George Gershwin

Gershwin began composing the song in December 1933, attempting to create his own spiritual in the style of the African American folk music of the period. The Ukrainian-Canadian composer and singer Alexis Kochan has suggested that he based the tune on a Ukrainian lullaby, Oi Khodyt Son Kolo Vikon (A Dream Passes By The Windows), which he heard in a New York City performance by Oleksander Koshetz?s Ukrainian National Chorus in 1929.[6] Gershwin had completed setting DuBose Heyward's poem to music by February 1934, and spent the next 20 months complete and orchestrating the score of the opera. The song was for the first time recorded by Abbie Mitchell on 19 July 1935, with George Gershwin playing the piano and conducting the orchestra (on: George Gershwin Conducts Excerpts form Porgy & Bess, Mark 56 667). It is sung multiple times throughout Porgy and Bess, first by Clara in Act I as a lullaby and soon after as counterpoint to the craps game scene, in Act II in a reprise by Clara, and in Act III by Bess, singing to Clara's baby. Wikipedia