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Irving Berlin |
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Irving Berlin is regarded--with near universality--as America's most important popular-music composer. This praise has come not only from music critics and fans but also from his contemporary songwriting greats and the country's leaders. When Berlin celebrated his one-hundredth birthday on 11 May 1988, members of the One-hundredth Congress gathered on the steps of the Capitol to sing for him. This tribute was without precedent, but it did resemble many others from late in his life. Many appreciations of Berlin in the 1970s and 1980s--articles, performances, and television documentaries--were written in the second person, referring to him as you rather than he. He was thus made a part of the audience as much as the subject of the celebration, no doubt because the reclusive songwriter usually refused to cooperate with such projects, despite the uniform reverence they showed for him and his work. By this time Berlin was receiving almost as much publicity for his longevity as for his music.
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