Hoagy Carmichael - Biography
By J Poet
Hoagy Carmichael was one of the greatest composers of American popular song, and one of the few songwriters of his time who could also perform his own songs as well as any of the more famous singers who made them hits. You could call him the first singer/songwriter without being too far off the mark. His catalogue includes some of the most famous, and most recorded melodies of the modern era including “Stardust,” “Georgia on My Mind,” “The Nearness of You,” “Heart and Soul,” “Skylark,” “Ole Buttermilk Sky” and “In the Cool, Cool, Cool of the Evening.” He was immensely successful as a songwriter, a great performer, and later on in his career a singing movie star playing thinly disguised versions of himself. He made many recordings, and while there weren’t major hits, his laid back, easygoing attitude and fine piano playing make them well worth having. His collaboration with lyricist Johnny Mercer, “In the Cool, Cool, Cool of the Evening,” sung by Bing Crosby and Jane Wyman in Here Comes the Groom, won an Oscar for Best Song in 1951. In 1972, Indiana University awarded him an honorary doctorate and in 1986 opened the Hoagy Carmichael Room in his honor to display his books, manuscripts and memorabilia. Carmichael died on December 27, 1981.
Hoagland Carmichael was born in Bloomington, Indiana, in 1899, the same year Scott Joplin published his biggest hit, Maple Leaf Rag. His father was an electrician and his mother a talented amateur piano player who augmented the family’s income playing at silent movies and house parties. (Carmichael was named after The Hoaglands, a troupe of performers who stayed at the family home during his mother’s pregnancy) He was singing and playing piano himself by the age of 6 and in high school was already known as a gifted pianist. He worked odd jobs to help bring in income to his family, haunted by the death of a 3-year-old sister who died because the family couldn’t afford good medical care.
The family moved to Indianapolis where Carmichael met Reginald DuValle a black jazz pianist who taught him how to play ragtime and improvise. Carmichael started hanging out in bars, clubs, restaurant and whorehouses; any place there was a piano for him to play.
Carmichael went to Indiana University, more interested in jazz and girls than his studies, although he did finish a law degree by 1925. His first band, Carmichael’s Collegians, became a regional success playing frat parties and college clubs. 1n 1924 Carmichael met Bix Beiderbeck. He’d booked his band for a fraternity dance and the two jazz fans became friends. Beiderbeck took Carmichael to Chicago where he introduced him to Louis Armstrong who was playing with King Oliver’s Creole Jazz Band at the time. Beiderbeck also got Carmichael interested in songwriting. One of his first compositions was “Free Wheeling,” which Beiderbeck cut with his band after changing the title to “Riverboat Shuffle.”
After graduation Carmichael moved to Miami to practice law, but he soon decided he wanted to be a musician. He moved back to Indiana, cut a few 78-RPM singles for the small Gennett Record Company of Richmond, Indiana, including “Stardust.” They didn’t sell. Carmichael decided to move to New York and try to make it as a songwriter.
Carmichael hit New York in 1929. Beiderbeck was around and introduced him to the Dorsey brothers, Benny Goodman, Jack Teagarden, and Johnny Mercer, another new songwriter in town. Carmichael started working with Mercer and in the years that followed produced “Lazybones,” which became a huge hit, “Skylark,” a jazz standard, and the Oscar winning “In the Cool, Cool, Cool of the Evening.” Carmichael also met Duke Ellington’s agent and publisher Irving Mills, who published the sheet music for “Stardust,” still a wordless instrumental piece. In May of 1930, Isham Jones recorded the song at a slower tempo and with words written by Mitchell Parrish, a writer who worked for Mills. The slower version started getting covered by other artists and the song began to build its legendary cachet.
Carmichael’s “Lazybones” became a big hit with several big names including Ted Lewis selling close to half a million copies of the song. He got a Manhattan apartment, a new wardrobe and hung out with George Gershwin, Fred Astaire, Duke Ellington, and his old pal Beiderbeck. He landed a record deal with Victor (later RCA) and made 36 singles (78 rpm) for them; twenty-one are collected on Stardust, and Much More (1994 RCA). He recorded with Louis Armstrong, Henry “Red” Allen, Bix Beiderbeck, Benny Goodman, Mildred Bailey, Jack Teagarden and other hot jazz giants. Mister Music Master 1928 – 1947 (2004 Naxos UK) collects some of these recordings as well as tune cut with Spike Jones, Earl Hines and his band, Ella Fitzgerald and Chick Webb. It includes “Washboard Blues” with the Paul Whiteman Orchestra, one of the first records Carmichael made after landing in New York. While his own records sold moderately well, his songwriting royalties made him comfortable. He married Ruth Meinardi and decided to try his luck in Hollywood.
He began working at Paramount (for 1,000 dollars a week) with lyricist Frank Loesser and turned out “Two Sleepy People,” “Small Fry,” and “Heart and Soul.” He wrote a musical comedy for Broadway with Johnny Mercer called Walk With Music, but it failed. He was more comfortable writing songs as they came to him, without having to fit them into a plot. In 1937 he played a piano player and singer in Topper and did so well he was offered other parts, usually versions of his laid back, philosophical persona. He appeared in To Have and Have Not (1942) with Bogart and Bacall, where he sang “Hong Kong Blues” and “The Rumba Jumps,” Canyon Passage (1945), singing a then new song “Ole Buttermilk Sky” which became a big hit and his theme song, The Best Years of Our Lives (1946), and Young Man with a Horn (1950). He had his own radio show that appeared on three major networks and made records for three labels. Ole Buttermilk Sky (1998 Collector’s Choice) has 20 tracks he cut for Decca from the mid 40s to early 50s including “Hong Kong Blues’ and “The Old Music Master.”
In 1946 he published a book of memoirs The Stardust Road (Greenwood Press) and continued writing songs including “Skylark” in 1942, soon recorded by Glenn Miller, Dinah Shore, and Harry James, “In the Cool, Cool, Cool of the Evening” in 1951, and “My Resistance Is Low” and “Winter Moon,” but he had no more big hits. Despite the changing times, Carmichael made what may be his best solo album Hoagy Sings Carmichael (1957 Pacific Jazz, 2000 Blue Note). Johnny Mandel arranged the music and the hottest LA jazz cats, including Art Pepper on sax, provide some hard swinging sounds to compliment the master’s laid-back vocals. The earthquake called rock’n’roll was rearranging the pop music landscape and sophisticated adult fare wasn’t needed by the masses. He continued to take small roles in movies and TV shows, but spent most of his time golfing and collecting coins. He had a heart attack and died in 1981.
Carmichael’s own recordings have been endlessly repackaged, often with only one or two Carmichael performances packed in with recordings of his hits by other singers. For a great overview of his life’s work pick up Hoagy Carmichael in Person 1925-1955 (2006 Avid UK), a ten disc set with 250 recordings of Carmichael doing his own tunes along with 25 tracks of other artists covering song well known and obscure. Hoagy on My Mind (2000 Pearl) a 24-track collection covers the same ground as the boxed set for those on a limited budget.
