"Stardust Melody follows Carmichael from his roaring-twenties Indiana youth in campus jazz bands to bandstands and recording studios across the nation, playing piano and singing alongside hot music greats Jack Teagarden, Benny Goodman, Tommy and Jimmy Dorsey, Bing Crosby, and close friends Bix Beiderbecke and Louis Armstrong. It illuminates his peak years in Hollywood, during which he starred in such films as To Have and Have Not and The Best Years of Our Lives and on radio, records, and TV. With insight and infinite compassion Sudhalter depicts Hoagy's triumphs and tragedies and his mounting despair as rock-and-roll drowns out, and ultimately lays waste to, the last days of his brilliant career." "With an insider's clarity Sudhalter enters the music, exploring songs that remain fresh and appealing even while reminding us of shared, perhaps more innocent, American yesterdays. Drawing freely on Carmichael's private papers and on new interviews with family, friends, and colleagues, he reveals that "The Old Music Master" (to borrow the title of one of Hoagy's most treasured songs) was almost as gifted a wordsmith as a shaper of melodies."--Jacket.