Cole Porter

Cole Albert Porter
File:Cole Porter.jpg Cole Porter, Composer and Songwriter
Born
June 9, 1891 Peru, Indiana, USA
Died
October 15 1964 (aged 73) Santa Monica, California, USA

Cole Albert Porter (June 9, 1891 – October 15, 1964) was an American composer and songwriter from Indiana. His works include the musical comedies Kiss Me, Kate (1948) (based on Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew), Fifty Million Frenchmen and Anything Goes, as well as songs like "Night and Day," "I Get a Kick Out of You," and "I've Got You Under My Skin." He was noted for his sophisticated (sometimes ribald) lyrics, clever rhymes, and complex forms. He was one of the greatest half-dozen contributors to the Great American Songbook.

Early years

Porter was born in Peru, Indiana, to a wealthy Protestant background; his maternal grandfather, James Omar "J.O." Cole, was a coal and timber speculator who dominated his daughter's family. His father, Sam was weak and ineffectual and the very opposite of this tyrant. His mother spoiled him from the start and started Porter in musical training at an early age. At six he studied piano and violin. Porter's mother, Kate, recognized and supported her son's talents even having his juvenile work published in order to encourage him, whilst sending signals to others as to how special he was. She changed his legal birth year from 1891 to 1893 to make him look like an advanced child. Porter's grandfather J.O. Cole wanted the boy to become a lawyer, and with that career in mind, sent him to Worcester Academy in 1905 (where he became class valedictorian) and then Yale University beginning in 1909.

Porter was a member of Scroll and Key and Delta Kappa Epsilon, and sang as a member of the original line-up of the Whiffenpoofs. While at Yale, he wrote a number of student songs, including the football fight songs "Yale Bulldog" and "Bingo Eli Yale" (aka "Bingo, That's The Lingo!") that are still played at Yale to this day. Cole Porter wrote 300 songs while at Yale.

Porter spent a year at Harvard Law School in 1913, and then transferred into Arts and Sciences. An unverified story tells of a law school dean who, in frustration over Porter's lack of performance in the classroom, suggested tongue-in-cheek that he "not waste his time" studying law, but instead focus on his music. Taking this suggestion to heart, Porter transferred to the School of Music.

In 1915, his first song on Broadway, "Esmeralda," appeared in the revue Hands Up. However, the quick success was immediately followed by failure; his first Broadway production, in 1916, See America First (book by Lawrason Riggs), was a flop, closing after two weeks. He soon started to feel the crunch of rejection, as other revues he wrote for were also flops. After the string of failures, Porter banished himself to Paris, selling songs and living off an allowance partly from his grandfather and partly from his mother.

Europe, Paris and marriage

Porter was working as a songwriter when the U.S. entered World War I in 1917. He traveled all over Europe, socializing with some of the best known intellectuals and artists in Europe, and becoming a charter member of the Lost Generation.

He did not register for the draft, yet loved to tell the press that he had joined the French Foreign Legion. In reality, he went to work for the Duryea Relief Fund and maintained a closet full of various tailormade military uniforms that he wore when the mood suited him. The French Foreign Legion, however, claims Porter as an enlistee and displays his portrait in its museum in Aubagne.

In 1918, Porter met Linda Lee Thomas, a very rich, Louisville, Kentucky-born divorcée eight years his senior, whom he married the following year. Linda was known as a great beauty in her day and was tall and slender and many saw this as a strange match between this older woman and younger man. She'd come from a loveless marriage whose macho husband had beat her, so this charming, small, effete man suited her. Although he'd an income, doled out in installments from his family, his new wife was happy to keep him in the manner to which Cole loved to be accustomed. It seemed, that there was a genuine love and affection between the two throughout their difficult life together and though she always remained in the background she was always there to encourage his talent and rejoiced with him in his success. Famously, she presented him with a bejewelled cigarette case from Cartier, at the opening to every new production that he'd written for. Replying in kind, he once outdid her with a gift of his own, a case even more dazzling in jewels and beauty. Later of course she was a great comfort in his downward, physical spiral. Later in life, as she fell seriously ill, he was so moved by her desire not to be forgotten after she had passed, that he had a tea rose created in her name with a distinct bloom and scent.

Unlike contemporaries such as George Gershwin and Irving Berlin, Porter had not succeeded on Broadway in his early years. However, born to as well as married to wealth, he did not lack for money, and sat out most of the 1920s, living in in Europe with one one long round of partying and lavish luxury. Porter was not lazy, though, and continued to play and write. Some of these songs would later be hits.

