When My Sugar Walks Down the Street

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When My Sugar Walks Down the Street (All the Little Birdies Go Tweet, Tweet, Tweet) is a pop song written by Jimmy McHugh (music), Irving Mills and Gene Austin (lyrics) and released in 1924. It was Jimmy McHugh's first hit.

background

Gene Austin (around 1920)

The lyrics of the pop song probably came from Irving Mills alone, who gave the previously unknown singer Gene Austin the copyrights as a co-author. Mills' music publisher had hired the singer to make a demo recording for Victor Records . Nat Shilkret , who oversaw the session, liked his voice and brought him together with Aileen Stanley , one of the record label's top singers at the time. Austin did not agree to just sing tweet-tweet-tweet when recording the song again . After the singer got halfway through (he played the back of the recording), the song recorded on January 30, 1925 (Victor 19585) promoted Gene Austin's career (it hit # 3 on the US charts) and made it in the United States the most famous crooner of the time before Bing Crosby .

First recordings and later cover versions

Musicians who covered the song from 1924 onward included Warner's Seven Aces (Columbia), the Regent Dance Orchestra, The Two Gilberts, Fred Weaver , Bix Beiderbecke & the Wolverine Orchestra (Gennett), Red McKenzie 's Candy Kids (Vocalion, with Eddie Lang ), Johnny DeDroit (OKeh), Hazay Natzy ( Pathé ) and Clara Smith (Columbia). Joe Frisco appeared with the song in the Vitaphone - Soundie The Benefit .

The discographer Tom Lord lists a total of 138 (as of 2015) cover versions in the field of jazz , u. a. by Duke Ellington / Ivie Anderson (1938), Wingy Manone , Ella Fitzgerald (1941), Eddie Condon (1944), Red Nichols (1945), Sy Oliver (1949), Bob Crosby (1950), Oscar Peterson (1954), Connee Boswell & The Original Memphis Five (1956), Ella Mae Morse , Peggy Lee (1957), Ruby Braff , Teresa Brewer (1958), Johnny Dankworth (1961), Jonah Jones (1966) and Brian Lemon (1970). In later years the title became a popular standard for numerous Dixieland bands. Pop singers and bands like The Four Aces , the Quintones, Judy Garland , Nat King Cole , The Ink Spots and Johnny Mathis also covered the song. The pianist at the Bel Air Hotel in Hollywood played the title whenever boxer Sugar Ray Robinson walked into the bar.

Notes and individual references

  1. ↑ a b Michael Lasser: America's Songs II: Songs from the 1890s to the Post-War Years . P. 86.
  2. ↑ When my sugar walks down the street (all the little birdies go tweet, tweet, tweet) in the Library of Congress
  3. ↑ Regal Records 8392
  4. ↑ With George Brunies , Jimmy Hartwell (cl, as) George Johnson (ts), Dick Voynow (p), Bob Gillette (bj), Min Leibrook (tu), Vic Moore (dr), Dave Harmon (voc)
  5. ^ Roy Liebman: Vitaphone Films: A Catalog of the Features and Shorts
  6. ↑ a b Tom Lord: Jazz discography (online)
  7. ↑ Walter Bruyninckx. Jazz: Traditional Jazz, 1897-1985: Origins, New Orleans, 1986
  8. ↑ Vocalion master WM WM 1078-1, rec. New York, September 5th 1939 approx. Patti Davis, Irving Deutsch, Murray Deutsch, Lloyd Hundling and Al Lane (voc), with an instrumental combo conducted by Buck Ram .
  9. ↑ Susie Boyt : My Judy Garland . 2014
  10. ^ Marv Goldberg: More Than Words Can Say: The Ink Spots and Their Music . 1998, page 130.
  11. ↑ Kenneth Shropshire: Being Sugar Ray: Sugar Ray Robinson, America's Greatest Boxer . 2009.