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52
THE
THE "WALTZ
MUSIC TRADE
BALLAD
REVIEW
THAT'S
MAY
3, 1924
DIFFERENT
Lovers Lane is a Lonesome Trail
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HEARST MUSIC PUBLISHERS OF CANADA LIMITED
Negro Spirituals Grow
in Concert Popularity
Bagley Stephens Tells of the Origin of This
Type of Song and of Its Rapidly Spreading
Use on Concert and Recital Platforms
Recent custom of including at least one negro
spiritual on concert programs has familiarized
the public with songs long hidden from any
but the Southern people, who, having always
accepted them as part of the very fiber of their
existence, did not recognize their full value.
For many years the slave songs, camp meet-
ing tunes and the real spirituals of the church
service were passed from father to son literally
by word of mouth. Gradually they came to be
regarded as worth recording. It is eminently
fitting that men of the negro race—Burleigh,
Coleridge-Taylor, Carl Diton and others—should
be the first to acquaint the music lovers of
America with the songs of their own people.
There are as many different dialects among
the negros as there are in the various sections
of Italy. The negro from the coast of South
Carolina or Georgia speaks a foreign language
to the wharf darky of New Orleans. And again,
the negro from the lower part of Florida
mingles in his speech so many words from the
Spanish of the Cuban population that he is not
able to make himself understood by those from
the inland States. Essentially a child of the
valley and of warmth and sunshine, it is rare
that he is to be found in the mountain regions,
wrote Bagley Stephens recently in the New
York Times.
The same holds true with negro music. The
song of the coast negro as he sells shrimps or
bananas is different, not so much in the actual
intervals as in the cadences and rhythm. The
negro of the Louisiana wharves shows plainly
the influence of the French in his gay tunes,
that of the Florida negro the Spanish lilt
Played
by
Be First
With A Hearst
strangely mixed with the minor intervals of his
own race. Perhaps the best example of negro
music can be found in the plantation songs of
Georgia, Alabama and Mississippi. There has
been no foreign influence here. The music is
elemental, plaintive, almost weird. The inter-
vals are not on the keyboard of our pianos. If
the negro music were actually written as it
sounds, it would be a new scale with new in-
tervals that would astonish the ultra-modernists.
Not long ago, at a concert in Carnegie Hall,
a well-known singer explained that he would
sing a "fake" negro spiritual which was based
on the largo from Dvorak's New World sym-
phony. The song was William Arms Fisher's
beautiful arrangement called "Goin* Home."
But Southern people knew that the largo was
based on the theme of an old slave song, "Massa
Dear," and Dvorak made no secret of this fact.
Spirituals, being the elemental music of the
race, are simple. They are not suited to the
elaborations of a concert achievement, as some
composers seem to think. Their beauty is so
sincere, their appeal so direct, that they need
no embellishment.
To hear them at their best one should pass
by some small country church and listen to the
singing from a distance. It is then that one
hears the unusual harmonization, the weird
humming cadences, the wonderful pathos and
beauty of the negro music.
"Nobody's Sweetheart"
Ted Lewis, Columbia record artist and noted
orchestra leader, made a feature of "No-
body's Sweetheart," the song-dance hit, in "The
Passing Show of 1923," at the Apollo, Atlantic
City, last week. On Monday, April 26, the
Ted Lewis Orchestra started an indefinite
run at the Ritz-Carlton, on the Boardwalk, dur-
ing which engagement "Nobody's Sweetheart"
was played regularly and often. "Nobody's
Sweetheart" is a Jack Mills publication.
CARL FENTONS ORCHESTRA
Also recorded by it on
BRUNSWICK RECORD No. 2574
Many Vaudeville Artists
Using Hearst Publications
"Foigct-Me-Not," "Only a Butterfly" and "You
Can Take Me Away From Dixie" Being
Widely Sung in Vaudeville
Among the well-known vaudeville artists who
arc singing numbers from the catalog of Hearst
Music Publishers, Ltd., are the following:
George Macfarlane, Paramount Four, Fred
Hughes, Dancing Stewarts, Tripoli Trio, Melody
Maids, Roy Dietrich, Eddie Van, Shrinner &
Fitzsimmons, Mack & Salle and Musical Lunds,
who are using "Forget-Me-Not"; Morris & Shaw,
Charles Forsythe, Lynn & Howland, Fred
Hughes, Dorothy Taylor, Dillon & Parker,
Mack & Salle, Schaeffer & Elliott, Matthews
Trio, O'Malley & Mason, Lang & Voelk, Friend
& Sparling, Henri Kublick and Musical Lunds,
who are using "Only a Butterfly"; and Murray
& Allen, Jack Norworth, Loos Brothers, Dolly
Malone, Eddie Nelson, Watts & Drake, the
McCarvers, Jack Bell & Band, McPherson
Brothers, Story Book Revue, Watts & Ringold
and Wylie & Hartman, who are using "You
Can Take Me Away From Dixie."
Mills Gets Jan Garber Hit
Jan Garber's comedy novelty sensation, "We
Don't Get Much Money (But We Have a Lot of
Fun)", featured with much success by the pop-
ular Garber-Davis Orchestra, has been acquired
by Jack Mills, Inc. The Garber-Davis combina-
tion, which makes Victor records when it isn't
playing vaudeville or making whirlwind one-
night tours, is rapidly becoming one of the
most popular orchestras in the country, because
of its versatility and the unusual novelty of its
arrangements.
Features Edwards' Ballads
Vera Ross, concert and operatic prima donna,
and featured with "The Passing Show," will
sing during Music Week the famous group of
Clara Edwards' beautiful ballads at a recital in
Aeolian Hall. The Clara Edwards edition,
which is being widely used by prominent Amer-
ican vocalists, consists of the following semi-
classics: "Little Brown Nest by the Sea," "Hap-
piness," " 'Tis Enough," "Little Shepherd's
Song" and "Dusk at Sea."
Charles R. Warfel Back
Charles R. Warfel, manager of the trade de-
partment of Hinds, Hayden & Eldredge, Inc.,
New York, recently returned from a ten-day
trip through the New England States, and re-
ports that he booked some nice orders for
Summer delivery.
Watch Late Releases for Other Recordings
A. J. STASNY MUSIC CO., Inc.
JACK
56 West 45th Street, New York
N9RWORTHS
Consult the Universal Want Directory of
The Review. In it advertisements are inserted
free of charge for men who desire positions.
BIG H I T
YOU CAN TAKE ME AWAY FROM DIXIE
With a Snappy
Melodious Rhythm
of Irresistible Charm
(BUT YOU CANT
TAKE
DIXIE
FROM M E )
HEARST MUSIC PUBLISHERS OF CANADA LIMITED
FOX TROT
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