Often called a blues poet, the influence of music on Langston Hughes's life and work was powerful. Hughes's Montage of a Dream Deferred epitomizes the influence of music, specifically jazz, in his work. Yet music was more than an influence in Hughes's prose and poetry. Langston Hughes made important contributions to popular music, art songs, and musical theater. He wrote librettos for Troubled Island (music: William Grant Still, 1941), Esther (music: Jan Meyerowitz, 1946), The Barrier (Jan Meyerowitz, 1950), de Organizer (music: James P. Johnson, 1939-1941), Soul Gone Home (music: Ulysses Kay, 1954), and Street Scene (music: Kurt Weill, 1947). Hughes also contributed lyrics for musicals including, Simply Heavenly (music: David Martin, 1957), The Ballad of the Brown King (music: Bonds, 1961), Black Nativity (1961), and Tambourines to Glory (1963).¹¹⁹

Langston Hughes developed a close friendship with composer Margaret Bonds, who composed Three Dream Portraits, a song cycle of his poetry. Three Dream Portraits includes musical settings of Hughes's poems Minstrel Man, Dream Variation, and I, Too. Bonds also composed music to Langston Hughes's famous poem The Negro Speaks of Rivers. In all, Langston Hughes wrote lyrics for more than 800 songs. He collaborated on songs with Duke Ellington and recorded a reading of The Weary Blues to accompaniment by Charles Mingus. Hughes also wrote three books about music, Famous Negro Music Makers (1955), The First Book of Jazz (1955), and Black Magic (1967).