Description

FLY ME TO THE MOON

Fly Me to the Moon – Audio Sample

Arr. for Clarinet Quartet
by
ALEX RUSSO

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Fly Me to the Moon – HISTORY

In 1954, when writing the song which would become “Fly Me to the Moon”, Bart Howard had been pursuing a career in music for more than 20 years. He played piano to accompany cabaret singers but also wrote songs with Cole Porter, his idol, in mind. In response to a publisher’s request for a simpler song, Bart Howard wrote a cabaret ballad in waltz time which he titled “In Other Words”. A publisher tried to make him change some lyrics from “fly me to the moon” to “take me to the moon” but Howard refused to do this. Many years later Howard commented that “… it took me 20 years to find out how to write a song in 20 minutes”.

He used his position as a piano accompanist and presenter at the Blue Angel cabaret venue to promote the song, and it was soon introduced in cabaret performances by Felicia Sanders.

In 1960 Peggy Lee recorded the song then made it more popular when she performed it in front of a large television audience on The Ed Sullivan Show. As the song’s popularity increased, it became better known as “Fly Me to the Moon” and in 1963 Peggy Lee convinced Bart Howard to make the name change official. In the early 1960s versions of the song were released under its new name by many well known singers, including Nat King Cole, Sarah Vaughan and Brenda Lee. Connie Francis released two non-English versions of the song in 1963: in Italian as “Portami Con Te” and in Spanish as “Llévame a la Luna”.

In 1962 Joe Harnell arranged and recorded an instrumental version in a bossa nova style. It was released as a single in late 1962, reached #14 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart in early 1963 and won Harnell a Grammy award. Harnell’s version was included on his album Fly Me to the Moon and the Bossa Nova Pops^[29] released in early 1963 which reached #3 stereo album on the Billboard 200 chart. Versions of the song were released by many other 1960s instrumental artists, including Roy Haynes Al Hirt and Oscar Peterson.

Frank Sinatra included the song on his 1964 album It Might as Well Be Swing accompanied by Count Basie. The music for this album was arranged by Quincy Jones who had worked with Count Basie a year earlier on the album This Time by Basie which also included a version of “Fly Me to the Moon”. Will Friedwald comments that: “Jones boosted the tempo and put it into an even four/four” for Basie’s version but “when Sinatra decided to address it with the Basie/Jones combination they recharged it into a straight swinger… [which]…all but explodes with energy”.