Burton Lane
Encyclopedia
Burton Lane was an American
composer
and lyricist
. His most popular and successful work is the musical Finian's Rainbow
, "the score for which Lane will always be most remembered."
(birth name Burton Levy) and studied classical piano as a child. At age 14 the theatrical producers the Shuberts
commissioned him to write songs for a revue, Greenwich Village Follies.
He was known for his Broadway
musicals, Finian's Rainbow
(1947) and On a Clear Day You Can See Forever
(1965). He also wrote the music for the less remembered Broadway shows, Hold On to Your Hats (1940), Laffing Room Only (1944), and Carmelina
(1979), the latter with lyrics by Alan Jay Lerner
, who had also written lyrics to Lane's music for On a Clear Day and the film Royal Wedding
(1951). Lane mainly wrote music for films, such as Dancing Lady
, Babes on Broadway
, and Some Like it Hot
, writing for more than 30 movies.
He was president of the American Guild of Authors and Composers from 1957 and for the next 10 terms, during which period he campaigned against music piracy. He also served three terms on the board of directors of the American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers
(ASCAP).
Lane's best-known songs include "Old Devil Moon
," "How Are Things in Glocca Morra?
", "Too Late Now," "How About You?", and the title song from "On a Clear Day." He shared a Grammy Award in 1965 for Best Broadway Cast Album of the year (On a Clear Day You Can See Forever).
Finian's Rainbow
has had four major revivals (1955, 1960, 1967, and 2009), and was also made into a film starring Fred Astaire
and Petula Clark
, directed by Francis Ford Coppola
, in 1968. In 2004 the Irish Repertory Theatre
staged a well-received Off-Broadway
production. New York's City Center Encores!
series performed a critically acclaimed concert version of the piece in March 2009. Directed and choreographed by Warren Carlyle, it starred Jim Norton
and Kate Baldwin
as Finian and Sharon, with Cheyenne Jackson
as Woody and Jeremy Bobb as Og, the leprechaun. The most recent Broadway revival opened on October 29 at the St. James Theatre
with most of the Encores! cast. Newly added to the Broadway cast are Christopher Fitzgerald as Og and Chuck Cooper as Billboard; Jim Norton
, Kate Baldwin
and Cheyenne Jackson
all reprise their roles.
). He caught her sisters' act at the Paramount theater in Hollywood which featured a movie and a live stage show. The sisters, Susie and Mary Jane, brought on their younger sister, Frances, who sang "Zing Went the Strings of My Heart". Lane immediately called Jack Robbins, head of the music department at MGM, and told her he'd just heard a great new talent.
Robbins told him to bring her in next day for an audition which Lane did. Robbins was knocked out by the little girl's voice (Lane played the audition piano for her), rushed upstairs and dragged Louis B. Mayer
down to listen to her belt out some songs. Mayer was so impressed he ordered every writer, director and producer on the lot to hear her with the result that the audition, which began at 9 am, finished at 7:30 pm. But Frances (Judy) was signed, and that was the start of her great career. Because of circumstance, and contractual arrangements, Burton Lane didn't work with her again for seven years (Babes on Broadway), but it was definitely he who discovered her.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
composer
Composer
A composer is a person who creates music, either by musical notation or oral tradition, for interpretation and performance, or through direct manipulation of sonic material through electronic media...
and lyricist
Lyricist
A lyricist is a songwriter who specializes in lyrics. A singer who writes the lyrics to songs is a singer-lyricist. This differentiates from a singer-composer, who composes the song's melody.-Collaboration:...
. His most popular and successful work is the musical Finian's Rainbow
Finian's Rainbow
Finian's Rainbow is a musical with a book by E.Y. Harburg and Fred Saidy, lyrics by Harburg, and music by Burton Lane. The 1947 Broadway production ran for 725 performances. Several revivals and a 1968 film version followed. A Broadway revival ran from October 8, 2009 until January 17, 2010...
, "the score for which Lane will always be most remembered."
