Date: Fri, 26 Jun 1998 03:04:25 EDT
From: "Barry A. Popik"
Subject: Hello; Skidoo; Rock and Roll
HELLO (continued)
January 1844, KNICKERBOCKER, pg. 37: "Hallo!"
January 1844, KNICKERBOCKER, pg. 42: "'Hallo! Harry; is this you?'"
January 1844, KNICKERBOCKER, pg. 68: "'Halloo! what's this?'"
January 1844, KNICKERBOCKER, pg. 86: "'Halloo, master!'"
February 1844, KNICKERBOCKER, pg. 121: "'Hello! Bill Jones.'"
March 1844, KNICKERBOCKER, pg. 290: "'Halloa! TIBBS!'"
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SKIDOO (continued)
Billy B. Van (1870-1950) is the author of SNAP OUT OF IT! (1933) and THE
SERIOUSNESS OF BEING FUNNY (193-?). I'll check out both in the NYPL on
Saturday.
Neither of these two obituaries mentions "skidoo," but both show he had
been popular at that time period. This is from the New York Times, 17
November 1950, pg. 27, col. 3:
_BILLY B. VAN DIES:_
_ONE-TIME COMEDIAN_
NEWPORT, N. H., Nov. 16 (UP)--Billy B. Van, 72 years old, one of the
country's top comedians at the turn of the century, died of heart seizure
tonight at a Newport hospital.
A long-time trouper and lecturer on Yankee philosophy, he was
instrumental in the formation of the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Corporation and once
toured the country in vaudeville with late heavyweight boxing champion James
J. Corbett.
A friend of Presidents Calvin Coolidge and Woodrow Wilson, Mr. Van was
widely known in theatrical circles. He started his stage career when he was
only 6 years old in a Gilbert and Sullivan production in 1884.
In 1915 he helped found the Equity Motion Picture Company at Geroge's
Mills, N. H., which later moved to California.
He retired from the stage about 1927 whe he organized the Pine Tree Soap
Company. Last year he resigned from the company and organized Vanpine, Inc.,
another soap concern.
He leaves a wife, Grace (Walsh) Van, a New York musical comedy star at
the time of her husband's peak popularity.
The VARIETY obituary, 22 November 1950, pg. 63, col. 1, adds that Van had
once served as mayor of Newport.
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ROCK AND ROLL (continued)
Amazon.com has a new music division. I tried it. ROCK BEFORE ELVIS,
BEFORE LITTLE RICHARD, BEFORE CHUCK BERRY, BO DIDLEY OR BILL HALEY arrived in
about four days--$17.94 for two CDs, tax included.
Here are some of the many liner notes:
(cover) YOU ARE HOLDING IN YOUR HANDS TWO CD'S WITH 44 _VERY_ EARLY _ROCK AND
ROLL_ RECORDINGS, ALL MADE BEFORE 1952. NO TIRED, SLOW BLUES. NO JAZZ. NO
DOO-WOP. NO CHICAGO BLUES. NO BIG BAND ERA. NO SISSY VOCAL GROUPS. NO
JUMPING JIVE. NOTHING BUT HARD DRIVING _ROCK AND ROLL_ RECORDINGS MADE WHEN
_ROCK AND ROLL_ STILL HAD NO NAME. (...)
IT INCLUDES THE VERY FIRST _ROCK AND ROLL_ RECORDING EVER MADE (1929).
IT IS BY FAR THE BEST "ROOTS OF ROCK" PACKAGE EVER PRODUCED, BECAUSE IT IS
_REAL ROCK AND ROLL_, NOT "ROOTS."
("I Want to Rock and Roll" by Scatman Crothers, late 1940's)
This recording was made when "rock and roll" was the name of a dance.
("Leroy Sent Me" by Joe Brown and his Kool Kats, 1949)
This local Detroit recording was for Leroy WHite, a DJ there, who had a
show on WJLB radio called "Rocking With Leroy."
("Sausage Rock" by Doc Sausage, Jan. 2, 1950)
Cut two days after the end of the rocking 40's, this track ushers in a
new decade with instructions on a dance step called "rocking." This dance was
later to be made widely popular by disc jockey Allen Freed and his "Moondog's
Rock and Roll Dance Party," which he produced both live and on radio, starting
in 1952. It is from this dance that the music received its name. While
"rocking" primarily meant to dance, the other meaning can be deduced by
considering "sausage."
("The Boogie Rocks" by Albert Ammons, Feb. 12, 1944)
In 1944, boogie woogie was already almost half a century old, though it
had gone under many different names before Pine Top Smith gave it a permanent
one in 1928. One of those early names was "the rocks."
("Rockola" by Joe Lutcher and his Society Cats, Aug. 1949)
The song included here refers to the Rockola brand of juke box, common in
the rocking 40's. (The jukebox caompany was founded in the 1920's by David C.
Rockola, who died in 1993 at the age of 96, and always maintained that his
name was just a coincidence.
The word "boogie" originated from the 14th century English word "bugge,"
which was pronounced with the final "e" not silent. It was also spelled bogy,
bogey, booger, also akin to bugaboo, bugbear, and bogeyman. The word meant
phantom or ghost, also a scarecrow. (...)
The expression "rock and roll" has only a slightly newer origin.
Starting in the late 20's, many blues and boogie musicians in Memphis and
Northwest Mississippi's Yazoo Delta, "The Delta" of blues, began using the
word "rocking" in their up-tempo songs in addition to the word "boogie." Many
delta and Memphis blues of the period can be heard in records with lyrics
mentioning things such as rocking the house, rocking blues away, rocking chair
daddy, rocking on the hill, rock me baby, etc., as far back as the earliest
recorded blues. The word quickly caught on outside the Delta. In 1929,
Indianapolis pianist Arthur "Montana" Taylor recorded a rock-solid boogie
piano solo he called "Detroit Rocks." The word "rocks" in that title is
probably a noun, as "the rocks" was an early name for boogie woogie. The word
"roll" in our context probably derives from "jelly roll," which started out
in the late 1800's as slang for sex or the vagina. Pianist and jazz
originator Ferdinand "Jelly Roll" Morton so named himself early in his career,
perhaps around 1907, and after him, the term "jelly roll" or just "roll"
became to mean the rolling sound of the right hand on the piano while certain
of Morton's jazzy blues figures were being played, as in "roll 'em, boy," or
"let 'em roll. While the left hand was rocking, the right hand was rolling,
as illustrated here in the lyrics of track 2-05. The first time the phrase
"rock and roll" appeared in a record, in which the phrase meant a form of
music specifically, was in the song "Rock It For Me," written in the 30's and
recorded in 1937 by Ella Fitzgerald....