Jeri Sullivan Transcriptions Plus More Singles

The talented yet virtually unknown singer Jeri Sullivan returns with some of the best material I've posted as yet - six songs from an Armed Forces Radio Service transcription, along with six additional songs from commercial singles.

Sullivan was on radio throughout the 1940s, worked as a Hollywood dubbing artist, and made singles for several labels. Then in 1953, she turned up as "Jenny Barrett" and made recordings for two different companies.

She's appeared on this blog several times. Post number one detailed her early career and included a single on Signature records, a V-Disc of her "Rum and Coca-Cola" recording and two radio transcriptions. In post two, we looked at her work on the movie A Song Is Born and some of her releases under the name Jenny Barrett in the 1950s.

Later, Bryan Cooper contributed another Signature single, which I published on Buster's Swinging Singles, and then a set of Standard Transcriptions for this blog. Simon Buckmaster added six one-of-a-kind acetate recordings, a single on the Metro Hollywood label and one more Signature single.

Here are the details on today's selections.

AFRS Showtime Songs

Sullivan appeared on an AFRS transcription in a series called Showtime. The programs in that series either recreated musicals or focused on the songs from musicals. The latter was the case in this program, which I believe came from about April 1946, based on the numbering and dating of other shows in the series.

Jeri sang six songs on the show - all excellent and well recorded. She started off with two Rodgers and Hart tunes - "This Can't Be Love" from The Boys from Syracuse and "I Didn't Know What Time It Was" from Too Many Girls, both beautifully done and sympathetically conducted by Michel Perriere.

The program took a break from show tunes to showcase what it called "Jeri's own song" - "Rum and Coca-Cola." A nice sentiment, even if Sullivan didn't actually write it. (See discussion here.) That said, her interpretation is among the best I have heard.

Finally, Jeri takes up three torch songs from circa 1930, and shows she had quite an affinity for the genre. The first is "The Thrill Is Gone," which originated in George White's Scandals of 1931, where it was introduced by Rudy Vallee. (Never would have guessed that.) The writers were Ray Henderson and Lew Brown.

Next she programmed two songs closely associated with Libby Holman, both from The Little Show of 1929. "Moanin' Low" was written by Ralph Rainger, with lyrics by Howard Dietz. "Can't We Be Friends?" has lyrics by Paul James and music by Kay Swift. I've not heard either done better, although it sounds like Perriere wanted a faster tempo than Sullivan.

A Second Metro Hollywood Single

The newly discovered singles start with a release by the small Metro Hollywood label circa 1948. The two songs were probably recorded by the ARA label, which was active from 1944 to 1946, and acquired by Metro Hollywood. The latter label seems to have gone under in 1948 after having been sued by M-G-M records for infringement.

As I previously speculated about another Metro Hollywood release, these probably were made in 1946. One side is "I'll See You in C-U-B-A," a 1920 Irving Berlin song revived for the 1946 Bing Crosby-Fred Astaire musical Blue Skies. (The Metro Hollywood label calls the song "CUBA" and dubs the singer "Jerri Sullivan," one of several variant spellings for her name.)

The flip side was another torch song - "Take Me in Your Arms," written by Fred Markush and Fritz Rotter. Mitchell Parish gave it English lyrics and it became a US hit in 1932 for Ruth Etting.

Both songs are very nicely done, with an unidentified orchestra.

Vogue, Coral and 'Jenny Barrett'

If You Please - Drusilla Davis, Sullivan, Frank Fay, Barbara Torrence

In 1950, Jeri appeared in Frank Fay's revue, If You Please, in San Francisco. As late as 1952, the singer was making personal appearances as "Jeri Sullivan." Then in 1953 she became Jenny Barrett, and again made a few records.

Billboard, June 13, 1953

The first, "He Loves Me," was on the small Vogue label. The label gave away the fact that Barrett was Sullivan by advertising that she wrote the song and attributing it on the label to Sullivan (and Bedell). 

This transfer of "He Loves Me" in this collection is better than the one I included in an earlier post. As I wrote then, "It's not a successful record, but is fascinating even so. The singer carries on an internal monologue throughout the song, a year before Richard Adler and Jerry Ross were to employ a similar device for 'Hey There' in The Pajama Game. But in 'He Loves Me,' it turns into an overdone and distracting gimmick."

