1. Harold Arlen was born in Buffalo, New York, the child of a Jewish cantor.
14 Facts About Harold Arlen
1. 2.
Harold Arlen learned to play the piano as a youth, and formed a band, Hyman Arluck's Snappy Trio, at age 15.
3.
Harold Arlen left home at 16 against his parents' wishes; within two years, he was performing on the Crystal Beach lake boat "Canadiana" with his new band, The Southbound Shufflers.
4.
Harold Arlen achieved some local success as a pianist and singer before moving to New York City in his early twenties, where he worked as an accompanist in vaudeville and changed his name to Harold Arlen.
5.
Between 1926 and about 1934, Harold Arlen appeared occasionally as a band vocalist on records by The Buffalodians, Red Nichols, Joe Venuti, Leo Reisman, and Eddie Duchin, usually singing his own compositions.
6.
In 1929, Harold Arlen composed his first well-known song: "Get Happy" and subsequently signed a yearlong song-writing contract with the George and Arthur Piantadosi firm.
7.
Harold Arlen signed with Samuel Goldwyn in 1935 to write songs for the film Strike Me Pink.
8.
Harold Arlen was a longtime friend and one-time roommate of actor Ray Bolger, who starred in The Wizard of Oz.
9.
Harold Arlen worked with Dorothy Fields on the 1952 film The Farmer Takes a Wife.
10.
Harold Arlen composed two of the defining songs of Judy Garland's career: "Over the Rainbow" and "The Man That Got Away", the last written for the 1954 version of the film A Star Is Born.
11.
Harold Arlen was inducted into the American Theater Hall of Fame in 1979.
12.
Harold Arlen died of cancer on April 23,1986, at his Manhattan apartment at the age of eighty-one.
13.
Harold Arlen is buried next to his wife at the Ferncliff Cemetery in Hartsdale, New York.
14.
Shortly before his death, Harold Arlen adopted his own nephew, Samuel, the 22-year-old adult son of his brother Julius "Jerry" Arluck; his estate would have an heir in order to extend his copyright.