Biography
Lane was born in New York CityNew York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
(birth name Burton Levy) and studied classical piano as a child. At age 14 the theatrical producers the Shuberts
Shubert family
The Shubert family of New York City, New York was responsible for the establishment of the Broadway district, in New York City, as the hub of the theatre industry in the United States...
commissioned him to write songs for a revue, Greenwich Village Follies.
He was known for his Broadway
Broadway theatre
Broadway theatre, commonly called simply Broadway, refers to theatrical performances presented in one of the 40 professional theatres with 500 or more seats located in the Theatre District centered along Broadway, and in Lincoln Center, in Manhattan in New York City...
musicals, Finian's Rainbow
Finian's Rainbow
Finian's Rainbow is a musical with a book by E.Y. Harburg and Fred Saidy, lyrics by Harburg, and music by Burton Lane. The 1947 Broadway production ran for 725 performances. Several revivals and a 1968 film version followed. A Broadway revival ran from October 8, 2009 until January 17, 2010...
(1947) and On a Clear Day You Can See Forever
On a Clear Day You Can See Forever
On a Clear Day You Can See Forever is a musical with music by Burton Lane and a book and lyrics by Alan Jay Lerner based loosely on Berkeley Square, written in 1929 by John L. Balderston. It concerns a woman who has ESP and has been reincarnated...
(1965). He also wrote the music for the less remembered Broadway shows, Hold On to Your Hats (1940), Laffing Room Only (1944), and Carmelina
Carmelina
Carmelina is a musical with a book by Joseph Stein and Alan Jay Lerner, lyrics by Lerner, and music by Burton Lane.Based on the 1968 film Buona Sera, Mrs. Campbell , it focuses on an Italian woman who has raised her teenaged daughter Gia to believe her father was an American who died heroically in...
(1979), the latter with lyrics by Alan Jay Lerner
Alan Jay Lerner
Alan Jay Lerner was an American lyricist and librettist. In collaboration with Frederick Loewe, he created some of the world's most popular and enduring works of musical theatre for both the stage and on film...
, who had also written lyrics to Lane's music for On a Clear Day and the film Royal Wedding
Royal Wedding
Royal Wedding is a 1951 Hollywood musical comedy film known for Fred Astaire's dance performance on a ceiling and another with a coat rack. The story is set in London in 1947 at the time of the wedding of Princess Elizabeth and Prince Philip, and stars Astaire, Jane Powell, Peter Lawford, Sarah...
(1951). Lane mainly wrote music for films, such as Dancing Lady
Dancing Lady
Dancing Lady is a 1933 musical film starring Joan Crawford and Clark Gable, and featuring Franchot Tone, the fourth of eight collaborations between Crawford and Gable. It was directed by Robert Z. Leonard, produced by John W. Considine Jr. and David O. Selznick, and was based on the novel of the...
, Babes on Broadway
Babes on Broadway
Babes on Broadway is a 1941 musical film starring Mickey Rooney and Judy Garland and directed by Busby Berkeley, with Vincente Minnelli directing Garland's big solo numbers. The film, which features Fay Bainter and Virginia Weidler, was the third in the "Backyard Musical" series about kids who put...
, and Some Like it Hot
Some Like It Hot
Some Like It Hot is an American comedy film, made in 1958 and released in 1959, which was directed by Billy Wilder and starred Marilyn Monroe, Tony Curtis, Jack Lemmon and George Raft. The supporting cast includes Joe E. Brown, Pat O'Brien and Nehemiah Persoff. The film is a remake by Wilder and I....
, writing for more than 30 movies.
He was president of the American Guild of Authors and Composers from 1957 and for the next 10 terms, during which period he campaigned against music piracy. He also served three terms on the board of directors of the American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers
American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers
The American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers is an American not-for-profit performance-rights organization that protects its members' musical copyrights by monitoring public performances of their music, whether via a broadcast or live performance, and compensating them...
(ASCAP).
