So I want you to imagine turning on the radio
today, right? OK. And the top five songs on the
Billboard chart are all the exact same song.
The exact same song. Yeah, the exact same track.
Not covers released decades apart, but the exact
same song released by five different rival pop
stars, all in the exact same month. And they're
all fiercely competing for the number one spot.
I mean, today, that would result in a billion
dollar copyright lawsuit before lunch. Right.
It would be absolute chaos for streaming platforms
and record labels. But the crazy thing is, in
1939, that was just, you know, another Tuesday
in the music business. Really was. And well,
welcome to the deep dive. Today, we have a very
specific mission. We are taking a stack of notes
which are anchored by this really fascinating
Wikipedia article. And we're going to explore
the bizarre, shape -shifting life cycle of a
single musical masterpiece. It's quite a journey.
It is. The song is called Stairway to the Stars.
And for you listening, we're going to trace how
this one piece of music travels through time,
constantly changing its clothes, surviving these
massive seismic shifts in pop culture, and somehow
capturing the imaginations of completely different
generations of musicians. It really is a remarkable
journey. And to really understand how a song
becomes this legendary pop and jazz standard,
We have to start at a point where it didn't even
have its famous title. Wait, really? Yeah. The
origin story of Stairway to the Stars does not
begin with a glamorous singer standing at a microphone.
It begins as a purely instrumental piece. We're
talking way back. Right. The year is 1934. two
composers, Matty Melnick and Frank Signorelli,
they write an instrumental called Park Avenue
Fantasy. And there are no lyrics. There are no
vocalists. It is literally just a melody. And
it just, you know, it sits out there in the world
for five years as this standalone piece of music.
Yeah, five years. Exactly. And then finally,
in 1939, a lyricist named Mitchell Parish comes
along. He writes words to that underlying theme.
Robin's music corp releases it. And suddenly,
the standard stairway to the stars is officially
born. But wait, I have to stop you right there.
You're saying a purely instrumental track from
1934 sat around for five whole years doing basically
nothing. And then one guy adds words and it's
suddenly the biggest song in America. That's
the timeline, yeah. Was the original melody just
lacking something, or did Mitchell Parish just
possess some kind of lyrical magic? Well, it
wasn't that the melody was lacking at all. In
fact, that five -year gap is crucial to understanding
the song's DNA. The melody had to be structurally
robust enough to stand entirely on its own, you
know, without any words to tell the listener
how they were supposed to feel about it. So it
was already fully formed? Yes, it was already
a complete sophisticated thought by the time
Mitchell Parish got his hands on it. What Parish
did wasn't fixing a broken song. He basically
translated a complex instrumental mood into a
relatable human sentiment. OK, let's unpack this.
Because for you listening, if you want a modern
equivalent of how wild this transition is, think
about modern music collection. Right. Imagine
Park Avenue Fantasy is this incredible atmospheric
EDM beat, or like a heavy instrumental hip hop
track. It's cool, people in the underground scene
vibe to it. It has this distinct mood. But it's
not a hit. Exactly. It's not a radio hit. Then,
Mitchell Parish acts like the superstar modern
producer who walks into the studio, hears that
beat, and says, hold on, I've got the perfect
vocal top line for this. Yeah, that's a perfect
way to put it. He drops these killer lyrics over
the existing track, and suddenly, what was just
a cool niche instrumental transforms into a massive,
undeniable mainstream pop hit. That is a highly
accurate way to look at it, actually. He unlocked
a totally different commercial potential for
the foundation that Malnick and Signorelli had
built. He gave the public a way to sing along
to what was previously just, you know, a beautiful
piece of architecture. And when we say commercial
potential, we are not exaggerating. That lyrical
edition in 1939 wasn't just a hit. It was an
absolute cultural explosion. Oh, absolutely.
The sheer dominance of this track... in that
specific year is almost hard to wrap your head
around. If we look at the timeline in our sources,
May of 1939 is when things really catch fire.
