Jerome Kern was born in New York City. His mother, Fanny Kern was an excellent pianist who gave Jerome his first piano lessons at the age of five. He was educated at the Newark High School and New York College of Music, where he studied piano with Alexander Lambert and Paolo Gallico and harmony with Austin Pierce and Albert von Doenhoff .
His first published composition appeared in 1902, when he was seventeen. In 1903, he commenced work in...