| "Let's Dance" | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Single by Benny Goodman | |
| B-side | "Boy Meets Horn" |
| Released | 1939 |
| Recorded | 1934-35 ff. (broadcast recordings). October 24, 1939 (Columbia studio recording) |
| Genre | Swing |
| Length | 2:31 |
| Label | Columbia |
| Songwriter(s) | Gregory Stone, Joseph Bonine |
"Let's Dance" is a jazz standard, an instrumental, used by Benny Goodman as his opening theme for over 50 years.
"Let's Dance" was adapted from the piece Invitation to the Dance by Carl Maria von Weber, and given the name of the radio program Benny Goodman performed on from 1934-1935, Let's Dance . Goodman used "Let's Dance" as an opening for almost all of his performances, eventually becoming his official theme song. [1] The song was composed by Gregory Stone and Joseph Bonime, with lyrics written by Fanny May Baldridge. Goodman never recorded the theme with the lyrics, although The Modernaires recorded it in a tribute to him in 1954. [2]
Benjamin David Goodman was an American clarinetist and bandleader known as the "King of Swing".
The swing era was the period (1933–1947) when big band swing music was the most popular music in the United States. Though this was its most popular period, the music had actually been around since the late 1920s and early 1930s, being played by black bands led by such artists as Duke Ellington, Jimmie Lunceford, Bennie Moten, Cab Calloway, Earl Hines, and Fletcher Henderson, and white bands from the 1920s led by the likes of Jean Goldkette, Russ Morgan and Isham Jones. An early milestone in the era was from "the King of Swing" Benny Goodman's performance at the Palomar Ballroom in Los Angeles on August 21, 1935, bringing the music to the rest of the country. The 1930s also became the era of other great soloists: the tenor saxophonists Coleman Hawkins, Ben Webster and Lester Young; the alto saxophonists Benny Carter and Johnny Hodges; the drummers Chick Webb, Gene Krupa, Jo Jones and Sid Catlett; the pianists Fats Waller and Teddy Wilson; the trumpeters Louis Armstrong, Roy Eldridge, Bunny Berigan, and Rex Stewart.
"I Got Rhythm" is a piece composed by George Gershwin with lyrics by Ira Gershwin and published in 1930, which became a jazz standard. Its chord progression, known as the "rhythm changes", is the foundation for many other popular jazz tunes such as Charlie Parker's and Dizzy Gillespie's bebop standard "Anthropology ".
"In a Sentimental Mood" is a jazz composition by Duke Ellington. He composed the piece in 1935 and recorded it with his orchestra during the same year. Lyrics were written by Manny Kurtz; Ellington's manager Irving Mills gave himself a percentage of the publishing, so the song was credited to all three. Other popular versions in 1935/36 were by Benny Goodman and by Mills Blue Rhythm Band. The opening notes of the song's melody resemble Gershwin's "Someone To Watch Over Me".
"Memories of You" is a popular song about nostalgia with lyrics written by Andy Razaf and music composed by Eubie Blake and published in 1930.
"Sing, Sing, Sing " is a 1936 song, with music and lyrics by Louis Prima, who first recorded it with the New Orleans Gang. Brunswick Records released it on February 28, 1936 on the 78 rpm record format, with "It's Been So Long" as the B-side. The song is strongly identified with the big band and swing eras. Several have performed the piece as an instrumental, including Fletcher Henderson and, most famously, Benny Goodman.
"I Want to Be Happy" is a song with music by Vincent Youmans and lyrics by Irving Caesar written for the 1925 musical No, No, Nanette.
"East of the Sun " is a popular song written by Brooks Bowman, an undergraduate member of Princeton University's Class of 1936, for the 1934 production of the Princeton Triangle Club's production of Stags at Bay. It was published in 1934 by Santly Bros. and soon became a hallmark of the Princeton Tigertones, Princeton University's signature all-male a cappella group. The standard is also sung by the Princeton Nassoons.
