Variety (Jun 1948)

OB€IIBSTIIAS.»fVSIC »7 'DISH NIGHT' AS DISK SALES HYPO Some lop Stare lon^ Receriffi^^ Paine Replacement Written Off There Isn't Ukely to be any more tails of a general manager for the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers, to replace the late John G. Paine. Subject of digging up a person- ality to take Paine*8 place came up again at last week's (27) monthly meeting of the ASCAP board, and was shouted down, Gene Buck, member of the writer faction of the board, proposed that the Society snag someone conversant with its affairs to co- ordinate and help the four paid. executives who jointly assumed Paine's administrative duties. His proposal was shunted aside by board members who had been instrumental in electing Fred Ahlert to ASCAP's presidency. These men feel that Ahlert, in the few weeks since he took office, has demonstrated he's qualified to handle a major portion of the work that a general manager might te called upon to perform. They expected Ahlert to more or less become a working president even though it is not demanded that the president of the Society do more than be a figurehead. :;fs Traveiliiui Bands Tbt Keep Locafites Jobless Slated for AFM Parley Talb One of the issues expected ti!)-* arise during the American Federa- tion pf Musicians annual conven- tion, starting June 7 in Asbury Park, is the "travelling" band sit- uation. In recent months, a num- ber of clubs and dance spots in various key cities have been in- duced to instaU travelling name- band policies in preference to the use of local orchestras, and a num-- ber of AFM locals are up in arms. : They want something done to dis- * courage them. In fact, a number of locals have already' made the path pretty bumpy for visitors. It's claimed by AFM men thai some locals along the eastern sea- board and from the midwest, have banded together to introduce tlirough one of their number, a ' resolution controlling the circula- tion of name bands through their territories as a means of protect- ing, jobs of their members. This rcrsoiution, it's said, will include a demand that travelling bands be barred from any given local juris- diction six months out of • every year, leaving the field to the local footers for the remaining six. This situation has long been a Bore spot. But due to the in- ■ creased use of travelling bands by nitery owners seeking to stimulate lagging gro.sses with name per- formers, the situation is much Wore acute this year. • The coffers of each local within Whose jurisdiction a travelling band may perform are benefited by the visitor, but. that makes no difference any longer. A trammel- ling leader pays 10% of his salary to the local within whose jurisdic- tion he works. The idea is to get jobs for the local members. Four hh WiD $1,630 hfriiigeiiKiit Judgment Ys. EnAassy Rest, N.Y. Embassy Restaurant, New York, failed to answer the complaint of four music publishers for alleged infringement of six of copyrighted numbers via public performance for profit without a license. De- fault judgment of $1,630, which in- cludes not less than $250 for each publisher plus attorney fees and costs, was granted the plain- wis in N.Y. supreme court last week. /..rnV*"' George Simon, Inc. I 111 Dance at Your Wedding"); Crawford ("Made for Each Other," September Song" and "Je Vous Aime"); Shapiro - Bernstein ("And Mimi ( and Morris ("Papa Won't «ou Dance with Me''). Filed sev- eral months ago against the E. 57th Amus. Corp., corporate opoi- «or of the Embassy, suit charged mtrmgements took place Feb. 7, 1946. Pub Sues 'Sfcalin' Toons* Claiming $5,000 damages, I. Pol- lock filed suit in N.Y. federal court last week against Hilyer Allen De Bois whose Skatin' Toons allegedly pirated the plaintiff's song, "The Toy Violin." J^Uock, according to the com- Piainl, wrote the unpublished nura- o *in!o'^ ''^""^ Harris prior'to July w, 1942. He charges De Bois lifted ms lune by using it for a recording »or skating rinks. An accotmting, etc., Is also asked. Dave Rose in Deal With E. H. Morris Dave Rose has concluded a deal with Edwin II. Morris via which the latter company will publish his compositions' for the next few years. Exact term of the deal, which is agreed upon but not yet signed, is undisclosedv .Rose formerly was connected with Bregman-Vocco-Conn, which has his "Holiday for Strings" and other items. B-V-Cj of course, re- tains them. AKM's $7tiO Take in 1947 Vienna, May 20. By handing in a report of a record revenue surpassing 7,000,- 000 Schilling ($700,000), board of directors of AKM (Austrian Society of Authors, Composers and Music Publi.shers) won hands-down ap- proval of general assembly. Slice of this is reserved for international accounting with the American So- ciety of Composers, Authors and Publishers. General manager Emil Oswald reminded members that it was 50 years aRo this month that the late Josef Weinberger founded AKM. i Austria's "point system" of ob- ligatory programs —(170,000 were scrutinized during 1947, registering 30,000 compositions) a considerable part of U. S. origin give complete returns and make a just distribu- tion possible. Members get what is due to them. Musicians union gets a piece as reward to its mem- bers for filling out programs. Revenues from