Love For Sale

Love For Sale was written by Cole Porter for the 1930 musical The New Yorkers. The lyrics refer to a prostitutes offerings of “love for sale” and was considered scandalous, even being banned from radio airplay for a time. However the piece became a hit and has been performed and recorded by many great vocalists and instrumentalists such as Ella Fitzgerald, Billie Holiday, Dexter Gordon,and Oscar Peterson among others. The first two chords of the piece (Ebmaj-Bbm) have also been played as dominant 7th chords in some recordings (Eb7-Bb7). It’s worthwhile to check out many different versions of this tune to observe how its been done.