In 1924 Jerome Kern banned the songs from his show Sitting Pretty from being broadcast or recorded, and his objection is often said to have been aimed at jazz versions. Within a few years jazz musicians were recording Jerome Kern songs, and several are now standard repertoire for improvisers.
Kern was born in New York on 27 January 1885, the son of a German Jewish immigrant who ran a livery stable and later a merchandising business. The family story goes that his father sent him to buy two pianos for the business and he came back having ordered 200, after which his father let him pursue music.
He learned his trade as a rehearsal pianist and song plugger, and spent long spells in London writing songs for West End shows. On one of those trips, in 1909, a boat outing on the Thames stopped at Walton-on-Thames, where he met Eva Leale, the daughter of the landlord of the Swan inn. They married at St Mary’s church in Walton in October 1910.
Kern went on to write more than 700 songs, used in over 100 stage works and films. The big break with the past came in 1927 with Show Boat, written with Oscar Hammerstein II, which dealt with racism and had a racially mixed cast.
His relationship with jazz was awkward. Kern called himself a “musical clothier”, writing music to fit the situations and lyrics of a show, and he disliked his songs being lifted out of context. The Sitting Pretty ban, which covered any broadcasting or recording of the show’s individual numbers, is the clearest example, and his irritation is said to have been aimed particularly at jazz interpretations of his work. That is where the often-repeated line comes from, which we’ve used ourselves on our Hoagy Carmichael songs page, that Kern hated jazz interpretations of his songs. No source we found quotes him using that word. The best-known fight, over the Platters’ “Smoke Gets in Your Eyes”, was actually his widow’s, more than a decade after his death.
Jazz players took up Jerome Kern songs regardless. Kern wrote long, flowing melodies over unusual harmony, with sudden key changes that give improvisers plenty to work with. “All the Things You Are” became a favourite of the bebop generation.
For more songs from this era, see our guide to the best jazz songs from the Great American Songbook.
1. “Ol’ Man River”
Show Boat opened on Broadway on 27 December 1927, and “Ol’ Man River” was its centrepiece. Hammerstein wanted a song about the Mississippi that ran through Edna Ferber’s novel, and he told Kern to use the melody the stevedores sing in the opening number, “Cotton Blossom”, but to invert some of it.
Paul Robeson was offered the part of Joe in the original New York production but turned it down, so Jules Bledsoe sang it on opening night. Robeson took the part in the 1928 London production and the song became his for life. From around 1938 he rewrote several lines in his concert performances, turning a song of weary endurance into one of defiance.
Jazz musicians picked it up straight away. Paul Whiteman’s orchestra had a hit with it in early 1928, with Bing Crosby singing and Bix Beiderbecke on cornet, at a much faster tempo than Kern and Hammerstein had intended.
Classic Ol’ Man River version: Paul Whiteman and His Orchestra with Bing Crosby and Bix Beiderbecke (78 rpm single, 1928)
Modern Ol’ Man River version: Keith Jarrett (Tokyo Solo, DVD, recorded 2002, released 2006)
2. “Why Was I Born?”
Kern and Hammerstein wrote “Why Was I Born?” for Sweet Adeline in 1929, a period piece set in the 1890s that opened just before the Wall Street crash. It was introduced by Helen Morgan, who had sung “Bill” as Julie in Show Boat and whose signature pose was draped over a piano.
Billie Holiday recorded it with Teddy Wilson and His Orchestra on 25 January 1937, and Ella Fitzgerald included it on her Jerome Kern Songbook in 1963.
Kenny Burrell and John Coltrane recorded it in March 1958 for an album that wasn’t released until 1963. Sonny Rollins played it at a Boston concert on 15 September 2001, four days after the 11 September attacks, and the recording came out in 2005.
