SONG “HITS.”

Auckland Star, Volume LXVI, Issue 236, 5 October 1935, Page 5 (Supplement)

SONG “HITS.”

RADIO AND TALKIES. MARKETS CHANGED. (By W. M. ELLIOTT.) Before the advent of talking pictures it was conceived that, by publishing a song under the same name as the film, the film could be popularised. Thus Mabel Wayne earned over £lO,OOO by writing “Ramona” at the time when the possibility of a song to popularise the film of the same title was being discussed. The chorus took her just 20 minutes to write. L. Wolfe Gilbert wrote the words in half an hour and in one hour the entire song was completed. But all song-writing success has not been as easy as this. The writer of “Sonny Boy” submitted his song to 14

publishers before it was finally accepted by a small publisher in New York. * "Springtime in the Rockies,” “Goodnight, Sweetheart,” “In the Valley of the Moon” and “The Old Spinning Wheel” were popular numbers not introduced through the “talkies.” Radio made a success of these songs.

As the century progresses we realise the value of radio for popularising songs and making them into "hits.” But radio, as the films have done, will cause songs to be so numerous that they will be sun’g and nlayed for such a short period that they will be forgotten after a few weeks.

However, radio has undoubtedly brought appreciation to many songs.

Bernice Petkere, on a February morning in 1932, was sitting at a table in a night club. She became tired of the music. Borrowing a pencil from her husband, she wrote a song on the clean side of the menu and hummed a tune to fit the words. She called it “Starlight.” Her husband’s opinion was that it sounded “pretty good, nothing, extraordinary, but better than the night club music.” That afternoon she took the song to the Shantley Brothers, Chicago music publishers. When he heard the tune one of the brothers wrote her an advance cheque for £2OO. For two weeks it was played more often on radio

programmes than any song ever written. But, you say, why do we not hear in 1935 of modern songs bringing fame to their writers as previously happened? This is because, in the words of Martin Broones, head of a Hollywood music department: “Greatly increased production of sheet music caused by musical talking pictures has resulted in greater variety and increased competition. As a result, for each song of 20 years ago that sold to 3,000,000 copies, to-day we have ten which pass 500,000.”

It will be noticed in modern musicals that there are usually about six songs, each on a different theme. This is another development in popular music

for which Barrett C. Hiesling, a notable figure in regard to the film industry, gives the motion pictures credit. The song writer who has a good song that will appeal to the public can be almost certain of at least a small financial success. For the films must have new songs, the broadcasting companies must have new tunes. If the song writer suddenly stopped writing songs and the films and broadcasting companies had to keep playing last year’s “hits” the film and radio industries would probably collapse. But will song writers give up composing? Never. There is money and often big money in the game.