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“It’s All In the Game”: The Hit Song Co-Written By a Vice President

It's All In the Game Charles G. Dawes served as Vice President of the United States under Calvin Coolidge during 1925-1929. At various times, he was a banker, a military general, and the co-winner of the 1925 Nobel Peace Prize (for his work on a post-World War I plan to help Germany stabilize its economy). If all that was not enough, he also co-wrote “It’s All in the Game,” the 1958 hit song recorded by Tommy Edwards.

Dawes’s Melody in A Major

Dawes wrote the music for what would become “It’s All in the Game” in 1911 while he was a banker. The amateur pianist and flautist then played his composition, “Melody in A Major,” for a musician friend who then took the sheet music to a publisher.

The tune became popular and was often played at appearances by Dawes. Below is a 1924 recording of “Melody in A Major,” featuring Carl Lamson on piano.

“It’s All in the Game”

Dawes, who was born in Marietta, Ohio on August 27, 1865 and passed away on April 23, 1951, just missed seeing his tune become a chart-topping pop standard. In the summer of 1951, not long after Dawes’s death, songwriter Carl Sigman took the melody that Dawes wrote and added lyrics to create “It’s All in the Game.”

Many a tear have to fall,
But it’s all in the game;
All in the wonderful game,
That we know as love.

Tommy Edwards Versions in 1951 and 1958

A number of artists sang “It’s All in the Game,” including Dinah Shore and Louis Armstrong. The Virginia-born R&B singer Tommy Edwards had a popular version of the song first with his 1951 recording.

But seven years later, Edwards recorded it again in 1958 in a rock and roll version. This recording went on to top the charts, becoming the version most people recognize today.

First, here is Edwards’s 1951 version.

Now, listen to the differences between that 1951 version and Edwards’s 1958 recording of “It’s All in the Game.” The later recording illustrates the influence of rock and roll in the intervening years after Elvis Presley first recorded “That’s All Right” at Sun Studios in 1954.

Edwards also performed this version of “It’s All in the Game” on The Ed Sullivan Show on September 14, 1958 (only two years after Presley’s first appearance on the show). Below, though, is his hit recording.

Edwards had some other minor hit songs, but he never again matched the success of “It’s All in the Game.” Edwards died on October 22, 1969 at the age of 47.

The Songwriters

As for the songwriters, Sigman wrote lyrics for other popular songs, including “(Where Do I Begin?) Love Story” (the theme from the 1970 tear-jerker movie Love Story) and “Ebb Tide,” the 1965 Righteous Brothers hit.

Sigman passed away on September 26, 2000 in Manhasset, New York. He was 91.

The other songwriter who wrote the melody, as noted above, went on to become the only U.S. Vice President to co-author a hit song. On top of that, he also is the only Nobel Peace Prize winner with a hit song (so far).

While you may not remember much from school about Dawes’s political career or his Nobel Peace Prize or his years as U.S. Ambassador to the United Kingdom, you likely recognize his important work on a great song that was made an American classic with some help by Carl Sigman and Tommy Edwards.

“It’s All in the Game” continues to touch people, whether in the version by Edwards or by other artists like Nat King Cole, Cliff Richard, the Four Tops, Van Morrison, George Benson, Tom T. Hall, Ricky Nelson, or Michael Buble. So, while I am still waiting for that hit song from Dick Cheney or Joe Biden or Mike Pence, for now, Charles Dawes remains the only vice president to get so many greats to sing his tune.

And that is the story behind the song.

Photo via public domain. Leave your two cents in the comments.

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Rick Nelson’s Death and Life

Garden Party

On December 31, 1985, singer-songwriter Rick Nelson was flying to new Year’s Eve appearance in Dallas when the DC-3 crashed. The crash killed Nelson and all seven passengers. The two pilots of the plane — which had taken off from Guntersville, Alabama — survived the attempted emergency landing with serious injuries.

The cause of the crash is still a mystery. The plane had started filling with smoke from an unknown origin before the pilots had to attempt to land the plane.