Classic Why Was I Born? version: Billie Holiday with Teddy Wilson and His Orchestra (Brunswick single, 1937)
Modern Why Was I Born? version: Sonny Rollins (Without a Song: The 9/11 Concert, recorded 2001, released 2005)
3. “The Song Is You”
Music in the Air opened at the Alvin Theatre on 8 November 1932 and ran for 342 performances. “The Song Is You” was introduced by Natalie Hall and Tullio Carminati, who played the librettist Bruno Mahler.
Its bridge shifts suddenly to a distant key, a move improvisers enjoy. Charlie Parker recorded it with a quartet in December 1952.
Classic The Song Is You version: Charlie Parker (Now’s the Time, recorded 1952, released 1956)
Modern The Song Is You version: Lee Konitz, Brad Mehldau and Charlie Haden (Alone Together, 1997)
4. “Smoke Gets in Your Eyes”
The melody had a long road to the stage. Kern first wrote it as an up-tempo tap number for Show Boat in 1927, where it wasn’t used, and in 1932 he tried it again as a march for a radio theme. Only when he and lyricist Otto Harbach slowed it down for Roberta in 1933 did it find its home. Harbach is credited with the idea of slowing it down.
Tamara Drasin introduced it in Roberta in November 1933, and Paul Whiteman’s 1934 recording with Bob Lawrence went to number one. Kern is said to have disliked the dance-band arrangements of the early 1930s.
The best-known Kern-and-jazz story belongs to this song, but it happened after he died. When the Platters’ doo-wop version became a number one hit in 1958–59, Kern’s widow Eva disliked it so much that she started legal action to stop its distribution. She dropped the case when she learned how much it was selling and how large her royalties would be. Harbach, by contrast, praised the group for reviving his song “with taste”, according to their producer Buck Ram.
For jazz players, the attraction is the bridge, which makes a bold leap into a distant key before finding its way back. Thelonious Monk recorded a version in 1954 that pulls the melody apart while keeping it recognisable.
Classic Smoke Gets in Your Eyes version: Thelonious Monk (Monk, recorded 1954)
Modern Smoke Gets in Your Eyes version: Keith Jarrett Trio (Tribute, recorded 1989, released 1990)
5. “Yesterdays”
“Yesterdays” came from the same 1933 Roberta score. The show ran for 295 performances. It was sung by Fay Templeton, a veteran star of the 1890s stage, which gave the lyric about lost days an extra edge.
Its dark, minor-key mood makes it one of the Jerome Kern songs most loved by pianists and saxophonists.
Billie Holiday recorded it for Commodore on 20 April 1939, the same session that produced “Strange Fruit”.
Classic Yesterdays version: Billie Holiday (Commodore single, recorded 1939)
Modern Yesterdays version: Fred Hersch and Bill Frisell (Songs We Know, 1998)
6. “The Way You Look Tonight”
By the mid-1930s Kern was writing for Hollywood, and his score for the Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers film Swing Time (1936) was written with lyricist Dorothy Fields. In the film, Astaire sits at the piano and sings “The Way You Look Tonight” to Rogers while she is in the next room washing her hair. She walks in with her head covered in shampoo.
Fields described hearing Kern play the melody for the first time in Max Wilk’s book They’re Playing Our Song: “I went out and started to cry. The release absolutely killed me.” The song won the Academy Award for Best Original Song in 1936.
Teddy Wilson recorded it with a 21-year-old Billie Holiday in October 1936, and Benny Goodman’s 1942 version with Peggy Lee put it back in the charts.
Classic The Way You Look Tonight version: Teddy Wilson and His Orchestra with Billie Holiday (single, 1936)
Modern The Way You Look Tonight version: Tony Bennett and Bill Charlap (The Silver Lining: The Songs of Jerome Kern, 2015)
7. “A Fine Romance”
Also written for Swing Time, “A Fine Romance” is sung by Astaire and Rogers during a drive through the snowy countryside. On the original sheet music Kern and Fields called it “a sarcastic love song”.
Writing upbeat dance numbers for Astaire did not come easily to Kern. As Mark Steyn tells it, Astaire asked Fields whether Kern could write anything hot, and during work on the Swing Time score Astaire tapped up and down Fields’ living room and stairs until Kern caught the beat.
