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Moon River
Written by Henry Mancini and Johnny Mercer, 1961
Some songs seem to have been with us forever, drifting in from somewhere we can’t quite remember. “Moon River” is one of them, yet it was written for a single moment in a single film: Audrey Hepburn, sitting on a New York fire escape in Breakfast at Tiffany’s (1961), strumming a guitar and singing softly to herself. Composer Henry Mancini wrote the melody with her in mind. Hepburn was not a trained singer, so he kept the tune simple and gentle, well within her comfortable range. That modest voice turned out to be exactly right.
Mancini spent about a month on the melody, then sent it to lyricist Johnny Mercer, who wrote the words. The two worked separately, which was common for them. Mercer’s working title was “Blue River,” but another songwriter was already using that name, so it became “Moon River.” Mercer grew up in Savannah, Georgia, and remembered its rivers fondly, and today a river near Savannah carries the song’s name.
The song nearly didn’t survive. After an early preview of the film, Paramount executive Martin Rackin suggested cutting it. Hepburn, usually known for her gentle manner, objected strongly. Mancini and others later described her reply in versions ranging from “over my dead body” to language a good deal more colorful. The song stayed in the film.
It went on to win the Academy Award for Best Original Song and Grammys for both Record of the Year and Song of the Year. Two recordings reached number 11 on the Billboard Hot 100 in late 1961, one a vocal by Jerry Butler and the other Mancini’s own version with orchestra and chorus. In Britain, Danny Williams took it to number one. Hepburn’s fire-escape performance wasn’t released as a record until 1993, after her death. In 2004 the American Film Institute ranked it fourth among the greatest songs in American film.
Most Americans, though, came to know “Moon River” through Andy Williams. He never released it as a single, but it appeared on his 1962 album Moon River and Other Great Movie Themes, which went gold. He opened his long-running television show with it for years, and it became his signature song. In 2022 the Library of Congress chose his recording for preservation in the National Recording Registry.
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