Vaughn De Leath - Are You Lonesome Tonight (1927)
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- Опубліковано 21 жов 2024
- Performed by: Vaughn De Leath
Full Song Title: Are You Lonesome Tonight
Recorded in: 1927
Vaughn De Leath (September 26, 1894 - May 28, 1943) was an American female singer who gained popularity in the 1920s, earning the sobriquets "The Original Radio Girl" and the "First Lady of Radio." Although very popular in the 1920s, De Leath is obscure in modern times.
De Leath was an early exponent of a style of vocalizing known as crooning. One of her hit songs, "Are You Lonesome Tonight?," recorded in 1927, achieved fame when it became a hit for Elvis Presley in 1960.
January 1920, inventor and radio pioneer Lee DeForest brought her to the cramped studio of his station, 2XG, located in New York City's World's Tower, where De Leath broadcast "Swanee River". Although not, as is sometimes stated, the first broadcast of live singing, she established herself as a skilled radio performer, and De Forest would later note: "She was an instant success. Her voice and her cordial, unassuming microphone presence were ideally suited to the novel task. Without instruction she seemed to sense exactly what was necessary in song and patter to successfully put herself across". According to some historical accounts of this incident, having been advised that high notes sung in her natural soprano might shatter the fragile vacuum tubes of her carbon microphone's amplifier, De Leath switched to a deep contralto and in the process invented "crooning", which became the dominant pop vocal styling for the next three decades.
By 1921, in the formative years of commercial radio, De Leath began singing at WJZ, in Newark, New Jersey (a station later known as WABC in New York City). She also performed on the New York stage in the early to mid-1920s, but radio became her primary medium, and she made a name for herself as a radio entertainer.
Her recording career began in 1921. Over the next decade she recorded for a number of labels, including Edison, Columbia, Okeh, Gennett, Victor, and Brunswick. She occasionally recorded for major label subsidiaries under various pseudonyms. These included Gloria Geer, Mamie Lee, Sadie Green, Betty Brown, Nancy Foster, Marion Ross, Glory Clark, Angelina Marco, and Gertrude Dwyer. De Leath had a highly versatile range of styles, and as material required could adapt as a serious balladeer, playful girl, vampish coquette, or vaudeville comedian.
De Leath also recorded songs for silent films, and composed songs, such as "Oliver Twist", written by the singer herself, for the 1922 silent film Oliver Twist. De Leath's recording accompanists included some of the major jazz musicians of the 1920s, including cornetist Red Nichols, trombonist Miff Mole, guitarists Dick McDonough and Eddie Lang, and bandleader Paul Whiteman. She demonstrated a high level of instrumental ability on the ukulele, and occasionally accompanied herself on recordings, including the hit Ukulele Lady (1925). In performance she played banjo, guitar, and piano. She also recorded ukulele instruction records for Victor.
In 1923, she became one of the first women to manage a radio station, WDT in New York City, on which she also performed. In 1928 she appeared on an experimental television broadcast, and later became a special guest for the debut broadcast of Voice of Firestone Radio Hour. She also was one of the first American entertainers to broadcast to Europe via transatlantic radio transmission.
De Leath made her last recording in 1931 for the Crown label. She made her final nationwide network performances in the early 1930s. In her waning years, she made radio appearances on local New York stations, including WBEN in Buffalo. Her 1925 hit recording, "Ukulele Lady", was used in the 1999 film, The Cider House Rules.
In 1931, De Leath sued Kate Smith for using the "First Lady of the Radio" designation. Although Smith desisted for a time, she resumed the mantle after De Leath's death.
Marriages and death
De Leath was married twice, to Leon Geer (an artist whom she married in 1924, and from whom she was divorced in 1935), and then to Irwin Rosenbloom, a musician.
Prior to her death in Buffalo, New York, she had had considerable financial difficulties, complicated by a drinking problem which contributed to her early death. Her obituary in The New York Times stated her age at death as 42. Her ashes were buried in her childhood home of Mount Pulaski, Illinois.
I hope you enjoy this as much as I have.
Best wishes,
Stu
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FANTASTIC, and thanks for the history too!
Love it!
Thank you so much for information about about this interesting lady seems to be hard to find her records though
You're very welcome and thank you for watching!
Just beautiful...Thank you!
Does anyone know who the actor is in the video? He's a pretty great actor it seems! Beautiful video.
The name of the actor is Ivor Novello www.imdb.com/name/nm0637040/. Who was a Welsh composer and actor who became one of the most popular British entertainers of the first half of the 20th century. The name of the movie is Downhill (1927) en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Downhill_(1927_film) .
@@the1920sand30s Thank you so much! I've heard of that name! Glad to put a face to it. I'm sure his name is a award of some type, I'll have to look him up. Thanks again for the info and wonderful upload, I appreciate it 😊
It's Ivor Novello.
. Thank you very much. He was wonderful in The Lodger.
What is that movie?
The name of the movie can bee seen at: 0:02 to 0:04 .
Downhill (1927) - which is a British silent drama film directed by Alfred Hitchcock, starring Ivor Novello, Robin Irvine, and Isabel Jeans, and based on the play Down Hill by Novello and Constance Collier. The film was made by Gainsborough Pictures at their Islington studios. Downhill was Hitchcock's fourth film as director, but the fifth to be released
@@the1920sand30s Thanks!