Born Isidore Hochberg to immigrant parents on the Lower East Side of New York, his name was changed to Edgar Harburg. He is best known by his nickname, Yip Harburg: Yip is short for yipsel, meaning squirrel. He attended Townsend Harris High School where he and Ira Gershwin worked on the school paper and became life-long friends. They went on to attend City University of New York together. After graduation, he worked as a journalist in South America, then returned to New York where he became co-owner of Consolidated Electrical Appliance Company. The company went bankrupt following the crash of 1929, and Ira Gershwin introduced Yip to Jay Gorney. He collaborated with Gorney on songs for a Broadway review (Earl Carroll's Sketchbook): the show was successful and Harburg was engaged as lyricist for a series of successful reviews, including Americana in 1932, for which he wrote the lyrics to Brother Can You Spare a Dime?, which became an anthem of the Depression. Harburg and Gorney were offered a contract with Paramount: in Hollywood, Harburg worked with composers Harold Arlen, Vernon Duke, Jerome Kern, Jule Styne, and Burton Lane, and wrote the lyrics for The Wizard of Oz. He was blacklisted for his left-wing political activity in the 1940s: no longer able to work in Hollywood, he returned to New York, where he began to write a series of book musicals with social messages, including Bloomer Girl and Finian's Rainbow.
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2 Broadway Reviews 3 Broadway Musicals 4 Films |
Songs
Broadway Reviews
Broadway Musicals
Films