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For those
who are interested: The song (with music by
Harry Warren and lyrics by Mort Dixon and Billy Rose),
now considered a pop standard, was first introduced on
the Broadway stage in May 1931 by Fanny Brice in
Billy Rose's Crazy Quilt
and recorded that same year by
several artists, the most popular being The Boswell Sisters,
with an opening by Tommy Dorsey (often erroneously
referred to as the original), Bing Crosby, and probably
the real original (recorded weeks before its Broadway
debut in Billy Rose's Crazy Quilt), Fred
Waring's Orchestra (The Pensylvanians). You are hearing an obscure version
also from 1931 with
an unknown vocalist and chorus (the arrangement and
tempo are quite
similar to the popular Crosby version except for the use
of a chorus). It's from a
"Hit of the Week" record by the Don Voorhees' Orchestra.
These were one-sided
laminated cardboard discs produced by the Durium
Products Company, issued weekly and distributed through
newsstands rather than conventional record dealers. The
price in 1931: 15 cents!
Over the following decades, the
song was re-recorded by many, many artists, the most
notable being The Benny Goodman Orchestra (1941), Perry
Como (1951), Nat "King" Cole and the Mills Brothers
(both in1958) and Barbra Streisand (the 1975 soundtrack
of Funny Lady, the
acclaimed movie sequel to Funny Girl, in both of
which she portrayed Fanny Brice).
(See
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_Found_a_Million_Dollar_Baby_(in_a_Five_and_Ten_Cent_Store)
for more information about the
song or
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F._W._Woolworth_Company
for a history of F.W. Woolworth Company.) |