Garland wrote a number of well-known swing jazz hits, including "Serenade To A Savage" for Artie Shaw (one of Shaw's gold records) and "Leap Frog" for bandleader Les Brown.[1]
"In the Mood" authorship controversy
Garland is credited as the composer (with Andy Razaf as lyricist) of the Glenn Miller hit "In the Mood",[2] but "In The Mood"'s main theme, featuring repeated arpeggios rhythmically displaced, had previously appeared under the title of "Tar Paper Stomp", credited to jazz trumpeter/bandleader Wingy Manone. Manone recorded "Tar Paper Stomp" which did not become popular until the middle of 1930, just months before Horace Henderson used the same tune in "Hot and Anxious," recorded by his brother's band, The Fletcher Henderson Orchestra, on March 19, 1931.
This song was first performed by bandleaders Charlie Barnet and Artie Shaw, but fell out of favor because Garland's original arrangement was too long to fit on one side of a 78rpm record. Garland then brought "In the Mood" to Glenn Miller, who created a shorter arrangement.[3]
^ abFlanagan, David; Kernfeld, Barry (2002). "Garland, Joe". In Barry Kernfeld (ed.). The New Grove Dictionary of Jazz, Vol. 2 (2nd ed.). New York: Grove's Dictionaries Inc. pp. 13–14. ISBN1561592846.
^Simon, George T. (1967). The Big Bands. The Macmillan Company. pp. 357–358. LCCN67-26643. Glenn, with his savvy as an arranger, made appropriate cuts, whittling it down to a length that would fit on one side of a record.