Sound Beat

Yup there it is. You know that feeling you get whether you’re in church, or a meeting, or somewhere where you really shouldn’t be laughing? Where you just can’t…quite…stop?

The Okeh Laughing Record was recorded in Germany and released in 1923, and was an immediate seller, hitting the Billboard charts and reached number eight. It wasn’t listed as a foreign language record because, well, everyone understands laughter. And, it’s particularly unique in that the eh, performers, were not credited, making it the first and only anonymous record to ever chart.

Want to hear the whole thing?

Image: “Chatterbox”, used through  Creative Commons license, Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0.

You’re listening to Freddie Fisher and the Shnicklefritz Band.

“Shnicklefritz” or “Snicklefritz” is a Pennsylvania Dutch expression for a

mischievous or talkative child, but used a term of endearment. It was a pretty

fitting name for Freddie Fisher’s band, an irreverent group that incorporated

comedy into their songs and a precursor to the novelty songs recorded by Spike

Jones. Decca advertised them as “America’s Most Unsophisticated Band!”, if it

gives you the idea. They recorded this song, “Old Hank” for Decca in 1939.

The band would appear in a handful of films and shorts. You can see them in all

their shnickelfritz-ing glory right here.

Where did you go in the 1930s when you wanted some of ground-breaking music that would become rock and roll? Sometimes…you just went to church.

You’re on the Sound Beat.

You’re listening to “Drinking Shine”, an Okeh 78 from 1930, performed by Elder Charlie Beck. He was pastor of the Way of the Cross Church of God in Christ, in Buffalo, NY. Beck would make about 60 recordings in his second career, though he viewed it as an integral part of his preaching. Said Beck “No use letting the Devil have all the good music.” The records are full of “fire and brimstone” type warnings and condemnations for all of society’s ills.

Elder may not be regularly named as a progenitor of rock and roll, but he probably should be. His prolific recording resume included songs/sermons that railed against rock and roll, but.., some of them really rocked.

Portrait: “John Martin – Sodom and Gomorrah” by John Martin – Licensed under Public domain via Wikimedia Commons

Written by Jimmy Kennedy and Nat Simon, “Istanbul (Not Constantinople)” tells a humorous tale of the city’s 1930 name change. The Four Lads recorded song 500 years after Constantinople became the capital of the Ottoman empire.

It wasn’t Jimmy Kennedy’s first geographically-themed song; the Irish songwriter was also famous for “Isle of Capri” and “South of the Border,” both recorded by Frank Sinatra.  His globally-titled songs reflected his own travel: he lived in Ireland, England, Switzerland, Nigeria, and the US.

The song represents another one of those musical history dividing lines. Fans of…different age brackets will probably recognize either this version or its famous cover by They Might Be Giants on the 1990 album Flood.

This episode was co-written by Syracuse University student Andrew Frasier as part of the Sound Beat Class Partnership.

You’re listening to the words of Mark Twain, performed by William Sterling Battis. This excerpt, from the second chapter of Tom Sawyer, shows Tom at his cunning, conniving best.

This recording was one of many Battis made between 1916 and ’17. Listen to more right here, courtesy of your tax dollars! (Library of Congress)

Photo: Martin Kenny, used with permission under Creative Commons license (Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic)

On today’s episode we’re talking electronic music…and the importance of a thorough resume.

You’re on the Sound Beat.

Miklos Rosza had long considered using electronic music in a film. He got his chance when director Alfred Hitchcock and producer David O. Selznick approached him about scoring 1945’s Spellbound. Wanting to add an atmospheric, contemplative air to the piece, he settled on the theremin.

Here’s a quote from Dr. Samuel Hoffmann.

“I put down theremin on my card…without thinking much about it. When Miklos Rozsa thought of using a theremin in his score for Spellbound he called the union to see if any players were available. I was the only one listed at that time who could read music.”

Before Rozsa’s call, Hoffmann was a practicing podiatrist in the Hollywood area. After the score won an Oscar, Hoffman and the theremin would feature in films like “The Day the Earth Stood Still”, “It Came from Outer Space” and more…see the whole list right now at soundbeat.org.

Sound Beat is produced at the Belfer Audio Archive, Syracuse University Libraries.

I’m Brett Barry.

Link to Hoffman’s discography

The Jubilee Singers are credited with introducing the “arranged spiritual”. Critics  claim these arranged versions, with European-style timbre, undermined authentic spirituals. Said Zora Neale Hurston in 1934

“There never has been a presentation of genuine Negro spirituals to any audience anywhere. What is being sung by the concert artists and glee clubs are the works of Negro composers or adaptors based on spirituals.”

John Lovell Jr. disagreed in 1972:

If people were forced to sing the songs the way some arbitrary authority decides or not sing them at all, the spiritual would quickly die. And would be better dead.

This episode was co-written by Anna Kurtz, part of the Sound Beat Class Partnership.

Pictured: The Fisk University Jubilee Singers in 1882

See if any of this sounds familiar. As a child, Baum was an imaginative loner who spent much of his time with imaginary friends. He was a shy, meek child, (see: not courageous)

And was even diagnosed as having a weak heart…

You’re listening to Dorothy’s companions from the rare original 1939 Decca Recording.

Baum’s stories became books in 1900 with publication of the Wonderful Wizard of Oz. He wrote 14 Oz books altogether, and many other stories for children. He was billed as the Royal Historian of Oz, claiming that Dorothy and Princess Ozma detailed accounts of the tales via wireless telegraph.

Syracuse University Library’s Special Collections Research center houses L. Frank Baum’s personal papers. They contain publishing history, correspondence and much more.

For an extended look at the Papers, click right here!

You’re listening to Yves Montand with A Paris, an Odeon record from 1949…

You’re  on the sound Beat.

When you think of Paris, chances are The Eiffel Tower springs to mind. Which is precisely why early detractors, in a letter opposing the Tower’s construction, called it

“a giddy, ridiculous tower dominating Paris like a gigantic black smokestack, crushing under its barbaric bulk Notre Dame, the Tour Saint-Jacques, the Louvre, the Dome of les Invalides, the Arc de Triomphe,

And so on.

Bet they weren’t complaining when the tower relayed communications during the first World War,  helping the Allies win the Battle of the Marne on Paris’ doorstep.

The Tower first opened to the public in 1889. Today the Tower has almost 7 million visitors per year making it the most-visited paid monument in the world. It’s open every day of the year, but during WWII, the Nazis found it closed.

Tower workers, given word of Hitler’s advance towards the city, cut the elevator cords. German soldiers were forced to scale the roughly 1,000 feet. See video.

Why did Governor Dewitt Clinton build a giant ditch across New York state? To get to the other side.

From the time the first shovel went into the ground in 1817, critics blasted the Erie Canal project, dubbing it Clinton’s Ditch. But it would go down in history as an engineering marvel. When finished, it stretched three hundred and sixty three miles across New York, from : (lyrics “Albany to Buffalo”)

This is Low Bridge! Everybody Down, sung by Edward Meeker in a wax cylinder recording from 1913.

The Canal forever changed shipping in the Northeast, cutting transportation costs a whopping ninety percent. It also helped open a steady trade route with the Midwest, turning a seed of a downstate port town into the Big Apple.

Mules like Old Sal were the early stars of the canal system, but steam powered barges rendered them obsolete by the end of the 19th century.