Soundies were music videos produced from 1940  to 1947, and played on portable video jukeboxes. Today, we sample the audio from soundies featuring African-American performers. These include: Count Basie, Dorothy Dandridge, Duke Ellington, Nat King Cole, Meade Lux Lewis and Fats Waller.

African-American Soundies

Recordings from the early 20th Century with comments.

History

Society & Culture

Music

Songs include: Born to Lose, Lost and Found, I'd Hate to Lose You, What Have We Got to lose?, Lost April and She Had to Go and Lose It At the Astor.  Performers include: Benny Carter, the Andrews Sisters, Ted Daffran, the Ink Spots, Richard Himbler, Thomas "Fats" Waller and Nat King Cole.

Lose

Songs include: It Don't Mean a Thing, If It Ain't Got That Swing, Swing It Sister, Waltz In Swing Time, Rug Cutter's Swing, Swing Low, Sweet Chariot and Swinging On a Star. Performers include: Duke Ellington, Les Brown, Ella Fitzgerald, Glenn Miller, the Mills Brothers and the Fisk Jubilee Quartet. 

It Don't mean a Thing If It Ain't got That Swing

Songs include: Apple Blossom Time, Apple Honey, Don't Sit Under the Apple Tree, Scrapple From the Apple, The Big Apple and Cherry Pink and Apple Blossom White. Performers include: Glenn Miller, Jo Stafford, Tommy Dorsey, the Andrews Sisters, Bing Crosby, Charley Parker and Woody Herman. 

Apples

Singers include: Judy Garland, Billie Holiday, Louise Tobin, Vera Lynn, Ella Fitzgerald, Helen Forest, the Andrews Sisters, Carmen Miranda, and Kate Smith.  Songs include: We'll Meet Again, Somewhere Over the Rainbow, Beer Barrel Polka, Undecided, What's New, Strange Fruit and God Bless America.

Female Singers of 1939

To mark Bach's 339th birthday, historical recordings of the Brandenburg Concerto 3 and the B Minor Prelude and Fugue from the Well Tempered Clavier. 

African-American Soundies

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