This post also includes the flip side, "Do Me a Favor," a double-tracked waltz that's an incursion into Patti Page territory. It's OK, and well produced. Both songs have lush backing by trumpeter-arranger Hall Daniels.

At the same time as her Vogue release, Barrett/Sullivan was in the studio for the much bigger Coral label. Her initial effort was a breathy take on the Ray Noble standard "The Touch of Your Lips." Billboard observed, "The thrush bows on the label with a sexy, suggestive rendition of the evergreen, selling the item via a most intimate and cozy rendition which should get it banned from a few stations with no trouble at all."

The other side of the Coral record was "Hurry, Hurry Home," which betrays more than a little familiarity with Chopin's Minute Waltz. It was attributed nonetheless to Jeri Sullivan and Cindy Barrett (not sure about the Cindy-Jenny relationship, if any). There is not as much heavy breathing on this side. Tony Iavello was the bandleader.

Since my first "Jenny Barrett" post, I've come across Sullivan's own explanation of the name change, via an article in the June 3, 1953 Down Beat. "Why did I become Jenny Barrett? The answer is just too simple: I am Jenny Barrett. It is my legal name. Jenny was the name my parents picked for me. Barrett was the name of my husband, who died about a year ago... Jenny Barrett is not only my real name but part of my life, the part that is nearest and most important to me right now."

Jeri Sullivan on radio in the 1940s

I have to say her explanation confuses me, because I had previously uncovered information that suggested she was born as Leona Schlosser. And the month after this Down Beat issue came out, the magazine announced that she was "becoming Mrs. Bob (Ten Top Tunes show on KLAC) McLaughlin."

The self-penned Down Beat story was likely placed by a Vogue records publicist to draw attention to her as Jeri Sullivan, allowing her to boast that "as soon as word got out that Vogue's 'new singer' was 'Jeri Sullivan' I have been contacted by not only the news services but by many nationally known columnists who 'wanted to get the real story.' Why was I scrapping Jeri Sullivan and all the publicity value that went with that name?" Well, precisely because publicizing the change helped her to regain the limelight she had lost.

Her revived recording career did not last long. Vogue went under and Coral made only one more single with her, one of the few items that hasn't turned up for posting here. 

Jeri Sullivan - the Standard Transcriptions

I first began looking into the recordings of 1940s singer Jeri Sullivan because I had a Signature label 78 of hers that I liked. I soon found out that her career was far more interesting than I had suspected. You can read more about her in the earlier posts devoted to her life and recordings.

Today we come full circle back to the first recording I owned, but on a different label. This post - courtesy of vocal aficionado Bryan Cooper - consists of the 12 Sullivan recordings issued by Standard Transcriptions in the 1940s, which are almost certainly sourced from session or sessions that also came out at least in part on the short-lived Signature label.

The origin of the Signature/Standard recordings is not entirely clear. I believe that they first were the property of United Artists Records (UAR), which had been a semi-vanity label. As Billboard explained in 1948, "UAR assumed pressing operations of masters produced by individual artists on a profit-sharing basis. UAR and producers split net profits equally after production and pressing costs were deducted."

A good assumption might be that Sullivan proffered her recordings to UAR on this basis. Then, when UAR went under in 1948 it sold the 12 masters to Signature. At some point, Standard Transcriptions leased or acquired the same masters as fodder for its business of supplying recorded music to radio stations.

I previously speculated that the United Artists/Signature/Standard masters could have been made as early as 1944, because they contain a version of "Dream House," the theme song of Sullivan's radio show of the time. It now seems more likely that they come from 1946. At that time, her backing artists (the Les Baxter Singers and the Johnny White combo) were recording together. Vibist White was a member of Benny Goodman's orchestra throughout 1946, while Baxter was making records with Mel Tormé as one of the Mel-Tones.

Another one of my speculations was that the Les Baxter group backing Jeri was the same as the Mel-Tones. The Standard Transcriptions seem to bear that out - they call the singers the Mel-Tones on the labels. Perhaps Siganture did not want to or could not use the name Mel-Tones when Tormé was recording for the rival Musicraft company.

Now let's discuss the music at hand, and how it relates to what we have heard in previous Sullivan posts.

First, there are several new items: "I Hadn't Anyone 'Til You," "But Beautiful," "I Wish I Had a Penny," "Let's Do It," "There's a Small Hotel" and "Forgotten Blues." As far as I know, Signature did not release these masters. A few of these songs also can be heard in different versions from rare and probably unique demo recordings graciously contributed by Simon Buckmaster in a previous post.

