"Strangers in the Night" is a song composed by Bert Kaempfert with English lyrics by Charles Singleton and Eddie Snyder.
[1] Kaempfert originally used it under the title "Beddy Bye" as part of the instrumental score for the movie A Man Could Get Killed.
[6] The song was originally an instrumental theme tune from the soundtrack of the film A Man Could Get Killed written by German composer Bert Kaempfert.
Music publisher Hal Fine played some tracks from the film to Frank Sinatra's producer Jimmy Bowen, and Bowen indicated that Sinatra would record the theme tune titled "Beddy Bye" if lyrics were written for the song, and that the title needed to be changed.
[7] Snyder suggested that he also had a hand in writing the music, and that he, Singleton and Kaempfert spent two weeks perfecting the song.
[2] The song was said originally to have been sung by Melina Mercouri, who thought that a man's vocals would better suit the melody and therefore declined to sing it.
Uvezian said that he was acknowledged by Kaempfert to be the composer of the song multiple times, including in a written letter.
[9] The Croatian singer Ivo Robić is also said to be the original author of "Strangers in the Night", which he sold to Kaempfert.
[2] Kaempfert later gave the German version of the song, "Fremde in der Nacht", for Robić to record.
[6] Bowen quickly contacted Ernie Freeman to come up with an arrangement for Frank Sinatra to record "Strangers in the Night" to beat Jones to the song's release.
[8] Bowen already had booked a session at the United Western Recorders on Sunset Boulevard with a 35-piece orchestra for 7–10 pm, April 11, 1966.
[17] Also present among the musicians was Glen Campbell, who was brought in the last minute to play rhythm guitar in his first session with Sinatra.
As Campbell could not read sheet music, he spent the first take listening to the melody instead of playing, which prompted Sinatra to yell out at him if he was sleeping.
[7] One of the most memorable and recognizable features of the record is Sinatra's scat improvisation of the melody (on take two) with the syllables "doo-be-doo-be-doo" as the song fades to the end.
[27] In concert, Sinatra had on many occasions sung the lines "Love was just a glance away, a warm embracing dance away" as "a lonesome pair of pants away".
[56] As a musical in-joke the first few bars are sampled in the 1967 film The Ambushers as background mood music for Matt Helm (Dean Martin's spoof spy character) to neck with a young woman who did not swoon when listening to Martin's competing love song Everybody Loves Somebody.
CBS television executive Fred Silverman listened to the song in 1968 while on a red-eye flight to a development meeting for Scooby-Doo, Where Are You!