Tempelhof Swing

Wer Lust hat kann mit uns am Ostermontag, 25 April, auf dem Tempelhofer Feld Swing tanzen. Swingtanzbare Musik kommt direkt vom Plattenteller.  Decken, Getränke und Verpflegung bitte mitbringen. Wenn ihr am Eingang Columbiadamm auf  Kreidezeichen auf dem Boden achtet,  findet ihr uns leicht.

Berlin Tempelhof Airport has a long history starting in 1923. In 1933 Berlin´s first concentration camp was established in this place. After Tempelhof Airport was massively reconstructed in 1936 by the Nazi governement, thousands of forced laborers worked there in air armament. Of course Tempelhof was also the base of the legendary  Berlin Airlift, the Allied mission to fly food and supplies to blockaded West Berlin in 1948-1949. The airport closed in 2008. Today it is a public park.

We´ll be dancing in Tempelhof park on Easter monday. To commemorate the US history of  the airport, here´s a 45 used for radio broadcasts. Betty Madigan together with Dick Hyman and his band advertise for WAF – Women in the Air Force.

“So rememer young ladies: if the life of the WAF appeals to you, talk with your local Air Force recruiter. Get in on the ground floor of the space age!”

BETTY MADIGAN WITH DICK HYMAN AND HIS BAND, Just Like Sam/  Candy, 1958

BETTY MADIGAN WITH DICK HYMAN AND HIS BAND, I`ll Never Say Never Again/  Tears ON My Pillow, 1958

CARLO GENOVESI, Baby Luna, 1960

One of the best things about doing a music blog -  apart from feedback from readers and artists involved with the records -  is when I get sent contributions from readers. This happy little tune and nice scan, I got via email from Frank from Milano, Italy.

This  is what he wrote:

Your blog is delicious: even if  I can’t understand the words in the records, the music is fabulous!
I love the 50s, and somewhat I’m a collector too: I’m interested mainly in Italian rock’n’roll of the 50s, that except for some names (Celentano amongst all), the rest is pretty obscure. I’d like to donate you a song taken from a flexi-disc.
The year is 1960, the guy who sings is named Carlo Genovesi (I don’t know if he made other records after this) and the song is called “Baby Luna”, and it sounds pretty well.
The same song was performed by a more famous Italian singer the year before, Bruno Martino (who co-wrote this song), and it was more uptempo than this version.

This flexi came along with a puzzle book called Nuova Enigmistica Tascabile, NET, and it was out every Saturday between the ‘50s and ‘60s.

Enjoy!

Thanks a lot for taking the time to record and scan this record.

Mille grazie, Franco!

CARLO GENOVESI, Baby Luna, 1960

Frank is also drumming in the great western swing/rockabilly band The Starliters, who will be playing in Berlin on Saturday, May 14th at the Roadrunners Club. I´ll definetely be heading over to the Roadrunners Club! If you´re into rockabilly, come and see The Starliters!

JACK DIÉVAL ET SON SEPTUOR, Rock´n´Roll Ruby, 1956

Despite the last two rainy days, springtime is in full swing here in Berlin, so I´d like to celebrate with some swinging early french rock´n´roll.  No idea how this turned up in Prague, but that´s where I  bought this 45 a couple of years ago. Great dual vocals by Maria Velasco and Jean-Pierre Sasson, backed by swing jazz veteran Jaques Diéval!

JACK DIÉVAL ET SON SEPTUOR, Rock´n´Roll Ruby, 1956

JACK DIÉVAL ET SON SEPTUOR, Church Bells May Ring (Bing! Bang! Rock!), 1956

LUISE MARTINI, Die Brieftaschen-Anni, 1957

Luise Martini (born 1931) is an Austrian actress. In 1957 she started co-hosting the popular daily radio-show Autofahrer unterwegs (car drivers on the way). The one-hour show ran for 42 years and featured music, traffic reports and notification requests for travellers on the road. These requests,  searching for travellers when a close relative at home was seriously ill or dead, are still being broadcasted all over Europe during summer vacation.  Of course in the past they were of greater importance. Before cellphones, once you were travelling, you were gone.

In the swinging Brieftaschen-Anni (wallet-Anni), sung in Austrian dialect, Luise Martini is telling the humorous story of Anni, a professional thief who “doesn´t like boogie, be-bop and rock´n´roll, because it makes stealing impossible when you´re twirling up in the air”.

LUISE MARTINI, Die Brieftaschen-Anni, 1957

LUISE MARTINI, Autofahrer unterwegs, 1957

MONA BAPTISTE, Die Mädchen aus de Mambo-Bar, 1959

The story of  Afro Carribean artists living and working in Germany, like Billy Mo, Roberto Blanco and Mona Baptiste has not been written yet.  At least I´ve never seen the book. Even though they were mostly offered Schlager material, sounds the conservative German audience was used to, these artists managed to leave a legacy of music in the post-war era that contributed greatly in making German culture much more varied and less insulated.

Mona Baptiste, born in Trinidad in 1928, had already  established herself as a blues singer, when she arrived in London in 1948. In the subsequent years she worked with Cab Kaye in London and Stephane Grapelli in Paris. In 1953 she got her first contract with Polydor in Germany and recorded and performed together with Werner Müller and later with Bert Kämpfert. Starting in 1954 she appeared in seven German films in the 50s. Mona Baptiste continued to work into the 70s. She died in 1993 in Krefeld, Germany.

This song is the title track to the film  Mädchen für die Mambo-Bar from 1959. Last year I posted Heiße Musik, another song from the film here. Bear Family Records has reissued Mona Baptiste´s early 50s material on the LP Es liegt was in der Luft and these two tracks on their great all-girl CD compilation Vor Kurven wird gewarnt.

MONA BAPTISTE, Die Mädchen aus der Mambo-Bar, 1959

MONA BAPTISTE, Boy, komm und küß mich, 1959

TANZ-ORCHESTER, Manches “Nein” heißt “Vielleicht”, 1931

Last week, while searching for German postwar swing records in a thrift store I came across these smaller 8 inch records. I´m not into tango music and I´m not going to start collecting records from the 1930s, but the names of the songs made me curious. The records are in poor condition -  at least they were cheap, only  1 euro. At home I was happy to find out that these tangos are quite  light-hearted, even funny. The song Manches “Nein” heißt “Vielleicht” suggests that sometimes “no” means “maybe”, because a lady who cares about her outward appearance is shy about the “yes”.

Ralph  Benatzky, who wrote the song, became  famous for his musicals that combined more traditional with new 1920s jazz rhythms. His most famous play “Im weißen Rössl” (1930) was banned by the nazis because of its jewish co-authors and marked as “enartet” because it made fun of traditional values and because of  a saucy bathing scene. Benatzky left Berlin in 1932,  first to Switzerland and later for Hollywood.

TANZ-ORCHESTER MIT REFRAINGESANG, Manch “Nein” heisst “Vielleicht”, 1931

„ Manches „Nein“ heißt „Vielleicht“/ Und „Vielleicht“ heißt „Gewiss“, oder so/ Denn die Dame von Welt, die auf´s Äußere hält, bis auf da mit dem „Ja“/ Man kaschiert sein Gefühl, teils aus Scheu, teils kokett, oder so/  Kurz, in dem Augenblick, macht der Ton die Musik“

Tri -Ergon, a system to record sound directly on film, was invented in Berlin in 1919. Fox Movietone later used it among other sytems for one of  the first talking films, Friedrich Wihelm Murnau´s Sunrise (1927). The Tri-Ergon record label produced a wide variety of records in the 20s and early 30s. The smaller 8 inch records were the cheapos.

TANZ -ORCHESTER MIT REFRAINGESANG, Ich hab´ kein Herz seit 24 Stunden, 1931

Pictures from a program of  the Berlin Wintergarten music hall from May 1931, that  I bought some years ago in a thrift store. Actually it´s a small mgazine filled with photos and little articles about Berlin nightlife. The cover and one more illustration are signed by BALKIE,  a cartoonist the Internet has no knowledge of. I really like his style and wish I could find more information about the artist.

ARGENTINISCHE TANGO-KAPELLE, Heut tanz´ ich nur mit dir, 1930

On more cheap 8 inch tango record, this one is on the Derby label. The local Berlin Derby label was an economy label that also produced  regular 10 inch records. Before I  “researched” a bit on the Internet, I didn´t know economy labels existed in the 1920s. But of course the recording industry was already huge,  so of course some businesses tried to sell cheaper versions of  hit records.

As was common practice with cheapo labels, the names of the artists didn´t appear on the labels but often well-known artists were playing on the recordings.  The musicians of the “Argentinean Tango Band” were most likely  local Berliners. The original of Heut tanz´ ich nur mit dir (today I´ll only dance with you) was written by famous Berlin composer  Will Meisel.

ARGENTINISCHE TANGO-KAPELLE, Heut tanz´ ich nur mit dir, 1930

ARGENTINISCHE TANGO-KAPELLE, Auf einer kleinen Bank im Park, 1930

A single page probably from another program, that I “found” in the May 1931 Wintergarten program, with a poem by Erich Kästner and nice photo of  contortionist Barbara La May.

HEINRICH RIETHMÜLLER TANZORCHESTER, Top-Light, 1959

Over the past month I´ve really gotten into 78rpm records and swing music. Suddenly the less than 50 shellac records I´ve  recently accumulated are much more exiting to me than the thousands of 45s I have in my collection. Also more exiting than the boxes I´ve filled with odd and never re-released 45s for this blog.

So what do I post next? More scratchy 78s? Not until I find a better way of recording them. As much as I like to listen to the shellac records on my record player, so far the results of my digitizing are painful to listen to.  While searching in my collection for something to get me at least a little bit inspired I found these records. They make a transition from the early to the late 50s. From swing on 78rpm to swing on 45.

Some nice up-tempo swing music on Top-Light by Heinrich Riethmüller and his orchestra from an advertisement record for the film “Elektroschiffe – Voll voraus” (full ahead) produced by the AEG company, proudly showing all of the electrical equipment on the electric-diesel ship “Wappen von Hamburg”. A quick look at Wikipedia revealed that it is currently being renovated in San Fransisco, California. The new owners even made a cool blog about the history of the vessel.

HEINRICH RIETHMÜLLER TANZORCHESTER, Top-Light, 1959

HEINRICH RIETHMÜLLER TANZORCHESTER, Voll voraus!, 1959

HEINRICH RIETMÜLLER & DAS CORNEL-QUINTETT, Winke Winke, 1950

Heinrich Rietmüller was born in 1921 in Berlin and after studying music, got his first professional job right after the war, playing piano in the Radio Berlin Tanzorchester. On this Amiga recording he can be heard backing the Cornel-Quartett playing the Wurlitzer electric piano.

The song was originally written by Michael Jary for the film “Die dritte von rechts” from 1950,  a spectacle picture most notable for Laya Raki´s taped nipples.

HEINRICH RIETMÜLLER & DAS CORNEL-QUINTETT, Winke Winke, 1950

HEINRICH RIETHMÜLLER, Grüne Welle, 1959

In the 1970s Heinrich Riethmüller (1921-2006) got to be known by millions of Germans when he appeared regularly on television in the Dalli Dalli quiz show. Without noticing  German kids were also familiar with Riethmüller because he was responsible for directing many  German soundtracks and voiceovers of Disney films.

As indicated on the back of the sleeve Heinrich Riethmüller recorded at least seven more 45s for the Austrian Amadeo label. He can be heard playing the electric piano on these two automobile related songs: Grüne Welle (A lucky streak of being given the green light at crossings) and Romanze für 12PS (PS = horsepower, so I guess it´s veeeery slow romance).

HEINRICH RIETHMÜLLER UND SEINE SOLISTEN, Grüne Welle, 1959

HEINRICH RIETHMÜLLER UND SEINE SOLISTEN, Romanze für 12PS, 1959

GOLDY UND PETER DE VRIES, Mich zieht´s zurück nach Hawaii, 1949

This week more shellac records: Danish rumba-swing, Danish western-swing and Dutch Hawaiian-swing sung in German.

I love this song! It´s schmaltzy and it is a little irritating when they sing about “das schöne Hula-Mädchen mit dem  rabenschwarzen Haar” (the pretty hula girl with the pitch black hair), but compared to the majority of German  Hawaiian music, this doesn´t sound so damn German.  Because it isn´t. The Dutch duo Goldy and Peter de Vries, backed by the  Horst Wende Trio, recorded in the ruins of Hamburg.

This is a 78rpm record that I bought two weeks ago in a local Berlin thrift store for 50 cents….

GOLDY UND PETER DE VRIES, Mich zieht´s zurück nach Hawaii, 1949

Peter de Vries is mentioned in this 1951 article about some Kids in cowboy gear posing in the ruins near the Cologne Cathedral. Apparently he was quite famous for his cowboy songs in the early 50s.

Indianer gingen – Cowboys blieben.

Geschäfte für Scherzartkel, die früher an kleine Kunden Indianer-Kopfschmuck verkauften, verdanken heute dem Cowboy-Darsteller William Boyd, der als “Hopalong Cassidy” in zahlreichen Filmen die Kinder in aller Welt begeistert, ungeahnten Umsatz. In Deutschland half der Schlagersänger Peter de Vries, die Cowboys und ihre Lieder populär zu machen. (Neue Illustrierte, Köln 1951)

EDDIE RUSSELL, Cowboyens Sang, 1947

For some reason the trift store, where I bought most of the 78rpm records, also had a lot of Danish records. Out of curiosity I bought a bunch of them, but most of them turned out to be pretty boring.

Not this one. Although sung in Danish, and nowhere as fast as the original “Blazin´The Trail To My Home” written by Teddy Powell and recorded in 1945 by Gene Autry, Eddie Russell´s version is a pretty close approximation of American western swing music. Or at least much closer than every German Cowboy song I have ever heard.

Now if I only found a cheap way of getting rid of the awful clicks and hisses. This record cost 50 cents.

EDDIE RUSSELL, Cowboyens Sang, 1949

EDDIE RUSSELL, The Last Round-Up, 1949

VALDEMAR DAVIDS, Managua Nicaragua, 1947

Managua, Nicaragua was first recorded by Freddy Martin´s orchestra and reached #1 on the Billboard charts in 1947. Rita Paul, backed by Walter Dobschinski and his Swingband, did a version sung in English for the Amiga label in 1948. I love Rita Paul but this Danish version, sung by Valdemar Davids, is much better. Danish just sounds much funnier and the fast swinging groove gets me on my feet every time.

VALDEMAR DAVIDS, Managua, Nicaragua, 1947

This is a Wikipedia photo of Danish bandleader Teddy Petersen (1892-1991) and his orchestra, probably at restaurant Wivex at Tivoli in Copenhagen in 1941. Petersen is standing to the far left with violin.

Teddy Petersen also appears in this 1941 film. The showgirls in the silky hot pants arguing with the lady toward the end of the film almost made me pee my pants:

Just for comparison, this is Freddy Martin´s original version of  Managua, Nicaragua:

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CORNEL-TRIO, Verlieb´ dich nicht am Nordpol, 1951

Recently I bought a stack of 78 rpm records and have really fallen in love with some of the tunes I “found” on them.  They were 50 cents a piece, so they are not in good shape but I still played some of them in our last radio show and even played them at a little  DJ Trümmerswing dance recently. The German swing records went over surprisingly well with the dancers.

I know, there are many serious German record collectors out there who know much more about 78rpm records than I do, but then again, there are no German music-bloggers that write about them.  So I might as well write what I know.

These records and artists were successful locally, but mostly went unnoticed in the rest of the world. Unless you know German, you will still not find much info about them today.  Most of these songs have been re-issued on CD, but I don´t think the quality of my records should hurt anybody´s business. There are fine re-issues of  Rita Paul, Peter Cornehlsen & the Cornel-Trio and Ilja Glusgal available. Even the most blatent CD-rip-off-blogs claim it, but in this case I really mean it: if you like these tunes,  despite the horrible quality of my recordings, go out and buy the CDs.

“Verlieb´ dich nicht am Nordpol” by Peter Cornehlsen and his Cornel-Trio  (also known as the Corni-Trio, Cornel-Quartett, Cornel-Quintett und Coronels) backed by Kurt Henkels and his orchestra, has been one of my new favourites recently. Kurt Henkels was Eastern-Germany´s king of swing.  The song was originally written by Michael Jary for the 1951 film “Die verschleierte Maja” (The Veiled Lady), one of the first big (West-) German musical production after the war.

“Don´t fall in love at the North Pole, because it will even freeze hot love!”

CORNEL-TRIO, Verlieb´ dich nicht am Nordpol, 1951

I found some photos of the movie in a article in Neue Illustrierte newspaper Nr. 26, June 6, 1951:

Filmed in Hamburg.

 

ILJA GLUSGAL, Wenn der Ki-, wenn der Ka-, wenn der Kuß nicht wär, 1949

German pop music probably never sounded more American than in the years right after WWII. American style swing music was discouraged in Nazi-Germany, surpassing the censors only when disguised as “Deutsche Tanzmusik”. Lots of  “German Swing Music” was published in Nazi-Germany, but nothing really wild was recorded until after the war, stuff like Kurt Henkels ultra-fast Swing Heil from 1949.  But by the mid-50s the schmaltzy “Heimat music” took over, killed most of the swing music and suger-coated the timid attempts to play  rock´n´roll  in Germany.

This might not be the really wild and fast type of swing music, but German music never got to be more swingin´ than Ilja Glusgal backed by Walter Dobschinski and his orchestra.

“Without the ke-, ka-, kiss, what would couples do?”

