Ted Lewis & His Band - Farewell Blues 1929
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- Опубліковано 8 вер 2024
- 8-21-1929 - Okeh 41580 - This Song Peaked On US Music Charts At #2 In 1929.
Song written by Paul Mares, Leon Roppolo & Elmer Schoebel.
Theodore Leopold Friedman, better known as Ted Lewis (June 6, 1892 -- August 25, 1971), was an American entertainer, bandleader, singer, and musician. He led a band presenting a combination of jazz, hokey comedy, and schmaltzy sentimentality that was a hit with the American public. He was known by the moniker "Mr. Entertainment" or Ted "Is Everybody Happy?" Lewis.
Born in Circleville, Ohio, Lewis was one of the first Northern musicians to start imitating the New Orleans jazz musicians who came up to New York in the teens. He first recorded in 1917 with Earl Fuller's Jass Band, who were making an energetic if somewhat clumsy attempt to copy the sound of the city's newest sensation, the Original Dixieland Jass Band. At the time, Lewis didn't seem to be able to do much on the clarinet other than trill. (Promoting one recording the Victor catalog stated:"The sounds as of a dog in his dying anguish are from Ted Lewis' clarinet"). He improved a bit later, forming his style from the influences of the first New Orleans clarinetists to reside in New York, Larry Shields, Alcide Nunez, and Achille Baquet.
By 1919, Lewis was leading his own band, and had a recording contract with Columbia Records, which marketed him as their answer to the Original Dixieland Jass Band who recorded for Victor records. For a time (as they did with Paul Whiteman) Columbia gave him a special record label featuring his picture. At the start of the 1920s, he was considered by many people without previous knowledge of jazz (that is to say, most of America) to be one of the leading lights of hot jazz. Lewis's clarinet playing barely evolved beyond his style of 1919 which in later years would sound increasingly corny, but Lewis certainly knew what good clarinet playing sounded like, for he hired musicians like Benny Goodman, Jimmy Dorsey, and Don Murray to play clarinet in his band. Lewis actually could play normally well (listen to his earliest records for an idea; no missed notes, for one). For years, his band also included jazz greats Muggsy Spanier on trumpet and George Brunis on trombone. Ted Lewis's band was second only to the Paul Whiteman in popularity during the 1920s, and arguably played more real jazz with less pretension than Whiteman, especially in his recordings of the late 1920s.
Lewis recorded for Columbia from 1919-1933. He was on Decca 1934 into the 1940s. In 1932, Lewis recorded "In a Shanty in Old Shanty Town", which he had performed in the film "The Crooner" with his orchestra. It was released on a 78 and reached number one on the charts where it stayed for 10 weeks.
Lewis's band got cornier and schmaltzier as the Great Depression wore on, but this seemed to match the general public's taste, as he kept commercially successful during an era when many bands broke up. Through it all he retained his famous catchphrase "Is everybody happy?". Lewis adopted a battered top hat for sentimental, hard-luck tunes (he called himself "the high-hatted tragedian of song"). Frequently he would stray from song lyrics, improvising chatter around them. This gave the effect of Lewis "speaking" the song spontaneously: "When ma' baby... when ma' baby smiles at me... gee, what a wonderful, wonderful light that comes to her eyes... look at that light, folks..."
Lewis and his band appeared in a few early-talkie movie musicals in 1929, notably the Warner Brothers revue The Show of Shows. The first of several films titled with Lewis' catchphrase, Is Everybody Happy? also premiered in 1929, while 1935 saw Lewis and his band performing several numbers in the film Here Comes the Band.
n 1941 the band was recruited at the last minute, along with the Andrews Sisters, to furnish musical numbers for the Abbott and Costello comedy Hold That Ghost (1941), released by Universal Studios on August 6, 1941. Musical numbers cut from the feature were released by Universal separately on September 3, 1941, in a short subject entitled Is Everybody Happy?
Lewis kept his band together through the 1950s, and continued to make appearances on television and in Las Vegas into the 1960s. True to his vaudeville beginnings, he created a visual as well as a musical act. His physical presence with props like his top hat combined with bits of visual humor and dancing were as important to him as his music.
One of his most memorable songs was "Me and My Shadow" with which he frequently closed his act. During the song he danced on stage with his own, spotlight-generated, shadow.
He died in New York City in 1971. In June 1977, Lewis's widow and friends dedicated the Ted Lewis Museum and park in his honor in his home town of Circleville, Ohio.
"Farewell Blues" is a 1922 jazz standard written by Paul Mares, Leon Roppolo and Elmer Schoebel.
best ted lewis song imo
Fr
What a nice song.
I love Ted Lewis!
1930s - 2016: Hey this is a pretty good piece of music
2016 - now: CaReTaKeR gO bRrR
It still is a banger tho,especialy when it's slowed down to *IT's* speed...
2019*
Great - you have a wonderful collection.
Very late re-issue of the 1929 Columbia probably 1935. One of the last Okeh's. One of Ted's best.
K1 - Advanced Plague Entanglements (Whisting Sample)
*Homesick by Ted Lewis
No it's not, but your comment is from a year ago so I understand why you are an idiot
"Ted Lewis made the clarinet talk, and what it usually said is 'Please put me back in my case.'" Eddie Condon
Now THAT'S a roast.
One quirky band leader who chose great jazz soloists!
Oddly, he was one of very few around 1920 who really knew what jazz was.
@@johnllewlyndavies222 I'll just say: he chose a few good sidemen to play jazzy solos!
Great, Really.
Thank You***
Teschemacher and Spanier are superb here--whatever one thinks of Lewis's "gaspipe" style.
when the l1 l1: 2:35
AAAAᴬᴬᴬᴬaaaaᵃᵃᵃᵃ
L1 when
AAAAA AAAAA AAAAA AAAAAAA
2:35 AAAAᴬᴬᴬᴬaaaaᵃᵃᵃᵃ
L1 moment
Hi Noli for the trillionth time.
@@the2ndcomingoflaynekrusz654 Yep, The Caretaker is a pretty famous musician and I took a lot of interest in his work a year or two ago. I think I will take interest in general 1920's music later
here before caretaker comments
you found it that quickly??? how
oh no
O shit
Alright, who put the content aware scale on Ted again?
M.Spanier at his very finest
0:18
2:35 AAAAAA AAAAAA AAAAAAA AAAAAAAA
Sussy bakas, found the Caretaker fan
I love Ted Lewis!
Damn 6 years ago💀