Rockin' Chair is a 1929 popular song with lyrics and music by Hoagy Carmichael, its only credited writer, and it is classed as jazz. Carmichael first recorded it on 19 February 1929 as a test recording for Victor, later issued on the Historical label, and he returned to it in 1930 and 1956. Mildred Bailey made the song famous by using it as her theme song.
Musically it is unconventional: after the B section, where most popular songs return to the A section, it runs A-B-C-A1. Like other standards of the 1920s, its words rely on minstrel stereotypes, including references to an 1853 anti-Uncle Tom song. Later versions by Louis Armstrong, several swing bands, Frankie Laine, Patti Page, Kay Starr, Rosemary Clooney and Eric Clapton are among the best known.
