Blue Skies: A Song History

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Copyright cards in Irving Berlin’s office date “Blue Skies” to on or about December 16, 1926.[1] Belle Baker first sang it in Betsy, a Florenz Ziegfeld show whose other songs were by Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart; it opened at New York’s New Amsterdam Theatre on December 28, 1926.[1][2] According to a Playbill history, Ziegfeld was said to be unhappy with the production and added the Berlin song to it.[3] The Irving Berlin Music Company rejects the story that the song was written overnight to rescue Betsy, pointing out that the show had already run a tryout at Washington’s National Theatre from December 20 to 25, 1926.[1] The show itself lasted only 39 performances, closing on January 29, 1927.[4]

Oil sketch of towering white clouds in a blue sky above a low line of trees

Thomas Cole, Clouds, oil on paper laid down on canvas, ca. 1838. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Public domain (CC0). Shown for the song’s title; it has no connection to the song.

In New York on January 15, 1927, Ben Selvin’s orchestra, billed as The Knickerbockers, recorded the song for Columbia with Charles Kaley singing.[5] Four days later George Olsen and his Music cut a version for Victor with a male vocal trio,[6] issued in April 1927 with Rodgers and Hart’s “Where’s That Rainbow?” on the other side.[7] Berlin’s company names the Selvin and Olsen discs as the song’s top-selling records.[1] Al Jolson sang it in The Jazz Singer,[1] which premiered in New York on October 6, 1927; in one of the film’s sound sequences his character, after a conversation with his mother, performs it at the piano until his father, a cantor, walks in and cuts him short with a shout.[8]

The song lent its title to Paramount’s 1946 musical Blue Skies, a showcase of Berlin songs starring Bing Crosby and Fred Astaire,[9] in which Crosby sang it.[1] More than half a century after it was written, Willie Nelson included it on Stardust, his April 1978 album of standards, in a minor-key arrangement.[10] His single reached No. 1 on Billboard’s Hot Country Songs chart dated September 2, 1978.[11]

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Sources

  1. The Irving Berlin Music Company: "Behind the Songs".
  2. The Morgan Library & Museum: "Betsy: a new musical comedy" (theater program, 1926).
  3. Playbill: "Playbill Vault's Today in Theatre History: December 28".
  4. Playbill Vault: "Betsy (Broadway, New Amsterdam Theatre, 1926)".
  5. Discography of American Historical Recordings: "Columbia matrix W143312. Blue skies / Charles Kaley ; The Knickerbockers".
  6. Discography of American Historical Recordings: "Victor matrix BVE-37549. Blue skies / George Olsen and his Music".
  7. Discography of American Historical Recordings: "Victor 20455 (Black label (popular) 10-in. double-faced)".
  8. AFI Catalog of Feature Films: "The Jazz Singer (1927)".
  9. AFI Catalog of Feature Films: "Blue Skies (1946)".
  10. Variety: "As 'Stardust' Turns 40, Willie Nelson Talks About the Great American Songbook".
  11. Billboard: "Hot Country Songs, week of September 2, 1978".