Variety (September 1954)

MUSIC Beta's Gamble on Disks In ’34 A By JIM WALSH Newspaper and magazine read- ers of 1934 received a real shock when they saw that a new com- pany—Decca—they’d never heard of before was advertising, of all things, phonograph records! To the figured that since 75c records weren’t selling at all, it couldn’t do any harm to take the chance of selling at least a few at less than half the standard price. Crosby had eight titles on four radio addict of 20 years ago the double : sided platters on page two phonograph and records were not —“i Love You Truly," "Just a- jUst moribund, they were finally wearyin’ for You,” "Let Me Call and irretrievably dead, and the You Sweetheart,” "Some Day, average reader was as much sur- sweetheart,” "The Very Thought prised to see them advertised as 0 f You,” “The Moon Was Yellow, if he were being offered a new is- “Two Cigarettes in the Dark" and sue of Godey’s Lady Book or a “The Sweetheart Waltz." This list setting of fresh dinosaur eggs. illustrates a policy that Jack Kapp However, a Decca ad which ap- unansweringly followed—issuing a peared in many newspapers* of judicious blend of favorite old as Dec. 6, 1934 may have been the we n as new pop numbers, turning point that started the plat- Running down the list of vocal- ter business on the long and pain- ists we come to the Mills Bros., ful uphill trek that led it to new g^ hel waters, Jane Froman, Arthur heights of prosperity. With the Tracy, Frank Crumit, Lee Wiley, shrewdness that characterized the j 0 hnny Mercer, the Montgomery pioneers of the Decca organiza- Quartet (singing four religious tion, the ad concentrated on high num bers — "Life’s Railway to quality recording, top-drawer art- Heaven,” "The Old Rugged Cross," ists and, perhaps in those depres* .< The Little B rown Church in the I'SssIE’Fy that inspired a comparatively small but fanatical group of admirers of the two-piano work of Ivor Kaye and Dave Morton), Dick Robertson and many other favorites whose vogues lasted for years, Robertson, an accomplished tenor pop singer, was a 10-strike, He sang current pop tunes but his biggest sellers were 'revivals of such things as "The Sidewalks of New York" and "Sweet Rosie O’Grady,” with a rhythm accompaniment and fre- quently with the tempo changed from .waltz to foxtrot. Wednesday* September 1 , 1954 Crosby’s Decca of ‘Silent Night 9 All-Time Peak Faith Platter—Other Highlights f Frank Luther’s Jackpot sion days, the most important fac tor of all, low price. The Decca "All-Star" record was only 35c in the 10-inch size, and many a citi- Vale” and "In the Garden”), Frank Luther, Bob Crosby and Everett Marshall. Dance bands were led by Guy zen who had stuffed the old Vic- Lom bardo, followed by Glen Gray, trola back into the attic must nave rped Lewis, the Dorsey Bros:, Isham reasoned that if you could hear Jones Jack Hylton (an English Bing Crosby or Guy Lombardo on imputation), Orville Knapp, Roy a double-faced record for a third Fox (ano ther British band), Victor of a dollar, it might not be a bad idea to stock up on a few new platters. But actually spending good Young, the Green Bros., Marimba Orchestra, and Justin Ring. There was a separate "hot dance” (soon to become "swing”) section of , • ' J • VT1 _ tu IIVVVIUV UTTAUQ / WWW klVll Vi, money in the year 1934, with King j| m y Lunceford, Noble Sissle, ft l! * 1 1 i. AttAMiirniMrf v ' _ Radio lording it over everything, to advertise phonograph records! Who ever heard of such a thing? Of course, only half a decade earlier, it had been far different. For years, up to the late 1920s, Victor was the nation’s No. 1 ad- vertiser. Even when the record business showed all the signs of going to pot in 1924 the Victor ad vertising budget stayed high. The advent of electric recording in 1925 gave the industry a shot in the arm, and records were still selling at a lively clip when the 1929 depression moved in and convinced the average family that Fletcher Henderson, the Spirits of Rhythm, the New Orleans Rhythm Kings, Chick Webb, Earl Hines, Claude Hopkins and Spike Hughes, Among the instrumentalists were:—Piano-r-Art Tatum and two duet teams—Muriel Pollock & Vee Lawnhurst; and Fray & Braggiotti. Jesse Crawford was at the organ and Max Rosen played the violin: Borrah Minevitch and His Har- monica Rascals were also heard from, as were Louis Katzman’s or- chestra playing and Lucy Monroe singing "Standard selections." Zora Layman and The Men About Town sang a Stephen C. |Foster Medley, phonograph Platte,s were o n e of ^t^Tere evei; Tour sTdeTby the world's most expendable com- p rovo] . s Golden Birds . modities. By 1932, the worst year in modern phonograph history, sales were down to about 5% of what they had been in peak years, and 1933 was only a little better. What improvement there was in 1934 was due almost entirely to the new blood brought into the record business by the newcomer Decca — then controlled by the English company of the same name, which was a direct descend ant of the famous old British jobbing firm of Barnett Samuels. Not that records costing only 25c weren’t already available in 5-and-10c stores. They were. Other companies, such as Victor with its Bluebird label, also had 35c brands. But Decca’s original and courageous contribution to the re birth of the record business was its policy of giving the day’s great est stars at one uniform low price All For 35c Let’s go back a moment to the original Decca newspaper ad Imagine yourself a reader of) The Houston Chronicle, and finding on page 10 a five-column ad headed, "Decca Scoops Music World." In Still to come a little later were Paul Whiteman’s Orchestra, Harry Roy’s Band (English importations Probably one of the most valua- ble'"properties” Decca acquired in those early years was one who is still With the firm—Frank Luther. Throughout the 1930s and the early ’40s, Luther, with his former wife, Zora Layman, and the New Century, Quartet, was the great "medley man" Presumably at Kapp’s suggestion, Luther and his associates made medleys of all con- ceivable types of old tunes—the compositions of George M. Cohan, baseball songs, songs of the North and South, "Songs of the Gay Nineties” — just about everything that could be put into medleys was thrown in, and the platters sold steadily. Luther and his pards even began an ambitious project of re- cording the songs of all 48 States,, but the effort bogged down, ap- parently, * when they had done "Songs of Old California” and "Songs of Old New York State.” Some 'years later, Luther, who had started out as a hillbilly recorder, under various assumed names, with Carson Robison as his partner, got into the groove of making chil- dren’s records and for something like a decade this one-time preach- er has been at the top of the kiddie platter procession. Thanks to the ingenuity of its "founding fathers,” Decca, al- though it must have found -the go- ing rocky in its earlier years, never faltered but kept on its upward path to become one of the domi- nant leaders of the wax works in- dustry. Today, after 20 years, it has long since given up its low price appeal, born of those grim depression years, but it has con tlnued its unending emphasis on quality merchandise and the cream of the crop among the nation’s star performers. There is still plenty of resourcefulness and ingenuity in Decca’s higher echelons, and an awareness of the value of blending the old and the new, as witnessed by the issuance of the new mam- moth Crosby LP of "the Groaner’s great past successes. Decca’s ‘Original Cast Album Sales Oklahoma! (Rodgers & Hammerstein) (1943)+ 1,300,000 (Alfred Drake-Joan Roberts-HOward DaSilva-Celeste Holm) Carousel (Rodgers & Hammerstein) (1950) 500,000 (John Raitt-Jan Clayton) Porgy and Bess (Gershwin) (1942) 450,000 (Todd Duncan-Anne Brown) Annie Get Your Gun (Berlin) (1946) 400,000 (Ethel Merman-Ray Middleton) King and I (Rodgers & Hammerstein) (1951) 350,000 (Gertrude Lawrence-Yul Brynner) Song of Norway (Grieg, adapted by Wright & Forrest) (1950). • 300,000 (Lawrence Brooks-Helena Bliss-Robert Shafer-Kitty Carlisle) Guys and Dolls (Loesser) (1951) 250,000 (Robert Alda-Vivian Blaine-Sam Levene-Isabel Bigley) ' This Is The Army (Berlin) (1942) 115,000 (GI Cast) Wonderful Town (Bemstein-Comden-Green) (1953) .... 100,000 (Rosalind Russell-George Gaynes-Edith Adams) Sold Under 100,000* ( alphabetically ) Arabian Nights (Carmen Lombardo-John Jacob Loeb) (1954) (Lauritz Melchior) smaller type you read, "All New Bloomer Girl (Harold Arlen-E. Y. Harburg) (1944; Recordings of These Great Artists (Celeste Holm-David Brooks-Joan McCracken) Now on Decca. Records Exclusively, Call Me Mister (Harold Rome) (1946) (Betty Garrett-Lawrence Winters-Paula Bane-Danny ’ Seholl-Bill Callahan-Jules Munshin) Carmen Jones (Oscar Hammerstein 2d) (1950) (Muriel Smith-Luther Saxon-Carlotta Franzecl-Glehn Bryant-June Hawkins) Cocktail Party (T. S. Eliot) (1950) (Alec Guinn ess-Cathleen Nesbitt) and "The Street Singer” (Arthur Consul (Gian Carlo Menotti) (1950) Tracy). (Marie Powers-Patricia Neway) The Decca sales pitch was Death Of A Salesman (Arthur Miller) (1950) summed up in half a dozen lines: (Thomas Mitchell) "Here they are—your favorite Lost In The Stars (Maxwell