Two additional songs - "Love Ain't No Good" and "Regular Man" - were previously heard only in incomplete versions also contributed by Simon. (That post also contains two additional rare songs that were issued on the Metro Hollywood label.)

"Cowboy Jamboree," "Dream House," "Baby Won't You Please Come Home" and "You've Been So Good to Me Daddy" have previously been uploaded from Signature pressings found in my collection and that of Bryan Cooper.

The sound on the Standard Transcriptions is at least as good as the Signature masters. However, all the recordings were pitched too high, which I have adjusted. The transfers come from two 16-inch Standard discs, R-193 and R-197. The download also includes two rave reviews from Cash Box.

These are all exceptional recordings from a much underrated singer, who is heard here at her warm and intimate best. I am so grateful to Bryan Cooper for his generosity, and want to thank him and Simon Buckmaster again for sharing their treasures with us.

Looking ahead, Bryan has sent me eight Hal Derwin recordings from his collection that weren't included in my recent post of that singer's discs. Coming up soon!

The Rarest Jeri Sullivan

Our ongoing exploration of the career of singer Jeri Sullivan has previously included two long posts on this blog and one on my singles blog.

Post number one detailed her early career and included a single on Signature records, a V-Disc of her "Rum and Coca-Cola" recording and two radio transcriptions. In post two, we looked at her work on the movie A Song Is Born and her releases under the name Jenny Barrett in the 1950s.

Later my friend Bryan Cooper contributed an additional Signature single, which I published on Buster's Swinging Singles.

Today we have an exceptional group of recordings, completely unknown to me, courtesy of Simon Buckmaster. These include six one-of-a-kind acetate recordings, a single on the Metro Hollywood label and an additional Signature single. This collection is a must-hear for those of you who like Jeri, and I am most grateful to Simon for bringing it our way. More details follow.

The Studio & Artists Acetates

The real prize of the collection consists of six acetates (or lacquers) that Sullivan made at Studio & Artists Recorders, which was in the CBS Building in Hollywood. The songs include "Gone with the Wind," "I Wish I Had a Penny," "Poi - Poi - Poi," "Take Care of You for Me," "There's a Small Hotel" and her own "Regular Man."

These records are excellent. Simon has done a spectacular job coaxing good sound from the fragile and dirty lacquers. Jeri is in terrific voice, accompanied by a small group with a prominent guitarist.

This is probably not the Johnny White Orchestra who backed her on the records issued by Signature. That group has a vibraphone not present on the transcriptions.

We don't know when they were made, but I suspect the early 1940s. We know it was not before 1942, when "Take Care of You for Me" was copyrighted. I believe the timing was circa 1944 for the following reasons. She cut "Regular Man" both for a commercial release and on this lacquer. The commercial release was on Signature in the late 1940s, but it was from a master made years earlier for a defunct label. Since the Signature sides also include "Dream House," the theme of her 1943-44 radio show, I suspect those commercial masters were made then - and possibly the acetates as well.

Now, what was the purpose of making these acetates? We know they were not publisher or songwriter demos - the presence of two well-known songs from 1937 rules that out. And they were probably not reference lacquers from a commercial session, because the commercial disc of "Regular Man" uses a different arrangement. Nor do they sound like air checks.

The answer is probably that Sullivan had them made to take to record companies in search of a contract - or even, as Simon suggests, to film studios. It was at about this time that she began making both commercial records and Soundies. So apparently this strategy may have been successful.

In any case, these six songs are a remarkable find.

The Metro Hollywood Sides

Simon also came up with two songs released by the small Metro Hollywood label circa 1948. Again, these have a convoluted history. They were probably recorded by the ARA label, which was active from 1944 to 1946, and purchased by Metro Hollywood. The latter label seems to have gone under in 1948 after having been sued by M-G-M records for infringement.

The A-side of Sullivan's 78 is "My Yiddishe Momme." Jeri switched ethnic identities for the B-side - "My O'Lovely, My O'Darlin', My O'Brien." The latter song was published in 1946, so the recording probably dates from about then. These are good performances with an anonymous backing that is probably not the Johnny White Orchestra.

Two More Signatures

Finally, Simon has discovered a Signature 78 that doesn't appear in the online 78 discography for that label. It pairs the Jeri's "Regular Man" with "Love Ain't No Good." These are splendid performances in good sound. Unfortunately, Simon's copy was chipped, so the performances are a bit abbreviated, but what's there is very fine indeed.