Richard Rodgers, in his autobiography, Musical Stages, relates an anecdote about meeting Cole in Venice, at his Palazzo during this period. Porter played Rodgers several of his compositions and Rodgers was highly impressed, wondering why Porter was not represented on Broadway, not knowing Cole had already written several shows that had flopped.

In the late 1920s, Porter returned to Broadway, and made up for lost time.

Middle years

Porter reintroduced himself to Broadway with the musical Paris (1928), which featured one of his greatest "list" songs, "Let's Do It (Let's Fall In Love)." Following this Gallic theme, his next show was Fifty Million Frenchmen (1929), which included several popular numbers including "You Do Something To Me" and "You've Got That Thing." Finishing out the decade, opening on December 30, 1929, was Wake Up and Dream, with a score that included "What Is This Thing Called Love?"

He started the 1930s with the revue The New Yorkers (1930), which included a song about a streetwalker, "Love For Sale." The lyric was considered too explicit for radio at the time, but has gone on to become a standard.

Next came Fred Astaire's last stage show, Gay Divorce (1932). It featured a hit that would become perhaps Porter's best known song, "Night And Day."

In 1934, Porter wrote what is thought by most to be his greatest score of this period, Anything Goes (1934). Its songs include "I Get A Kick Out Of You," "All Through The Night," perhaps his ultimate "list" song "You're The Top," and "Blow, Gabriel, Blow," as well as the title number. For years after, critics would compare most Porter shows—unfavorably—to this one.

Anything Goes was also the first Porter show featuring Ethel Merman, who would go on to star in five of his musicals. He loved her loud, brassy voice, and wrote many numbers that featured her strengths.

Jubilee (1935), written with Moss Hart while on a cruise around the world, was not a major hit, but featured two songs that have since become part of the Great American Songbook—"Begin The Beguine" and "Just One Of Those Things."

Red Hot And Blue (1936), featuring Merman, Jimmy Durante and Bob Hope, introduced "It's De-Lovely," "Down in the Depths (on the Ninetieth Floor)" and "Ridin' High."

Porter also wrote for Hollywood, including the scores for Born To Dance (1936), featuring "Easy To Love" and "I've Got You Under My Skin," and Rosalie (1937), featuring "In the Still of the Night." (In addition, he composed the cowboy song "Don't Fence Me In" for an unproduced movie in the 1930s, but it didn't become a hit until Roy Rogers and Bing Crosby & The Andrews Sisters, as well as other artists, introduced it to the public in the 1940s.)

Porter continued to live the high life during this period, throwing lavish parties and hobnobbing with the likes of Elsa Maxwell, Monty Woolley, Beatrice Lillie, Igor Stravinsky and Fanny Brice. In fact, some of his lyrics mention his friends.

Unlike some composers who worried when their musicals opened, Porter would make a grand entrance and sit up front, apparently relishing the show as much as any audience member. Porter had made it and there was no end in sight.

Then, in 1937, a riding accident crushed his both legs and left him in chronic pain, largely crippled. Apparently his wit still showed at the time, as he quipped, that he now understood why the French ate their horses rather than ride them. (According to a biography by William McBrien, a story from Porter himself has it that he composed the lyrics to part of "At Long Last Love" while lying in pain waiting to be rescued from the accident.)

Doctors told Porter's wife and mother that his right leg would have to be amputated and possibly the left one as well. However they fought to have them saved and Porter underwent more than 30 surgeries on his legs and was in constant pain for the rest of his life. During this period, the many operations led him to severe depression. He was one of the first people who experienced electric shock therapy. He finally did lose one leg shortly before he died.

Later years

Despite his pain, Porter continued to write successful shows. Leave It To Me (1938) (introducing Mary Martin singing "My Heart Belongs To Daddy"), DuBarry Was a Lady (1939), Panama Hattie (1940), Let's Face It! (1941), Something For The Boys (1943) and Mexican Hayride (1944) were all hits. These shows included songs such as "Get Out Of Town," "Friendship," "Make It Another Old-Fashioned Please" and "I Love You." Nevertheless, Porter was turning out fewer hit songs and, to some critics, his music was less magical.

After two flops, Seven Lively Arts (1944) (which featured the standard "Ev'ry Time We Say Goodbye") and Around The World (1946), many thought he was washed up.