Ozzie And Harriet

What was not a mystery was that Rick Nelson was a great talent, often underrated. He had rose to fame as “Ricky Nelson” in the 1950s with his parents on the television show, The Adventures of Ozzie And Harriet.

But it was his performance of a song on the show in 1957 that really began his career as a musician. In an April 10, 1957 episode, he sang the Fats Domino song “I’m Walkin’.”

Following his first release of “I’m Walkin” and “A Teenager’s Romance” in 1957, Nelson hit the top 40 charts around thirty times in the next five years. Below he performs his classic version of “Lonesome Town,” which was written by Baker Knight, on The Adventures of Ozzie And Harriet.

Later Music Career

After his early string of hits, his career had various ups and downs. The arrival of the Beatles made rockabilly music out of fashion for a time. But Nelson’s work influenced others. His influence can be heard in what came to be known as “the California sound.”

In the early 1970s, Nelson’s popularity returned for a period. He had a top 40 song with a cover of Bob Dylan’s “She Belongs to Me.” Nelson performs the song with his band, The Stone Canyon Band, on The Mike Douglas Show in 1969 below.

Nelson’s final major hit was his 1972 song, “Garden Party.” Nelson wrote the autobiographical song after he had been booed for performing a current song, “Country Tonk” (a version of The Rolling Stones’s “Honky-Tonk Woman”) at a performance. The incident during Richard Nader’s Rock ‘n Roll Revival concert, which took place on October 15, 1971, inspired Nelson to pen “Garden Party.”

An interesting piece of trivia is that the “Mr. Hughes” mentioned in “Garden Party” refers to The Beatles’ George Harrison. Harrison was a neighbor and friend of Nelson’s who was in the audience at the show. Harrison used the alias “Hughes” when traveling, and he was likely in disguise so people would not recognize him.

“Garden Party” was Nelson’s last success on the charts. But he continued touring up until his death. The last song he performed the night before his death was Buddy Holly’s “Rave On.”

Below Nelson performs “Travelin’ Man” in 1985, not long before the plane crash that took his life.

After Nelson’s death in 1985, his work continued to earn more respect among critics. In 1987, he was posthumously inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

What is your favorite Rick Nelson song? Leave your two cents in the comments.

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“It’s All In the Game”: The Hit Song Co-Written By a Vice President

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Eddie Cochran’s Car Crash

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Eddie Cochran’s Car Crash

In 1960, music stars Eddie Cochran and Gene Vincent were riding in a cab that crashed, resulting in 21-year-old Cochran’s death.

On April 17, 1960, early rock-and-roll stars Eddie Cochran and Gene Vincent were in a car crash that resulted in Cochran’s death. Cochran — who had hits with songs like “C’mon Everybody,” “Somethin’ Else,” and “Summertime Blues” — was only 21.

Eddie Cochran and Gene Vincent were taking a cab from a show in Bristol, England to the airport when the taxi, traveling at more than 60 mph through a dark and winding road, crashed into a light post. Cochran was thrown through a window and died at the hospital from a head injury. Vincent survived but sustained a broken leg and walked with a limp for the rest of his life.

Cochran’s girlfriend Sharon Sheeley, who was also in the car, survived, reportedly because Cochran had thrown himself on top of her to protect her. Sheeley was a songwriter and wrote songs such as Ricky Nelson’s “Poor Little Fool.” She continued to write songs after the crash, and she passed away in 2002.

Gene Vincent passed away in 1971. Along with the Minnesota-born Cochran, the two young rock and roll stars exerted a strong influence on the British rock scene.

Both Vincent and Cochran helped bring together John Lennon and Paul McCarney. John Lennon was playing Gene Vincent’s “Be Bop A Lula” at a 1957 garden party where he met Paul McCartney. McCartney immediately found a connection through the song with Lennon, as his first record purchase had been of that song. And later that afternoon, the two future Beatles got together and McCartney taught Lennon to play Eddie Cochran’s “Twenty Flight Rock.”

In this video, Eddie Cochran performed on the Town Hall Party TV show on February 7, 1959. This performance took place not long after Cochran had lost two of his friends, Ritchie Valens and Buddy Holly in a tragic plane crash. And it was only a little more than a year before his own death.