Some more studio politics

Now that the holidays are essentially over, hopefully I can get back to making more blog posts, since it's still been hard to find more interesting information to talk about. 

Recently while searching around for quartet records, I came across a very strange record that hadn't even a record number to be found. The performer listed in the announcement of the record was given by the familiar voice of this chap:

Steve Porter.

So the creation of this strange record seems to have been facilitated by Mr. Porter, though the leading voice in this so-called "Diamond Quartette" would most certainly be George Gaskin. This record is centered around a parody on the hit "I'd Leave my Happy Home for You", but on the record it is called "I'd Leave my Job to Vote for You"(haha). 

Porter's announcement begins with this, 

"republican campaign song..." 

after the announcement the lovely and unmistakable Ragged playing of Hylands lumbers through. 

Of course on this record, there's a mot more than just Hylands and that Quartette. It seems that in this quartette, there was Gaskin, Porter, Roger Harding, and George Hargraves. This witty parody is rallying for William McKinley's campaign in 1900, and throws William Jennings Bryan and the Democrats in the dust. Sorry, it's one of those records I can't share out of kind courtesy to the owner. 

So, in past digging, I had heard of such campaign songs and rallying done by a certain group at Columbia. Those "clan" members at Columbia(let's say Harding, Porter, Spencer, Gaskin, Emerson brothers, Hylands at this point in time) were most certainly prominent politicos in their time. And with that, it can further be proven by the first Phonoscope section I found regarding their prominence in the Republican Party of New York. 

I hate that these are so hard to read. What a politico Harding was! Harding did quite a lot of rallying. well there ya go, there's that exact group from that record I've described. It's amazing to see an actual written account regarding the group, and then later finding a rather "wild" record by the very same group. Of course when digging all of this up after listening to the record, this brought back the research I did on studio politics a little while ago. Also, while doing some random digging on something else last night, I stumbled across something else telling about a certain someone.

It's clear that I talk about Fred Hylands quite often, and finding new information on him has been very slim the past 6 months. One thing that's fascinating about Hylands however is that his political view and morals seemed to have changed somewhat after a certain point in time. This change was a gradual process, and it took a few years for him to transition. Luckily, that recording and Hylands' associations in the recording business can lead us to assume he was on the dominant Republican side of the Columbia staff(keep in mind not every one of the boys and few ladies was on the same political side). Despite Hylands' more popular relations, he(much like Scott Joplin believe it or not) around 1899-1900 began associating himself with some of the underground people's and political activists. By these terms, I mean Socialists. Those progressive outcasts that were dreaded by every factory and corporation, yes, Hylands began flirting with members of these groups. 

I've made it clear that Hylands switched to the other side by 1904-1905 by becoming a leader with the White Rats, but it seems that a few years before that he was pondering the ideas that his progressive friends told to him. I had assumed some of his actor friends like J. Grant Gibson would have swayed him over, but actually, come to find out it was someone else familiar. 

Well, this "ranting Bill" is Will J. Hardman. 

(cartoon by me!)

Just last night, I went digging for some early roots of Rag-Time on the Johns Hopkins sheet music website, but stumbled upon something fascinating. So what has Will J. Hardman to do with Hylands' socialist streak? Well it seems I found an indirect answer. 

(the date on this one is 1886)

There we go! It seems I found another source of influence for this transition. 

Of course! It makes so much sense now. Hardman was a gifted wordsmith, and now it seems that my hypothesis of his friendship with Hylands was in fact true! I had assumed by how many songs Hylands wrote with Hardman in such a short period of time that they had a bond outside of their music. So at a certain point, Hardman must have explained his world view to Hylands, and since Hylands was already somewhat fed up with Columbia, these new ideas from progressive Hardman must have been eyeopening. Unfortunately, I know nothing on Hardman at all, but because of the age of the other pieces I've dug up, he was most certainly older than Hylands, probably a decade older as far as I can guess. That would put him at around 38 by the time he met Hylands. Without a doubt, in 1900, Hylands was keeping his rebellion and disenchantment well hidden, since he had to participate in many of those political gatherings that Harding organized. By the time of the publishing firm with Spencer collapsed, Hylands was essentially outcasted from the tight pact that the Columbia staff had in the 1890's. With the shunning however, came Hylands' opportunity to go the way he desired, and head off to become a "Knight of Labor". We know his first try left all his old friends at Columbia a little frightened while also made him the laughingstock of Columbia and the Broadway community. This Socialist leaning left some of his old Columbia fellows concerned, and it must have made Len Spencer roll his eyes. 