* * *

So what is missing as yet from the Sullivan legacy? Several things:

- Both Bryan and I have 16-inch transcriptions that we have not yet been able to transfer.

- Jeri made a set of eight songs for Standard Transcriptions with Johnny White and the Mel-Tones, which have not surfaced so far.

- She recorded at least four songs for Coral in the 1950s under the name Jenny Barrett.

- Finally, there are many potential radio air checks out there - she not only had her own show, she appeared on many other programs such as Jimmy Durante's (see photo below). Reader boppinbob was kind enough to send along a link to a number of these shows, and I hope to mine them for content sometime in the future.

I also want to mention belatedly that Bryan Cooper consulted on the Sepia Records issue of the soundtrack recordings of A Song Is Born, where Sullivan dubbed Virginia Mayo's vocals. That CD includes the 1947 pre-recordings taken from original Goldwyn Studios acetates in Bryan's collection, along with the Capitol recordings and many other items.

Let me conclude by thanking Simon again for the wonderful recordings in this post!

Radio publicity photo from 1945: Garry Moore,
Jeri Sullivan and Jimmy Durante

Jeri Sullivan, Part 2: 'A Song Is Born' and the 1950s

In Part 1 of this two-part series, I looked into the early life and career of Jeri Sullivan, including her radio program, the controversy about "Rum and Coca-Cola" and her Signature records releases.

Part 2 examines her brief career as a movie dubber, then the rest of her career as I've been able to discover, including one of the records she made under the name Jenny Barrett.

First, let's go into some depth about her first dubbing assignment, the 1948 film A Song Is Born, because it is musically interesting even aside from her participation.

'A Song Is Born'

Sullivan had had a screen test, but never had appeared in films except for a 1942 short titled "You'll Have to Swing It," I assume for the song sometimes called "Mr. Paganini," a hit for Ella Fitzgerald in 1936. I haven't been able to locate a copy of this short.

Late in 1947, Sullivan became involved in a feature film for the first time - but not on the screen. She was engaged to dub the singing voice of Virginia Mayo, one of the leads in the Goldwyn musical, A Song Is Born.

A Song Is Born is a remake of the better-regarded Ball of Fire from 1941. Instead of Gary Cooper and Barbara Stanwyck as leads, you get Danny Kaye and Virginia Mayo. In the excerpts I viewed on YouTube (links below), Mayo is better than I remembered, but Kaye is at his most fidgety. The plot is insanely dumb, so I'll not try to explain it. Suffice to say that Benny Goodman, with plastered-down hair and a moustache, is cast as classical clarinetist Professor Magenbruch, who learns to loosen up from such swing savants as Louis Armstrong and Charlie Barnet.

I don't know if the movie's plot does more violence to classical music or pop, but it does manage to introduce several interesting musical interludes that involve Benny, Louis, Lionel Hampton, Mel Powell, Barnet and Page Cavanaugh - and Jeri Sullivan's singing voice.

In 1948, Capitol Records issued a three-record 78 set called Giants of Jazz containing songs from the film (included in the download). The title song ("A Song Is Born") is an edited version of what appears on the soundtrack, but the others were made in the Capitol studio a few months before the film was released in late 1948.

"A Song Is Born," written by Don Raye and Gene de Paul, is a good tune, although clearly inspired by "The Birth of the Blues," a 1926 DeSilva-Brown-Henderson song that was revived for the Crosby film of the same name in 1941.

You see Virginia Mayo; you hear Jeri Sullivan

The album version of "A Song Is Born" is double-sided, but even so was significantly shortened from what appears in the film. On screen, Kaye introduces the Golden Gate Quartet as presenting a "pure Negro spiritual" - which turns out to be a setting of the principal theme of the Largo from Dvořák's Ninth Symphony, which is almost certainly not based on a spiritual (although it was later reworked into the quasi-spiritual "Goin' Home" by one of the composer's pupils). This passage is eliminated from the two-sided 78 version, so when Tommy Dorsey reprises the "Goin' Home" music as his solo, it comes out of nowhere. The film sequence also features drummer Louie Bellson at his most Krupa-esque. And Jeri Sullivan makes her first vocal appearance; she's perfect as Mayo's double.

