1935-02-19 — Page 15

THE HONGKONG TELEGRAPH.

TUESDAY

FEBRUARY 19, 1935.

FORTUNE FROM SONGS

MAN WHO MADE £16,000 A MINUTE

TRAGEDY OR ROMANCE

By PETER DAVIS

Music publishers are clamour- ing for fresh dance tunes with which to feed the hungry ears of dance restaurants, broadcasting, gramophones, and the theatre...

It is a fact that some of the most revolutionary tunes of dance- band history come from unknown tw0 writers. Ten years ago youngsters, Jim Campbell and Rog Connelly were in the train on route to London. Said Jim, "Rog, I'm fed up" Said Reg, "Jim so'm I- show me the way to go home!”

In ten minutes this casual phrase had been adapted to an old Canadian Cumberland Jumber camp song. Confident of success, the two rented a bare little room in Brilala's. Tin Pan Alley and published the song themselves. Within six months their profits hnd amounted to £20,000. Even. tually they cleared up. £50,000. Subsequent songs gained success equally meteoric.

SOME FAMOUS HITS

Dance music luck!

It was experienced by Billy Hil when he wrote "The Last Round- Up." At one time he was on the point of parting with his gold- ining for £5 to a gramophone com- pany. He hold on, and the song of this one-time tramdriver and dlsh-washer. is now estimated to have sold more coples than "Yea. We Have no Bananas." "You Are My Heart's Delight" lay neglected on a desk for ten years. Nobody expected very much when Ralph Butler, a poultry farmer, submitted "I'm Happy When I'm Hiking" to the musical magnates, but every errand boy was whistl ing it with in week of publica- tion. Frederick Norton hawked the music of "Chu Chin Chow" round West End thentro manage- monts for five years without a result. To-day tho talking ple ture of the great success is net- ting him another fortune,

An Irish schoolmaster spent his last two-pence on a cup of tea, wrote a fragment of tune on scrap of paper and signed a con- tract for several songs a few days Inter. "The Barmaid's Song" wont round the world, and Jim Kennedy within two years became an established-composer.

£16,000 A MINUTE

Witness the romantic career of Tolchard Evans. Still in his ear- ly thirties, ho commenced writing at 14, achieved publication of a composition at 18, and then casually tapped out "Barcelona,"

These things go in cycles. Not many months previously & prac- tically unknown Spanish musician

Alternately singing hymns and cheering the officers and men of the as. Tuorchow, paranta, relative, "aku the iw enildren' who safely experienced the latest and, perhapa must sunational piracy on the China Coast, ware recently revnited. At the top left la r group of the parente, singing and calling to their children as the ship neared the wharf...Top right shows Ittle fanet MacPherson ari hey father as she made her way to bases which were waiting to sscort the children to the Mission Home. She is happily clutching a big basket in which her rabbits lived quite conleoladly through the anxious days and nights. As left below is Mrs, F. W. Baker grasting her children, Rosemary, Faith, and Phyills Mary Bannan. At centre are Ethel and John Quimby being escorted down the

·gangplank by their parents. At right--Mrs. H. M. Griffin with her son Mark and daughter, Fern.

As no words could describe, this plature zivos a vivid idea of the extent of the damage done when three three storeyed buildings were blown into the air simultaneously in an alley off Cheklang Road, Shanghai, last week. Blasted to a height of about 200 feat the buildings dropped perpendicularly again to the ground leaving scarcely a stick standing. The exposion revealed the presence of a large plant for the manufacture of narcotics. Only two persons are known to have been killed.

had written in nine minutes ang sweeper, made money with melody that was to be called "Westing the House," but he never "Valencia," and was to bring in wrote another published song. A £16,000 for every minute spont Tyneside miner wrote a song and on the song. Tolchard Evans nung up his job when made several hundred pounds accepted. Before very long he every time he struck a note when was waiting at the pit-head for thinking out "Barcelona," and the fresh work.

it was

additional fortunes he, has made Tragedy The tragedy of the with "Lady of Spain," "Life's Desire," and "Lady of Madrid" printer's devil who sold for a stingy £16 a song that was to go are beyond computation.

down in history, "Are we to Part an In-

HUEY LONG after his book of the same name, king, for you can bu & millonaire.

SINGS A SONG

OUGHT TO STAY IN POLITICS

New Orleans, Feb. 14. Huey P. Long has joined the

with pubileation of a song titled Every Man' a king, every man a "Every Man a King." And just to But there's something belonging prove that it is a good song and to others, there's enough for all that he is a crooner of the first people to share rank, the Kingflah hummed the

ditty to newsmen who caught him. When it's sunny June and in bed at the Roosevelt Hotel ons December too or in winter time of morning recently.

The words of the song follow: "Why weep or slumber, America land of the brave and true

With castles clothing and food for all,

If sheet sales of music. are fail- Like This, Bill?" Of ing in these days, radio, gramo-surance clerk found dead of ex- phone, film and, stage rights, both posure on the Thames in this country and abroad, are ment, another of the army who ranks of American music composers.

more than compensation.

New composers are still appear-

ing. A aixteen-year-old Ipswich

boy, Vittorio Zagni, has been able

Embank-1

went to London seeking fortune

in Tin Pan Alley-and failed.

SUCCESSFUL COMPOSERS

They do say that less than 60 can write KORKS. One

to think out an acceptable fox-men in this country trot in the intervals of hawking money-making ice-cream, Richard Dabson, ♫ Harry Castling, who stepped on, London waiter, began by persuad- to the highway of success with a ing dance band leaders to try out Arst attempt 44 years ago and has his tunos, and has now been in- since made thousands of pounds. vited to conduct the Bournemouth Another, needless to вду,

1s Municipal Orchestra in one of his Horatio Nicholls, one time assist moro serious compositions.

ant In his father's music shop at Leicester, now the most prolific composer and publishor of them

THE TRAGIC SIDE-

On the other hand, you can't all. Then thero la Montague always toll. If the light but hard- Ewing, composer of "Fairy on the working world of dance music has Clock,' "Moonlight on. the its romances, it also witnesses Ganges," and other hits, who tragedy. The percentage of suc- worked in

draper's, ilsl- cessful song-writers is low, and monger's, and A stockbroker's even the lucky ones know that if office before he found his right their name is to be kept before vocation. the public they must work day aftor day, producing hundreds of Noel Gay, Robert Hargreaves, tunes in the course of a few years. Bruce Sevier, Pator Maurice, Lealie Holmes, Leslie Sarony,

In one year, so a music publi- Vivian Ellis, and the rest had sher assures me, 50,000 people they not distinguished themselves submit musical manuscripts in the in other fielda, how many people hope of gaining fame and fortune. would recognise their names? 49,500 are returned "with ro grots," and $9 of every 100 lucky ones are subsequently unable to keep the pace.

G. H. Turner, a Manchester crogs

Perhaps the strangest and most tragic fact of all in Tin Pan Alloy is that song success usually means more fortune than fame.

All belongs to you." And the chorus gocs:"

Spring

There'll be peace without end, every neighbour a friend,

With every man a king-Ev'ry man a King."

Senator Long, one newspaperman suggests, can do better in politics-- |much better.--United Prest.

~Bridal party leaving Holy Trinity Cathedral in 'S anghai, afine the marriaga of Miss Violet-Richards and Mr. Denis Fitz Gerald Baare, which was attended by a large number of friends." The bride, who is, the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. C. Richards, of Shanghai, is one of the most popular members ́of "the younger sat. The honeymoon is being spent in Nikko, Japan."

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