Victor Young (1899-1956)
Many people know he was a famous composer for motion pictures and popular music but don’t realize that he also wrote ‘serious’ music and original songs for radio programs, even the Broadway stage. He was a sought-after conductor and skilled arranger; a concert violin soloist (who had toured Europe), and a musical innovator, but he was just as much a good-natured prankster, a dedicated photographer, the host of a weekly poker game, a show dog exhibitor, a doting uncle, devoted husband, and beloved friend. Posthumously, he would receive an Academy Award for Best Motion Picture Score (after more than 20 nominations), but also a stunning, full-page memorial on the back cover of the prestigious trade magazine, The Hollywood Reporter, and then album after album of musical tributes recorded and released by his admiring peers. Today his legacy lives on, as a new generation of musicians practices, covers, and posts their performances of his music every day.
To learn more about Mr. Young’s life and music, or related events, please Navigate the site using the Menu (Top) or Quick Links (Bottom.) The web site content is as follows:
Biographies: This has a short background of Mr. Young’s life and the reason I decided to write his first full-length biography. Also on this page are links out to existing, short biographies, such as Wikipedia and the Songwriters Hall of Fame. These will highlight to the reader many of the intriguing elements of Young’s journey from the Chicago ghetto to Beverly Hills , from musical obscurity to a career broader than experienced by any other Hollywood composer of his day, and perhaps all time.
Newsletter: This page has a sign-up sheet for my Monthly Newsletter on the biography project, and also is a repository of past Newsletters, essentially in a Blog format, so you can catch up on past editions that you have missed. Newsletters will be sent out to the private email distribution list and posted on this page starting March of 2023. The general format will include three short sections:
- A short summary of a current research topic, not typically covered in one of the on-line biographies,
- A YouTube or Spotify link to a new cover of Young’s music that you won’t want to miss, and,
- Announcements of any Victor Young-related programs or performances that have come to my notice.
YouTube: Video and Audio postings of Victor Young’s music to YouTube are nothing less than omnipresent. Some are well-organized into Playlists and others are just one-off posts, such as a new cover of one of his popular songs, like When I Fall in Love or A Women’s Intuition. This page has organized mainly film score cues, that an author has taken the trouble to edit into a ‘suite’ related to a particular film, such as Shane or For Whom the Bell Tolls. These are typically 10 minutes or so in length and quickly give a listener an idea of how Mr. Young approached a given film. The main YouTube link on this page is to a five-hour long collection of film score suites that I roped into a Playlist. Check back for new playlists and links to individual YouTube posts that I highlight in the future.
Spotify: As a top, streaming music platform, Spotify offers free and paid subscriptions to a catalog of over one-hundred million pieces of music. The Spotify page on VictorYoung.com has a link to a five-hour playlist of popular covers, where I picked more than 70 songs that showcase a range of performance styles, from the original, often Fox Trot arrangements meant for dancing, recorded by Young himself under the Decca and Brunswick labels, to modern performances one might hear at a live show anywhere in the world. For this initial playlist I randomized selections using 3 to 4 recordings of the same set of 25 or so songs, so you can hear how musicians interpreted Young’s music during the 1930s, right down to the 2020s. You will likely discover song titles that you never heard before, or musicians that heretofore have escaped your notice.
Events: This page will announce upcoming (or linked recordings of) Concerts and Programs that include music written by Victor Young, or Film Screenings for movies that were scored by him. These sometimes come to my attention via a Google search that runs every day, but that often fails to pick up notices in advance of the event. Many more pass unnoticed by this search, I suspect, because the programmer hasn’t specifically called out Young’s name or doesn’t know that he composed a certain song or scored a particular film. This is where I particularly need, and would appreciate, YOUR ongoing help! Whenever you come across announcements like this, PLEASE pass them along to me using the Contact page, so I can post them to this Events page and take notice of them in the Newsletter for posterity.
Contact: Last, but not least, is a page where you can send me a message using a Contact Form on this web site or send an email to me using your own email client (to John@VictorYoung.com.) As noted above, I want to find out about Concerts and Film Screenings in which Mr. Young’s music is featured, but I also want to hear from you about the up-coming biography, such as topics you’d like to see covered, or information you want me to know about or investigate. Approaching this project from the standpoint of a Scientist and Project Manager who loves biography, not as a trained Musician, Composer, Conductor, Musicologist, Historian, etc., I am counting on you all to help me make this tribute to Victor Young be the best that it can be.
