Embraceable You

Embraceable You is a standard composed by George Gershwin with lyrics by Ira Gershwin. The music was originally written in 1928 for a Ziegfeld musical adaptation of the 1918 play East is West, a story about Americans in China, but that production was shelved and the song was recycled into the 1930 Broadway musical Girl Crazy. It was introduced as a duet by Ginger Rogers and Allen Kearns at the Alvin Theatre on October 14, 1930, marking Rogers' debut as a leading lady in a routine choreographed by Fred Astaire, though Ethel Merman's showstopping rendition of I Got Rhythm largely overshadowed her that evening. The Girl Crazy pit orchestra was itself remarkable, featuring Benny Goodman, Glenn Miller, Jack Teagarden, Jimmy Dorsey, and Gene Krupa, with Gershwin conducting opening night. The first pop chart hit came from Red Nichols and His Five Pennies in November 1930, reaching number two, with I Got Rhythm as its flip side. The melody is a tender, flowing ballad whose harmonic richness derives from embellishing chords that serve as tasteful substitutions for simpler progressions, lending sophistication without obscuring the song's emotional directness. Despite I Got Rhythm generating hundreds of contrafacts, Embraceable You has been recorded by more jazz artists, with landmark versions by Billie Holiday in 1944, inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 2005, and Sarah Vaughan in 1954, captured in a celebrated single-take, single-microphone session.