Glenn Miller and his orchestra, featuring vocals
by a singer named Ray Eberly, they released their
recording on the RCA Bluebird label, and it climbs
all the way to number one on the Your Hip Parade
chart. Number one in May. Right. But the song
does not stop there. By June, so the very next
month, Ella Fitzgerald and her famous orchestra
released their own recording of it. Right, the
very next month. Then we hit July, and the Inc.
sponsored doing it on an NBC radio broadcast.
And in that exact same year, 1939, you have hit
recordings of the exact same song by Jimmy Dorsey,
by Kay Kaiser with vocals by Harry Babbitt, and
by Al Donahue with vocals by Paula Kelly. It's
everywhere. Oh, wait, looking at these notes,
um... I have to interrupt. Glenn Miller's singer
is Ray Eberly with an L -E at the end. But Jimmy
Dorsey's rival version from that exact same year
features a vocalist named Bob Eberly with an
L -Y. Yes, he does. Is that a typo in our source
material or were two guys with essentially the
exact same name battling it out on the charts
with the exact same song? It is not a typo and
it's actually this brilliant piece of historical
trivia. They were brothers. Got up, really? Really.
Bob Eberly and Ray Eberly were siblings singing
for rival heavyweights, Bob for Jimmy Dorsey,
and Ray for Glenn Miller. And because Glenn Miller's
version hit number one, Ray effectively beat
his own brother on the charts with the exact
same song. Oh my gosh, that must have made it
for an incredibly tense Thanksgiving dinner.
I can only imagine. But familial rivalries aside,
how does an industry even function like that?
Yeah. Today, we're so used to the idea that a
song belongs to a specific artist. The competition
isn't supposed to be about who can sing the exact
same track better in the exact same month. What's
fascinating here is what the simultaneous recording
frenzy tells us about the music industry's model
during that era. In 1939, a hit didn't belong
to just one artist. It belonged to the culture.
The culture owned it. Exactly. The song itself,
like the actual sheet music, was the product.
The moment a song proved it had heat like Stairway
to the Stars did when Glenn Miller took it to
number one. every single bandleader raced to
get their own unique spin out to the public.
They were all just capitalizing on the melody.
Right. The competition wasn't about who wrote
the best song. It was about whose orchestra could
capture the public's imagination the best using
the exact same raw material. It's fascinating.
But, you know, lots of songs conquered a specific
year like 1939 and then faded into total obscurity.
Tastes change. They do. The real story of Stairway
to the Stars isn't just that it was a hit. It's
how it survives the end of the swing and big
band era. Because the music industry was about
to go through a massive, massive upheaval. Precisely.
As we move from the late 1930s into the mid -century,
the musical landscape shifts dramatically. You
have the World War II recording bands. The economics
of touring with massive 20 -piece dance hall
orchestras just becomes unsustainable, and the
swing era starts to die out. So what happens
to the musicians? Well, musicians are pushed
into smaller, more complex bebop ensembles. Thousands
of big band pop hits from the 1930s were completely
forgotten because they were either too simple
or too rigidly tied to that dance hall style
to survive the transition. But not Stairway to
the Stars. It doesn't get left behind. It actually
evolves into a deeply respected vehicle for serious
jazz improvisation. Looking at the timeline here,
we see this bridge in 1947, where you have recordings
by the legendary vocalist Dinah Washington with
Chubby Jackson's orchestra, and another by pianist
Carmen Caballero. Setting the stage for what's
next. Right. And then we plunge into the 1950s
and 60s. And the list of people tackling this
song reads like a Mount Rushmore of jazz heavyweights.
The roster is honestly staggering. In the 1950s
alone, you have the Buddy DeFranco quartet in
1953. Yeah. You have the brilliant, complex pianist
Bud Powell. offering his interpretation in 56,
Lee Connett's in 57. And that same year, the
vocal titan Sarah Vaughn records it for her landmark
live album at Mr. Kelly's. And the momentum just
keeps building into the 1960s. Ella Fitzgerald
returns to the track in 1960 for her album, Hello,
Love. Johnny Mathis records it in 61. It just
doesn't stop. In 1962, you have Milt Jackson
and Wes Montgomery putting it on Bags Meets Wes.
