Forgotten genius

THE LOST LEGENDS WHO MADE THE WORLD GO POP

Kay Swift

She was a classical musician until she met George Gershwin in 1925, with whom she had a long affair. She began writing popular music and was the first woman to score an entire Broadway musical. Swift collaborated with her husband, lyricist and lawyer Paul James, and together they wrote hits like Can’t We Be Friends, which would end up on Sinatra’s In The Wee Small Hours album and Ella Fitzgerald’s Sweet Songs For Swingers, and Can This Be Love. She later eloped to Oregon, moving to a ranch and writing the memoir Who Could Ask For Anything More?, which was turned into a Hollywood musical called Never A Dull Moment, with Irene Dunne playing Swift.

Lee Morse

Stanley writes that Morse had the “sleepy-eyed looks of Bette Davis and the sound of a more tuneful Mae West”. Her voice was so deep that earlier recordings credited her as Miss Lee Morse. She often accompanied herself on guitar, ukulele and kazoo and wrote a lot of her own material, such as There Must Be A Silver Lining and Be Sweet To Me. She was a star in the 1920s but spent the following decade performing in small nightclubs, hindered by alcohol.

Whispering Jack Smith

Smith was said to have gained his nickname after a First World War German gas attack left him with a limited vocal range. After the war, he worked for Irving Berlin’s publishing company by day. But, when the radio industry informed Tin Pan Alley that a range of no more than five melody notes suited the limited capabilities of radio broadcasting, his voice was ideal in comparison to bellowing vaudeville voices. He was a natural crooner and had hits with Cecilia, Baby Face and Me And My Shadow, before falling out of favour.

John Hill Hewitt

Stanley describes Hewitt as “the first truly American songwriter, and one not scared to write about current affairs”. He wrote popular songs in the 1820s, such as The Minstrel’s Return’d From War, which was about a soldier torn between his girl and his country. He wrote more than 300 songs and was a music teacher at seminaries for women, as well as working as a theatre manager, concert performer, and magazine and newspaper editor.