Charlie Barnet, Tommy Dorsey, Benny Goodman
and Louis Armstrong

Harry Babasin, Mel Powell, Virginia Mayo and Lionel Hampton
stare in disbelief at Benny's moustache

The next song in the album is a Benny Goodman take on "Stealin' Apples," a song he first released in 1940. The film version of "Stealin' Apples" is in the swing idiom, using Lionel Hampton and Mel Powell as soloists in addition to Benny. By the time Capitol got around to making its recording a year later, Goodman had tentatively embraced the newest jazz fashion, and the version in the album has a bop arrangement, with soloists Wardell Gray and Fats Navarro (identified on the label as Theodore Navarro). Benny fits right in, although his licks are not different from what he might have played in a swing arrangement. This appears to be the only session where Benny employed the very bop-oriented Navarro. Gray was with Benny from May 1948 off and on until late 1949 or 1950.

"Muskrat Ramble" (not on YouTube) is a highly effective Dixieland workout, led by pianist Mel Powell. As early as 1939, Powell was working with Bobby Hackett, George Brunies, and Zutty Singleton, as well as writing arrangements for Earl Hines. He joined Goodman in 1941, then was assigned to Glenn Miller's Army Air Force Band from 1943 to 1945. From 1948 to 1952 he studied at Yale University with classical composer Paul Hindemith, and subsequently became a well-known educator and composer himself, winning a Pulitzer Prize while continuing to play and occasionally record jazz. Powell's technique is rooted in the 1920s, but he has his own take on the older style. "Muskrat Ramble" includes lively contributions from the gusty Clyde Hurley and Lou McGarity.

Charlie Barnet appears with a tune called "Redskin Rhumba" (not on YouTube), which he had been using as his band's theme song. It is a Latin version of Ray Noble's "Cherokee," a hit for Barnet in 1939. Here the song is ascribed to Dale Bennett, which I believe is a Barnet pseudonym. Barnet's solo is characteristically noisy.

Now back to Jeri Sullivan. The big number for her (and Mayo) is a fun Don Raye-Gene de Paul song written for the film called "Daddy-O." Sullivan is backed by Page Cavanaugh and his trio in the film and on record, with Al Viola on guitar and Lloyd Pratt on bass. Cavanaugh recorded a different version for Victor backing vocalist Lillian Lane, which can be found on YouTube.

"Daddy-O" bears some resemblance to "Shoo Shoo Baby," a Phil Moore song that was a hit for the Andrews Sisters in 1943. Sullivan's manner is a bit reminiscent of Ella Mae Morse's vocal on her single of "Shoo Shoo Baby," although Jeri's approach is not as down-home as Ella Mae.

The download of the album has been considerably remastered from the version on Internet Archive. I do own the Sullivan record of "Daddy-O" (which was backed by the Barnet side), but was too indolent to transfer it when I had another rip in hand.

The 1950s and 'Jenny Barrett'

Sullivan did so well as a vocal double that you would think more opportunities would have come her way. But only one did - in 1950, she was engaged for the film Love That Brute, dubbing Jean Peters in "You Took Advantage of Me" - and doing it exceptionally well.

Meanwhile, her nightclub career was at a standstill. A Billboard article in 1950 noted that she had started making personal appearances again "after several years of inactivity." In 1952, she could be seen at the Gatineau Country Club in Ottawa (right).

As far as I can tell, her Capitol and Signature releases of 1948 had been her last. Then, in 1953, she made the curious decision to change her professional name to Jenny Barrett - making a fresh start, I suppose.

The newly named singer did snag a record contract with a fledgling firm - Vogue Records (not the picture-disc company nor the French jazz label). Vogue tried to make a splash but didn't last long. Its other artists included Geno Rockford and Fred Darian, so not a well-known roster.

Jeri/Jenny's contribution to the Vogue catalogue - as far as I can determine, her only issue - was a coupling of "He Loves Me" and "Do Me a Favor." I was able to locate a transfer of "He Loves Me" and have remastered it for the download. It's not a successful record, but is fascinating even so. The singer carries on an internal monologue with herself throughout the song, a year before Richard Adler and Jerry Ross were to employ a similar device for "Hey There" in The Pajama Game. But in "He Loves Me," it turns into an overdone and distracting gimmick.

"He Loves Me" was a Sullivan composition, one of several that I've discovered. She also worked with Bob Carroll (possibly the singer) on some songs, and other writers. Guy Lombardo recorded her "('Round the) Christmas Tree at Home" in 1951; it appears on his Jingle Bells LP.

