[78-L] Heartaches and Decca 25000s

Sun Jan 11 20:17:10 PST 2015

Hmmm...if it was the Bluebird, there must be a hot pocket of those rare
Bluebirds scattered in the Carolinas.  Looking at Ty's site, looks like
25000-25130 were a mix of singles and albums, all 1942 or before.  Starting
at 25131 is 1945+ stuff.  I have album A-514, 'Cowboy Songs' by Bing, with
25000-25003, and the cover says Copyright 1946, which may be a clue or an
anachronistic red herring (it may be the cover only).

Paging Doc Biel - I think he knows the Heartaches story better than anyone.
I know he's waxed eloquently about it here before.  Somebody check facebook,
I'm going to bed.

Rodger

-----Original Message-----
From: 78-l-bounces at klickitat.78online.com
[mailto:78-l-bounces at klickitat.78online.com] On Behalf Of David Lennick
Sent: Sunday, January 11, 2015 9:42 PM
To: 78-L Mail List
Subject: Re: [78-L] Heartaches and Decca 25000s

My understanding is that the deejay who popularized it (Kurt somebody) was
playing the Bluebird, which Victor then "reissued by request". The 25000s
were a reissue series, mostly album sets, and I've never found when they
started..anyone know? Personality Deccas skip from 24999 to 27000, I seem to
remember.

dl

On 1/11/2015 10:24 PM, Rodger Holtin wrote:
>
> Was Fletcher Henderson 78
>
> Congratulations, Art.  You are the only one I know who has a copy of 
> the Bluebird of Heartaches and I've always been curious about that 
> tune and Weems.  If it is so scarce on Bluebird, it must not have been 
> a big seller when it was new and must not have stayed in the catalog 
> very long, and yet he re-recorded it in 1938 for Decca, something I 
> would have expected if it had been a hit.  Even as fond of history 
> rewrites as he is in "Pop Memories," Whitburn does not even show it as
being a hit for Weems in 1933.
> I have seen/owned several of the blue label Deccas #2020, so I guess 
> that may have been the "hit" which prompted Decca to recycle it on the 
> black
> 25000 series, of which I have seen almost as many as Near You.  I 
> assume it was the black label 25017 that the record dealer had so many 
> leftovers and started sending them out to radio stations, and it 
> became the mega hit, although Whitburn lists the Victor!  Hooboy.
>
> The first copy of the Weems on 25017 was given to me by a neighbor who 
> said he got it before he shipped out to the south Pacific, before the 
> war was over.  When were the Decca 25000s started?  Based on what he 
> told me and what I have seen on the earliest of the 25000s, I have 
> always assumed they were a ploy to get around the OPA Price Ceiling 
> that went into effect with the war in 1942 so it was a way to recycle 
> a lot of proven blue label sides onto the higher priced black series.  
> Always looked to me like that's what Victor did with so many Bluebirds
recycled on to the Victor 20-1500s.
> Right?  Wrong?  Maybe?
>
>
> Rodger
>
> For best results use Victor Needles
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: 78-l-bounces at klickitat.78online.com
> [mailto:78-l-bounces at klickitat.78online.com] On Behalf Of 
> zimrec at juno.com
> Sent: Thursday, January 08, 2015 4:39 PM
> To: 78-l at klickitat.78online.com
> Subject: [78-L] Fletcher Henderson 78
>
>
> David Burnham&  J. E. Knox wrote:>>  Bluebird 78s seem to abound in 
> any record collection I doubt if any of them is rare enough to become 
> a collectors' item and I'm not really interested in the monetary value 
> of records generally anyway, but I came across one record which I like 
> simply because of the physical artifact itself.  It is a U.S. pressed 
> Bluebird with the "Victor" label style used between fall 1938 and fall 
> 1943 of Fletcher Henderson's Band, Number B 10246.  It is in such 
> pristine condition, (it came from the CBC library and the surface 
> shines like a new record), that I'm sure it hasn't been played more 
> than half a dozen times if at all, (well it's been played once because 
> I just played it).  What is particularly attractive about it is that 
> even though it's a reissue, from April 27, 1927, unusual for Bluebird, 
> they obviously used the original 1927 stampers.  There is no 
> distortion and the surface is so clean that switching CEDAR on and off
resulted in no audible chan  ge in surface noise whatsoever.
> <snip>>As for rarity...two hard-to-come-by Bluebirds that spring to 
> mind (and only recently acquired by me after decades-long searching) 
> are Bluebird B-5014-B "Hold Me" by Little Jack Little and B-5131-B 
> "Heartaches" by Ted Weems and his Orchestra. Both were reissued in the 
> 1940s on RCA Victor, to be sure, but the reissues were dubbed. The
original Bluebirds are scarce.
> Fletcher Henderson's only other original-issue Bluebird (B-5682 "Hocus 
> Pocus"/"Tidal Wave") might also qualify, but I don't think it's as rare.
> Blues, country and gospel on Bluebird from the 1930s has got to be 
> quite collectible. What you might be thinking about as not rare enough 
> to be a collectors' item would be the plethora of big-band stuff 
> 1937-45, which would largely be true. A master-pressed copy of 
> Bluebird B-10352-A "Sold American" by Glenn Miller may qualify as 
> collectible, though; most copies were dubbed (-1R master).
>
> As most people on this list are aware, scarcity of a particular record 
> does not necessarily have a direct relationship to market price.
> Perhaps the rarest of the issued Bluebirds are many of the 4500 and 
> 4900 calypso series.  They were made for export only and many were 
> confiscated by the British.
> Does anyone other on this list, other than Steve Shapiro, have any.
> Art
>
>
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