SONGWRITERS

[Allen Johnston]

Allen L. Johnston – The Music Specialist
www.asha.com
Songwriters are a special breed of people. They are normally spiritually and mentally attuned to the emotional experiences of life and take pride in creating lyrical descriptions and stories. Within the past few years contemporary writers have lost their direction, spirituality and closeness to emotion, writing more about physical encounters, lewd and lascivious actions, mayhem and murder.
Historically music publishers had a separation of talent; musicians found lyricists and created teams that wrote songs for almost every aspect of daily life. The creation of music as a career became commercially popular after the Civil War when 25,000 pianos were sold a year in America alone. By 1887 over 500,000 Americans were studying piano thus developing a demand for sheet music and new songs. Thomas B. Harms and Isadore Witmark published their first sheet music I'll Answer That Question Tomorrow in 1885 issuing in commercial music publishing.
Song composers were hired under contract giving the publisher exclusive rights to popular composer's works. The market was surveyed to determine what style of song was selling best and then the composers were directed to compose in that style. Once written, a song was actually tested with both performers and listeners to determine which would be published and which would be thrown out. All of a sudden music became an industry more than an art form. Once a song was published, song pluggers (performers who worked in music shops playing the latest releases) were hired and performers were persuaded to play the new songs in their acts to give the music exposure to the public (original payola). By the end of the century, a number of the more important publishers had offices on 28th street between 5th Avenue and Broadway. This street (28th) became known as "Tin Pan Alley." Rumor has it that this name came from the large amount of pianos playing every day and the combined sound was like people banging on tin plates.
Over the years every major music publisher in America had a presence in Tin Pan Alley at one time or another. Songwriters and publishers like, Irving Berlin, Inc., Shapiro, Bernstein & Co., Remick Music Co., Robbins Music Corp, and E. B. Marks Music Company. These visionaries concentrated almost exclusively on popular music, and the key to their success was their use of market research to select music and the use of aggressive marketing techniques to sell the product.
Born in Georgia Harry Pace was a prolific writer after having graduated with honors from Atlanta University where he was a student of W.E. B. Dubois. In 1912 he met W.C. Handy, moved to Memphis and formed the Pace and Handy Music Company dedicated to printing and music publishing. The first all Black owned record company based in Harlem and founded in May of 1921 Black Swan Records was created by Harry Pace. Fletcher Henderson was the recording manager and played piano accompaniment, while William Grant Still was arranger and later musical director. Artists on this label included • C. Carroll Clark, baritone, made the label's first record. • Four Harmony Kings, vocal quartet • Henry Creamer and J. Turner Layton, vaudeville duo • Katie Crippen, vaudeville singer • Kemper Harreld, violinist • Revella Hughes, soprano • Alberta Hunter, blues singer • Trixie Smith, blues singer, was second only to Ethel Waters in Black Swan sales. • Florence Cole Talbert soprano • Ethel Waters, blues and pop song singer. She had the label's first commercially successful records, and remained their best seller.
This company produced several firsts that can be seen manifested today.
1. Publishing house that became a record label
2. Created multiple genres of music, classical, instrumental, gospel and blues
3. "Mamie Jones" was actually a pseudonym on Black Swan for singer Aileen Stanley, perhaps the only Caucasian artist to record for the label (she was "passing for colored" on these records).
4. The company declared bankruptcy in December 1923. As a result, in March 1924 Paramount Records bought the Black Swan label.

White owned record companies began to recognize the demand for black artists to the point that major companies began publishing music by these performers. In addition, the Chicago Defender credited Mr. Pace with bringing major companies to begin targeting the black audience and advertising in black newspapers. Paramount discontinued the Black Swan label a short time later, but kept the artists recording under their label.
James Bland, Erskine Hawkins, Avery Parrish, Scott Joplin, Clarence and Spencer Williams and Eubie Blake were among a few of the greatest Black songwriters and publishers in musical history.

[Gerald " Mighty Roscoe" Floyd]

Allen This is Roscoe From Memphis who lives in Birmingham we worked music promotions
call me 205-306-5813 trying to make it to charlotte next week