[78-L] It's One-Hit Wonder Day! (must be some 78s that qualify)

[Philip Carli]

Regarding August Molinari's "Street Piano Medley" (Edison 9615), it is likely that August was a family member of the NY firm of street piano and barrel organ manufacturers G. Molinari & Sons, which were established in 1842 and had relocated from Manhattan to Brooklyn at the time of the building of the Brooklyn Bridge.  Quite a number of Molinari instruments are extant, and some years ago there were postings on the Mechanical Music Digest website from Joseph G. Molinari, who had several crates of the firm's business records and was planning to write a history.  I don't know if this went any further.  P. Carli
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From: 78-l-bounces at klickitat.78online.com [78-l-bounces at klickitat.78online.com] on behalf of Ryan Barna [ryansrecords1 at hotmail.com]
Sent: Wednesday, September 28, 2011 10:10 AM
To: 78-l at 78online.com
Subject: Re: [78-L] It's One-Hit Wonder Day! (must be some 78s that qualify)

I'll look through my sources to see if there's others, but there's at least a few that come to mind...

Barney Bernard's "Cohen on the Telephone" (Victor 18029), his only record.

August Molinari's "Street Piano Medley" (Edison 9615). According to the Edison studio cash books, Molinari participated in the background of two other Edison cylinders (which I've determined as "Pedro, the Hand Organ Man" and "Mrs. Clancy and the Street Musicians"), but "Street Piano Medley" is the only cylinder which he's announced by name. I know nothing about Molinari, he seems to be very obscure. I couldn't find anything in the censuses or newspapers about him.

Ralph Bingham's "Goldstein Behind the Bars" (Victor 18231). Bingham made a few other records, but how many of those have you seen compared to this one?

Rhoda Bernard's brother Lester made only one Edison Blue Amberol as a single artist, "Italian Rosa" (2939), but I don't think it was that big of a hit.

I'm not sure if Arthur Collins' "Preacher and the Bear" would qualify. We've heard and seen Collins over and over again, but did he really sing anything else that was really a big hit? What other song did he sing for every major and minor company as big as this one, besides some duets with Harlan ("Bake Dat Chicken Pie" or "N*gger Loves His Possum")?

I'll probably think of some others later on.

-Ryan
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