Ill Wind is a 1934 traditional pop tune written by Harold Arlen with lyrics by Ted Koehler. It was created for their Cotton Club Parade show and was originally sung by Adelaide Hall, whose performance featured nitrogen smoke rising from the stage, a pink dress, and twenty-four grey dancers behind her. The melody came to Arlen during a visit with Anya Taranda, who would later become his wife. Over the years it has become a standard of the Great American Songbook and has been recorded by many artists, including Frank Sinatra, Ella Fitzgerald, Lena Horne, Dinah Washington, Billie Holiday, and Sarah Vaughan, appearing on albums such as Sinatra's In the Wee Small Hours and Fitzgerald's Sings the Harold Arlen Songbook. The song also features in the 1984 Coppola film The Cotton Club, sung by Lonette McKee.
