Chauncey Olcott

Actor Chauncey Olcott, 1896, photo by WM Morrison

Chauncey Olcott (born July 21, 1858 as John Chancellor Olcott in Buffalo , † March 18, 1932 in Monte-Carlo ) was an American stage actor, songwriter and singer.

Life

Olcott was born in Buffalo, New York . His mother Margaret Doyle was born in Killeagh in Ireland Cork .

In the early years of his career, Olcott sang in minstrel shows before studying singing in London in the 1880s. Lillian Russell played an important role in making him a Broadway star. When producer Augustus Pitou approached him in 1893 whether he wanted to succeed William J. Scanlan as lead tenor in sentimental operettas on Irish themes, Olcott accepted and played pseudo-Irish roles for the rest of his career.

He combined the roles as tenor , actor, songwriter and composer in many productions. He wrote the complete scores of Irish musicals such as Sweet Inniscara (1897), A Romance of Athlone (1899), Garrett O'Magh (1901) and Old Limerick Town (1902). For other productions he worked with Ernest R. Ball and George Graff in works such as The Irish Artist (1894), Barry of Ballymore (1910), Macushla (1912) and The Isle o 'Dreams (1913). There are about 20 such works created between 1894 and 1920.

He was a songwriter who met the mood of his Irish-American audience with a melancholy feel by combining melodic and rhythmic phrases from traditional Irish music. Some songs from his musicals became very popular, such as My Wild Irish Rose from the musical A Romance of Athlone , Mother Machree from the musical Barry of Ballymore and When Irish Eyes Are Smiling from the musical The Isle o 'Dreams . He has sometimes borrowed the melodies from other artists, such as the title track of Macushla by Irish composer Dermot Macmurrough (pseudonym of Harold R. White) or Too Ra Loo Ra Loo Ral (Irish lullaby) by James Royce Shannon for his production Shameen Dhu (1914 ).

In 1925 a serious illness forced him to retire from work and he moved to Monte-Carlo , where he died in 1932 of pernicious anemia . His body was returned home and buried in Woodlawn Cemetery in the Bronx , New York City .

legacy

Dennis Morgan as Chauncey Olcott and Andrea King as Lillian Russell in the film My Wild Irish Rose (1947)

Olcott's life story was told in the 1947 Warner Bros. Entertainment film My Wild Irish Rose starring Dennis Morgan as Olcott. The plot of the film was based on the biography Song in His Heart (1939) of Olcott's widow Rita. In 1970, Chauncey Olcott was posthumously inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame .

literature

Rita Olcott: Song in His Heart. House of Field, New York 1939.
Mari Kathleen Fielder: Chauncey Olcott: Irish-American Mother-Love, Romance and Nationalism. In: Éire-Ireland , 22, 1987, Volume 2, pp. 4-26.
William HA Williams: Twas Only an Irishman's Dream. The Image of the Irish and Ireland in American Popular Song Lyrics 1800–1920. University of Illinois Press, Urbana IL 1996, ISBN 0-252-02246-7 (linen); ISBN 0-252-06551-4 (paperback).

Web links

Chauncey Olcott in the database of Find a Grave (English)
Selected recordings of Chauncey Olcott - Internet Archive
Chauncey Olcott portraits; University of Washington, Sayre collection
Chauncey Olcott portraits; NY Public Library, Billy Rose collection
Sheet music in the public domain by Chauncey Olcott in the Choral Public Domain Library - ChoralWiki (English)

Individual evidence

^ The Green Book Magazine. Volume 9, pp. 519 and 521 ( books.google.com ).
^ Walter Brown, E. De Roy Koch: Olcott, Chauncy (John Chancellor) . In: Who's who on the Stage, 1908. The Dramatic Reference Book and Biographical Dictionary of the Theater - Containing Careers of Actors, Actresses, Managers and Playwrights of the American Stage . BW Dodge & Co, New York 1908, p. 333 ( books.google.com ).
↑ ^a ^b Axel Klein : Olcott, Chauncey. In: Harry White, Barra Boydell (ed.): The Encyclopaedia of Music in Ireland UCD Press, Dublin 2013, ISBN 978-1-906359-78-2 , pp. 775-776.
↑ SHAMEEN DHU [musical show]: Bibliographic Record Description . In: Performing Arts Encyclopedia . Library of Congress. Retrieved December 18, 2014.
↑ The screen play was based on the story written by Chauncey's widow, Rita Olcott, in her book, Song in My [sic] Heart. (liner notes to 1947 RCA Victor album).

personal data
SURNAME	Olcott, Chauncey
ALTERNATIVE NAMES	Olcott, John Chancellor (maiden name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	American stage actor, songwriter and singer
DATE OF BIRTH	July 21, 1858
PLACE OF BIRTH	Buffalo , New York
DATE OF DEATH	March 18, 1932
Place of death	Monte Carlo

[1] The Green Book Magazine. Volume 9, pp. 519 and 521 ( books.google.com ).

[2] Walter Brown, E. De Roy Koch: Olcott, Chauncy (John Chancellor) . In: Who's who on the Stage, 1908. The Dramatic Reference Book and Biographical Dictionary of the Theater - Containing Careers of Actors, Actresses, Managers and Playwrights of the American Stage . BW Dodge & Co, New York 1908, p. 333 ( books.google.com ).

[Klein-3] Axel Klein : Olcott, Chauncey. In: Harry White, Barra Boydell (ed.): The Encyclopaedia of Music in Ireland UCD Press, Dublin 2013, ISBN 978-1-906359-78-2 , pp. 775-776.

[4] SHAMEEN DHU [musical show]: Bibliographic Record Description . In: Performing Arts Encyclopedia . Library of Congress. Retrieved December 18, 2014.

[5] The screen play was based on the story written by Chauncey's widow, Rita Olcott, in her book, Song in My [sic] Heart. (liner notes to 1947 RCA Victor album).