Songfacts®:

• Not the Gershwin standard, this 'Summertime" is a delicate, yearning ballad where Diana Ross wishes away her heartbreak season. She longs to put away her winter blues and embark on a new summery romance.
• Leonard Cohen wrote "Summertime" with Sharon Robinson, who Cohen had initially hired to sing backup on his Field Commander Cohen: Tour Of 1979. It was the first song they wrote together, birthing their successful songwriting partnership.
  
  "We were at our hotel in Tel Aviv one day and I noticed the piano in the reception area," Robinson recalled to Uncut magazine. "I went up to Leonard and asked him if he would like to hear a tune that I had written. He was surprisingly receptive to the idea! I remember sitting down at the piano thinking, 'Oh my God, what's going to happen now?' I played this very simple melody and Leonard sort of paced around the piano several times and came up with the lyrics right there and then. When we got back to Los Angeles after the tour, we finished 'Summertime' - and that was the beginning of our collaboration."
• Beginning with "Everybody Knows" from 1988's I'm Your Man, Robinson became a regular collaborator for Cohen. "He didn't have to, but he took me very seriously as a songwriter, as someone that was in his league, who was worthy of his words," said Robinson. "All through subsequent years, he would send me lyrics and involve me in his albums and his body of work. I am still very honored."
• Ross recorded "Summertime" for her 1987 Red Hot Rhythm & Blues album. Robinson also wrote "Cross My Heart" for the project (this time without Cohen).
• Roberta Flack covered "Summertime" for her 1991 Set the Night to Music album.