Stan Kenton puts it on Adventures in Jazz, and
the legendary pianist Bill Evans includes it
on Moon Deems. Some of the greatest albums of
the era. Then you have Dexter Gordon doing it
on Our Man in Paris in 1963, the incredibly smooth
Johnny Hartman in 64, and Benny Goodman returning
to it in 67. It's incredible. But I have to push
back here. For you, the listener, I don't want
us to just read a table of contents. I want to
know how they did this. OK, fair enough. How
does a bright, peppy, 1939 dancehall track by
Glenn Miller turn into a serious piece of art
for someone like Bill Evans or Dexter Gordon?
What are they actually doing to the music? If
we connect this to the bigger picture, that is
the perfect question, because the genius lies
in the mechanics of the song itself. A standard
only survives if it has a strong harmonic foundation.
Right. To put it in accessible terms, Stairway
to the Stars features this incredible chromatic
descending bass line, meaning the underlying
chords step down half note at a time in certain
sections. OK, I can picture that. Right. To a
pop singer in 1939, that just sounds romantic
and swooning. But to a jazz musician in 1962,
that descending bass line acts like a playground.
Oh, interesting. It is an open invitation to
substitute more complex chords, to twist the
harmony, and to completely change the emotion.
weight of the song. So when Bill Evans gets his
hands on it in 62, he isn't just playing the
Glenn Miller melody with fewer instruments. Not
at all. Evans takes that 1930s swing foundation
and adds these dense, melancholic, closely clustered
piano voicings. He slows the tempo way down.
He makes it introspective. He finds sadness and
longing in a chord progression that was originally
designed to make people dance. Here's where it
gets really interesting, because for you listening...
I want you to imagine this song as a piece of
open source software. Oh, I like that. Right.
Matty Malneck and Frank Sinirelli wrote the bass
operating system. The melody is the user interface.
It's catchy. It's easy to interact with. But
the chords beneath it, that descending bass line
you mentioned, that is the backend code. Yes.
And it is so impeccably written that any developer,
or in this case, any musician, can come in, tweak
the code, and build an entirely new application
on top of it without crashing the system. I love
that analogy, because when you compare those
different versions, you really hear entirely
different applications being run. Take Dexter
Gordon's version on Our Man in Paris in 1963.
Gordon is a tenor saxophonist steeped in bebop.
He isn't playing a sweet, sentimental dance tune.
He's playing in a smoky Parisian jazz club, pushing
the tempo, playing behind the beat, and exploring
the gritty, bluesy corners of that exact same
harmonic structure. And then you contrast that
with what the vocalists were doing. Like you
have Johnny Hartman in Oh, Hartman is legendary.
Right. Hartman possessed this rich, impossibly
smooth, baritone voice. When he sings the lyrics
Mitchell Parish wrote, he isn't using it as an
upbeat pop hook. He's delivering it as this intimate,
late -night romantic confession. Same ink, completely
different novels. Exactly. How incredibly elastic
does a melody have to be to stretch across that
many different stylistic interpretations? From
West Montgomery's vibraphone and guitar textures
to... Bud Powell's cerebral piano without snapping.
It requires a rare combination of simplicity
and depth and that elasticity, the fact that
the song could be pulled into these smoky avant
-garde jazz clubs while still retaining its beautiful
melodic core is exactly what caught the ear of
Hollywood directors. Oh right, the movies. Because
while the song is busy being deconstructed by
jazz giants, it is also living a completely parallel
life on the silver screen. Right. The directors
needed something with enough gravitas for a cinematic
moment, but enough pop sensibility to actually
connect with moviegoers. Yes. Enter the year
1959. Stairway to the Stars is used as a major
theme in the iconic motion picture. Some like
it on. Which is an absolute milestone. Some Like
It Hot is widely considered one of the greatest
comedies ever made. Placing the song so prominently
in a major Hollywood blockbuster cements it in
the pop culture consciousness in a way that goes
far beyond just record sales or jazz club credibility.
It exposes the melody to millions of people who
might never have bought a Bill Evans record or
remembered the 1939 Glenn Miller hit. Exactly.