Spencer after 1900 went a different direction as well, he was still a solid Roosevelt Republican, but his entering into the business aspect of vaudeville took something out of him. Spencer was unhappy with the progressives like Hylands and the other Union men, and this must have worsened over time when he had to deal with quite a few scrambles regarding union members and leaders. Of course, before his "falling out" with Hylands, Spencer would have seen bits of these progressives, as Frank P. Banta was part of a musicians' union, despite the contradictory nature of his employers. 

Since Hylands' relationship with Hardman was relatively close for enough time, it's likely that Hardman was part of Hylands' political transition. Another thing to note from that sheet music cover I found, notice the other titles listed under Hardman's name.

"For one day of Turkey there's six days of hash" 

well well Mr. Hardman, that's an amusing title certain. The words above the title are also interesting:

"an injury to one is the concern of all"

What a Socialist remark that is. Much like the cartoon above, I can envision Hylands being hypnotized by Hardman's ranting, since his lyrics were perfect with Hylands' weird often drug-induced Rag style.(think about the multiple meanings for "hash" in the title listed above). Keep in mind that Hardman's lyrics to Hylands' songs are very weird. They're strange even for the time period, and weirdly poetic all the same. 

here's that famous Berliner of Hylands' biggest hit 

Really listen to those lyrics, they're funny but really weird and have a few nearly unrelated lines. 

Of course one can wonder about how Hylands and Hardman became friends, and of course my mind goes directly to them both being den ramblers(essentially the opium equivalent to drinking buddies), who were both second grade musician/composers with unique talents. Hopefully, someone will dig something up on Hardman sometime soon, the suspense of learning little bits about him through his music is starting to get aggravating. 

Before I finish, I wanted to share the two record related finds I got for Christmas. The first thing I saw was an original Columbia box from 1897 or so, and when I opened the box, out popped a bunch of the soft fluff that record companies used to protect their records. I had always wanted one of those beautiful pre 1900 Columbia boxes, as they were colorful and elaborate, much like the late-1890's was in a nutshell. 

There's the pretty old box. 

Now the record on the inside was also really nice too, because it's Dan Quinn singing "put me off at Buffalo" from around 1898 or so. 

I'm looking forward to hearing the thing sometimes soon, as it will likely be a varied round of this take:

https://ia801401.us.archive.org/3/items/DanWQuinn/DanWQuinn-PutMeOffatBuffalo_64kb.mp3

There's the record and the box. 

And my gloved hand holding it correctly. 

So far I've heard three different takes of Quinn singing this song all on Columbia brown wax. I wonder how many rounds he made of it for Columbia anyway. 

Other than that fantastic gift, I also unwrapped a piece of Hylands published sheet music. He did not write it, but it's another Hylands, Spencer, and Yeager piece, which is always worth my time and money. Of course it's not one with Dan Quinn or Spencer on the cover, but it's about the next best thing. 

there ya go. 

Another Hylands Spencer and Yeager piece is always welcome in my sheet music collection. Any time that certain lady is on a Hylands piece is always interesting to me. 

So I've seen her on three Hylands sheets now...the number seems to keep increasing, as does the evidence of a little fling there. I learned somewhat recently that she divorced her husband in 1900, the year that this piece was published with her picture on it. The charges of the divorce were impropriety. It's very tantalizing to read this, and it legitimately shocked me when I saw it. Maybe sometime I'll do a post on what evidence I have about this tantalizing coincidence....

Anyway...

Hope you all had an all-right holiday season!

Character Studies--- Harry Spencer(1875-1946)

Harry Spencer, the Spencer who was always Len's shadow. 

