Alec Wilder

Composer and arranger, born in Rochester, New York, USA. He began songwriting and arranging in New York in the 1930s for such artists as Cab Calloway, Bing Crosby, Ethel Waters, and Mabel Mercer. In 1939 he composed a series of innovative octets that combined classical and popular musical forms. He began writing chamber and orchestral music and opera (1950s), and in the 1970s he hosted a series of radio programmes on American popular music. Although appreciated by jazz and classical musicians, his work is not very well known by the public.

Alec Wilder (born Alexander Lafayette Chew Wilder in Rochester, New York, February 16, 1907;

His family was prominent in Rochester;

He was largely self-taught as a composer;

He was good friends with Frank Sinatra, Peggy Lee, Tony Bennett and other luminaries of the American popular music canon. Among the popular songs he wrote or co-wrote were I'll Be Around (a hit for the Mills Brothers), While We're Young (recorded by Peggy Lee and many others), and It's So Peaceful in the Country. He also wrote many songs for the cabaret artist Mabel Mercer, including Have You Ever Crossed Over to Sneden's?

In addition to writing popular songs, Wilder also composed classical pieces for exotic combinations of orchestral instruments.

Wilder authored the definitive American Popular Song, 1900-1950 (1973). With lyricist Loonis McGlohon, he composed songs for the Land of Oz theme park in Banner Elk, North Carolina.

Wilder loved puzzles: he created his own cryptic crosswords, and could spend hours with a jigsaw puzzle. Displeased with how Peggy Lee improvised the ending of While We're Young, he wrote her a note: "The next time you come to the bridge [of the song], jump!" He often maintained that music publishers "stole everything", but in a reflective moment, noted that as badly as he had been treated by the powers-that-be of the music industry, black artists had been treated worse.

Wilder is buried in a Catholic cemetery in Avon, New York, outside Rochester.