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- Artist:
Various Artists - Rating:
- Release Date: November 21, 2006
- Genre: Vocal Music
Review
Back near the dawn of the 20th century, and not long after the invention of the lateral phonograph record, popular taste called for well-coordinated male vocal quartets singing polite, wholesome melodies in perfect harmony accompanied by small studio ensembles. The formula, based upon the traditional barbershop quartet, called for two tenors, a baritone, and a bass, often with one clarion tenor singing the lead. The Living Era label presents In the Good Old Summertime, an anthology of recordings made between 1904 and 1921 that documents a fascinating and all-but-forgotten chapter in the history of popular entertainment. Beautifully restored, the earliest recordings in this compilation were committed to wax between March 1904 and April 1910 by the Haydn Quartet. The Haydn's tenors at first consisted of Harry MacDonough and John Bieling, with baritone S.H. Dudley (who had formed this group in 1896 as the Edison Quartet and would later be replaced by Reinald Werrenrath) and basso William F. Hooley. By 1908 the arrival of vibrant comedic tenor Billy Murray galvanized the Haydn into a marvelous chortling machine. They perform two of this collection's five Percy Wenrich melodies, "Rainbow" and "Put on Your Old Grey Bonnet," as well as Gus Edwards and Edward Madden's masterpiece, "By the Light of the Silvery Moon," heard here complete with the charming and often omitted verse section. Women occasionally invaded the domain of the male vocal quartets; Corrine Morgan dominates Jerome Kern's "How'd You Like to Spoon with Me?" and Ada Jones chimes in with Billy Murray on the famous topical novelty "Come, Josephine, in My Flying Machine."Several different vocal quartets used the word "American" in their billing; although one of these was active as early as 1899, the American Quartet heard here (a modified version of the Haydn that included Bieling and Hooley) were created in 1909 specifically as a vehicle for Billy Murray. Their material became steadily more animated and brusque as Murray rose into the limelight; "Casey Jones" and "On the 5:15" are definitive locomotive Americana; "It's a Long, Long Way to Tipperary" was one of this group's number one hits, while "Chinatown, My Chinatown" and "When You Wore a Tulip" would soon become standards in the classic jazz repertoire. Based upon the traditional Creole melody "Eh La Bas," George M. Cohan's "Over There" was an effective recruitment tool that funneled thousands of impressionable young men into the meat grinder of the First World War, largely through the popularity of the American Quartet's bellicose rendition, issued on the Victor label soon after it was recorded near the end of June 1917. This belongs within a subgenre of saber-rattling routines that included "Hunting the Hun" as sung by Arthur Fields. Formed during the 1890s as the Columbia Male Quartet, the Peerless (or Columbia) Quartet are remembered as a unit that adhered to the conventional sound of the traditional barbershop quartet, with their emphasis more upon group harmonies rather than star tenor soloists. With Henry Burr and Albert Campbell softly intoning airs like "Sweet Adeline," this was a subtler act than the groups associated with Murray. Perhaps the most unusual track of all is the poignantly pacifist "I Didn't Raise My Boy to Be a Soldier," a rare example of an antiwar tune, recorded in January 1915 well before the U.S. entered into the global conflict. This powerfully understated protest song was the antithesis of Cohan's jingoistic "Over There." ~ arwulf arwulf, All Music Guide
Tracks
| Track Title | Composers | Performers | Time |
| In the Good Old Summertime | (2:48) | ||
| Blue Bell | (2:48) | ||
| In the Evening by the Moonlight | (2:24) | ||
| Down Where the Silv'ry Mohawk Flows | (2:39) | ||
| How'd You Like to Spoon with Me? | Jerome Kern, |
(2:13) | |
| Rainbow | Percy Wenrich, |
(2:28) | |
| Put on Your Old Grey Bonnet | Percy Wenrich, |
(2:48) | |
| By the Light of the Silvery Moon | (2:56) | ||
| I'll Make a Ring Around Rosie | (3:03) | ||
| Casey Jones | American Quartet | (2:49) | |
| Come, Josephine, in My Flying Machine | (2:32) | ||
| Oh, You Beautiful Doll | American Quartet | (2:51) | |
| Moonlight Bay | Percy Wenrich, |
American Quartet | (3:03) |
| It's a Long, Long Way to Tipperary | American Quartet | (3:11) | |
| When You Wore a Tulip and I Wore a Big Red Rose | Percy Wenrich, |
American Quartet | (3:06) |
| Chinatown, My Chinatown | Jean Schwartz, |
American Quartet | (2:38) |
| On the 5:15 | American Quartet | (2:58) | |
| Oh Johnny, Oh Johnny, Oh! | American Quartet | (2:51) | |
| Over There | George M. Cohan | American Quartet | (2:58) |
| Silver Bell | Percy Wenrich, |
(2:38) | |
| I Want a Girl Just Like the Girl That Married Dear Old Dad | (2:44) | ||
| Everybody's Doin' It Now | Irving Berlin | (3:06) | |
| Sweet Adeline (You're the Flower of My Heart) | (3:18) | ||
| I Didn't Raise My Boy to Be a Soldier | (3:01) | ||
| My Bird of Paradise | Irving Berlin | (3:19) | |
| My Sunny Tennessee | Harry Ruby, |
(3:13) | |
| The Lights of My Home Town | (3:07) |
