Blue Moon

Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart began writing this for the 1933 movie musical Hollywood Party, but it was cut from the film. The following year, it was used in Manhattan Melodrama - starring Clark Gable, William Powell and Myrna Loy - where it was performed by Shirley Ross in a nightclub scene. The song was originally called "The Bad in Every Man," befitting the story of Gable's kind-hearted criminal, but was rejected by MGM until it was re-worked as "Blue Moon." Rodgers and Hart wrote many songs for Broadway plays, including "The Lady is a Tramp" and "My Funny Valentine" for Babes in Arms (1937). In 1948 a movie was made about the duo called Words And Music. It starred Mickey Rooney as Lorenz Hart.

Mel Tormé sang this in the 1948 movie Words And Music, which was loosely based on the story of Rodgers and Hart's partnership. It was also used in the movies Malaya (1949); East Side, West Side (1950); and With A Song In My Heart (1952) before Elvis Presley recorded it for Sun Records in 1954. Three different versions of the song appear in the 1981 film An American Werewolf in London: by Bobby Vinton, Sam Cooke, and The Marcels.

Producer Stu Phillips was ordered by his boss not to waste time on the Marcels and to spend his days devoted to a different artist at Colpix Records. But he didn't say anything about his nights. Phillips waited until everyone else had gone home and sneaked the band into the studio for a secret session. They recorded this at the last minute when they recorded three songs and needed a fourth. When one of the members said he knew "Blue Moon," Phillips told him to teach the song to the rest of the group in an hour, then they'd record it.