"Stompin' at the Savoy" is a 1933 jazz standard composed by Edgar Sampson. It is named after the famed Harlem nightspot the Savoy Ballroom in New York City.
"Serenade in Blue" is a 1942 Big Band song composed by Harry Warren, with lyrics written by Mack Gordon. It was introduced in the 1942 film Orchestra Wives by Glenn Miller and His Orchestra, sung by Lynn Bari in the film but dubbed by Pat Friday.
"Easy Living" (1937) is a jazz standard written by Ralph Rainger and lyrics by Leo Robin for the film Easy Living where it was the main theme of the score but not sung. A popular recording in 1937 was by Teddy Wilson with Billie Holiday, Benny Goodman, and Lester Young.
Between 1938 and 1944, Glenn Miller and His Orchestra released 266 singles on the monaural ten-inch shellac 78 rpm format. Their studio output comprised a variety of musical styles inside of the Swing genre, including ballads, band chants, dance instrumentals, novelty tracks, songs adapted from motion pictures, and, as the Second World War approached, patriotic music.
"Rose Room", also known as "In Sunny Roseland", is a 1917 jazz standard, music by Art Hickman, lyrics by Harry Williams. It is almost always performed as an instrumental. Composed at a time when the popularity of ragtime was fading in favor of thirty-two-bar form and twelve-bar blues songs, the song has been called "definitely ahead of its time" by composer Alec Wilder. Indeed, while popular in the late 1910s and early 1920s, the song enjoyed its biggest popularity during the swing era. The song was named after the Rose Room in St. Francis Hotel, where Hickman was playing at the time. In 1914, jazz pioneer Bert Kelly was a member of Hickman's band.
"Avalon" is a 1920 popular song written by Al Jolson, Buddy DeSylva and Vincent Rose referencing Avalon, California. It was introduced by Jolson and interpolated in the musicals Sinbad and Bombo. Jolson's recording rose to number two on the charts in 1921. The song was possibly written by Rose, but Jolson's popularity as a performer allowed him to claim composer co-credit. Originally, only Rose and Jolson were credited, and DeSylva's name was added later.
Swing jazz emerged as a dominant form in American music, in which some virtuoso soloists became as famous as the band leaders. Key figures in developing the "big" jazz band included bandleaders and arrangers Count Basie, Cab Calloway, Jimmy and Tommy Dorsey, Duke Ellington, Benny Goodman, Fletcher Henderson, Earl Hines, Glenn Miller, and Artie Shaw. Duke Ellington and his band members composed numerous swing era hits that have become standards: "It Don't Mean a Thing " (1932), "Sophisticated Lady" (1933) and "Caravan" (1936), among others. Other influential bandleaders of this period were Benny Goodman and Count Basie.
The period from the end of the First World War until the start of the Depression in 1929 is known as the "Jazz Age". Jazz had become popular music in America, although older generations considered the music immoral and threatening to cultural values. Dances such as the Charleston and the Black Bottom were very popular during the period, and jazz bands typically consisted of seven to twelve musicians. Important orchestras in New York were led by Fletcher Henderson, Paul Whiteman and Duke Ellington. Many New Orleans jazzmen had moved to Chicago during the late 1910s in search of employment; among others, the New Orleans Rhythm Kings, King Oliver's Creole Jazz Band and Jelly Roll Morton recorded in the city. However, Chicago's importance as a center of jazz music started to diminish toward the end of the 1920s in favor of New York.
"Soft Winds" is a 1940 jazz standard composed by Benny Goodman, with lyrics by Fred Royal. Charlie Parker performed it regularly in the 1940s. In 1961, jazz harpist Dorothy Ashby released an album of the same name with the song as the title track, recorded at the Plaza Sound Studios in New York City. Canadian jazz pianist Oscar Peterson regularly performed the song in the 1970s and 1980s with the Oscar Peterson Quartet. Chet Baker, Dinah Washington and numerous others recorded it. The theme song to the British dating show Blind Date closely resembles the standard but Goodman is not credited.
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