Albert Von Tilzer

Albert Von Tilzer (born March 29, 1878 in Indianapolis , Indiana , † October 1, 1956 in Los Angeles , California ) was an American music producer .

He was born as Albert Gumm or Albert Gummblinsky, but, like his four brothers Harry, Jack, Julie and Will, took his mother's maiden name, Tilzer, and upgraded it with a "from" (which he apparently capitalized). The Tilzer brothers all ended up in the music store on Tin Pan Alley .

Tin Pan Alley

Albert grew up in Indianapolis and left high school early to work in his father's shoe business. His older brother Harry was already working in the music business at this point, and Albert received - from whom, is unknown - some music lessons. More or less self-taught, he then learned to play the piano and made it music director of a vaudeville troupe.

He moved to New York around 1900, and in 1902 he succeeded with Tell me That Beautiful Story , which was created in collaboration with Arthur J. Lamb , the first publication to gain greater fame. A year later, That's What the Daisy Said came out, a song that became very popular, and Albert founded the York Music Company with his brother Jack. You published z. B. Teasing , Lonesome , The Moon has Eyes on You and A Picnic For Two . Several successful productions were created in collaboration with Jack Norworth . Most famous was Take Me Out to the Ball Game from 1908, which is sung at baseball games to this day . In the following years he worked a lot with Lew Brown ; well-known results were Here Comes the Bride and Oh! By Jingo! . In 1915 Von Tilzer changed the name of his company to Broadway Music Corporation . One of the first publications under the new name was My Little Girl . During the First World War, propagandistic songs such as I May Be Gone for a Long, Long Time emerged . In the following years, due to the time of Prohibition , the topic of alcohol was also taken up, e.g. B. The Alcoholic Blues .

Von Tilzer worked increasingly for Broadway in the twenties: Honey Girl, The Gingham Girl, Adrienne, Three Doors and Burlesque date from this period.

After the musical taste had changed and the sound film had spread, Von Tilzer moved to California . The film Rainbow Over Broadway came out in 1933, Here Comes the Band in 1935 ; thereafter Albert Von Tilzer more or less withdrew into private life. His last song is I'm Praying to Saint Christopher (around 1950).

Web links

• Albert von Tilzer, Tin Pan Alley Pioneer ( Memento from October 24, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) (English)
• Albert Von Tilzer in nndb (English)