1940 was a banner year for Alfred Hitchcock. Two of his films Foreign Correspondent and Rebecca were nominated for a total of 17(!) Academy Awards. For the latter, he was nominated for best director, though he would lose to John Ford and The Grapes of Wrath. As a matter of fact, Hitchcock would be nominated in the category 5 times over his career but would never take home a statue.
Of his 144 compositions, Franz Waxman called Rebecca his favorite. He was invited to arrange the piece for the Standard Symphony hour, a popular radio show on the NBC radio network. The arranged suite was broadcast, in the words of production manager Ray Klune “May 9th at 8:30 PM, over the entire Pacific Northwest Radio Network as far East as but not including Chicago.”