Lane's best-known songs include "Old Devil Moon
Old Devil Moon
"Old Devil Moon" is a popular song composed by Burton Lane, with lyrics by E.Y. Harburg for the 1947 musical Finian's Rainbow.-Notable recordings:*Rosemary Clooney - Out Of This World , At Long Last...
," "How Are Things in Glocca Morra?
How Are Things in Glocca Morra?
"How Are Things in Glocca Morra?" is a popular song about a fictional village in Ireland.The music was composed by Burton Lane and the lyrics written by E. Y. Harburg. The song was published in 1946 and introduced in the 1947 musical Finian's Rainbow. There is no actual Glocca Morra in Ireland...
", "Too Late Now," "How About You?", and the title song from "On a Clear Day." He shared a Grammy Award in 1965 for Best Broadway Cast Album of the year (On a Clear Day You Can See Forever).
Finian's Rainbow
Finian's Rainbow
Finian's Rainbow is a musical with a book by E.Y. Harburg and Fred Saidy, lyrics by Harburg, and music by Burton Lane. The 1947 Broadway production ran for 725 performances. Several revivals and a 1968 film version followed. A Broadway revival ran from October 8, 2009 until January 17, 2010...
has had four major revivals (1955, 1960, 1967, and 2009), and was also made into a film starring Fred Astaire
Fred Astaire
Fred Astaire was an American film and Broadway stage dancer, choreographer, singer and actor. His stage and subsequent film career spanned a total of 76 years, during which he made 31 musical films. He was named the fifth Greatest Male Star of All Time by the American Film Institute...
and Petula Clark
Petula Clark
Petula Clark, CBE is an English singer, actress, and composer whose career has spanned seven decades.Clark's professional career began as an entertainer on BBC Radio during World War II...
, directed by Francis Ford Coppola
Francis Ford Coppola
Francis Ford Coppola is an American film director, producer and screenwriter. He is widely acclaimed as one of Hollywood's most innovative and influential film directors...
, in 1968. In 2004 the Irish Repertory Theatre
Irish Repertory Theatre
The Irish Repertory Theatre is an Off Broadway theatre, founded by Ciarán O’Reilly and Charlotte Moore, which opened its doors in September 1988, with Sean O’Casey’s The Plough and the Stars.The mission of the theatre was and remains:...
staged a well-received Off-Broadway
Off-Broadway
Off-Broadway theater is a term for a professional venue in New York City with a seating capacity between 100 and 499, and for a specific production of a play, musical or revue that appears in such a venue, and which adheres to related trade union and other contracts...
production. New York's City Center Encores!
Encores!
Encores! Great American Musicals in Concert is a program that has been presented by New York City Center since 1994. Encores! is dedicated to performing the full score of musicals that rarely are heard in New York City...
series performed a critically acclaimed concert version of the piece in March 2009. Directed and choreographed by Warren Carlyle, it starred Jim Norton
Jim Norton (actor)
Jim Norton is an Irish character actor.-Performances:Jim Norton has been acting for over forty years in theatre, television, and movies, and frequently plays clergymen, most notably Bishop Brennan in the sitcom Father Ted, as well as in The Sweeney , Peak Practice , Sunset Heights , A Love Divided...
and Kate Baldwin
Kate Baldwin
-Biography:Born in Evanston, Illinois, Baldwin graduated from the theatre program at Northwestern University in 1997.-Career:Kate Baldwin made her Broadway debut in The Full Monty in 2000, followed by appearances in Thoroughly Modern Millie and Wonderful Town...
as Finian and Sharon, with Cheyenne Jackson
Cheyenne Jackson
Cheyenne Jackson is an American actor and singer. He started in regional theater when he moved to Seattle, and after moving to New York City, made his 2002 Broadway theatre debut understudying both male leads in the Tony Award-winning musical Thoroughly Modern Millie...
as Woody and Jeremy Bobb as Og, the leprechaun. The most recent Broadway revival opened on October 29 at the St. James Theatre
St. James Theatre
The St. James Theatre is located at 246 W. 44th St. Broadway, New York City, New York. It was built by Abraham L. Erlanger, theatrical producer and a founding member of the Theatrical Syndicate, on the site of the original Sardi's restaurant. It opened in 1927 as The Erlanger...
with most of the Encores! cast. Newly added to the Broadway cast are Christopher Fitzgerald as Og and Chuck Cooper as Billboard; Jim Norton
Jim Norton (actor)
Jim Norton is an Irish character actor.-Performances:Jim Norton has been acting for over forty years in theatre, television, and movies, and frequently plays clergymen, most notably Bishop Brennan in the sitcom Father Ted, as well as in The Sweeney , Peak Practice , Sunset Heights , A Love Divided...
