SONG CONTEXT PAPER

Name: Hanako Greensmith

Information
Song Title: “I Had Myself a True Love”
Show Title: St. Louis Woman
Composer: Harold Arlen
Lyricist: Johnny Mercer
Librettist: Arna Bontemps, Countee Cullen
Source Material: Based upon the novel, God Sends Sunday, by Arna Bontemps.

Show Circumstances
Who: Lila
When: 1940s, evening (?) .
What: Lila is longing for the love of her married significant other, Bigelow Brown.
Yearning for his full attention and a life they might live together, she sings this in
her angered sorrow, for she knows that he has left, their future may no longer be
what she had dreamed it would.
Why: This song must be sung for the sake of Lila’s mental place and stability,
singing this as her release of intense yearning towards Brown.