And that Hollywood placement ensures its survival
for decades to come. The timeline in our sources
stretches right through the modern era. You have
Natalie Cole recording it on her album Don't
Look Back in 1980. A great version. You have
The Velvet Fog himself, Mel Tormé, including
it on an evening with Mel Tormé in 1994, all
the way up to the 21st century. with the acclaimed
British jazz vocalist Ian Shaw recording it for
the Abbey Road Sessions in 2011. This raises
an important question about the duality of the
song itself. How many pieces of music can exist
as a mainstream Hollywood movie theme for a major
blockbuster in 1959, while simultaneously being
torn apart and reimagined by avant -garde bebop
musicians in the exact same era? Not many, that's
for sure. It is an incredibly rare piece of art
that perfectly bridges the gap between high art
exploration and popular mass market entertainment.
So what does this all mean for the artists who
actually have to perform it today? That's the
big question. If you put yourself in the shoes
of a modern vocalist, say, you are Ian Shaw walking
into the legendary Abbey Road Studios in 2011.
You look at the sheet music on the stand. You
know the sheer crushing weight of the history
behind this song. That's heavy. You know that
by choosing to sing these lyrics, you were stepping
up to the exact same microphone, metaphorically
speaking, as Ella Fitzgerald, Sarah Vaughn, and
Johnny Hartman. You were singing over the same
chords that Bud Powell and Bill Evans spent years
exploring. How do you even approach recording
it without being completely paralyzed by the
legacy? I feel like I would just fold up the
sheet music and go home. That is the ultimate
challenge of performing a standard. It's an intimidating
tightrope walk. As an artist, you have to balance
your reverence for the history with the courage
to bring your own distinct voice to it. You have
to understand what Dexter Gordon did, but you
can't just mimic Dexter Gordon. You have to believe
that the foundation is strong enough and elastic
enough to support one more house being built
on top of it. And clearly, for nearly a century,
artists have found that courage because the song
just invites them in. It really is a master class
in the power of reinvention. Let's look back
at the incredible journey we've mapped out for
you today. It's a lot of ground. It really is.
We started in 1934 with a pure standalone instrumental
called Park Avenue Fantasy. We explored the five
-year incubation period and then watched it get
a lyrical top line and absolutely explode into
a vocal phenomenon in 1939. We saw it dominate
the charts and spark literal sibling rivalries
among the biggest band leaders in the world.
And then we explored how it survived the death
of the swing era and the musician's strikes of
the 1940s. We unpacked how its unique chromatic
baseline allowed it to become this defining open
-source canvas for the mid -century jazz giants,
transitioning from a dance tune into a vehicle
for serious introspective art. And we watched
it grace the silver screen in a 1959 cinematic
masterpiece, living a parallel life as a Hollywood
theme before following its endurance all the
way into the recording studios of the 21st century.
And the takeaway for you, the listener, goes
far beyond just music history. Understanding
the lineage of Stairway to the Stars is a lesson
in how true brilliance isn't just about the original
moment of creation. Definitely. It's about structural
integrity. A lasting legacy is about building
a foundation that is so inherently strong, so
perfectly balanced, and yet so wonderfully blank,
that other people can project their own emotions
onto it and continue building their own houses
on it for a century. Exactly. It's not a rigid
skyscraper locked in steel and concrete. It's
a living, breathing framework that constantly
invites new architects to dream. Which leaves
us with a final thought for you to ponder as
we wrap up this deep dive. Let's hear it. If
Matty Malinak and Frank Signorelli were to sit
down and write Park Avenue Fantasy today in the
year 2026, what genre would it be? Oh, that's
a great question. Right. Would it be an ambient
electronic track? A heavy trap beat. And who
would be the modern -day equivalent of Mitchell
Parish and Glenn Miller to step in, add the vocal
hook, record the track, and make it immortal?
The next time you turn on the radio and hear
a massive chart -topping remix, ask yourself,
is the back -end code underneath that beats strong
enough that artists will still be finding new
heartbreaking ways to play it 80 years from now?