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| Harry Ruby | |
|---|---|
| Name | Harry Ruby |
| Birth name | Harry Rubenstein |
| Birth date | July 27, 1895 |
| Birth place | Chicago, Illinois, United States |
| Death date | February 23, 1974 |
| Death place | Beverly Hills, California, United States |
| Occupation | Songwriter, composer, screenwriter, librettist |
| Years active | 1910s–1960s |
Harry Ruby
Harry Ruby was an American songwriter, composer, and screenwriter prominent in the early to mid-20th century. He was a central figure in the Tin Pan Alley songwriting community and best known for his long collaboration with lyricist Bert Kalmar, contributing to Broadway, Hollywood films, and radio. Ruby's songs became standards recorded by prominent performers and featured in stage revues and motion pictures during the Jazz Age, the Swing Era, and early television.
Born Harry Rubenstein in Chicago, Illinois, Ruby grew up amid the urban immigrant neighborhoods of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. He attended local schools in Chicago and was influenced by the vaudeville circuits that passed through the city, including touring companies associated with the Keith-Albee circuit and the Orpheum Circuit. Early exposure to sheet music from publishers in Tin Pan Alley and performances in venues tied to the Broadway theater scene shaped his musical ambitions. During this period he intersected with contemporaries who later worked in New York publishing houses such as Jerome H. Remick & Company and Waterson, Berlin & Snyder Co., connecting Chicago popular music culture to the New York songwriting milieu.
Ruby relocated to New York City, where he entered the vibrant Tin Pan Alley apparatus that also supported figures associated with the Ziegfeld Follies and the Shubert Organization. He wrote novelty songs and contributed material for vaudeville acts, collaborating with accompanists and orchestras that played at venues linked to the Palace Theatre and the Apollo Theater circuits. His early professional contacts included publishers and song pluggers who operated on Tin Pan Alley alongside composers like Irving Berlin, George Gershwin, and Jerome Kern. Ruby's facility with melody and comic timing enabled him to produce songs for sheet music distribution and phonograph recordings issued by companies such as Victor Records and Columbia Records. The Tin Pan Alley ecosystem, including the ASCAP community and the American Society of Music Publishers, provided the infrastructure for his rising reputation.
A pivotal phase began when Ruby formed a songwriting team with lyricist Bert Kalmar, joining the lineage of established duos that dominated Broadway and Hollywood. The partnership produced material for Broadway revues and musical comedies staged by producers in Manhattan's Theater District, including shows mounted on Broadway that featured choreography by dance figures from the Ziegfeld tradition. Kalmar and Ruby crafted lyrics and melodies for performers who worked with impresarios associated with the Loew's circuit and film studios transitioning from silent pictures to talkies. Their collaboration paralleled other notable partnerships such as Rodgers and Hart and DeSylva, Brown and Henderson, situating Kalmar and Ruby within the Golden Age songwriting community. The team also contributed to motion picture musicals produced by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and other studios where composers and lyricists were employed to adapt stage material for sound films.
Kalmar and Ruby wrote scores and individual numbers for Broadway productions and for Hollywood studios producing musical comedies and animated shorts. Their work appeared in films featuring stars under contract with studios like MGM and RKO Radio Pictures, and their tunes were arranged for orchestras led by bandleaders who appeared on radio broadcasts nationwide. Radio programs such as big-band variety shows and early network episodes provided performance outlets for their songs, reaching audiences through NBC and CBS affiliates. The partnership also supplied material for short subject musicals and for Broadway revivals that later informed cinematic adaptations. Their involvement in film extended to screenwriting and adaptation, collaborating with directors and producers during the studio era's demand for integrated musical sequences.
Ruby, often with Kalmar, wrote several enduring popular songs recorded by leading interpreters on 78 rpm and later LP releases. Among their best-known numbers are tunes that entered the repertoires of jazz, pop, and big-band artists and were performed in both nightclub settings and concert halls. Their catalog includes works that were popularized by performers associated with the swing movement and by vocalists contracted to major record labels. Songs written or co-written by Ruby were featured in Broadway revues, Hollywood musicals, and radio programs, and were later anthologized in collections of American popular song. The team's compositions became standards performed by singers and instrumentalists across generations, appearing in recordings, compilation albums, and retrospective broadcasts that trace the development of 20th-century American popular music.
Ruby settled in California later in life, where he continued to work in film and television circles and maintained friendships with entertainers from Broadway and Hollywood. He received recognition within the songwriting community for his contributions to popular music and for the long-running Kalmar–Ruby partnership that influenced later generations of composers and lyricists. Biographical portrayals and stage tributes have referenced the duo's role in the history of American musical theater and cinematic songcraft, situating them alongside other Tin Pan Alley figures celebrated in histories of Broadway and Hollywood. His death in Beverly Hills marked the close of a career that intersected with major institutions of American entertainment, leaving a catalog of songs and theatrical works preserved in archives, discographies, and recordings by performers from the early sound era through the mid-20th century.
Category:American songwriters Category:20th-century American composers Category:People from Chicago Category:1974 deaths