Long Ago (and Far Away) is a popular song with music by Jerome Kern and lyrics by Ira Gershwin. It comes from the 1944 Technicolor film musical Cover Girl, a Columbia Pictures production starring Rita Hayworth and Gene Kelly, and was published that year by Crawford Music. In the film, Hayworth sings it to Kelly, her voice dubbed by Martha Mears, and Jinx Falkenburg later briefly reprises it. The song was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Original Song in 1944 but lost to "Swinging on a Star". Its sheet music sold over 600,000 copies within a year. The original recording, by Jo Stafford with Paul Weston and His Orchestra, was made in January 1944 and released that April, and Stafford's version reached number six on the charts. Other 1944 hit versions came from Dick Haymes and Helen Forrest, Bing Crosby and Perry Como. Kathryn Grayson sang it in Till the Clouds Roll By (1946), and the Crosby version was used in Someone to Love (1987). Johnny Desmond sang a German version that was used in psychological warfare. The American Film Institute ranked the song number 92 in its 100 Years...100 Songs list in 2004, and it is described as Ira Gershwin's greatest commercial success.