In 1948, Porter made a great comeback, writing what was by far his biggest hit show, Kiss Me, Kate. The production won the Tony Award for Best Musical, and Porter won for Best Composer and Lyricist. The score—generally conceded to be his best—includes "Another Op'nin' Another Show," "Wunderbar," "So In Love," "We Open In Venice," "Tom, Dick or Harry," "I've Come To Wive It Wealthily In Padua," "Too Darn Hot," "Always True to You (In My Fashion)," and "Brush Up Your Shakespeare." Porter was back on top.

Though his next show—Out Of This World (1950)—didn't do that well, the show after that, Can-Can (1952), featuring "C'est Magnifique" and "It's All Right With Me," was a major hit. His last original Broadway production, Silk Stockings (1955), featuring "All Of You," was also successful.

After his riding accident, Porter also continued to work in Hollywood, writing the scores for two Fred Astaire movies, Broadway Melody of 1940 (1940), which featured "I Concentrate On You," and You'll Never Get Rich (1941). He later wrote the songs for the Gene Kelly/Judy Garland musical The Pirate (1948). The film lost money, though it does feature the delightful "Be A Clown" (intriguingly echoed in Donald O'Connor's performance of "Make 'Em Laugh" in the 1952 musical film Singin' in the Rain). High Society (1956), starring Bing Crosby, Frank Sinatra and Grace Kelly, had Porter's last major hit, "True Love."

Eventually, his injuries caught up with him. After a series of ulcers and 34 operations on his right leg, it had to be amputated and replaced with an artificial limb in 1958. The operation followed the death of his beloved mother in 1952 and the end of his wife's battle with emphysema in 1954. The combined hardships Porter endured proved to be too much. He never wrote another song and spent the remaining years of his life in relative seclusion.

Cole Porter died of kidney failure at the age of 73 in Santa Monica, California and is interred in Mount Hope Cemetery in his native Peru, Indiana.

Legacy

The legacy that Cole Porter left us are not only his songs but also the theatrical shows that encased them. Since America left the European tradition of Opera behind and embraced the popular homegrown 'Musical' writers have striven to fill them with the songs and music of the American ethos. Cole, with his unique talent and personality gave that genre the light and lovely songs of love, lost and found, false and true, songs that are still sung and revived today along with those great shows and will for ages to come. When asked if he thought his songs would last, he said that he'd never given it a thought, all the enjoyment was in writing them.

Sexual orientation

Although Porter was often photographed in the arms of beautiful women, was married for 34 years to one wife who conceived and miscarried, it is the current consensus that he was homosexual. The couple separated briefly in the early 1930s when, it is believed, Porter's sexual orientation became more and more open during their time living in Hollywood. After Porter was badly injured in a horseriding accident, Linda was reunited with her husband. He had an affair in 1925 with Boris Kochno, a poet and Ballets Russes librettist. He also reportedly had a long relationship with his constant companion, Howard Sturges, a Boston socialite, as well as with architect Ed Tauch (for whom Porter wrote "Easy to Love"), choreographer Nelson Barclift (who inspired "You'd Be So Nice To Come Home To"), director John Wilson (who later married international society beauty Princess Nathalie Paley), and longtime friend Ray Kelly, whose children still receive half of the childless Porter's copyright royalties.

Fictional portrayals and tributes==

His life was made into Night and Day, a very sanitized 1946 Michael Curtiz film starring Cary Grant and Alexis Smith. His life was also chronicled, somewhat more realistically but movingly, with emphasis on his marital relationship, in De-Lovely, a 2004 Irwin Winkler film starring Kevin Kline as Porter and Ashley Judd as Linda. It also contains fine examples of his music sung by contemporary singers.

Judy Garland performed a medley of Porter's songs at the 37th Academy Awards, the first Oscars ceremony held since Porter's death.

Fact sheet

• In 1980, Porter's music was used for the score of Happy New Year, based on the Philip Barry play Holiday.
• He is referenced in the song The Call of the Wild (Merengue) by David Bryne on his 1989 album Rei Momo.
• He is also mentioned in the song Tonite It shows by Mercury Rev on their 1998 album Deserter's Songs
• Porter is buried between his wife and father in Peru, Indiana
• Irving Berlin used to refer to "Begin the Beguine" as "that long, long song."

Song samples

• Complete List of Cole Porter works
• Cole Porter Collection at the Library of Congress

Well-known songs

Shows listed are stage musicals unless otherwise noted. (Where the show was done both as a film and on stage, the year refers to the stage version.)

