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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Vittorio Gui Conducts Haydn and Mozart

Just about 10 years ago I offered my transfer of this recording, with the Italian conductor Vittorio Gui (1885-1975) leading 1953 performances of Haydn and Mozart symphonies. Recently I pulled out that transfer, but was none too happy with what I had wrought back then. So I found the record and had another go at it. Today's post is the result.

Gui is remembered primarily as an opera conductor because many if not most of his commercial recordings were of opera. Even on this LP, he is leading an opera ensemble, the Glyndeborne Festival Orchestra. Then again, the Glyndeborne band was just another name for the Royal Philharmonic. It appeared under the Glyndeborne banner because Gui was the music director at that festival, where he held sway from 1951-63. He also founded the Maggio Musicale Fiorentino in 1933.

These are fine performances, especially of the Haydn "Il Distratto" symphony. The young Andrew Porter, writing in The Gramophone, was particularly taken with the Haydn, less so by the Mozart Symphony No. 38, which he downgraded for some untidy ensemble and a sluggish first movement. His review is in the download, along with the HMV ad for the LP (see below). Both symphonies are well recorded, with the Haydn being particularly sonorous. My transfer is from a U.S. pressing issued by RCA Victor.

I have a few other Gui recordings that I will be presenting later on - another Mozart-Haydn pairing made during the same 1953 sessions, and a Wagner set from Florence, also recorded that year.

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HMV's offerings for March 1954 - click to enlarge

Louis Alter's Jewels from Cartier

Louis Alter is known primarily for his "Manhattan Serenade," popularized by Paul Whiteman, and for writing the music for such standards as "Nina Never Knew," "My Kinda Love," "You Turned the Tables on Me" and "Do You Know What It Means to Miss New Orleans."

Today's post - courtesy of our great friend Ernie - captures Alter's 1953 suite "Jewels from Cartier," as released in 1956 on an RCA Victor LP. The artists involved are Claude Yvoire and his Orchestra, who do very well by the lush material that Alter has provided.

Yvoire was for many years a conductor for Radio-Genève, so it seems likely that this is a Swiss ensemble we are hearing. They are very well recorded, and Ernie's transfer is excellent.

Louis Alter

As you might have guessed, Alter has named each number in his suite after a Cartier jewel, not that there is any particularly significance to the titles, which for the most part could have been assigned at random for all the difference it makes sonically. The notes don't tell us whether Cartier commissioned the suite, but again, it seems likely.

Those of you who have downloaded my post of Alter's album of Manhattan may be expecting similar music, but instead you will hear light music that could have been written by any number of artists working in that genre at the time. Only "Cat's Eye in the Night" sounds like it is from the same pen as "Manhattan Serenade." Not that the music isn't enjoyable - a more pleasant half-hour would be hard to imagine.

Thanks again, Ernie!

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Sylvia Marlowe Plays Falla, Surinach and Rieti

After my recent post of harpsichordist Sylvia Marlowe playing the music of Vittorio Rieti, friend of the blog centuri asked if I had her recording of the Falla Harpsichord Concerto.

I do, indeed, and it is the centerpiece of this 1955 Capitol LP. Also on the record are Carlos Surinach's "Tientos" and the second of Marlowe's three traversals of Rieti's Partita.

Sylvia Marlowe

Marlowe is accompanied by the Concert Arts Players. "Concert Arts" was a nom de disque that Capitol hung on a variety of studio ensembles in the 1950s. I haven't been able to track down any further information about the musicians. The lack of credit seems ungenerous on the part of Capitol and perhaps Marlowe - these are all chamber works. The Falla is scored for six instruments, the Rieti for seven and the Surinach only three!

Regardless, it is a good record. The Falla is widely considered a masterpiece and the beguiling Rieti work is here even more persuasive than in the 1966 recording I posted not long ago. If I don't much care for the overbearing timps in "Tientos," it is a relatively brief work. (It seems to me that I also own Surinach's own recording of this piece, made in the same year for M-G-M.)

As I mentioned in my earlier Marlowe post, she specialized in contemporary music as much as the more often-heard baroque repertoire for the harpsichord. She also ventured into the realm of popular music - earlier in her career she made a living as a cabaret and radio attraction, and her first records were of popular music. Earlier this week I posted two boogie-woogie pieces that she borrowed from the repertoire of pianist Meade "Lux" Lewis, from a 78 dating from about a decade before this LP. Boogie on down to my other blog for those sides.

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Introducing Johnny Costa

André Previn's recent death reminded me that I had intended to present the first LP by another pianist strongly influenced by Art Tatum - Johnny Costa.

Costa's wizardry has appeared on this blog before, via a 1955 Coral LP, available here in a newly remastered version.

That Coral album dates from July 1955; this present record comes from February of the same year and was issued by Savoy. It's in the 10-inch format, although Savoy put it out later as a 12-incher.

