This standard had a modest introduction as part of Princeton University’s Triangle Club production Stags at Bay in 1934. A west coast dance band recording of the tune landed number one in the charts the following year:

Tom Coakley and His Orchestra (1935, Carl Ravazza, vocal, #1)

The Triangle Club was the successor to the Princeton College Dramatic Association, founded in 1883. The Club staged a production every academic year, and for the 1934-35 show, Princeton student Brooks Bowman (class of 1936) composed the music, which in addition to “East of the Sun” featured “Will Love Find a Way?” and “Love and a Dime.” The show garnered positive reviews while on tour and culminated with two sold-out performances in New York.

Tom Coakley had a popular, California-based dance band. In 1934 they were playing the Rose Room at the Palace Hotel in San Francisco, recording and being featured on live radio broadcasts. As a result they did a coast-to-coast tour in 1935, the year they recorded “East of the Sun.” In January, 1936, they returned to San Francisco and an engagement at the Hotel St. Francis.

Bandleader Hal Kemp recorded Bowman’s “Love and a Dime” and Will Love Find a Way?” for Brunswick Records in 1934. Although it appears he didn’t record “East of the Sun,” references abound in print and on the internet that he did. A listing of Brunswick releases of Kemp’s band from 1934-1936 shows only the two titles.

Probably the most famous pre-World War II recording was by trombonist Tommy Dorsey’s Orchestra in April, 1940, featuring his new vocalist, Frank Sinatra. Based along the lines of Dorsey’s earlier successes with “Marie” and “Who,” the recording features a call-and-response vocal between Sinatra and the band. A high point on the record is a marvelous trumpet solo by Bunny Berigan.

It’s likely Brooks Bowman came up with the title from a Norwegian fairy tale where a prince and his step-mother live “east of the sun and west of the moon.” The tune’s lyrics have a fairy tale quality, beginning with the seldom-performed verse: “I wish that we could live up in the sky, to live among the stars, the moon, just you and I.” In the chorus the couple will “live in a lovely way, on love and pale moonlight.” The tune is a romantic ballad that continues to find favor with vocalists and instrumentalists alike.