The Development of "Crooning"

[16_sparrows]

I'm in the middle of reading this book, Daily Life in the US 1920-1940, which has much insight on how things developed in the US. One chapter I found quite interesting is "Radio and the Connecting of Daily Lives." In particular, there is one paragraph I though would be good to share here:

"...The limitations of radio, however, reshaped this sort of music. Intense voices, especially high sopranos, had a tendency to blow out the tubes on radio transmitters. As a result, a number of singers developed a new soft, gentle style that came across well and soon became known as 'crooning.' Female singers such as Vaughn De Leath and Kate Smith as well as males such as Rudy Vallee and Bing Crosby built large and loyal audiences as they perfected the 'crooning' style."

(pg. 79, ISBN 1-56663-584-5)

I'm going to write a little review on this book and couple others when I finish it in a few weeks. But I thought this little tid-bit would be appreciated by FLers.

 

[LizzieMaine]

This is a very interesting subject -- a few years ago, I was interviewed by a gal doing her masters thesis on the development of microphone singing techniques during twenties and thirties, and provided her with a bunch of specimen recordings to illustrate the points I made. One conclusion she reached is that the development of the radio and the microphone allowed a whole new wave of singers who simply wouldn't have ever had a career at all if they had to fill a theatre with the power of their lungs alone, or drive an acoustic recording head. She ranked Crosby, Vallee, Columbo, Whispering Jack Smith, Gene Austin, and any number of lesser-known crooners of the day in this category -- without the development of the microphone, we'd probably have been left with the latter-day descendents of Billy Murray, Scrappy Lambert, and Henry Burr!

The shattering of tubes by high sopranos was very much an issue before sophisticated mixing panels were developed in the mid-twenties. When Jessica Dragonette became a big star on NBC in the late twenties, special care was taken by the engineer to keep her high notes under control!

 

[happyfilmluvguy]

That book sounds interesting. I can clearly understand the reason for "crooning" after reading that quote.

 

[LocktownDog]

Very interesting indeed. As if my "to read" list wasn't long enough!

Richard

 

[dhermann1]

Tube radios

This sort of feeds into what I'm always saying about listening to old music on an old radio. The music was created for output devices that had a specific range and contour, so it sounds more natural played that way. Tube radios!! (That's valves for you folks in the UK, etc.)