Frederick Loewe 10 June 1901 – 14 February 1988
My Fair Lady Overture
By Distributed by NBC (Motown). Photographer uncredited and unknown. – Originally published in 1962 as part of a publicity photo collage to promote the NBC TV special “The Broadway of Lerner and Loewe”; see this listing at WorthPoint. Scan via Getty Images. Retouched by uploader., Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=107644002
Frederick Loewe was a famous composer known for his Broadway musicals. Born in Berlin, Germany, he moved to America with his father, a Jewish operetta star. Loewe began playing piano at a young age and started composing songs by seven. He attended the Stern Conservatory in Berlin and became a concert pianist.
In New York, he struggled initially but found work in German clubs and silent films. Loewe met lyricist Alan Jay Lerner at the Lambs Club in 1942, and they collaborated on several successful musicals, including Brigadoon and My Fair Lady. Brigadoon, a romantic fantasy, won the New York Drama Critics’ Circle award for Best Musical.
Their adaptation of George Bernard Shaw’s Pygmalion, My Fair Lady, became a massive hit, winning the Tony Award for Best Musical. Loewe also worked on Camelot and the film Gigi, which won nine Academy Awards.
