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Irving Berlin
1888–1989 · 101 years Tier II
A cantor's son from Cherry Street who could only play in F-sharp
His father sang as a cantor in the shtetl of Tolochin and, in New York, cut kosher meat and gave Hebrew lessons on the side. The family came through Ellis Island on September 14, 1893, when Israel Beilin was five, and settled in three rooms at 330 Cherry Street. He was hawking the Evening Journal at eight. His father died when he was 13, and his own earnings were the smallest in the house, which made him feel worthless enough to leave it. He lived in Bowery lodging houses and sang in saloons for coins pitched at him. At 18 he was a singing waiter in a Chinatown cafe, improvising blue parodies of hit songs, and after closing he taught himself the piano.
His first published song, Marie from Sunny Italy, brought him 33 cents in 1907 and a printer's version of his name, I. Berlin, that he kept for life. Four years later Alexander's Ragtime Band made him internationally famous, and he did not stop for six decades: roughly 1,500 songs, 20 original Broadway shows, 15 Hollywood films, eight Academy Award nominations. White Christmas has sold more than 50 million records, the largest total in the history of recording. He founded the Music Box Theatre on West 45th Street, where it still stands. He wrote the score for Annie Get Your Gun in 1946 after Jerome Kern died mid-project, and it ran 1,147 performances. He could not read music. He played in one key, and a lever on a custom piano moved everything else for him.
He married Dorothy Goetz in February 1912. She caught typhoid on their Havana honeymoon and died on July 17, five months later. Berlin could not write for months, then produced his first ballad, When I Lost You, which sold more than a million copies. Twelve years on he fell in love with Ellin Mackay, whose father ran the Postal Telegraph Cable Company and told the press the marriage would happen over his dead body. They eloped to a civil ceremony at the Municipal Building in 1926. Her father cut her off, and Berlin signed over the rights to Always so she would have an income whatever came. Their son, Irving Berlin Jr., was born in late November 1928 and died on Christmas Day, not a month old. Clarence Mackay began speaking to them again after that.
He stopped appearing in public after the late 1960s and did not turn up to the televised Carnegie Hall concert held for his hundredth birthday. He died in his sleep at 17 Beekman Place on September 22, 1989, at 101, and the Broadway houses dimmed their marquees the following evening. He lies in Woodlawn Cemetery in the Bronx. He had kept the whole catalog inside his own publishing company all his working life, and after his death his three daughters gave 750,000 items to the Library of Congress. The God Bless America royalties he signed away in 1938 have paid the Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts of New York more than 10 million dollars.
Lifespan
Irving Berlin's life against the full span of the corpus.
Notable works
-
Alexander's Ragtime Band
song
A march more than a rag, and the song that made him famous at 23 1911 -
When I Lost You
song
His first ballad, written after his wife died of typhoid. It sold over a million copies. 1912 -
As Thousands Cheer
other
The revue built like a newspaper, which produced Easter Parade and Ethel Waters's lynching song Supper Time 1933 -
God Bless America
song
Written for a 1918 army show, shelved, then given to Kate Smith. He assigned the royalties to the Scouts. 1938 -
White Christmas
song
More than 50 million records, the top-selling song in recording history, and an Academy Award 1942 -
Annie Get Your Gun
other
Taken over after Jerome Kern died. It ran 1,147 performances and was his biggest success. 1946
Life in brief
with age at each point- September 14, 1893 aged 5 Arrives at Ellis Island with his family, aged five They settled in a three-room tenement at 330 Cherry Street.
- 1901 aged ~13 His father dies and he leaves home for the Bowery He sang in saloons for coins and slept in lodging houses.
- 1907 aged ~19 Publishes Marie from Sunny Italy for 33 cents The sheet music printed his name as I. Berlin, and he kept it.
- 1911 aged ~23 Alexander's Ragtime Band makes him an international name
- July 17, 1912 aged 24 Dorothy Goetz dies of typhoid five months after the wedding
- 1918 aged ~30 Writes and performs in the army revue Yip Yip Yaphank It raised 150,000 dollars for a camp service center. One cut song waited 20 years.
- 1926 aged ~38 Elopes with Ellin Mackay against her father's objection He gave her the rights to Always as a wedding present.
- December 25, 1928 aged 40 His infant son Irving Berlin Jr. dies, not a month old
- September 22, 1989 aged 101 Dies in his sleep at 101 Broadway dimmed its marquees the following evening.
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Contemporaries
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Grant Wood 1891–1942Arts & LettersRegionalist painter best known for American Gothic, one of the most parodied images in American art.
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