Fly Me to the Moon: The Jazz Standard That Actually Went to the Moon

By Dan Cohen · Published 2026-06-27

Fly Me to the Moon is one of the great American standards, and its history is a quiet lesson in how songs evolve. It was written by Bart Howard in the 1950s under a different title — originally “In Other Words” — as a gentle waltz. It took years and many singers before it settled into the swinging, finger-snapping form the world now knows.

The version that became the song

That definitive form arrived with Frank Sinatra’s 1964 recording, arranged in a brisk, buoyant swing with the Count Basie orchestra. Sinatra’s reading was so complete that it effectively became the version — the one every later singer is measured against. A modest little waltz had been transformed into an effortless, jet-age romance.

A song that left the planet

And then it did something almost no song can claim: it went to the Moon. Sinatra’s recording is widely reported to have been carried on NASA’s Apollo missions, played in connection with the journeys that actually reached lunar orbit and the surface. A love song that asks, as a romantic flourish, to be flown to the Moon ended up literally accompanying humanity there.

What it measures like

On our measurements it’s bright and swinging — an easy, up-tempo lilt, warm and buoyant rather than intense. Full profile on its song page.

Fly Me to the Moon was written by Bart Howard (originally as “In Other Words,” 1954); Frank Sinatra’s definitive version was recorded in 1964 with Count Basie. Its association with NASA’s Apollo missions is widely reported. No lyrics are reproduced.