Richard Rodgers composed fifty-nine musical scores and over a thousand songs across a sixty-year career, with an estimated 85 becoming standards. Born in New York City in 1902, his catalog divides into two major partnerships: 26 Broadway musicals with lyricist Lorenz Hart from 1919 to 1943, and transformative works with Oscar Hammerstein II from 1943 onward. With Hart, he created sophisticated shows including Babes in Arms and Pal Joey, yielding songs such as "My Funny Valentine," "Blue Moon," "Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered," "My Romance," and "I Didn't Know What Time It Was." His Hammerstein collaborations revolutionized musical theater with Oklahoma!, Carousel, South Pacific, The King and I, and The Sound of Music, producing "It Might as Well Be Spring," "My Favorite Things," and "Some Enchanted Evening." Rodgers's melodies became essential repertoire in jazz and popular music, with his harmonic sophistication and structural innovation influencing generations of composers and performers. He died in New York in 1979.