Vogue apparently did not have enough money to stay in business, but it did give Jenny Barrett a fair amount of promotion. She appeared on the cover of the industry publication The Cash Box in July 1953, and was promoting Soundcraft recording tapes at about the same time, looking notably ill-at-ease in both situations. Her photo was also on the "He Loves Me" sheet music.

Post-Vogue, Jenny moved on to the Coral label for four sides that I don't have and that don't seem to be online.

I hate to end with an anti-climax, but I don't have any more information about Jenny Barrett. The only later Jeri/Jerri Sullivan/Sullavan entry that I could locate was in a publisher's Billboard ad from 1960, which has a Jerri Sullivan recording Steve Allen's "This Could Be the Start of Something" for Mark 56 records (right). Is she our Jeri Sullivan? It's hard to say.

Why couldn't Sullivan build on her early success? We can only speculate. One theme, though, is that she seems more relaxed when she is not "out front" - her movie dubbings are much more persuasive than her Soundies, for example. A theme that runs through the early reviews of her nightclub act is that she was not engaged with the audience - although if later reviews are to be believed, that did improve.

The most likely explanation, though, is simply chance. There isn't much that separates a talented singer whose career sputters from a star who achieves lasting fame.

I enjoyed doing this deep dive into the career of a relatively unknown singer. I want to thank two of my friends, musicologist Nick Morgan and author Andy Propst, for inspiring me and suggesting research tools. You were right, Nick - newspapers.com is addictive.

Coda to my last post: our great friend David Federman has concocted a "Rum and Coca-Cola" collection for all of us, with the toast, "Let's all drink to imperialism!" He includes the versions by Lord Invader and Wilmoth Houdini (and their follow-up records), plus the likes of Abe Lyman and Louis Prima, among others. See the comments to the last post for a very limited-time (five days) link.

Jeri Sullivan, Part 1: Radio, Rum & Coca-Cola and Signature Records

If singer Jeri Sullivan is remembered at all today, it is as one of the composers of the massive wartime hit "Rum and Coca-Cola," which she almost certainly didn't write.

Too bad she isn't better known as a singer - she was a most talented artist. Today we will begin a two-part look at her career, which began in the 1940s and continued into the 1950s.

Included in this first part will be her own version of "Rum and Coca-Cola" and the controversy about the song, a few of her radio programs, and one of her rare Signature 78s.

In part two, we'll discuss her participation in the 1948 film "A Song Is Born," where she dubbed the vocals for star Virginia Mayo and appeared on the "songs from the film" album issued by Capitol, and examine what is known about her career from then forward.

Is It Jeri or Jerri? Sullivan or Sullavan?

In researching Jeri Sullivan's professional career, you quickly discover that she appears almost as often as "Jeri Sullavan" as she does "Jeri Sullivan," and sometimes her first name is spelled with two "r's" rather than one. This can't be just carelessness. The lawsuits over "Rum and Coca-Cola" have her as Sullavan, as do her Soundies. But her records, radio shows and most personal appearances have her as Sullivan.

Publicity photo for Jeri Sullivan's radio show

I don't know which she preferred. It wasn't her real name, so maybe she didn't care. She seems to have been born Leona Schlosser, and grew up in Bremerton, Washington. She actually may have been born in Alberta, Canada, probably in 1918.

(Oh, to make matters even more confusing, in the 1950s she changed her professional name to Jenny Barrett. And then may have changed it back. More on that in Part 2.)

Sullivan became a singer in her early 20s. I've been able to confirm that she sang with the Art Jarrett band for a few months in 1942, and she apparently appeared in an elusive musical short that same year.

She next turns up as a guest on the Col. Stoopnagle radio show in 1943, then on her own sustaining 15-minute program on CBS from late 1943 through at least part of 1944. The show was called "Jeri Sullivan's Dream House" after her romantic theme song, which Signature records later issued (see below).

Transcription label

At least two of the Dream House programs survive and I have remastered them and included them in the download package. Both suffer from clumsy previous attempts at noise reduction, rendering the sound unsteady in the February 19, 1944 program and muffled in the June 6, 1944 program. But both are listenable, and you will hear that she had a most attractive voice and quite a way with a song even then. The June 6 program has added interest in that it was recorded on D-Day for the Allied invasion of Europe, and is interrupted for the latest news from the front.

Who Wrote 'Rum and Coca-Cola'?

