Music: Stravinsky in Tin Pan Alley

Igor Stravinsky’s fortunes had not kept pace with his fame. In the 37 years since he had written it, The Firebird had made a lot of money, but not for him. For one thing, as a Russian emigre, his royalties seldom caught up with him. Guided by his friend, Music Publisher Lou Levy, Stravinsky has earned $10,000 on Firebird in the past two years, simply by writing a new arrangement of it and thereby securing a U.S. copyright. But Levy wasn’t through helping.

Levy, who is married to one of the Andrews sisters, is the man who launched such Tin Pan Alley successes as Beat Me Daddy and Scrub Me Mamma. Said he: “Look, Mr. Stravinsky, I would not like to write a chapter in my book about you —a book called You’ve Got to Die Before You Write Popular Songs.” At first Stravinsky didn’t get it. Then Levy reminded him of what Tin Pan Alley grave robbers had done to Tchaikovsky and Chopin. Why shouldn’t Stravinsky steal from his own Firebird?

Stravinsky reduced Firebird’s rondo to a simple foxtrot, and brought it back. Levy had his boys write 35 versions of the lyrics before he finally settled on one written by John (Heartaches’) Klenner. He named it Summer Moon. Stravinsky changed only one word. Copies went out to what Levy calls “the guys with the big pipes”—Melchior, Nelson Eddy. Said Levy: “When guys like Sinatra and Crosby hear them singing it, they’ll want to do it quick. Create a demand, that’s what you do. But control the demand too. You gotta try to establish a song as a ‘standard’ like White Christmas.”

Last week, the process known as creating a demand began. Front-page headlines read: STRAVINSKY ADAPTS HIS ‘FIREBIRD,’ SEEKING JUKE-BOX FAME, ROYALTIES.

It was all a little unnerving to 65-year-old Composer Stravinsky, and when he saw the papers, he denied that he had written the arrangement: he had only okayed it. Stravinsky once wrote an elephant’s polka for Ringling Bros, and Barnum & Bailey, and a jazz concerto for Woody Herman (neither had the common touch). He will get double the going Tin Pan Alley rates for Summer Moon, and a 50-50 split on movie rights. Said he: “According to the newspapers, the only reason I wrote this arrangement was to make money. I am very glad if I do make money, but I am very glad also if everyone sings my song.”