Harold Arlen. Happy with the Blues

Garden City, New York : Doubleday & Company, Inc., 1961. 'Somewhere Over the Rainbow...'
With a Signed Photograph of the Composer Harold Arlen

[ARLEN, Harold]. JABLONSKI, Edward. Harold Arlen. Happy with the Blues. Garden City, New York: Doubleday & Company, Inc., 1961.

With a signed photograph of Harold Arlen dated "aug. - 14 - 72" pasted to the half-title.

First edition. Octavo (9 1/8 x 6 inches; 232 x 152 mm.). [1-11], 12-286 pp. Illustrated with black & white photographs.

Publishers black cloth over boards, front cover and spine lettered in gilt and blue, pictorial endpapers, pictorial dust jacket. A near fine copy in a price-clipped printed dust jacket with a couple of neat tape repairs on lower edge.

Affixed to the half-title is a black & white photograph signed "Harold Arlen - Aug - 14-72"

Harold Arlen, born Hyman Arluck; (1905-1986) was an American composer of popular music, who composed over five hundred songs, a number of which have become known worldwide. In addition to composing the songs for the 1939 film The Wizard of Oz (lyrics by Yip Harburg), including "Over the Rainbow", which won him the Oscar for Best Original Song, he was nominated as composer for eight other Oscar awards. Arlen was a highly regarded contributor to the Great American Songbook.

"Over the Rainbow" was voted the 20th century's Number 1 song by the RIAA and the NEA.