, Kate Baldwin
Kate Baldwin
-Biography:Born in Evanston, Illinois, Baldwin graduated from the theatre program at Northwestern University in 1997.-Career:Kate Baldwin made her Broadway debut in The Full Monty in 2000, followed by appearances in Thoroughly Modern Millie and Wonderful Town...
and Cheyenne Jackson
Cheyenne Jackson
Cheyenne Jackson is an American actor and singer. He started in regional theater when he moved to Seattle, and after moving to New York City, made his 2002 Broadway theatre debut understudying both male leads in the Tony Award-winning musical Thoroughly Modern Millie...
all reprise their roles.
Discovery of Judy Garland
Lane is credited with discovering the 13-year-old Frances Gumm (Judy GarlandJudy Garland
Judy Garland was an American actress and singer. Through a career that spanned 45 of her 47 years and for her renowned contralto voice, she attained international stardom as an actress in musical and dramatic roles, as a recording artist and on the concert stage...
). He caught her sisters' act at the Paramount theater in Hollywood which featured a movie and a live stage show. The sisters, Susie and Mary Jane, brought on their younger sister, Frances, who sang "Zing Went the Strings of My Heart". Lane immediately called Jack Robbins, head of the music department at MGM, and told her he'd just heard a great new talent.
Robbins told him to bring her in next day for an audition which Lane did. Robbins was knocked out by the little girl's voice (Lane played the audition piano for her), rushed upstairs and dragged Louis B. Mayer
Louis B. Mayer
Louis Burt Mayer born Lazar Meir was an American film producer. He is generally cited as the creator of the "star system" within Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in its golden years. Known always as Louis B...
down to listen to her belt out some songs. Mayer was so impressed he ordered every writer, director and producer on the lot to hear her with the result that the audition, which began at 9 am, finished at 7:30 pm. But Frances (Judy) was signed, and that was the start of her great career. Because of circumstance, and contractual arrangements, Burton Lane didn't work with her again for seven years (Babes on Broadway), but it was definitely he who discovered her.
Stage credits
- Earl Carroll's Vanities (1931) - revueRevueA revue is a type of multi-act popular theatrical entertainment that combines music, dance and sketches. The revue has its roots in 19th century American popular entertainment and melodrama but grew into a substantial cultural presence of its own during its golden years from 1916 to 1932...
- co-composerComposerA composer is a person who creates music, either by musical notation or oral tradition, for interpretation and performance, or through direct manipulation of sonic material through electronic media...
and co-lyricistLyricistA lyricist is a songwriter who specializes in lyrics. A singer who writes the lyrics to songs is a singer-lyricist. This differentiates from a singer-composer, who composes the song's melody.-Collaboration:... - Singin' the Blues (1931) - playPlay (theatre)A play is a form of literature written by a playwright, usually consisting of scripted dialogue between characters, intended for theatrical performance rather than just reading. There are rare dramatists, notably George Bernard Shaw, who have had little preference whether their plays were performed...
with music - co-composerComposerA composer is a person who creates music, either by musical notation or oral tradition, for interpretation and performance, or through direct manipulation of sonic material through electronic media... - Hold on to Your Hats (1940) - musical - composerComposerA composer is a person who creates music, either by musical notation or oral tradition, for interpretation and performance, or through direct manipulation of sonic material through electronic media...
