He was a composer, songwriter and screenwriter born Thomas Montgomery Adair in Newton, Kansas, who studied at Los Angeles Junior College and wrote music for Bing Crosby, Tommy Dorsey and several radio shows.
He composed well over 300 songs, often in collaboration with Matt Dennis or Gordon Jenkins, such as ” Let’s Get Away From It All”, “In the Blue of the Evening”, and “There’s No You” which were recorded and achieved success for artists including Frank Sinatra, Mel Torme and Sarah Vaughan.
Gaining recognition for his work on TV and film he was nominated for an Academy Award in 1957 for music on the film Julie and an Emmy nomination in 1969 for his music on The Story of Babar: The Little Elephant. His compositions for film and television include the music for The Ann Sothern Show, Hazel and The Tennessee Ernie Ford Show and his screenwriting included episodes for the TV series Hogan’s Heroes, Laredo, The Munsters and My Favourite Martian.
He died in Honolulu, Hawaii in 1988 aged 74 and two decades later was posthumously inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2010.
Frank Sinatra Recordings
Let’s Get Away From It All (Tom Adair/Matt Dennis)
Sources:
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Adair
- http://nfo.net/cal/ta1.html
- http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0010480/
- https://www.discogs.com/artist/661120-Tom-Adair
- https://www.ibdb.com/broadway-cast-staff/tom-adair-12722
- http://www.allmusic.com/artist/tom-adair-mn0000937544