. Read more.

Cole Porter (1891-1964) Inducted December 2019 as a “Top 10 Songwriter.”

Musical theater composer born in Indiana. Songs included “Love for Sale,” “Night and Day,” “You’re the Top,” “I Get a Kick Out of You,” “I’ve Got You Under My Skin,” and “Begin the Beguine.” Musicals included Anything Goes, Kiss Me, Kate, and High Society. Read more.

Richard Rodgers (1902-1979) Inducted December 2019 as a “Top 10 Songwriter.”

Musical theater songwriter born in New York who composed over 900 songs and 43 Broadway musicals. He worked with lyricist Lorenz Hart (“Blue Moon,” “My Funny Valentine,” “Bewitched, Bothered, and Bewildered,” Pal Joey) in the 1920s and ‘30s and Oscar Hammerstein II (, “You’ll Never Walk Alone,” “Some Enchanted Evening,” Oklahoma!, Carousel, South Pacific, The King and I, The Sound of Music) in the ‘40s and ‘50s. He was the first person to win the four top American entertainment awards – an Emmy, a Grammy, an Oscar, and a Tony Award. He also won a Pulitzer Prize, making him and Marvin Hamlisch the only two people to do so. Read more.

On This Day (1936): Billie Holiday charted with “Summertime,” the most recorded song in history

Summertime Billie Holiday

Writer(s): George Gershwin (music)/ DuBose Heyward/Ira Gershwin (lyrics) (see lyrics here) First Charted: September 12, 1936 Peak: 12 US, 3 DF (Click for codes to charts.) Sales (in millions): -- Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, 6.3 video, -- streaming

Awards (Billie Holiday): Awards (Sidney Bechet): Awards (Ella Fitzgerald & Louis Armstrong):

About the Song: It has been widely reported and accepted for years that the Beatles’ “Yesterday” is the most recorded song of all time. It isn’t. Not by a longshot. The song has been said to be recorded as many as four thousand times, but a group known as the Summertime Connection says they know of at least 82,000 public performances of “Summertime,” of which more than 67,000 have been recorded. GW Despite all those recordings, the song astonishingly only charted once in the first 50+ years of recorded music PM when Billie Holiday took it to #12 in 1936. In the rock era, Sam Cooke (#81 BB, 1957), Herb Alpert (#28 AC, 1971) the Marcels (#78 BB, 1961), Ricky Nelson (#89 BB, 1962), and the Chris Columbo Quintet (#93 BB, 1963) all had minor hits with the song. In 1966, Billy Stewart had a top ten hit with the song. Fun Boy Three hit #18 with it on the UK charts in 1982. Janis Joplin’s blues-rock version with Big Brother & the Holding Company didn’t chart, but is one of the best known versions. SF The song also became a jazz standard with popular versions from Sidney Bechet as well as Ella Fitzgerald with Louis Armstrong. Others who’ve recorded the song include Tori Amos, Cab Calloway, Perry Como, Bing Crosby, Miles Davis, Lana Del Rey, Dennis DeYoung, Tommy Dorsey, Peter Gabriel, Al Green, Herbie Hancock, Lena Horne, Mahalia Jackson, Al Jarreau, Annie Lennox, Paul McCartney, Willie Nelson, the Platters, Lou Rawls, R.E.M., the Righteous Brothers, Marty Robbins, Pete Seeger, Nina Simone, Sonny & Cher, Sarah Vaughan, Dionne Warwick, Brian Wilson, and the Zombies. SH George Gershwin composed the aria in 1934 for folk opera Porgy and Bess, based on the 1926 DuBose Heyward novel Porgy, a top seller about a South Carolina black community. Heyward and his wife Dorothy turned it into a Broadway play and Gershwin, after reading the novel and seeing the play, turned it into a musical, SF with his brother Ira and Heyward contributing lyrics. George visited Folly Island, off the South Carolina coast, where the opera is set. He observed the local customs and soaked in their music and idioms. LW Originally, Bess had a minor role. However, when Anne Brown – the first African-American singer admitted to Juilliard – contacted Gershwin, he let her sing for him and started crafting songs around her. He expanded the role to the point that he renamed the musical Porgy and Bess. Anne Brown played the role when it opened on Broadway on Ocrober 10, 1935. “Summertime” is sung four times throughout the musical, but most notably as a lullaby to a baby right after the overture. The song mixed “elements of jazz and the song styles of blacks in the southeast United States from the early twentieth century.” AMG Heyward was inspired by the lyrics for “All My Trials,” a southern folk spiritual lullaby. WK The song has also been considered an adaptation of the African American spiritual “Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child.” Broadway composer Stephen Sondheim called the lyrics for this and “My Man’s Gone Now” “the best lyrics in the musical theater.” WM Resources: DMDB Encyclopedia entry for Sidney Bechet AMG All Music Guide (by Robert Cummings) GW GuinnessWorldRecords.com (2017). “Most Recorded Song” LW Alan Lewens (2001). Popular Song – Soundtrack of the Century. Billboard Books: New York, NY. Page 69. SH SecondHandSongs.com WM Wayback Machine PM Joel Whitburn (1986). Pop Memories 1890-1954. Record Research, Inc: Menomonee Falls, WI. Page 586. WK Wikipedia Related Links: First posted 1/24/2020; last updated 9/10/2023.