• (1916) See America First
• (1919) Hitchy Koo Of 1919 — "An Old Fashioned Garden"
• (1928) Paris — "Let's Do It, Let's Fall In Love"
• (1929) Wake Up And Dream — "What Is This Thing Called Love?"
• (1929) Fifty Million Frenchmen — "You Do Something To Me"
• (1930) The New Yorkers — "Love for Sale," "I Happen To Like New York"
• (1932) Gay Divorce — "After You, Who," "Night And Day" (basis for film renamed "The Gay Divorcee" in 1934)
• (1933) Nymph Errant — "Experiment," "The Physician," "It's Bad For Me"
• (1934) Anything Goes — "All Through the Night," "Anything Goes," "Blow Gabriel, Blow," "I Get A Kick Out Of You," "You're the Top"
• (1934) Adios Argentina (un-produced) — "Don't Fence Me In"
• (1935) Jubilee — "Begin The Beguine," "Just One Of Those Things"
• (1936) Red, Hot and Blue — "It's De-Lovely"
• (1936) Born to Dance (film) — "Down in the Depths," "Easy To Love (You'd Be So Easy To Love)," "I've Got You Under My Skin"
• (1937) Rosalie (film) — "In the Still of the Night"
• (1937) You Never Know — "At Long Last Love," "From Alpha To Omega"
• (1938) Leave It To Me — "From Now On," "My Heart Belongs to Daddy"
• (1939) Broadway Melody Of 1940 — "Between You And Me," "I Concentrate On You," "I've Got My Eyes On You," "I Happen To Be In Love," "Begin the Beguine"
• (1939) Dubarry Was A Lady — "Do I Love You," "Well, Did You Evah!," "Friendship"
• (1940) Panama Hattie — "Let's Be Buddies," "Make It Another Old-Fashioned, Please"
• (1941) You'll Never Get Rich (film) — "Dream Dancing," "So Near and Yet So Far"
• (1941) Let's Face It — "Everything I Love," "I Hate You, Darling"
• (1942) Something for the Boys — "Could It Be You"
• (1942) Something To Shout About — "You'd Be So Nice To Come Home To"
• (1943) Mexican Hayride — "I Love You"
• (1944) Seven Lively Arts — "Every Time We Say Goodbye"
• (1946) Around the World in Eighty Days — "Look What I Found"
• (1947) The Pirate — "Be a Clown"
• (1948) Kiss Me, Kate — "Another Op'nin', Another Show," "Brush Up Your Shakespeare," "I Hate Men," "So In Love," "Too Darn Hot"
• (1950) Out Of This World — "From This Moment On," "I Am Loved"
• (1953) Can-Can — "I Am In Love," "I Love Paris," "C'est Magnifique"
• (1954) Silk Stockings — "All Of You," "Paris Loves Lovers"
• (1955) High Society — "Mind If I Make Love To You," "True Love," "Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?," "You're Sensational"
• (1956) Les Girls — "Ca, C'est L'amour," "You're Just Too, Too"
• (1958) Aladdin (television) — "Opportunity Knocks But Once"

A far more comprehensive list of Cole Porter songs, along with their date of composition and original show, is available here: [1].

References

ISBN links support NWE through referral fees

• Morella, Joseph; Mazzei, George, Genius and Lust: The creative and sexual lives of Cole Porter and Noel Coward, Carol & Graf Publishers Inc., 1995. ISBN 0-786-70237-0
• McBrien, William, Cole Porter: A Biography, New York: Vintage Books, 1998. ISBN 0-679-72792-2.
• Rimler, Walter, A Cole Porter Discography, N. Charles Sylvan Company, 1995, ISBN 1-886-38525-4.
• Schwartz, Charles, Cole Porter: A Biography (Hardcover and a Da Capo Paperback), 1979. ISBN 0-306-80097-7.

Further bibliography

• JX Bell, Cole Porter Biography (retrieved February 16, 2005).
• Derbyshire, John (NRO columnist), "Oh, the Songs!" (indepth review of film De-Lovely), 2004-07-28, National Review Online (nationalreview.com), webpage: NationalReview-CP: explains Cole Porter's marriage.
• Stefan Kanfer, (Winter 2003) The Voodoo That He Did So Well City Journal.

External links

• Gay Greats - Cole Porter Retrieved August 31, 2007.

Great American Songbook 

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