As a youth, he was recognized as an extraordinary talent and formed a traveling duo with Danny Polo, a musical prodigy on the clarinet and trumpet from nearby Clinton, Indiana. As a student at Garfield High School in Terre Haute, he played with several theater bands.
Thornhill entered the Cincinnati Conservatory of Music at age 16. That same year he and clarinetist Artie Shaw started their careers at the Golden Pheasant in Cleveland, Ohio with the Austin Wiley Orchestra. Thornhill and Shaw went to New York together in 1931.
Claude went to the West Coast in the late 1930s with the Bob Hope Radio Show, and arranged for Judy Garland in Babes in Arms.
In 1935, he played on sessions for Glenn Miller's first recordings under his own name, as Glenn Miller and His Orchestra. He played on Glenn Miller's composition "Solo Hop," which was released on Columbia Records.
After playing for Paul Whiteman, Benny Goodman, Ray Noble, Glenn Miller, and Billie Holiday, and arranging "Loch Lomond" and "Annie Laurie" for Maxine Sullivan, in 1939 he founded his Claude Thornhill Orchestra. Danny Polo was his lead clarinet player. Although the Thornhill band was originally a sophisticated dance band, it became known for its many superior jazz musicians and for Thornhill's and Gil Evans' innovative arrangements; its "Portrait of a Guinea Farm" has become a classic jazz recording.
The band played without vibrato so that the timbres of the instruments could be better appreciated, and Thornhill encouraged the musicians to develop cool-sounding tones. The band was popular with both musicians and the public; the Miles Davis Nonet was modeled in part on Thornhill's cool sound and use of unconventional instrumentation. The band's most successful records were "Snowfall," "A Sunday Kind of Love" and "Love for Love."
His most famous recording, "Snowfall," was released in 1941 as Columbia 36268. He released the song also as a V-Disc recording, as V-Disc 271A1.
Playing at the Paramount Theater in New York for $10,000 a week in 1942, Thornhill dropped everything to enlist in the US Navy to support the war effort. As chief musician, he played shows across the Pacific Theater with Jackie Cooper as his drummer and Dennis Day as his vocalist.
In 1946, he was discharged from the Navy. Then in April, he reformed his ensemble. He kept his same stylistic lines, but added some Bop lines to it. He got his old members of Danny Polo, Gerry Mulligan, and Barry Galbraith back together, but also added new members like Red Rodney, Lee Konitz, Joe Shulman and Bill Barber. Barber was a tuba player, who was considered as a "soft brass" player rather than a bass as to not interfere with (Joe) Shulman on the bass. Their creative and immaculately clean and delicate interpretation of Evans’s arrangement of Dizzy Gillespie’s fast bop theme "Anthropology" (1947) provides a particularly noteworthy example of Thornhill’s style, which influenced Miles Davis’s recordings in 1949 for Capitol and many musicians who followed .
In the mid 1950s, Thornhill was briefly Tony Bennett's musical director.
He offered his big band library to Gerry Mulligan when Gerry formed the Concert Jazz Band, but Gerry regretfully declined the gift, since his instrumentation was different. A large portion of his extensive library of music is currently held by Drury University in Springfield, Missouri.
After his discharge from the Navy he continued to perform with his orchestra until his death of a heart attack at 1:30 a.m., July 2, 1965, at his home in Caldwell, New Jersey. Claude was booked at the Steel Pier in Atlantic City, New Jersey, at the time, the engagement was kept in his honor with his music director in his place. He was survived by his wife, actress Ruth Thornhill, and his mother, Maude Thornhill (81 at the time), of Terre Haute, Indiana, still active at the time conducting choirs.
Claude Thornhill's compositions included the standard "Snowfall", "I Wish I Had You", recorded by Billie Holiday and Fats Waller, "Let's Go", "Shore Road", "Portrait Of A Guinea Farm", "Lodge Podge", "Rustle Of Spring", "It's Time For Us To Part", "It Was A Lover And His Lass", "The Little Red Man", "Memory Of An Island", and "Where Has My Little Dog Gone?"
In 1984, Claude Thornhill was inducted into the Big Band and Jazz Hall of Fame.
If You Were The Only Girl
Claude Thornhill Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
And I were the only boy
Nothing else would matter in the world today
We could go on loving in the same old way
A garden of Eden, just made for two
With nothing to mar our joy
There would be such wonderful things to do
If you were the only girl in the world
And I were the only boy
A garden of Eden just made for two
With nothing to mar our joy
I would say such wonderful things to you
There would be such wonderful things to do
If you were the only girl in the world
And I were the only boy
Claude Thornhill's song "If You Were The Only Girl in the World" is a romantic love song that paints a picture of a perfect world where two lovers can be together in a blissful existence. The song is all about the power of love and how it can conquer all obstacles, as long as the two people in love are together. The song starts off with the singer stating that if the person they love were the only girl in the world, and the singer was the only boy, nothing else in the world would matter. This demonstrates the love and devotion the singer has for their partner, indicating that they are willing to give up everything else in their life just to be with their loved one.
The song then goes on to describe a perfect world where the two lovers can go on loving each other in the same old way. The use of the word "old" here indicates that the singer wants their love to be everlasting and never tires of being in love with their partner. The singer imagines a world where there are no problems or obstacles to their love, and they can live in a garden of Eden made just for them. The reference to the garden of Eden indicates a paradise-like environment, free from the constraints and struggles of everyday life.
The latter part of the song focuses on the things that the singer would do and say to their loved one if they were the only girl in the world, and the singer was the only boy. This shows the depth of the love the singer has and how they are willing to go to great lengths to make their partner happy. The song ends with a repetition of the chorus, reinforcing the idea that if the two lovers were together, nothing else but their love for each other matters.
Line by Line Meaning
If you were the only girl in the world
If you were the one person that mattered most in my life
And I were the only boy
If I were the one person that mattered most in your life
Nothing else would matter in the world today
No other person, place, or thing could compare to the importance of our love
We could go on loving in the same old way
We would never tire of each other's company because our love would always be new and exciting
A garden of Eden, just made for two
Our love would be a paradise, with no worries or problems to weigh us down
With nothing to mar our joy
Our happiness would be pure and unspoiled by any negative influences
I would say such wonderful things to you
I would express my love for you in every way imaginable
There would be such wonderful things to do
We would have endless opportunities to explore our love and enjoy each other's company
If you were the only girl in the world
If you were the most important person in my life
And I were the only boy
And I were the most important person in your life
A garden of Eden just made for two
Our love would be the perfect setting for us to enjoy each other's company
With nothing to mar our joy
Our happiness would be complete and unblemished
I would say such wonderful things to you
I would express my love for you in every way possible
There would be such wonderful things to do
We would have endless opportunities to experience new things and enjoy our time together
Lyrics © CARLIN AMERICA INC
Written by: CLIFFORD GREY, NAT D. AYER
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind