Babes on Broadway–Part II
In the previous post, we asked you to ignore the bad practice of using “blackface” in movies that featured Minstrel music. Now that we know the nature of these past practices, we realize that the dance routines on the screen were historically accurate, even if still distasteful. In Babes on Broadway, released in January 1942, there was a Minstrel Show sequence, featuring a number of songs. One of the songs was from the 1923 Broadway show, Kid Boots, starring Eddie Cantor. The song was “Alabamy Bound” and was composed by Ray Henderson, with lyrics by Buddy De Sylva and Bud Green. While it could be used as a syncopated Minstrel song, it was composed well after the Minstrel era had ended. We have been unable to find a video clip from the movie, but we do have an audio clip of Al Jolson singing the song.
On the other hand, the Minstrel section in Babes on Broadway also featured a popular song from 1912, written by Lewis F. Muir and L. Wolfe Gilbert, “Waiting for the Robert E. Lee.” While not written within the Minstrel era, it is a ragtime tune that fits within the Minstrel/Vaudeville format. The choreography emphasizes the cakewalk dances that were featured in Minstrel Shows, but the most important feature of the song is its exuberance. The greatness of the Minstrel style, whether it is from King for a Day or Babes on Broadway, is that the music is infectious; it makes you want to tap your feet, sing along or get up and dance.
As we end our brief excursion into Minstrel music and the magic of Bill Robinson, we ought to include a song and dance routine that was written for a movie in 1936 and was intended to honor Robinson’s legacy. It was called “Mr. Bojangles of Harlem’ and was composed by Jerome Kern for the movie, Swing Time (1936). We cannot find a clip of just the one musical number; we found a 15 minute segment that includes “Pick Yourself Up,” “The Waltz in Swingtime,” “Mr. Bojangles of Harlem” (at 4:28) and finishes with “Never Gonna Dance” at 12:30. If you progress the red ball on the clip to 4:28, you will see a swing version of a Minstrel song and dance routine (orchestrated by Robert Russell Bennett), with Fred Astaire blackening his face in preparation to perform. Astaire was a white dancer who was admired by black tap dancers. They gave him credit for being able to “dance black.” Our understanding of this compliment is this: Astaire had the ability to capture the rhythm of syncopated music and fashion dance steps that augmented the rhythm in the band’s arrangement. The taps became another part of the band’s percussion section.
Having finished with Minstrel music, we would like to finish our exploration of Babes on Broadway with one additional song from that movie. It was written by composer Burton Lane and lyricist, Ralph Freed, Arthur’s brother, just for the movie, as a duet between Judy Garland and Mickey Rooney. It has become an American Songbook classic.
In our next post, we are going back to a 1941 movie to highlight a famous vaudeville team.