Norman Luboff (May 14, 1917 – September 22, 1987) was an American

music arranger In music, an arrangement is a musical adaptation of an existing composition. Differences from the original composition may include reharmonization, melodic paraphrasing, orchestration, or formal development. Arranging differs from orchestr ...

, music publisher, and

choir director A choir ( ; also known as a chorale or chorus) is a musical ensemble of singers. Choral music, in turn, is the music written specifically for such an ensemble to perform. Choirs may perform music from the classical music repertoire, which sp ...

Early years

Norman Luboff was born in

Chicago, Illinois (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...

in 1917. He studied piano as a child and participated in his high school

chorus Chorus may refer to: Music * Chorus (song) or refrain, line or lines that are repeated in music or in verse * Chorus effect, the perception of similar sounds from multiple sources as a single, richer sound * Chorus form, song in which all verse ...

. Luboff studied at the

University of Chicago The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, U of C, or UChi) is a private research university in Chicago, Illinois. Its main campus is located in Chicago's Hyde Park neighborhood. The University of Chicago is consistently ranked among the b ...

and Central College in Chicago. Following this, he did graduate work with the composer Leo Sowerby while singing and writing for radio programs in Chicago. Luboff served in the U.S. Army's Signal Corps. In the mid-1940s, Luboff moved to

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

Radio, TV and film

With a call from Hollywood to be choral director of ''

The Railroad Hour ''The Railroad Hour'' was a radio series of musical dramas and comedies broadcast from the late 1940s to the mid-1950s. Sponsored by the Association of American Railroads, the series condensed musicals and operettas to shorter lengths, concentra ...

'', a radio weekly starring

Gordon MacRae Albert Gordon MacRae (March 12, 1921 – January 24, 1986) was an American actor, singer and radio/television host who appeared in the film versions of two Rodgers and Hammerstein musicals '' Oklahoma!'' (1955) and ''Carousel'' (1956) and who p ...

, Luboff began a successful career scoring many television programs and more than 80 motion pictures. He also recorded with artists such as

Bing Crosby Harry Lillis "Bing" Crosby Jr. (May 3, 1903 – October 14, 1977) was an American singer, musician and actor. The first multimedia star, he was one of the most popular and influential musical artists of the 20th century worldwide. He was a ...

Frank Sinatra Francis Albert Sinatra (; December 12, 1915 – May 14, 1998) was an American singer and actor. Nicknamed the " Chairman of the Board" and later called "Ol' Blue Eyes", Sinatra was one of the most popular entertainers of the 1940s, 1950s, and ...

Jo Stafford Jo Elizabeth Stafford (November 12, 1917July 16, 2008) was an American traditional pop music singer, whose career spanned five decades from the late 1930s to the early 1980s. Admired for the purity of her voice, she originally underwent classi ...

Frankie Laine Frankie Laine (born Francesco Paolo LoVecchio; March 30, 1913 – February 6, 2007) was an American singer, songwriter, and actor whose career spanned nearly 75 years, from his first concerts in 1930 with a marathon dance company to his final ...

and

Doris Day Doris Day (born Doris Mary Kappelhoff; April 3, 1922 – May 13, 2019) was an American actress, singer, and activist. She began her career as a big band singer in 1939, achieving commercial success in 1945 with two No. 1 recordings, " Sent ...

Publishing company

In 1950, he established

Walton Music Walton may refer to: People * Walton (given name) * Walton (surname) * Susana, Lady Walton (1926–2010), Argentine writer Places Canada * Walton, Nova Scotia, a community ** Walton River (Nova Scotia) *Walton, Ontario, a hamlet United Kingdo ...

Corporation, to publish his music. Luboff provided a vehicle for composers in Sweden to have their works available in the United States, including Waldemar Åhlén, and

Egil Hovland Egil Hovland (October 18, 1924 – February 5, 2013) was a Norwegian composer. Hovland was born in Råde. He studied at the Oslo conservatory with Arild Sandvold and Bjarne Brustad, in Copenhagen with Vagn Holmboe, at Tanglewood with Aar ...

from Norway. Walton Music exists today as a major choral music publisher under the guidance of Luboff's widow,

Gunilla Marcus-Luboff Gunilla is a Swedish female name, derived from Gunhild. It was among the top feminine names in the Scandinavian countries in the 1940s. People named Gunilla * Gunilla Andersson (born 1975), ice hockey player from Sweden * Gunilla Bergström (1942 ...

, a former Swedish television producer.

Norman Luboff Choir

Luboff was the founder and conductor of the Norman Luboff Choir, one of the leading choral groups of the 1950s, 60s and 70s. They came to prominence through their participation in the very successful Christmas broadcasts with Bing Crosby which ran from 1955 to 1962. History was made in 1956 when Luboff and his choir recorded with

Harry Belafonte Harry Belafonte (born Harold George Bellanfanti Jr.; March 1, 1927) is an American singer, activist, and actor. As arguably the most successful Jamaican-American pop star, he popularized the Trinbagonian Caribbean musical style with an internati ...

on " Calypso", the first album to sell one million copies. The choral group toured yearly from 1963 to 1987, and recorded more than 75 albums. The holiday albums ''Songs of Christmas'' (1956) and ''Christmas with the Norman Luboff Choir'' (1964) were perennial bestsellers for years. Luboff and his choir won the 1961

Grammy Award for Best Performance by a Chorus The Grammy Award The Grammy Awards (stylized as GRAMMY), or simply known as the Grammys, are awards presented by the Recording Academy of the United States to recognize "outstanding" achievements in the music industry. They are regarded by ma ...

. Luboff was also a guest conductor at many choirs in the United States and abroad. His choir’s version of Dixie was used on numerous tv & radio station sign-on & sign-offs in Southern USA including

WRAL-TV WRAL-TV (channel 5) is a television station licensed to Raleigh, North Carolina, United States, serving as the NBC affiliate for the Research Triangle area. It is the flagship station of the locally based Capitol Broadcasting Company, which h ...

WBBR WBBR (1130 AM) is a Class A clear-channel radio station licensed to New York, New York. It serves as the flagship station of Bloomberg Radio, Bloomberg L.P.'s radio service. The station offers general and financial news reports 24-hours a ...

WQOK WQOK (97.5 FM) is a commercial radio station licensed to Carrboro, North Carolina, and serving the Raleigh/Durham radio market. WQOK is owned and operated by Urban One and airs an urban contemporary radio format, featuring hip hop and R&B mus ...

, & WALT.

Death

Norman Luboff died of lung cancerNew York Times Obituary
/ref> at his home in Bynum,

North Carolina North Carolina () is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. The state is the List of U.S. states and territories by area, 28th largest and List of states and territories of the United ...

in 1987 at the age of 70. The Norman Luboff Collection was donated to the Music Division of the

United States Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is the research library that officially serves the United States Congress and is the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It is the oldest federal cultural institution in the country. The library ...

in 1993 by his widow.

References

External links

*
Walton Music website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Luboff, Norman 1917 births 1987 deaths American male composers American choral conductors American male conductors (music) American music arrangers Musicians from Chicago Grammy Award winners RCA Victor artists Deaths from lung cancer in North Carolina 20th-century American conductors (music) 20th-century American composers Classical musicians from Illinois 20th-century American male musicians