Many record nerds forget about Len's younger brother Harry,  which is many ways is unfortunate, but does make some sense. He only had one talent, dramatic recitations, not singing. All the singing was left to Len. Harry was damn good at recitations however, and in some ways, he had a voice more fit for doing more dramatized monologues than Len. They both had haunting voices, that were frightening to some who heard them. Harry's voice, being darker and deeper certainly was the more frightening one. Harry could never do those records intended for the Spencer girls that Len did in the late-1890's. Harry had just as strong a love for the phonograph as his brother Len, but never was able to get the love and praise that Len received from his records. Harry had even more of an engineering mindset than Len did, and that's really saying quite a heap, as Len was always said to have been the one who took things from Columbia when they started and was later making chimes records in the churches late at night. Harry knew the technical end of the recording sessions better than anyone did, which is why he was such a great announcer and sound effects man. He remained one of Columbia's best exhibitors for many years, doing practically all of their nightly exhibitions from 1896 to 1901. Harry was a sort of behind-the-scenes genius at Columbia, fixing all the little things in the technology of the studio, and keeping the machines running finely as often as they could be, and he did this for many years, and for thousands of surviving records. 


Harry was the more handsome of the Spencer boys. Many of the ladies and girls that came to the exhibitions looked more toward Harry than Len, as Len was rather frightening sometimes, but Harry, with a sutler face, was easier on the eyes. Harry was not as tall as Len, and had a little more of a plumpness to him, contrasted with Len with that ridiculously tall stature and the ancient Roman physique. Harry's voice was darker than Len's, more penetrating, and certainly haunting. The few times that he was seen with that wife of his, they could easily have been mistaken for Len and Eliza(that was his wife's name). His wife was Gazella, a true Italian dame, with skin more of an Olive tone than pale white, and a long nose, with a shapely figure. When the Spencer's all came to those dinners and parties that were hosted by the Emerson's and Easton's, Harry was much more quiet than Len and his well-respected mother Sarah. Harry hadn't the best social skills, as he was always thinking technically, whereas Len was getting drunk and talking to everyone with full passion and contentment in his voice and words. Gazella did much of the talking for Harry, as many times she would introduce him to new people for him, especially when Len was running that publishing firm with Freddy Hylands. So many new names were dropped in the business in that short period of time, and Harry was only just on the edge of all of that madness. He remained a popular monologists, who was very great at imitating famous political figures. In 1901, Harry was the only successful recording artist to imitate William McKinley not long after he was assassinated. Spencer must have studied the president's speech very closely, probably going to many of his speeches, and probably attended his inauguration parade in 1897.  It must not have been too hard for him, as McKinley was from Ohio, much like the Spencer's were, so that allowed for some immediate likeness when the people hear the record by Spencer. They purposely didn't list the artist on the label when the Climax record was sold in 1901, as it fooled most of the people who heard it, they assumed it was president McKinley shortly before he was shot, but it was actually the voice of Harry Spencer. Harry worked prominently in the business for another 6 years or so, after that living in various boardinghouses with Gazella, not really doing nearly as much as Len was. Harry was just Len's "first servant" if you will, as that Lyceum needed the best help it could get, so Harry was running the thing under Len and his top advisors. He primarily ran the lyceum with his brother until Len croaked in 1914. Harry was probably doing some technical work when he heard from one of his nieces that Len had collapsed on his desk and died. Harry was then forced to run the business, be since he hadn't the social ability and leadership, the business soon fell by the middle of 1915. If Len had known that his whole vaudeville empire had crashed and burned only a few months after he died, he would have gotten into a "fight-to-the-death" with Harry, and probably would have ended up terribly hurting his brother, just from his anger with this. Harry completely left the music business by 1920, from there just living from boardinghouse to boardinghouse with Gazella, telling wild old tales of the old recording business to the other boarders and people he met. His mental health had always been unstable, and since he was so quiet and antisocial, many of the people around him assumed something was not completely right about him, but no one knew what could have been the problem, if there was any. This especially began to show after Len's death, it was a slow downhill drop, but it was getting lesser with every year that passed by. He worked occasional jobs here and there, all up until the second World War, where he was still living as a boarder with Gazella, but by the early 40's, she had died, which was a terrible blow to him. This is where he fell into the abyss, he was sent to a mental asylum in the early 40's, where he did nothing but tell crazy stories, and weep and whine for Len or Gazella. That's all he did there until he died in 1946, over 30 years after Len passed. It's a terrible and hard tale to tell, as he would have been a wonderful source of information about early recording, but he had deteriorated far too much to get a reasonable amount of information from him. Or to get anything out of him, since he was so introverted.

To close off, here is one of his most haunting records, from 1903:
http://cylinders.library.ucsb.edu/search.php?queryType=@attr+1=1020&num=1&start=1&query=cylinder2913

I hope you enjoyed this!