“I Thought About You” | Stories of Standards

“I Thought About You” (1939), with music by Jimmy Van Heusen and lyrics by Johnny Mercer, began as a melody that Van Heusen played for Mercer just before Mercer left on the Denver Zephyr for a radio appearance in Chicago with Benny Goodman. Mercer later said that he couldn’t sleep, the tune was running through his mind and he wrote the lyrics on the train. Benny Goodman’s 1939 recording with vocalist Mildred Bailey went to #17 on the charts in 1940. A favorite of ballad-oriented singers, there have been many great recordings.

 

Jimmy Van Heusen (1913-1990) changed his name from Edward Chester Babcock to the more sophisticated-sounding Jimmy Van Heusen when as a teenager he started singing and playing piano on a Syracuse, New York, radio station. In college he collaborated with Harold Arlen’s brother Jerry on a song which was recorded by Cab Calloway. After moving to New York in 1933 he and Eddie De Lange produced nearly 20 hit songs before Jimmy moved on to collaborating with Johnny Burke from 1939 until Burke’s retirement in 1956. Together they started a publishing firm, the first of his life-long publishing associations. Van Heusen then started a famously productive partnership with Sammy Cahn. In the course of 40 years of writing music Van Heusen received 10 Oscar nominations, 4 Academy Awards, 1 Emmy Award and 6 Golden Laurel Nominations. A close friend of Frank Sinatra, Jimmy died in 1990 and was buried in the Sinatra family plot.

 

Johnny Mercer (1909-1976) was born and raised in Savannah, Georgia; he once said “My Aunt Hattie told me that when I was a baby six months old she’d hum to me and I’d hum right back at her.” His first hit, “Lazybones”, was written in 1933 with Hoagy Carmichael. He was elected to serve on the board of directors of ASCAP in 1940. In 1969 he established The Songwriters’ Hall of Fame with music publishers Abe Holman and Howie Richland; Mercer served as its first president. He wrote lyrics to more than 1500 songs, composed music, was a popular singer, received 19 Academy Award nominations and won four Oscars.