Sammy Fain

Sammy [Samuel] Fain [Feinberg]
(b New York, 17 June 1902; d Los Angeles, 6 Dec 1989). American popular songwriter.

He worked for music publishers Jack Mills as a staff pianist and in 1928 began to perform in vaudeville and on radio. Between 1927 and 1942 he wrote many popular songs with the lyricist Irving Kahal, such as Let a smile be your umbrella, adopting a popular jazz style. In 1931 he went to Hollywood and for the rest of his career contributed songs to films for performers including Maurice Chevalier, Dick Powell, Doris Day and Dean Martin. He achieved great success with the revue Hellzapoppin’ (1938).

He collaborated with the lyricist Paul Francis Webster on the songs for the Doris Day film vehicle Calamity Jane, which gained great popularity through a score that ranged from the energetic ‘The Deadwood Stage’ through the atmospheric ‘Black Hills of Dakota’ to the romantic ballad ‘Secret Love’, for which he received an Academy Award. The film was revised in a stage version in 1961, and has been in both professional and amateur repertories since. Despite this, most of Fain’s stage musicals proved to be failures. Many of his ballads, however, have become standards, notably ‘That Old Feeling’ (Vogues of 1938, 1937; lyrics by Lew Brown) and the evocative ‘I'll be seeing you’ (Right This Way, 1938; lyrics by Kahal). He contributed title songs to many films, winning an Academy Award for Love is a many splendored thing (1955) and nominations for April Love (1957), A Certain Smile (1958) and Tender is the Night (1961), all with lyrics by Webster.