Tomorrow Night - Lonnie Johnson

"Tomorrow Night is a 1939 song written by Sam Coslow and Will Grosz. The same year Horace Heidt peaked at number sixteen with his version of the song. In 1948, Lonnie Johnson had a crossover hit with the song, which had Simeon Hatch on piano. Lonnie Johnson's version hit number one on the R&B charts for seven non consecutive weeks and peaked at number nineteen on the pop chart. Lonnie Johnson's version of "Tomorrow Night" would become his theme song." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tomorrow_Night

"Alonzo "Lonnie" Johnson (February 8, 1899 – June 16, 1970) was an American blues and jazz singer/guitarist and songwriter who pioneered the role of jazz guitar and is recognized as the first to play single-string guitar solos. Johnson was the only one of the classic 1920's blues artists to have a revived high charting career after WWII.


Johnson was born in Orleans Parish, New Orleans, Louisiana and raised in a family of musicians. He studied violin, piano and guitar as a child, and learned to play various other instruments including the mandolin, but concentrated on the guitar throughout his professional career.

By late teens, he played guitar and violin in his father's family band at banquets and weddings, alongside his brother James "Steady Roll" Johnson. He also worked with jazz trumpeter Punch Miller in the city's Storyville district. In 1917, Johnson joined a revue that toured England.

He and his brother settled in St. Louis in 1921. The two brothers performed as a duo, and Lonnie also worked on riverboats, working in the orchestras of Charlie Creath and Fate Marable. In 1925 Lonnie married Mary Smith (i.e. Mary Johnson, a blues singer in her own right, who recorded from 1929 until 1936 - curiously enough never with Lonnie Johnson), with whom he had six children before their divorce in 1932." Read the full history of Lonnie Johnson here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lonnie_Johnson

Robert Matthew Walker in Elvis - A Study in Musicwrote
" Tomorrow Night was withheld by Sam Phillips and RCA until 1965 when Chet Atkins supervised anew backing track for Elvis's original vocal line. As the early Sun takes were not multi-tracked, the original backing had to be obliterated. Despite all this cosmetic surgery,the result is quite good, but it cannot be judged as an example of early Elvis. Atkins was no doubt responsible for larding the voice over with echo. However something of the excitement and passion of early Presley shines through."

Songwriters - Sam Coslow and Will Grosz

"Sam Coslow was born in New York City on December 27, 1902. He attended Erasmus Hall High School and began writing songs while he was still a teenager. His first success came in 1920, with a song called "Grieving For You". He had a number of hit songs over the next few years, and contributed songs to Broadway's Artists and Models revues. Together with composer Larry Spier, he founded his own publishing company, the Spier & Coslow Music Company and in those beginning years, he also had a minor career as a performer, recording for RCA Victor, Decca and Columbia Records. In 1929, Spier and Coslow sold their publishing firm to Paramount Pictures. Spier continued on in publishing, while Coslow signed up with Paramount as a songwriter for their movies. It was the early days of sound movies, and Coslow was the first Broadway songwriter to be hired by Paramount. During his decade with Paramount, he wrote songs for many of their films, including most of the early Bing Crosby pictures. His songs from this period include "True Blue Lou" (written in 1929 with Leo Robin and Richard Whiting for The Dance of Life); "Sing You Sinners" (1930, with W. Frank Harling, included in Honey); "Just One More Chance" (1931, with Arthur Johnston); "Thanks" and "The Day You Came Along” (both songs written with Arthur Johnston for 1933's Bing Crosby picture Too Much Harmony); "Learn To Croon" (1933, with Arthur Johnston, for a Bing Crosby film College Humor); "Cocktails For Two" (1934, with Arthur Johnston, for Murder at the Vanities); and "My Old Flame" (1934, with Arthur Johnston for a Mae West film Belle of the Nineties)." Read more here http://www.songwritershalloffame.org/exhibits/bio/C52


Wilhelm Grosz (11 August 1894  – 10 December 1939) (aka Hugh Williams) was an Austrian composer, pianist and conductor.
Wilhelm Grosz was born in Vienna. He studied music with Franz Schreker and Guido Adler. In 1921 he was appointed conductor of the Mannheim Opera, but returned to Vienna in 1922, where he worked as a pianist and composer. From 1927 he was the artistic manager of the Ultraphone Gramophone company in Berlin. In 1933 he became conductor of the Kammerspiele Theater in Vienna. Forced to flee his native land because of the Nazi takeover, Grosz resettled in England in 1934. However, he found little interest there for his avant garde musical style. He was able to apply a considerable melodic gift to setting the lyrics of popular songs, some of which became international successes. Most of his most popular titles were written with lyricist Jimmy Kennedy: "Harbour Lights," "Red Sails in the Sunset," "When Budapest Was Young," and "Isle of Capri."
Grosz's classical compositions include three operas, two ballets, incidental music for three plays, scores for a number of films, orchestral works, a Symphonic Dance for piano and orchestra, chamber music, piano pieces and songs." More here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilhelm_Grosz