provinces doubled those of the capital. Dis- appointing item was revenue from broadcasting stations, due to con- fusion caused by zoning system. Some broadcasters Tyrol Just throw demands for accounting into waste- basket. Others, remit whatever they please, but fail to forward de- tailed progi-ams. ' Losses during period of currency reform were heavy. Cash money ■Was devaluated November last by two-thirds. News of Rudolf Schanzer's tragic death in a German concen- tration csiinp In 1944 was an- nounced. /This had not been known up to now. Schanzerwas one of the most I successful librettists be- fore the second world war. m p TEST DOE !N II The dish night angle of sales- manship is making its bow in the record retailing business tlvis week. Columbia is trying out such an approach through -its New York dealers. As part of a multi-pronged drive to lure people back to the platter counters, Columbia launched yes- terday (Tuesday) an ad campaign in the New York dailies offering free premiums with the purchase of a batch of any six records from its catalog. Premium consists of a Columbia sapphire needle and an album with six pockets. Package is being advertised as "a $6.75 value: for $4.50." It makes perhaps the first time in the history of the business that records are being sold like soap and drugs. ithe way theatre-admissions were i pulled years ago. The special package will be limited to .lune 30. With the retailing end of the industry down to its lowest level since the depression, Columbia has intensified consumer research, pro- motion and advertising activities, seeking to find ways of stimulating fresh interest in record i buying. As an important facet -of this drive it has been paking tests, in New England with different types of newspaper ads and. radio commer- cials. One of the radio tests took place in Worcester, Mass. Kay Kyser's recording of "Woody Woodpecker" was . singled out as the "guinea pig." Platter was plugged via tran- scription in stationbreak time at frequent intervals during, a single day. The rjesult of the concen- trated splurge was the sale of close to 6,000 copies of the' etching within the period of a week. According to,some of the major (Continued on page 51) ENGLISH JAZZ CLUBS BAND TO FORM FED. London, June 1. A National F^ederation of Jazz Organizations of Great Britain has bben formed. Federation is to hold an inaugural meeting of club dele- gates from all over the country here June 5. Aim of the organization is to help and advise member clubs on mat'^ ters relating to jam sessions, rec- ord recitals, and effect liaison with the Musicians' Union, Board of Trade, local authorities and other official bodies. Sets '1 ForHhLeipt, But Not for Pub Mickey Goldsen, operator of the Barbour-Lee catalog for Peggy Lee and Dave -Barbour, completed a unique deal last week for the song, "Manana," written by the latter pair. Goldsen made a deal with 'English legit producer Leigh Staf- ford under which the hit is being used in the show "Maid to Meas- ure," headlining Jes.se Matthews and Lew Parker. Show opened at the Cambridge. London, last week (24), the deal for tlie tune being made at the last minute. What makes the arrangements strange is that Goldsen has not made any deal with a British pubr Usher to handle the tune. And he doesn't expect, to make any even if it becomes as big a hit in Eng- land as it was here, as a result of its use in the show; Goldsen figures he's better off taking the weekly sum he'll collect on this side from the show's pro- ducer for the song's use, plus col- lecting record royalties direct and receiving performance royalties from the British Performing Rights Society through the American So- ciety of Composers, Authors and Publishers. , He figures he'll wind up with more coin by handling the song's English career in this man- ner. Goldfipn believes" that as English sheet .sales are off, the best income he can hope for from the u.sual lOC'f) of the English selling price, is less than $1,000. If he made a deal with a British pub, the latter would also cut in on the recording and performance royalties. By not making such a deal, Goldsen figures he'll come out ahead. New Rochelle Local Waives Glen Isle Tax Though the. New Rochelle, N. Y., local of the American Federation of Musicians r,eGently. instituted a $3 per man broadcast tax for re- mote band programs. Glen Island Casino in New Rochelle is not pay- ing the levy. Glen Isle debuted for the season last Thursday (27) with Gene Krupa, the tax rule being in effect but not being applied to broadcasts by Krupa. Spot's man- agement made other arrangements: involving employment of local men for banquets, parties, etc., which satisfied the basic idea of the local —to give localites jobs. At the same time that the local put the $3 tax into effect, it boost- ed scales for the area to $103.50 per man for travelling bands work- ing'two sessions. Glen Me solved this high cost by instituting new hours for Krupa and bands to fol- low. They'll work only 9 p.m. to 2 a.m. for which the scale is only $83 weekly. Formerly Glen Isle s bands worked from 7 p.m. SPA, nfPA Agree On New Contract After some 20-months of nego- tiation, the Songwriters Protective Assn. and the Music Publishers Protective Assn. have