Anderson-Kurt W T eill (1949) stars of radio, screen and stage— (Todd Duncan) in their greatest performances of Lute Song (Raymond Scott-Bernard Hanighen) (1946) instrument and voice! Not obso- (Mary Martin) lete records, cut in price to meet Medea (adapted by Robinson Jeffers from Euripides) (1948) a market, but the latest, newest (Judith Anderson) . ' The religious kick in which record companies are currently in- dulging is nothing new. Vocal and instrumental platters with a re- ligioso significance have always been part of the background bread and butter of the*recording busi- ness. Chief new trend is that most big- selling present-day numbers of the hallelujah type are written by pop tunesmiths ’ as a change of pace from their ordinary outpourings. (The late Arthur Fields and George Graff Jr., set the example a few years ago in their series of "Hymns for Happiness,”) In the old days, religious recordings were almost entirely the time-honored staples—-"Adeste Fideles,” "Nearer, My God, to Thee,” "Onward, Chris- tion Soldiers,” "Abide With Me,” and, of course, "Ave Maria.’\ In- cidentally; Decca, from the very beginning of its recording activi- ties in 1934, recognized the neces- sity of a strong religious catalog. Among other things, it engaged the famous radio quintet, The Revel- ers, to record a series of hymns. In the earliest days of the phono- graph, when sound was engraved on soft wax cylinders, records were intended largely for use in slot machine parlors and saloons. But even then phonographs were owned by serious-minded families, some of them do devout that the children were allowed to hear, only religious tunes on Sundays. Hymn tunes were recorded for their special pleasure, and some pioneer artists, who were later to be known almost entirely as comedians, sang religious compositions at the start of their careers for a dollar a "round." Len Spencer, Billy Mur- ray, Steve Porter and "Dan W. Quinn all had whack at the doxol- ogy deal. One of the early artists who profited most- by the demand for hymns was the late "Harry Mac- donough” (under his teal name of John S. Macdonald, he afterwards became head of thV Victor a&r dept.); whose specialty was "The Holy City.” Macdonough once told this writer that he paid his rent each month for years with his earnings from singing Stephan Adams’ brainchild at a doRar a throw. After he became exclusive to Victor, his interpretation of "The Holy City” could be had three ways—in a shortend version on one side of a 10-inch platter; the complete text on both sides of a double-faced disk; and un- der the disguise of "The Sabbath Morn,” he sang part of "The Holy City” with incidental chime effects. He likewise took the lead in the Haydn Quartet’s interpretation. nothing but religious offerings. It had an extensive staff consisting of Henry purr, and its vertical-cut, sevOn-inch records were sold un- der the Angelophone label for 10c in- department and five-and-dime stores. On one side you got a hymn sung by the fabulous Burr; on the other, some unidentified gentleman told you what the song was about. The records bore a suspicious re~- semblance to the Par-o-ket label which Burr issued for a year or two. He was one of the few record- ing artists who hhs ever owned his own company and simultaneously sung for all the competing firms. ! Henry Burr’s Start Only 35c,” Between the varying type faces were cuts of . Bing Crosby, Decca’s all-time Mr. Big, Guy Lombardo (still going strong in the Decca fold), Ted Lewis, Glen Gray, Isham= Jones, the Mills Bros., Tommy and Jimmy Dorsey, smash hits—-exclusively DECCA. Hear them when you want— as often as you want—right in your own home.” The first Decca catalog was a slim booklet of 16 pages but its contents were remarkable. It’s amazing that so many topnotch performers could have been lined up by a new company specializing in a low-price record. Probablj most of the artists, who signed up. On The Town (Bernstein-Comden-Green) (1946) (Nancy Walker-Betty Comden-Adolph Green-Mary Martini) Red Mill (Victor Herbert-Henry Blossom) (1946) (Wilbur Evans-Eileen Farrell-Felix Knight) Sing Out, Sweet Land! (Walter Kerr-Elie Siegmeister) (1945) (Alfred Drake-Burl Ives-Alma Kaye-Bibi OsterWald-Jack McCauley- Juanita Hall) + Parenthetic information next to title indicates author and composer and year when first released; second line indicates the cast toppers. t Mary Martin ivas not in the Broadway show but she did two. num- bers for the Decca album. The all-time most prolific free- lance recording artist and later "Dean of Ballad Singers,” the late Henry Burr, got his start as a plat- ter worker by