Costa's first instrument was the accordion

My previous post tells you something of Costa's background. Here, let me just mention that he was the music director of Mister Rogers' Neighborhood for nearly 30 years until Costa's death in 1996. That show was produced in Pittsburgh, where both Costa and Fred Rogers spent most of their careers. Costa's early LPs, however, date from his time in New York, where this record was taped. His rhythm section on the date included the well-known bassist Gene Ramey and drummer Kenny Clarke.

I know that many of you enjoy André Previn's early recordings and those of Cy Coleman, both of whom play in a similar style. I can almost guarantee that you will like Johnny Costa as well.

I want to mention that my vintage copy of the LP was in deplorable shape - it sounded like it was recorded under a tin roof in a hail storm. But after some restoration, the sonics are good, save some slight discoloration on the piano tone. I've included a brief excerpt from the unrestored transfer for those who want to hear where I began.

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Previn Plays Hindemith, Barber and Martin

André Previn, who died this week, was a thoroughly remarkable musician. Several of his pop and jazz recordings have appeared here over the years:

• His astonishing early jazz recordings from 1947-50, made while he was still a teenager.

• His wonderfully eclectic score for one of the three segments in Gene Kelly's film, Invitation to the Dance. Previn manages to wedge in echoes of Britten, Khachaturian, Gershwin, Kenton, blues piano, salon music, mood music and much more.

• A set of songs written with his then-wife, Dory Langdon Previn, and performed by the superb jazz duo, Jackie and Roy.

• His pop success, the Secret Songs for Young Lovers LP, with its hit song, "Like Young," all featuring his piano and backing by David Rose.

For some reason, I've never featured Previn in the classical repertoire, and now, sadly, will need to do so posthumously.

Previn in 1961

The beginning of Previn's classical recording career is sometimes marked by his Britten/Copland orchestral session in St. Louis on March 25, 1963. But his recordings as classical pianist date back to the early 1950s, when he did a series of short works for RCA Victor. As far as I can determine, his next outing was a duo-piano Mozart record with Lukas Foss for Decca in 1956. In March 1960, Kostelanetz engaged him as soloist in two Gershwin works. Then, in November of that year, Previn taped the program for US Columbia that I'm presenting today.

Rather than sticking to the standard repertoire, Previn took on three works by living composers dating from the preceding 25 years - Paul Hindemith's Piano Sonata No. 3 from 1936, Samuel Barber's Excursions from 1944, and Frank Martin's Prelude No. 7 from 1948.

Previn plays these as naturally as he did the Art Tatum-like pieces that he recorded for RCA Victor a decade earlier. The Hindemith is something of a neo-baroque work. Barber's Excursions are his closest approach to writing in the Americana style that was popular in the 1940s. Surprisingly, Previn seems a little too chaste in his approach to this music. Martin's music is not to my taste, and this dour Prelude did little to change my mind.

The Hindemith was recorded on November 3, 1960; the Barber and Martin on November 29, 1960, all at Radio Recorders, Hollywood. While the LP was issued in stereo, this transfer is from my mono copy. The sound is good, though. I'm not sure what the circuit board graphic on the cover is supposed to represent.

Much or all of Previn's orchestral output has been reissued. I'll have to search around to see if I can locate something in my collection that isn't in print.

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Mac Wiseman - 'Tis Sweet to Be Remembered

It's been a week for notable deaths in the music world. I will be paying tribute to the remarkable André Previn soon, but before I do, I want to mention the passing of the beloved bluegrass musician Mac Wiseman, whose career dates to the early days of the genre.

Born in 1925 in north central Virginia, early in his career Wiseman had been a sideman for Molly O'Day, then a founding member of Flatt & Scruggs' Foggy Mountain Boys and a member of Bill Monroe's Blue Grass Boys. This particular record captures Wiseman as a fledgling solo artist. He was one of Dot Records' first signings, and the album gathers 12 of his 1951-54 singles for that company.

Wiseman's high, clear voice was perfectly suited to the bluegrass genre, as is shown in his first record, "'Tis Sweet to Be Remembered," his 1951 take on a sentimental tune from 1902.

1953 Billboard ad touting many of the songs on this LP

Wiseman always was willing to try his hand at material from other types of music, and later in his career would chafe at being typed as a bluegrass artist. This compilation is squarely in the bluegrass realm, however, even though he brings in "Love Letters in the Sand," a 1931 pop song based on an 1881 melody. Wiseman's New York Times obituary states that his version of "Love Letters" was a cover of Pat Boone's hit record, but the opposite is true. Wiseman's dates from 1953, Boone's from 1957. Both were on Dot Records.

Wiseman recorded a great many LPs, and the songs on this 1957 compilation were later anthologized a number of times. I doubt, however, that many readers of this blog will be familiar with his artistry, so I wanted to bring him to your attention.

The recorded sound is good, although the pitch was quite sharp on several songs, which I have adjusted. My guess is that Dot increased the speed of some singles to give Wiseman even more of the high lonesome sound that is supposed to characterize bluegrass music.

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