ari-ived at a tentative agreement for the settle- ment of terms of a new contract. Ideas of: both sides were finally resolved in meeting; last Friday (28) in New Yorfc As fan as pub- lishers are concerned, the terms arc okay, but before they can lead to a formal contract-signing, the SPA Council must rubber-stamp the deal made by its negotiating eommitte.. This isn't likely: for a couple weeks since some members of the Council are out of town. Last two stumbling blocks to a settlement were the SPA's demand to "restrict foreign copyright grips on U. S. songs to the same 28-year period that exists in the U. S., de- spite the fact that English copy- right law allows a 50-year beyond death of authors hold. And the splitting of costs to financially sus- tain the office of Harry: Fox, col- lector of mechanical and synchron- ization fees for pubs. The 28-year idea was settled amicably (space doesn't permit details) and as for Fox's fees, it was agreed that the 21/^% he collects will be under- written equally by writers and publishers. Formerly, the writers had .asked that the cut of sums Fox collects be jumped.to 3%% and the extra 114% be given to the SPA treasury. This was flatly re- jected by the pubs, who couldn't see contributing to a union fund that might eventually be used, against them. Later, the writers then demanded that the pubs carry the entire 2Vj.% cut to Fox. This the pubs rejected. Finally, ithe SPA'ites agreed to the even split. ■ Some major and minor com* panies are having" difficuity with top stars over post-ba^ recording. In varying ways, artists are re-": fusing to make disks with which their employers seek to coiqpefe: in the market with post-ban hits: either started by indies or made by majors before Jan. 1. Perry Como, for example, flatly refused RCA-Victor's plea to cut "Nature Boy" some weeks back. Como felt that Nat (King) Cole's; market lead on the tune was too great to overcome, plus which the public had shown preference for. Cole's interpretation. Como could not see the wisdom of trying to top Cole on something the latter him- self had caused- to become a hit. Other- singers have refused fftr ■ other reasons. Some are members of the American Federation of Musicians and do not want to risk penalties that might be applied'in the event they disregard the ban, even though they are not musicians in the true sense of the " word. Frank Sinatra is one of the few who have recorded in face of the ban. Y Last week, Frankie Laine Hatly refused to record for Mercury for I a different reason. He explained j he would not make disks without the 88'ing of his accompanist and partner, Ciwl Fischer, and the latter cannot work, of course, since he's a wforking AFM member, Mer* cury had asked Laine to put vocals to backgrounds recorded for the company in. England and pipped here. RED ALLEN'S 'SHANTY' NO BOON TO WITMARK Witmark music has advised Apollo Records that it is preparing to enjoin it from further manufac- turing or marketing, of a Red Allen parody of "Shanty in Old Shanty Town." Publishing firmdaims; that the arrangement represents not only a misuse of license but serious dam- age to the value of the number. •I Whiteman's New Book On Records Is More Than a Disk Anthology Paul Whiteman's new book, "Records for Millions" (Hermitage; $3.50) is misnomered, at least in part, as being "a guide to record collecting." It's really a highly entertaining and informative book, with an authoriative, first-hand knowledge of diskting which makes for some good reading. The record collecting guide thus becomes sec- ondary, despltev the fact it com- prises two-thirds of-the.' haoki liDavid A; Stein gets iMlling as "editor," and whether he- assisted in ghosting for "Pops" or organ- izing the text, fact is the book sounds like Whiteman and nobody else.- Thus, while basically an an- thology of recordings, by group- ings and style, it's not dull because Whiteman's introductory text has made it breezy and informative. He runs the gamut from such di- verse subjects as "Little Joe," : archivist of record rarities, .to Crosby; from the reason why sym- phony musicians make the best popular or dansapation dispensers to Whiteman's iormula for an ASCAP method of jukebox pay- ment to the diskeries and disk art- ists; from- "jazzing the classics," which he pioneered, and how and why "Song of India," for example, subsequently sold more and better : in their orthodox "cla.ssic" ver- sions after the Whiteman orches- tra first popularized Cesar CJuI and Rimsky-Korsakoff. Unfortunately the book comes out at a period when the record-: ing business is at its nadir. How- ever, because it is such a great trailer for all recording companies, who probably will and should get behind .this book, it will doubt- lessly get support perenrkially. Deems 'Taylor did the foreword, a chatty ihtro in keeping with the goneral informality of the entir* book. Abei. Blue Barton's orchestra goes into the Jones Beach, N. Y. main restaurant July 3 for four weeks and may be followed by Skinny Ennis. Two GAG bands oTIglRSW were tliought to have been set. Tommy Dorsey leased his 96-foQt yacht. The Sentimentalist, to beer nianufaciurer George Trommer for the summer. On the road with his 'rbitoa.'Dbreey'Woirt'tje'aHe to us^ it, anyway.