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Otto Harbach

Shows · Otto Harbach

LyricistBook Writer 1873–1963

Otto Abels Harbach, born Otto Abels Hauerbach (August 18, 1873 – January 24, 1963) was an American lyricist and librettist of nearly 50 musical comedies and operettas. Harbach collaborated as lyricist or librettist with many of the leading Broadway composers of the early 20th century, including Jerome Kern, Louis Hirsch, Herbert Stothart, Vincent Youmans, George Gershwin, and Sigmund Romberg. Harbach believed that music, lyrics, and story should be closely connected and, as Oscar Hammerstein II's mentor, he encouraged Hammerstein to write musicals in this manner. Harbach is considered one of the first great Broadway lyricists, and he helped raise the status of the lyricist in an age more con…

Also credited on16 works

Madame Sherry
The Firefly
Rose-Marie
No, No, Nanette
Sunny
The Desert Song
The Cat And The Fiddle
Golden Dawn
Good Boy
Jimmie
Lucky
Roberta
Song of the Flame
The Wild Rose
Tickle Me
Wildflower

These come off the person record, which names a work and not a production. So we can say this name is attached to the work and we cannot say which staging, or in what capacity. For a composer or a writer that is the whole career we hold; there is no cast list to find them in.

In the literature8 passages

  • From The Desert Song (1926), Book and lyrics by Otto Harbach, Oscar Hammerstein II, and Frank Mandelebooks/Engel, Lehman/Words with Music_ Creating the Broadway Musical Libretto - Lehman Engel.txt
  • Madame Sherry remains the best remembered of the six productions written by Karl Hoschna and Otto Harbach (who spelled his name Hauerbach until World War I). It was adapted from an English musical of 1903, which had a different score, and which, in turn, had been based on a French musical. Among the reasons for its success were the insinu…ebooks/Green, Stanley/Broadway Musicals, Show By Show - Seventh Edition - Stanley Green & Cary Ginell.txt
  • Songs: “Call of the Sea”; “Too Many Rings Around Rosie”; “I Want to Be Happy”; “No, No, Nanette” (lyric: Otto Harbach); “Tea for Two”; “ ‘Where Has My Hubby Gone?’ Blues”; “You Can Dance With Any Girl at All”ebooks/Green, Stanley/Broadway Musicals, Show By Show - Seventh Edition - Stanley Green & Cary Ginell.txt
  • Possibly the decade’s most enduring operetta, The Desert Song marked Sigmund Romberg’s first association with librettists-lyricists Otto Harbach and Oscar Hammerstein II (Romberg and Hammerstein would do four other musicals together). Though a swashbuckling romance created along familiar lines, the work was equally inspired by such recent…ebooks/Green, Stanley/Broadway Musicals, Show By Show - Seventh Edition - Stanley Green & Cary Ginell.txt
  • Songs: Same as original production, plus “I’ve Confessed to the Breeze” (lyric: Otto Harbach); “Take a Little One-Step” (lyric: Zelda Sears)ebooks/Green, Stanley/Broadway Musicals, Show By Show - Seventh Edition - Stanley Green & Cary Ginell.txt
  • Back in the world of operetta, Rudolph Friml remained active on Broadway for many years, often working with Otto Harbach, often being produced by Arthur Hammerstein, and eventually working with Hammerstein's nephew, Oscar. Friml was a veritable fountain of melodic inspiration. He composed all of the time. He believed, along with Herbert,…ebooks/Jones, Tom/Making Musicals_ An Informal Introduction to the World of Musical Theater - Tom Jones.txt

Passages naming this person, found by keyword across 178 books. A keyword match is not a biography, and a common name will pull in the wrong one.

What this page does not know

  • What this person played. No cast list we hold records a character against a performer.
  • Any staging. This name appears in no production cast list we hold — 1,877 of 7,139 people are in that position, most of them writers, composers and designers rather than performers.
  • Which of the credits above the roles on this record — lyricist, book writer — apply to. The roles sit on the person and never on a credit, so a director who also acted looks the same here as one who did not.

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