Fats Waller’s “Ain’t Misbehavin’” was introduced at Connie’s Inn in Harlem during the opening of the all-black musical revue, Hot Chocolates. The show proved such a success that it moved onto Broadway, opening at the Hudson Theatre on June 20, 1929, and running for 219 performances. The Connie’s Inn performance of “Ain’t Misbehavin’” was sung as an opening number by Margaret Simms and Paul Bass and then, later in the show, by Russell Wooding’s Hallelujah Singers. At the Hudson Theatre, the opening remained the same, but at intermission Louis Armstrong, in his Broadway debut, took to the stage to play “Ain’t Misbehavin’” as a trumpet solo.

According to the Kennedy Center’s website page, “A Place Called Harlem,” Connie’s Inn was a Harlem speakeasy that featured song and dance revues. Found at the intersection of 131st Street and 7th Avenue it was second in popularity only to the Cotton Club. The owners eventually opened the originally segregated club to blacks who were allowed to patronize the club after the whites had gone home. Fats Waller was in good company at Connie’s Inn, at least with regard to other performers which included the likes of Duke Ellington, Fletcher Henderson, and Ethel Waters.

In David Ewen’s book, American Songwriters: An H.W. Wilson Biographical Dictionary, Andy Razaf divulges, “I remember one day going to Fats’ house to finish up a number based on a little strain he thought up. The whole show was complete, but they needed an extra number for a theme, and this had to be it. He worked on it for 45 minutes and there it was-“Ain’t Misbehavin’.” Columnist David Hinckley provides another account. “The song, as Waller told it, was composed at Razaf’s 133rd St. apartment in about 45 minutes. It reflected Waller’s habit of finding a few riffs and repeating them until he had a 32-bar song.”

Regardless of whose house that 45 minutes was spent in, “Ain’t Misbehavin’” has become one of Razaf and Waller’s most enduring compositions. For jazz vocalists and musicians, “Ain’t Misbehavin’” is second in popularity only to “Honeysuckle Rose.”

Leo Reisman and His Orchestra’s recording of the song was the first to appear on the pop charts, rising to number two in August of 1929. In all there were half a dozen hit recordings in 1929:

• Leo Reisman and His Orchestra (Lew Conrad, vocal, #2)
• Louis Armstrong (#7)
• Bill Robinson (Bojangles) (with Irving Mills and His Hotsy Totsy Gang , #8)
• Gene Austin (with Leonard Joy and His orchestra, #9)
• Ruth Etting (#16)
• Fats Waller (instrumental, #17)

And then in 1937:

• Teddy Wilson Quartet (instrumental, #6)

Fats Waller’s 1929 recording was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1984.

In 1978 Ain’t Misbehavin’ was used as the title of a musical about the Harlem Renaissance. Wildly successful, the show moved from the Manhattan Theatre Club to Broadway. Opening at the Longacre Theatre on May 9, 1978, the show ran for 1,604 performances and won Tony Awards for best musical, best director of a musical, and best actress in a musical.