recording hymns. Joe Belmont, who whistled and did bird imitations in vaude all over the world for many years prior to his death in 1949, once recalled that he was in the Columbia stu- dios in 1902 when a fat, rosy- cheeked young fellow of 20 walked in and said he’d like to make some tests. The youngster was Burr. After he had gone, Belmont sug gested that the boy’s tenor voice was exactly suited to recording hymns, and so ■Columbia put Burr to wording singing "Abide With Me,” "Safe in the Arms of Jesus,” arid similar standbys, He was called on for many years to make new recordings of the old hymn tunes as techniques.improved. His religious recordings for all com- panies, • as Solos, in duets and as lead of the Peerless Quartet, must have run into the thousands. Few artists have been so defi- nitely identified with hymn singing as the late Frederick Wheeler and the still living John Young, who called themselves "James F. Har- rison” and "Harry* Anthony” at the beginning of their recording careers. No Edison or Victor list around 1906-07 was complete with- out "Anthony & Harrison" singing "The Valley of Peace," "Tarry With Me,” "When the Mists Have Rolled Away,” "When the Roll Is Called Up Yonder”—anything with a flavor of Moodv Sc Sankey. . Around 1915 or 1916 there was one record company that issued | Rodeheaver and Others . | Another, several years later, was Homer Rodeheaver, the baritone who led the group singing and played the trombone in I^illy Sun- day’s "hit-the-trail” revival cam- paigns. Around 1923-24, Rode- heaver was. not only singing for all the old-established record com- panies but was also turning out his own Rainbow records with head- quarters in Chicago. Besides ex- tensively recording himself and his duet partner, Mrs. Virginia Asher, Rodeheaver also issued vocal selec- tions and sermons by such almost superannuated hymn writers and do-gooders as E. Q. Excell, Charles H. Gabriel and the Rev. W. E. Biederwolf. The nearest thing to jazz on a Rainbow platter was Bob Matthews, the official Billy Sunday pianist, plunking "Swanee River” and "Humoresque.” Throughout the years Red Seal celebrities were perfectly willing to add to their royalties by record- ing hymns. John * McCormack’s "Nearer, My God,” sold hugely, and “Whispering Hope," by Alma Gluck and Louise Homer, was one of the biggest sellers Victor ever had. But undoubtedly the all-time best-selling religious platter is Bing Crosby’s DecCa of "Silent Night.” Generally speaking, the religious record output was slanted toward the sort of numbers sung at a Methodist prayer meeting or camp meeting—pronouncedly evangelical Protestant music. However, no de- nominational possibilities were overlooked. Most Jewish selections were issued in special Hebrew lists, but Cantor Josef Rosenblatt was a .good seller in Victor’s regular cata- log. As early as 1903 Columbia re- corded the voice of the Pope, who, aged 92, must have been one of the oldest persons ever to make a record. The following year Victor followed with a series of Gregorian chants by the Sistine Choir, fea- turing the famous male soprano, Prof. F. Moreschi. All companies issued the standard Christian Sci- ence hymns, such as "Day By Day the Manna Fell” and "O’er Waiting Harp Strings of the Mind,” and Edison even turned out some 30 "lesson sermons,” sung by a bari- tone, Robert C. Dyrenforth. After electrical recording was introduced platters made in the Morrrion Tabernacle at Salt Lake City were a Sensation. A recent survey seems to indi- cate that "The Old Rugged Cross” is now America’s most popular hymn, but less than 40 years ago you could have turned through every catalog, without finding it on even one waxing. Not until Rode- heaver began to put it over at the Billy Sunday meetings and on rec- ords did "Old Rugged Cross” grip the public emotions and heart strings. But you could take your pick of anywhere from six to a dozen versions of “Ave Maria,” “Nearer, My God” and "Abide With Me" in the 1914 Victor, Edi- son and Coluinbia lists. No survey of this "type should end without at least a passing ref- erence to the Negro "preachin’ rec- ords” which were made popular in the 1920s by several companies, with Okeh in the lead. The arch examplar of recorded preachment was the Rev. J. M. Gates, a colored minister in Chicago. Presumably the Reyi was a Conscientious broth- er who walked in the odor of sanc- tity, but some of his productions were downright earthy—-such as the classic "Dead Cat on the Line,’ in which he purported to be ques- tioning the sisters Of his congrega- tion as to why their offspring didn t look more like their fathers!