Eddie de Lange

Eddie de Lange, born Edgar DeLange Moss on January 15, 1904, in Long Island City, Queens, New York, was an American lyricist, bandleader, and Broadway book writer. He came from a theatrical family: his father, Louis De Lange, was a playwright and actor, and his mother, Selma Mantell, was an actress. His father died when de Lange was two years old, found dead in a hotel room with his throat slit in circumstances that were never conclusively determined. His uncle, Alexander De Lange, worked as a comedian under the stage name Alexander Clark.

De Lange graduated from the University of Pennsylvania in 1926 and subsequently worked as a stunt man in twenty-four comedies produced by Universal Studios, frequently on productions featuring Reginald Denny. He returned to New York City in 1932 and secured a contract with Irving Mills, achieving several hits in his first year, among them "Moonglow." In 1935, he and composer Will Hudson, born Arthur Murray Hainer, formed the Hudson-DeLange Orchestra, which recorded their collaborative songs and undertook numerous road shows. The partnership dissolved in 1938, after which de Lange assembled a new band and continued touring.

He subsequently entered a songwriting partnership with composer Jimmy Van Heusen, and the two produced a substantial body of work together, including "Darn That Dream." In 1942, de Lange co-wrote "A String of Pearls," which became a successful recording for Glenn Miller. His songs attracted recordings from artists including Frank Sinatra, Ella Fitzgerald, Louis Armstrong, Nat King Cole, Duke Ellington, and Benny Goodman.

On Broadway, de Lange contributed as a book writer to One Good Year and to the musical Swingin' The Dream. In 1943, he married Marge Lohden, born Margaret Mary Lohden in 1918, and relocated with her to Los Angeles, where the couple had two children: Stephanie Barr DeLange, born in 1944, and Warren Edgar DeLange, born in 1945. De Lange spent his remaining years in Los Angeles writing music for motion pictures. He died there on July 15, 1949, and is interred in an unmarked grave at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale, California. The National Academy of Popular Music's Songwriters Hall of Fame inducted him posthumously in 1989.