Program Notes

After Franz Waxman had completed the musical score for Sunrise at Campobello (Warner Brothers, 1960), the film version of the hit Broadway play that dramatized Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s struggle to overcome polio (Ralph Bellamy recreated his Tony award-winning performance as FDR and Greer Garson, would be nominated for an Oscar, as Eleanor), writer-producer Dore Schary asked Waxman and arranger Leo Arnaud to prepare a medley of 1920’s hits that would serve as an overture – and set the mood of the period – before the movie began.

The classic arrangements of “The Japanese Sandman,” (music by Robert Van Alstyne), “Avalon” (Vincent Rose), “Pretty Baby” (Tony Jackson & Robert Van Alstynee), “I’m Forever Blowing Bubbles” (Jaan Kenbrovin & John William Kellette), “The Japanese Sandman” (Richard Whiting), and “Smiles” (Lee S. Roberts) are as memorable today as when they were composed almost a century ago.