"That's for Me": Song history, Commentary, Discography, Performances on Video

"That's for Me"

Jo Stafford, Dick Haymes and Kay Kyser all recorded charted versions of "That's for Me" in 1945; and according to one source, "That's for Me" was the twentieth most popular song of that year.

State Fair, 1945, the only score of Rodgers and Hammerstein written originally for the screen stars Jeanne Crain, Dana Andrews, Dick Haymes and Vivian Blaine. The songwriting team got involved when producer Darryl F. Zanuck saw Oklahoma on Broadway and got the idea that Rodgers and Hammerstein would be perfect to write words and music for a movie-musical version of State Fair, originally a 1932 novel by Phil Stong which had already been made into a film in 1933, starring Janet Gaynor and Will Rogers. Rodgers notes in his autobiography that he and his partner "were immediately won over" after being given a special screening of the earlier film at the Twentieth Century Fox New York office on Fifty-sixth Street. Rodgers further explains that

We made sure, though, that our contract included one provision. Becacuse of our multiple activities in New York, we had no intention of spending an extended length of time in Hollywood, and we insisted that we be allowed to write the songs in the East. Though they found the request a bit unusual, the studio people agreed; the story, which was set in Iowa, would be filmed in California, while the music and lyrics would be written in Fairfield Connecticut, and Doylestown, Pennsylvania [where Rodgers and Hammerstein, respectively, resided] (Musical Stages, pp. 235-236) .

State Fair opens as the Frakes, an Iowa farm family, get ready for the Iowa State Fair, which takes place every autumn. Sister and brother Margie (Jeanne Crain) and Wayne (Dick Haymes) are both prime candidates for falling in love and the fair is not a bad place to get started. Emily Edwards (Vivian Blaine) is a singer with the band at the fair and it doesn't take Wayne a long time to spot her as she sings "That's for Me." The clip below also includes a brief scene with Jeanne Craine and Dana Edwards (Pat Gilbert) who have also met at the fair.

• Susie Ariol, livei: thickcut
• Vivian Blaine: cendrillon325
• Jo Stafford: OnlyVocalHQ
• Doris Day: sampodmike
• Dick Haymes: Classic Mood Experience
• Louis Armstrong All Stars: ulajazz

Notes

• Other songs written for the movie State Fair currently included in the Cafe Songbook Catalog of The Great American Songbook :
• 1. It Might As Well Be Srping
• For a complete listing of songs used in the movie State Fair , see IMDB soundtrack .
• Richard Rodgers, Musical Stages: An Autobiography New York: Random House, 1975 (Da Capo paper bound ed., 2002, pictured above).
• Vivian Blaine, playing Emily Edwards, introducing "That's for Me" in the 1945 movie State Fair (Vivian {Emily} includes the verse.)
• Click here to read the lyrics (inlcuding the verse , for "That's for Me," as sung by Vivian Blaine.
• The complete, authoritative lyrics for "That's for Me" can be found in:

Cite this page: "That's for Me": Song history, Commentary, Discography, Performances on Video, Cafe Songbook, https://greatamericansongbook.net/pages/songs/t/thats_for_me_p.html