Many arguments could be generated over whether Cole Porter or Irving Berlin should be considered America's greatest tunesmith. Both wrote music and lyrics; it's clearly a pick 'em situation. Porter had violin and piano lessons as a child, pursued undergraduate studies at Yale (where he penned fight songs that endure to this day such as... [+] Read More

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A respected Broadway name due to his Guys and Dolls and How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying, a composer who wrote half a dozen wartime songs including "Praise the Lord and Pass the Ammunition," a Hollywood lyric-writer for several 1940s films -- it appears that Frank Loesser had several careers packed into his one... [+] Read More

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In a career tragically cut short in mid-stride by a brain tumor, George Gershwin (1898-1937) proved himself to be not only one of the great songwriters of his extremely rich era, but also a gifted "serious" composer who bridged the worlds of classical and popular music. The latter is all the more striking, given that, of his contemporaries,... [+] Read More

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During the '40s and '50s, lyricist/librettist Oscar Hammerstein II and composer Richard Rodgers were the most successful composing team on Broadway, writing several long-running shows that were eventually made into movie musicals. Hammerstein was also the second most prolific lyricist of the 20th century, second only to Irving Berlin. Born into... [+] Read More

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