- Laffing Room Only (1944) - revueRevueA revue is a type of multi-act popular theatrical entertainment that combines music, dance and sketches. The revue has its roots in 19th century American popular entertainment and melodrama but grew into a substantial cultural presence of its own during its golden years from 1916 to 1932...
- composerComposerA composer is a person who creates music, either by musical notation or oral tradition, for interpretation and performance, or through direct manipulation of sonic material through electronic media...
and lyricistLyricistA lyricist is a songwriter who specializes in lyrics. A singer who writes the lyrics to songs is a singer-lyricist. This differentiates from a singer-composer, who composes the song's melody.-Collaboration:... - Finian's RainbowFinian's RainbowFinian's Rainbow is a musical with a book by E.Y. Harburg and Fred Saidy, lyrics by Harburg, and music by Burton Lane. The 1947 Broadway production ran for 725 performances. Several revivals and a 1968 film version followed. A Broadway revival ran from October 8, 2009 until January 17, 2010...
(1947, revivalsRevival (play)A revival is a restaging of a stage production after its original run has closed. New material may be added. A filmed version is said to be an adaptation and requires writing of a screenplay....
in 1955, 1960, 2009) - musical - composerComposerA composer is a person who creates music, either by musical notation or oral tradition, for interpretation and performance, or through direct manipulation of sonic material through electronic media... - On a Clear Day You Can See ForeverOn a Clear Day You Can See ForeverOn a Clear Day You Can See Forever is a musical with music by Burton Lane and a book and lyrics by Alan Jay Lerner based loosely on Berkeley Square, written in 1929 by John L. Balderston. It concerns a woman who has ESP and has been reincarnated...
(1966) - musical - composerComposerA composer is a person who creates music, either by musical notation or oral tradition, for interpretation and performance, or through direct manipulation of sonic material through electronic media...
- TonyTony AwardThe Antoinette Perry Award for Excellence in Theatre, more commonly known as a Tony Award, recognizes achievement in live Broadway theatre. The awards are presented by the American Theatre Wing and The Broadway League at an annual ceremony in New York City. The awards are given for Broadway...
Nomination for Best Composer and Lyricist - We Bombed in New Haven (1968) - playPlay (theatre)A play is a form of literature written by a playwright, usually consisting of scripted dialogue between characters, intended for theatrical performance rather than just reading. There are rare dramatists, notably George Bernard Shaw, who have had little preference whether their plays were performed...
- composerComposerA composer is a person who creates music, either by musical notation or oral tradition, for interpretation and performance, or through direct manipulation of sonic material through electronic media...
for the song "Bomb, Bomb, Bombing Along" - CarmelinaCarmelinaCarmelina is a musical with a book by Joseph Stein and Alan Jay Lerner, lyrics by Lerner, and music by Burton Lane.Based on the 1968 film Buona Sera, Mrs. Campbell , it focuses on an Italian woman who has raised her teenaged daughter Gia to believe her father was an American who died heroically in...
(1979) - musical - composerComposerA composer is a person who creates music, either by musical notation or oral tradition, for interpretation and performance, or through direct manipulation of sonic material through electronic media...
- TonyTony AwardThe Antoinette Perry Award for Excellence in Theatre, more commonly known as a Tony Award, recognizes achievement in live Broadway theatre. The awards are presented by the American Theatre Wing and The Broadway League at an annual ceremony in New York City. The awards are given for Broadway...
Nomination for Best Original ScoreTony Award for Best Original ScoreThe Tony Award for Best Original Score is the Tony Award given to the composers and lyricists of the best original score written for a musical in that year. The score consists of music and lyrics...
External links
- Awards & Nominations at Internet Broadway DatabaseInternet Broadway DatabaseThe Internet Broadway Database is an online database of Broadway theatre productions and their personnel. It is operated by the Research Department of The Broadway League, a trade association for the North American commercial theatre community....
- Awards & Nominations at Entertainment Awards Database
- http://www.box.net/shared/zj5khzdgia Piano Solo "On a Clear Day" by Burton Lane, played by Roger Williams, from the Pianocorder Contemporary Artists Series. (7 ft Grand Piano)