Andrew Gold mother was singer Marni Nixon, who provided the singing voice for numerous actresses, notably Natalie Wood in "West Side Story", Deborah Kerr in "The King and I", and Audrey Hepburn in "My Fair Lady"; his father was Ernest Gold, an Austrian-born composer who won an Academy Award for his score for the movie "Exodus". He had two younger sisters. Gold began writing songs at the age of 13. Abroad in England for school, the 16-year-old Gold scored his first recording contract on the strength of a selection of demos he submitted to Polydor Records' London office. That contract resulted in
My Fair Lady (Shelly Manne album) first issued as "My Fair Lady with the Un-Original Cast", and later reissued as "My Fair Lady Swings". This album was based on arrangements thoroughly worked out in advance, and some of the tunes were sung by Jack Sheldon and Irene Kral. Some of these albums were performed by small combos, others by big bands. Some used hastily improvised arrangements, others carefully worked out ones. Sometimes singing was involved, but most often the tunes were presented in instrumental versions. Regardless of the exact approach, the practice of recording an entire album of jazz versions of the songs of a single