Posted on 02/14/2016 2:58:50 PM PST by Arthur McGowan
Jack Hylton and His Orchestra performs "Sitting At A Table Laid For Two" on Zonophone 6043 (1931).
Vocalist is Pat O'Malley.
Real music for real dancing.
I like the sound of a lot of the 30’s orchestras, some of which you can hear in films. Some that come to mind are the Vitaphone Orchestra, Ambrose, and the orchestras that played in some Astaire films.
Oh what delight to be given the right to
Be carefree and gay once again.
No longer slinking, respectfully drinking
Like civilized ladies and men...
Paul Whiteman’s “Japanese Sandman” is classic!
Good stuff! Thanks.
Spin Little Web of Dreams (1934)
Not to be confused with I Am the Japanese Sandman by the Cellos (1957)
I like the Ambrose recordings as well. One of the first blue-label Deccas that I ever picked up at a garage-sale was Ambrose’ recording of Raymond Scott’s “War Dance of the Wooden Indians,” back when I was still in junior-high. Didn’t even know initially that it was a British band.
One thing you might like are the radio transcriptions of Bill Challis, circa 1936 (they were released on the Circle CD label), which really epitomize that bouncy ‘movie musical’ sound, with tunes like “Temptation,” “Dardanella,” and such. Challis had earlier arranged for Whiteman.
Seems like just about every band recorded “Japanese Sandman” at one time or another. I’ve always been pretty partial to the Benny Goodman version from the mid-1930s. The weirdest example has to be Frankie Trumbauer’s, which features a truly awful vocal by him, but is otherwise an eccentric delight.
For decades, everyone remembered the “big bands”—1935-45—but not the dance bands of the previous decade, which had a much more interesting, brilliant, joyful sound.
I wish we could be carefree and gay.
The word gay no longer is used according to the old dictionary definition.
Now the word gay means homosexual and only homosexual. Its not even a double meaning word. The word has been completely transformed.
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