Yesterdays is a 1933 song written by Jerome Kern (music) and Otto Harbach (lyrics) for the Broadway musical Roberta, which was based on Alice Duer Miller’s novel Gowns by Roberta. The ballad expresses nostalgia and was overshadowed by Smoke Gets in Your Eyes, the show’s big hit. Fay Templeton introduced Yesterdays during the Roberta Broadway premiere in October 1933, and Leo Reisman and His Orchestra issued the first recording with Frank Luther on vocal in November 1933. Since then it has become a jazz standard with famous interpretations by Billie Holiday (1939 and 1952), Miles Davis, Bud Powell, Ella Fitzgerald, Frank Sinatra, Barbra Streisand and many others. The tune has appeared in films such as Roberta (1935), Till the Clouds Roll By (1946) and Lovely to Look At (1952). Its genre is show tune and jazz ballad, known for a moody, minor-key mood and harmonic richness that invites improvisation.
