THE JOHNNY MERCER EDUCATIONAL ARCHIVES

TEXAS Lil DARLIN

Lyricist and Composer

Johnny Mercer, lyricist, and Robert Emmett Dolan, composer, have finally caught up with each other after turning out dozens of song hits with other songwriting partners-and the results are the witty lyrics and catchy music for "Texas, Li'l Darlin'," which is being heard with increasing frequency on the Hit Parade. 

The association of Mercer and Dolan, which was brought about for this show, now promises to be another of the theatre's enduring combinations,for which Rodgers and Hammerstein (and before them Gilbert and Sullivan!) have provided ample and distinguished precedent. Already, they are at work on a new musical for next season based on the adventures of Marco Polo, and they have also discussed with Anthony Brady Farrell, their present producer, still another musical project.

Before "Texas, Li'l Darlin'," Mercer and Dolan each had separate success turning out songs that somehow expressed the American scene and the American idiom. This aptitude has given the movie soundtracks, the airwaves, and the jukeboxes such song hits as Mercer's "Accentuate the Positive," "Blues in the Night Dream," "Too Marvelous for Words," "Lazy-bones", "Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe" (for which he won an Academy Award), "Pardon My Southern Accent," "I'm an Old Cowhand," "Goody, Goody," "Jeepers, Creepers," "That Old Black Magic," "You Must Have Been a Beautiful Baby," and Dolan's melodic scoring for such films as "Going My Way," "The Bells of St. Mary's," "The Great Gatsby," "Top o' the Morning," and "Let's Dance," in addition to individual song hits like "Little by Little," "At Last I'm in Love," "Red Hot Rhythm," and "Cross My Heart."

Johnny Mercer is also well-known as a recording artist. Two of his current best-selling records are his own "Yodel Blues" and "It's Great to be Alive" from "Texas,Li'l Darlin"' and his rendition of Frank Loesser's "Baby, It's Cold Outside." Mercer was born in 1909 and brought up in Savannah, Ga. and educated at the Woodbury Forest Preparatory School in Virginia. He now lives in Hollywood with his wife, the former Ginger Meehan, and their two children, Amanda and John. Amanda was the inspiration for Johnny's song, "Mandy is Two," which he wrote for her second birthday. For a time after his first arrival in New York, Johnny was a vocalist with Paul Whiteman's orchestra, having won the job through an audition with the maestro. Later he joined Benny Goodman's Camel Caravan as vocalist. Since then he starred on many radio programs and recorded dozens of song hits. His last Broadway show was "St. Louis Woman," for which he wrote the lyrics to Harold Arlen's music.

Robert Emmett Dolan is also noted outside the field of composing. He has been well-known as an orchestra conductor for radio, motion pictures, and the legitimate theatre. He was born in 1908 in Hartford, Conn. and educated at Loyola University in Montreal. On Broadway, he conducted "Good News Follow Thru," "Very Warm for May," "Louisiana Purchase," "Leave It to Me," and many others. For the last nine years he has been composing and conducting in Hollywood for Paramount Pictures where he is still under contract.

Now, with their association so happily begun in "Texas, Li'l Darlin'," Mercer and Dolan are a songwriting team that promises to shine in the legitimate show shops for years to come.

 ...Text from Souvenir Program of this 1949 Broadway show.

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