Fields’ lyric, which compares an unresponsive partner to yesterday’s mashed potatoes, is a gift for singers who can act. In the film Rogers gets two choruses and Astaire the last, before she slams the car door and drives off. Ella Fitzgerald and Louis Armstrong turned it into a comic duet on their second album together. For more of Ella’s work, see our guide to the best Ella Fitzgerald albums.
Classic A Fine Romance version: Ella Fitzgerald and Louis Armstrong (Ella and Louis Again, 1957)
Modern A Fine Romance version: Stacey Kent (Let Yourself Go, 2000)
8. “All the Things You Are”
Very Warm for May opened on 17 November 1939 and closed after 59 performances. It was Kern’s last Broadway show, and it would have been forgotten if not for “All the Things You Are”, with lyrics by Hammerstein.
The melody travels through several keys, with the bridge moving to G and then E major before the tune returns home to A-flat. Tommy Dorsey’s recording, with Jack Leonard singing, was a hit in early 1940.
For jazz musicians, those key changes made it a workout. Charlie Parker wrote “Bird of Paradise” on its chords in 1947. In 1953 Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, Bud Powell, Charles Mingus and Max Roach played it at Massey Hall in Toronto, at the concert later released as Jazz at Massey Hall.
Classic All the Things You Are version: The Quintet (Jazz at Massey Hall, 1953)
Modern All the Things You Are version: Gonzalo Rubalcaba with Charlie Haden and Paul Motian (Discovery: Live at Montreux, recorded 1990)
9. “I’m Old Fashioned”
Kern wrote this for You Were Never Lovelier (1942), with lyrics by Johnny Mercer. Rita Hayworth sings it to Fred Astaire before they dance, although her singing voice was dubbed by Nan Wynn.
Its long, even melody sounds simple, but the harmony underneath is richer than it first appears.
John Coltrane recorded it on Blue Train in 1957, and Chet Baker sang it the following year on It Could Happen to You. For more of Baker’s vocal work, see our guide to Chet Baker Sings.
Classic I’m Old Fashioned version: John Coltrane (Blue Train, recorded 1957, released 1958)
Modern I’m Old Fashioned version: Bill Charlap with Peter Bernstein and Peter Washington (I’m Old Fashioned, recorded 2009, released 2010)
10. “Long Ago (and Far Away)”
For the 1944 film Cover Girl, starring Rita Hayworth and Gene Kelly, Kern worked with Ira Gershwin. “Long Ago (and Far Away)” is sung by the two leads as a duet, with Hayworth’s voice dubbed by Martha Mears.
The song was nominated for an Academy Award but lost to “Swinging on a Star”.
Chet Baker recorded it in 1955, singing and playing trumpet.
Classic Long Ago (and Far Away) version: Chet Baker (Chet Baker Sings and Plays, 1955)
Modern Long Ago (and Far Away) version: Charlie Haden and Brad Mehldau (Long Ago and Far Away, recorded 2007, released 2018)
Kern came close to an early death in May 1915. He was due to sail to London with the producer Charles Frohman on the Lusitania, but by the usual account he overslept after a late night of poker and missed the boat. Frohman died when the ship was torpedoed.
In November 1945 he was back in New York to work on a revival of Show Boat and a new musical about Annie Oakley. On 5 November he collapsed with a cerebral haemorrhage at the corner of Park Avenue and 57th Street. Carrying only his ASCAP membership card, he was at first taken to the ward for the destitute at City Hospital.
He died on 11 November 1945, aged 60, with Hammerstein at his side. Hammerstein sang or hummed “I’ve Told Ev’ry Little Star” to him, and realised he had gone when there was no response. The Annie Oakley show went to Irving Berlin and became Annie Get Your Gun; we cover that score in our Irving Berlin songs article.
Looking for more about the great songwriters of jazz? We highlighted 10 of them here.
Which other Jerome Kern songs would you add to this list? Let us know in the comments below.
