[78-L] Glad you guys are back and Radiex Question

Malcolm Rockwell malcolm at 78data.com
Sun Oct 5 09:33:25 PDT 2008


Donna Halper wrote:
>> Steven wrote--
>>
>> (2) Grey Gull was famed for re-recording "hits" using different artists! As
>> well, they usually DIDN'T re-print labels, since that cost MONEY...?!
>>     
>
> For the newbies on the list, the owner of GG, Theodore Lyman Shaw, 
> never spent money unless he absolutely had to.  That has always 
> puzzled me, given that he came from a fabulously wealthy upper-class 
> White Anglo-Saxon Protestant family, with a long and distinguished 
> history in Massachusetts.  But I think they all got upset with him 
> because (a) he married a Catholic (gasp) and not just any Catholic 
> but a manicurist... not exactly upper-class, don't ya know.  And (b) 
> he didn't go into the family businesses (banking, real estate, 
> dealing in antiques) but instead sunk some of the family money into 
> creating and maintaining a recording studio and a record company, 
> which at one time had offices in New York and Chicago as well as 
> Massachusetts.  He became the black sheep of the Shaw family.  There 
> was a period of time when it seems Theo did in fact try to promote 
> and publicise his artists, but by the mid-1920s, rumours were 
> circulating about his not paying them, plus the sound quality of the 
> GG family of records was not exactly the best... And yet, he did have 
> a good relationship with Andy Sannella and Mike Mosiello-- both did 
> lots of work for him under a variety of names.  But other 
> musicians... well, they didn't stay with him for very long, and by 
> the late 1920s, just about nobody had much good to say about 
> GG/Radiex/Van Dyke or anything else Theo put out.    
>
> *******

Seems Grey Gull also liked avoiding paying writer's royalties whenever 
possible, as well. Many of the dance band sides featuring Sannella and 
Mosiello were thinly disguised hits of the day copyrighted under their 
names or a pseudonym. They'd change the melody line slightly or alter 
the chord structure a bit  and retitle the tune. Since these were dance 
band sides there were no lyrics to have to revamp - there was no singer! 
So, as a theoretical example, "The Sheik Of Araby" becomes "Son Of The 
Sands" and GG collects all the money. Impossible to promote, though, 
except by word of mouth. It's only now that Sannella & Mosiello's odd 
sense of musical humor can really be appreciated. Steven Abrams and I 
play "Name That Tune" with Grey Gulls when I go a-visitin' San 
Francisco. I believe he has a little list of all the adaptations 
(perversions?) he's been able to find. I'll ask next we speak. Great fun!
Mal




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