"I Don't Want to Walk Without You" is a popular song.
The music was written by Jule Styne with the lyrics by Frank Loesser. Composer Irving Berlin was a huge admirer of the song. Berlin reportedly said that of all the songs by other composers he had heard, he would have been most proud to have written I Don't Want to Walk Without You. Writing of Berlin's praise for the song, Loesser wrote in his diary, "Irving Berlin came in today and spent a solid hour telling me that 'Walk' is the best song he ever heard. He played and sang it over, bar by bar, explaining why it's the best song he ever heard. I was flattered like crazy."
The song was published in 1941. I Don't Want to Walk Without You was first performed in the 1942 Paramount Pictures film, Sweater Girl, by actress Betty Jane Rhodes. In 2012, Tom Vallance of The Independent wrote of Rhodes' performance, "Her place in the history of popular song is secured by her having introduced on screen one of the great songs of wartime longing, "I Don't Want To Walk Without You."
I Don't Want to Walk Without You became a number one pop hit for Harry James and his orchestra in 1942. Tommy Tucker recorded the song on December 2, 1941.
Olive Oyl seranaded Popeye with this song in a Popeye cartoon.
There have been several charting versions of this song during the rock era. Phyllis McGuire charted with her 1964 version, and Barry Manilow released a version of the song in early 1980 which reached number 36 on the Billboard Hot 100.
Famous quotes containing the word walk:
“Life is extraordinarily suave and sweet with certain natural, witty, affectionate people who have unusual distinction and are capable of every vice, but who make a display of none in public and about whom no one can affirm they have a single one. There is something supple and secret about them. Besides, their perversity gives spice to their most innocent occupations, such as taking a walk in the garden at night.”
—Marcel Proust (1871–1922)