While Sullivan was appearing on radio, she also was a nightclub artist, and that dual status led to her involvement in one of the most notable musical copyright cases of all time. It concerns the authorship of the calypso song "Rum and Coca-Cola," which was a massive hit for the Andrews Sisters in 1945.

Before the Andrews siblings got a hold of it, comic Morey Amsterdam had introduced the song to Sullivan while she was appearing at the Versailles in New York and on the radio. He had just come back from entertaining troops in Trinidad, where he said he got the idea for the number.

Here the story becomes convoluted, so let me give you just an outline of what appears to have happened.

Sullivan took the song to her radio music director, Paul Baron. They were excited about it and went so far as to prepare a demo recording, with the thought of getting Coca-Cola's blessing for it.

Meanwhile, Amsterdam shopped the song to the Andrews Sisters, or their producer. They liked it as well, and recorded it for Decca in October 1944. Amsterdam was listed as the sole author of the piece, which angered Sullivan and Baron when the song became a smash hit. Thinking they had agreed to a deal with the comedian, they got an attorney involved, and eventually the song credits were changed to "Amsterdam-Sullivan-Baron," the idea being that Morey wrote the words, and Jeri and Paul the music.

Trouble was, none of them had much to do with either the music or the lyrics. The hit tune was plainly based on an earlier Trinidad composition, with calypso singer Lord Invader (Rupert Grant) setting words to music published by Lionel Belasco early in the century, although possibly from a folk source. Invader's very ribald lyrics are a commentary about the Trinidadians catering to the US troops on the island. Amsterdam or someone toned else them down considerably for the US market, while retaining the suggestive couplet, "Both mother and daughter / Working for the Yankee dollar."

Eventually, Grant and Belasco sued Amsterdam, Sullivan and Baron, and won the suit several years later, although somehow the names of the American trio are still on the sheet music.

While this was happening, the song had been commercially recorded by everyone from the Vaughan Monroe to Amos Milburn, including 78s from Lord Invader and his calypso rival, Wilmoth Houdini. Recorded by everyone but Sullivan, that is, except for a non-commercial version that appeared on an Armed Forces V-Disc.

Web author Kevin Burke believes the V-Disc was actually the Sullivan demo version mentioned above. The idea was for the publisher to get Coca-Cola's permission to use its name in the title. That is why Sullivan sings "Cola Cola" instead of "Coca-Cola" and the disc is titled "Rum and Cola Cola." But the demo became moot when the Andrews Sisters version came out. (Burke has prepared an in-depth website about the "Rum and Coca-Cola" controversy, currently available only via Internet Archive.)

I've included a cleaned-up and repitched version of the Sullivan V-Disc in the download. She also made a Soundie of the song in about 1947. It is on YouTube in awful condition - even worse that that site's norm.

Parenthetically, Sullivan made at least two other Soundies - one of "Tico-Tico" from 1945 is on YouTube in fairly good shape.

1945 to 1948

Sullivan continued to be a popular radio presence after her own show went off the air sometime in 1944. In 1945 she was a regular on Ray Bolger's summer replacement show. She then went on to the Jimmy Durante-Garry Moore radio show in 1946, followed by a regular stint with Bob Crosby on his show. In 1947 she guested on the Mark Warnow and Bob Hope programs.

Tune In Magazine, September 1946

In 1948, Signature Records purchased the masters of 12 songs that Sullivan had cut for the small United Artists label some time before. She was accompanied by a vocal group led by Les Baxter, one-time band sideman turned vocal group director (and later mood-music maestro). I can find no evidence that United Artists ever released any of the songs, and Signature only put out four of them. I thought I had both 78s in my collection, but it turns out that I had two copies of the same disc. Good thing - one of them is cracked.

Fortunately, the one 78 I do have is most enjoyable, with Sullivan in excellent voice and singing stylishly, and Baxter's voices providing backing similar to the sound of Mel Tormé's Mel-Tones, who employed Les for a time. (It may in fact have been the Mel-Tones, who were appearing with Johnny White's orchestra, which is on the Signature disc as well.)

One side is Baxter's "Cowboy Jamboree," which is much better than the title portends, and a heartfelt reading of Sullivan's old radio theme, "Dream House," a pleasing ballad. The sound is excellent.

So to recap, today's download includes two radio transcriptions, the V-Disc of "Rum and Coca-Cola" and the Signature 78. More in Part 2.

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