Description

OSCAR LEVANT (PITTSBURGH, PENNSYLVANIA, DECEMBER 27, 1906 – BEVERLY HILLS, CALIFORNIA, AUGUST 14, 1972)

Levant was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States, in 1906, to Orthodox Jewish parents from Russia. His father, Max, was a watchmaker who wanted his four sons to become either dentists or doctors. His mother Annie was a highly religious woman whose father was a Rabbi who presided over his daughter’s wedding to Max Levant. Oscar Levant moved to New York in 1922, following the death of his father. He began studying under Zygmunt Stojowski, a well-established piano pedagogue. In 1925, aged 18, he appeared with Ben Bernie in a short film, Ben Bernie and All the Lads, made in New York City in the DeForest Phonofilm sound-on-film system. In 1928, Levant traveled to Hollywood, where his career took a turn for the better. During his stay, he met and befriended George Gershwin. From 1929 to 1948 he composed the music for more than twenty movies. During this period, he also wrote or co-wrote numerous popular songs that made the Hit Parade, the most noteworthy being “Blame It on My Youth” (1934), now considered a standard. Around 1932, Levant began composing seriously. He studied under Arnold Schoenberg and impressed him sufficiently to be offered an assistantship (which he turned down, considering himself unqualified). His formal studies led to a request by Aaron Copland to play at the Yaddo Festival of contemporary American music on April 30 of that year. Successful, Levant began composing a new orchestral work, a sinfonietta. The year 1938 saw Levant make his debut as a music conductor on Broadway, filling in for his brother Harry in sixty-five performances of George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart’s The Fabulous Invalid. In 1939 he was again working on Broadway as composer and conductor of The American Way, another Kaufman and Hart production. At this time, Levant was becoming best known to American audiences as one of the regular panelists on the radio quiz show Information Please. Originally scheduled as a guest panelist, Levant proved so quick-witted and popular that he became a regular fixture on the show in the late 1930s and 1940s, along with fellow panelists Franklin P. Adams and John Kieran and moderator Clifton Fadiman. From the 1930s through the mid-1950s, Levant appeared in a number of feature films, often playing a pianist or composer. He had major supporting roles in the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer musicals The Barkleys of Broadway (1949), starring Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers, An American in Paris (1951), starring Gene Kelly, and The Band Wagon (1953), starring Fred Astaire and Cyd Charisse. In the early 1950s, Levant was an occasional panelist on the NBC game show Who Said That?, in which celebrities would try to determine the speaker of quotations taken from recent news reports. Between 1958 and 1960, Levant hosted a television talk show on KCOP-TV in Los Angeles, The Oscar Levant Show, which later became syndicated. In 1960, Levant was awarded a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in recognition of his recording career. evant was briefly married to actress Barbara Woodell; they divorced in 1932. In 1939, Levant married his second wife, singer and actress June Gale (née Doris Gilmartin), one of the Gale Sisters. They were married for 33 years, until his death in 1972, and had three children: Marcia, Lorna, and Amanda. A lifelong heavy smoker, Levant died in Beverly Hills, California, of a heart attack in 1972 at age 65.

TRACKLIST 

1. Piano Concerto in D-Flat Major, Op. 38 I. Allegro non toppo e maestoso (Khachaturian)
2. Piano Concerto in D-Flat Major, Op. 38 II. Andante con anima (Khachaturian)
3. Piano Concerto in D-Flat Major, Op. 38 III. Allegro brillante (Khachaturian)

4. Piano Concerto in F Major I. Allegro (Gershwin)
5. Piano Concerto in F Major II. Adagio – Andante con moto (Gershwin)
6. Piano Concerto in F Major III. Allegro Con Brio (Gershwin)