Composer, Pianist, Conductor (1887-1951)
Sigmund Romberg had already served in the army in Hungary before emigrating to the U.S. He was hired as staff composer for the Shubert brothers where he wrote material for revues by entertainers such as Al Jolson and adapted European musicals for American audiences, contributing to over 50 Broadway shows during his lifetime. Romberg wrote “Auf Weidersehn” for his first operetta (1915), collaborated on the successful Maytime (1915), and adapted Franz Schubert’s compositions for Blossom Time (1921).
Then he settled into writing a series of operettas that were international hits. The first, The Student Prince (1924), featured lyrics by Dorothy Donnelly for the lively “Drinking Song” and for “Serenade.” Two years later, with Oscar Hammerstein II and Otto Harbach, Romberg scored The Desert Song, based on the exotic tales of The Prisoner of Zenda, which featured “All Alone” and the captivating title tune. In 1928, again with Hammerstein, Romberg wrote The New Moon, which flopped in tryouts. Retaining the rousing “Stouthearted Men” but with a new libretto and new songs--“Softly As in a Morning Sunrise,” “Lover Come Back to Me,” and “Wanting You”--the show opened to rave reviews. That same year Rosalie, written in collaboration with the Gershwins and P.G.Wodehouse, was a Broadway hit.
Despite the success of his operettas, Broadway had had enough and was moving on to more contemporary fare. Romberg conducted concerts of his music and continued to write for stage and screen, collaborating on “When I Grow Too Old to Dream” with Hammerstein for a 1934 film. Up in Central Park (1945), with Dorothy Fields was a moderate success, but Romberg died before he saw his last show, The Girl in Pink Tights (1954), staged. A movie, Deep in My Heart (1954), starring Jose Ferrer, told a somewhat fictionalized story of Romberg’s life.
- Sandra Burlingame
Courtesy of JazzStandards.com
