Gordon Hill Jenkins (May 12, 1910 – May 1, 1984) was an American arranger, composer and pianist who was an influential figure in popular music in the 1940s and 1950s, renowned for his lush string arrangements. Jenkins worked with the Andrews Sisters, Johnny Cash, The Weavers, Frank Sinatra, Louis Armstrong, Judy Garland, Nat King Cole, Billie Holiday, Harry Nilsson, and Ella Fitzgerald, among others.

Biography

Career

Gordon Jenkins was born in Webster Groves, Missouri. He began his career doing arrangements for a St. Louis radio station. He was then hired by Isham Jones, the director of a dance band known for its ensemble playing, which gave Jenkins the opportunity to develop his skills in melodic scoring. He also conducted The Show Is On on Broadway.

After the Jones band broke up in 1936, Jenkins worked as a freelance arranger and songwriter, contributing to sessions by Isham Jones, Paul Whiteman, Benny Goodman, Andre Kostelanetz, Lennie Hayton, and others. In 1938, Jenkins moved to Hollywood and worked for Paramount Pictures and NBC, and then became Dick Haymes' arranger for four years. In 1944, Jenkins had a hit song with "San Fernando Valley". In the 1940s, he was music director for the radio version of the program Mayor of the Town, and his orchestra provided the music for Ransom Sherman's program on CBS.

"Goodbye" (sometimes written "Good-Bye") is a song by American composer and arranger Gordon Jenkins, published in 1935. It became well known as the closing theme song of the Benny Goodman orchestra.

Jenkins had written the song when working with the Isham Jones orchestra, and Jones allegedly rejected it as it was "too sad". Music critic Alec Wilder described "Goodbye" as "as sad a song I know" and Leonard Feather called it among his "top ten songs it would be hardest to tire of hearing".

Origin

Jenkins' son, the sportswriter Bruce Jenkins, wrote a biography of his father entitled Goodbye: In Search of Gordon Jenkins. While researching the biography, Jenkins interviewed the singer Martha Tilton, who had performed with the Benny Goodman orchestra. Tilton revealed that the song was written by Jenkins after the death of his first wife in childbirth.

Recordings

The song was used as the closing theme for radio broadcasts by the Benny Goodman orchestra, and was recorded several times by Goodman in the mid 1930s. Upon Goodman's death in 1986, Richard Stoltzman commissioned an arrangement of "Goodbye" by Bill Jenkins for clarinet and strings. The resulting "Goodbye: In Memory of Benny" was recorded by Stoltzman and London Symphony Orchestra under the direction of Michael Tilson Thomas in 1992. Another arrangement in tribute to Benny Goodman has also been recorded by Sabine Meyer.