Biography for
Jay Blackton More at IMDbPro »

Date of Birth

25 March 1909, New York City, New York, USA

Date of Death

8 January 1994, Los Angeles, California, USA (heart attack)

Birth Name

Jacob Schwartzdorf

Mini Biography

Composer, conductor, pianist and arranger who gave his first piano concerto at the Brooklyn Academy of Music at age 12. He conducted the New York Opera Comique, the Federal Grand Opera Project and the Federal Gilbert and Sullivan Project, the St. Louis Municipal Opera, and the Delaware Philharmonic. He directed the music for the Broadway production of Oklahoma!; Annie Get Your Gun; Inside U.S.A.; Miss Liberty; Call Me Madam; Wish You Were Here; New Faces of 1956; Happy Hunting; Oh Captain; Redhead; Mr. President; and The Girl Who Came to Supper.

IMDb Mini Biography By: Hup234!

Spouse

Louise Holt

(? - 8 January 1994) (his death)

Trivia

He conducted the orchestra for three major productions of "Oklahoma!"--the original 1943 Broadway stage version, the 1955 film version, and the 1979 Broadway revival. Each of these three versions featured orchestrations by Robert Russell Bennett (slightly revised and expanded for large orchestra in the film). The 1979 Broadway revival cast album, which used the original 1943 orchestrations, is perhaps the only instance in Broadway history in which a show's original conductor re-recorded his interpretation of the score in hi-fi stereo thirty-six years after his original recording.

Was twice nominated for Broadway's Tony Award as Best Conductor and Musical Director: in 1959 for "Redhead" and in 1963 for "Mr. President."

He was Ethel Merman's favorite conductor of Broadway musicals.

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