ILJA GLUSGAL, Wenn der Ki-, wenn der Ka-, wenn der Kuß nicht wär, 1949

From the same year, this picture from Paprika magazine, published in Berlin. The young dream girl of 1949:

ILJA GLUSGAL, Sensation am Broadway, 1951

Ilja Glusgal often performed with the Cornel-Trio. Here, backed by Walter Dobschinski and the Tanzkapelle des Berliner Rundfunks, he´s covering Doris Day´s 1951 hit record Lullaby Of Broadway. From the movie of the same title, starring Doris Day and Gene Nelson.

The lyrics in the Doris Day´s version are rather light hearted:

The band begins to go to town/ And everyone goes crazy/ You rock-a-bye your baby round/ ‘Til everything gets hazy/ Hush-a-bye, I’ll buy you this and that/ You hear a daddy saying/ And baby goes home to her flat/ To sleep all day

The German version of the song by Ilja Glusgal tells a differnt story:

In New York  at midnight on Broadway/  There´s a sensation on Broadway/ The crowd is captivated, the police is helpless: A naked girl!/ Everybody is shouting: Sweet Baby! Liebling, you´re adorable!/ He wants so protect her and take her home/  She says: “No way,  I have to stand here without a dress – I´m advertizing for lingerie!”

Yea, I know the recording sounds awful, but that´s the condition my copy is in…

ILJA GLUSGAL, Sensation am Broadway, 1951

From roughly the same period, some images from Paprika magazine Nr.7, 1949. The magazine combined a variety of  pin-up photos, cartoons and essays.

BULLY BUHLAN, Ein Mann mit knarrenden Schuhen, 1948

Today only old people might remember his name, but in the late 40s and early 50s Bully Buhlan was Germany´s most popular pop singer and Berlin´s most famous son.

“Ein Mann mit knarrenden  Schuhen” – a man with squeaky shoes – explains why a couple will have a perfect marriage, because the wife will always know when her husband is approaching. The squeaky shoes are really practical, especially when she´s with another man…

BULLY BUHLAN, Ein Mann mit knarrenden Schuhen, 1948

Dutch reader Ron suggested I post some of the b-sides. This one I acctually  ignored and never listened to,  because the title sounded like boring Schlager music. Stupid. The Cornel Trio is almost all swingin´:

CORNEL-TRIO, Die Rose vom Wörther See, 1948

From a British “Men Only” magazine from 1952:

Non-squeaky crepe soles were the rage in the early 50s:

I love these little hand drawn ads. Graphic designers still knew how to draw:

Hand drawn lettering and cartoon in this ad:

RITA PAUL, Deine Klingel ist kaputt, 1950

A while back I posted Rita Paul´s 1949 swinging scat-song  “Du hast ja keine Ahnung” on the West-Berlin  Regina label, the A-side to  “Swing Heil” by Kurt Henkels Tanzorchester. Like Bully Buhlan, who often accompanied her, Rita Paul had recording contracts with both the East-German Amiga label and  the West-German Polydor label.

A nice German post-war swing tune, Rita Paul and the Cornel Trio singing: “Your doorbell is not working. So why don´t you try shouting!”

RITA PAUL, Deine Klingel ist kaputt, 1950

Doorbell? What doorbell? From a 1951 newspaper article: Germany´s biggest problem: building appartements. The family on the picture was still living in the basement below the ruins. The woman is meeting with a man from the housing office. The needy family hopes for a new two-bed appartement with a monthly rent of 23,80 Deutschmarks.

CORNEL-TRIO, Ein verliebter kleiner Affe, 1955

The lovely Cornel-Trio led by Peter Cornehlsen with a cute swinging song about a little monkey who is in love with a giraffe.

CORNEL-TRIO, Ein verliebter kleiner Affe, 1955

WERNER HASS, Heut´ spielt der Willi, 1956

In the late 4os and early 50s the Amiga label released countless great swing records but by 1953 the label was state-owned. That´s why only a handful of rock´n´roll songs were recorded for the Amiga label in the 1950s – this is one of them. Werner Hass managed to record cool German versions of Shake Rattle And Roll (Simsalabim) and See You Later Alligator (Mr. Patton aus Manhattan) but eventually his rockin´proved too much for the commies. In 1959 he was banned from performing and left Eastern Germany. Werner Hass continued to record in Western Germany into the 70s.

Backed by swinging Kurt Henkels and the Rundfunk Tanzorchester Leipzig:

WERNER HASS, Heut´ spielt der Willi, 1956

Some wild swing dance aerials from a British “Men Only” magazine from 1952.