Smiles (song)
Smiles is a pop song written by Lee S. Roberts (music) and J. Will Callahan (lyrics) and released in 1917.
background
Roberts and Callahan wrote Smiles for the music revue The Passing Show of 1918 , part of a series of events based on the then popular Ziegfeld Follies produced since 1912 by the brothers Lee and Jacob J. Shubert . The show, for which Sigmund Romberg and Jean Schwartz wrote most of the songs, premiered on July 25, 1918 at New York's Winter Garden Theater .
First recordings and later cover versions
One of Smiles' first recordings was a piano instrumental version by Lee S. Roberts & Max Kortlander (Piano Roll QRS 251). Other musicians who covered the song from 1918 included Lambert Murphy (with the Josef Pasternack Orchestra, Victor 45155), Henry Burr and Albert Campbell , as well as Jim Europe 's 369th Infantry Hell Fighters Band (Pathé), Max Kortlander , in Paris Marcel's Jazz Band du Folie Bergere ( Pathé ). The recording of the Joseph C. Smith Orchestra (with Harry Macdonough, vocals) reached position 1 on the US charts in August 1918.
The discographer Tom Lord lists over 200 (as of 2016) cover versions in the field of jazz , including a. in the interwar period by Willard Robison , Red Nichols , Boyd Senter , Jean Wiener / Clément Doucet , The Original Ramblers with Coleman Hawkins (1937), Benny Goodman , Charlie Barnet , Chris Bullock and Flavio Ambrosetti . Of the recordings from the later years, the versions by Andy Bey , Stan Getz and Oscar Peterson should be emphasized. Judy Garland had the song in her repertoire.
Notes and individual references
- ↑ a b c Michael Lasser: America's Songs II: Songs from the 1890s to the Post-War Years . 2014, p. 64
- ↑ a b Tom Lord: Jazz discography (online)
- ^ Whitburn, Joel (1986). Pop Memories 1890-1954. Menomonee Falls, Wisconsin: Record Research, Inc. p. 397. ISBN 0-89820-083-0 .
- ↑ Information at Jazzstandards.com