• hace 6 meses
Ada Jones and Len Spencer

“A Bowery Flirtation”

Edison Standard Record 10082, issued in 1909

Leonard Garfield Spencer was born in Washington, D. C., on January 12, 1867.

The middle name was given in honor of Senator James A. Garfield, a friend of the Spencer family before he became a U.S. president. Len's mother, Sara, was a leader in the women's suffrage movement. His father Henry Caleb Spencer--son of Platt Rogers Spencer, co-inventor of the Spencerian style of penmanship--operated the Spencerian Business College located in the nation's capitol at Ninth and D Streets. He died in 1890.

Len's younger brother--Henry Caleb Spencer, Jr., born on February 14, 1875--also became a recording artist. Harry worked mostly for Columbia but occasionally made records for other companies, even making Zon-o-phone discs in 1901. He mostly cut recitations, such as the popular "President McKinley's Address at the Pan-American Exposition." On minstrel records, he is addressed as "Mr. Henry."

By the early 1900s Harry was Columbia's chief announcer and his voice can be heard at the beginning of many cylinders and early discs. Jim Walsh states in the October 1958 issue of Hobbies that Harry later was a train caller in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, as reported to Walsh by Joe Belmont. Harry suffered mental illness late in life and died on August 29, 1946, in St. Elizabeth's Hospital in Washington, DC.

Len Spencer himself did announcing for other Columbia artists of the 1890s. Listing titles of the Columbia Orchestra, the company's June 1897 catalog states, "The announcements are as loud and distinct as only Mr. Spencer can make them, and his quaint negro humorisms, laugh, shouts, etc., so familiar to talking machine patrons, add much to the popularity of these records."

Only Len Spencer is identified elsewhere in the catalog, so the "Mr. Spencer" here undoubtedly refers to Len, not Harry. Columbia Orchestra numbers that include "shouts" and "laughs" include "Alabama Walk Around" (15086), "Old Nigger Wing" (15088), "Tapioca Polka" (15091), and "Frolic of the Coon" (15092).

Working as a junior instructor at the Spencerian Business College, the young Len Spencer frequently visited the sales office of the newly formed Columbia Phonograph Company, at that time with headquarters at 919 Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington, DC, to get information, have parts serviced, and purchase cylinders. The college used an office graphophone, or dictaphone. He expressed a desire to record his own voice, and company executives discovered he had not only a rich baritone voice but an ability to put his character into a song.

Frank Dorian, a Columbia official who began working for the company in 1889, recalled in later years for Walsh that Spencer's career as a recording artist began either in late 1889 or early 1890.

Category

🎵
Música
Transcripción
00:30¡Vale,no puedes perderme,Chip!
00:32Dime,¿has amado a alguien?
00:34¡Claro que lo he hecho!
00:36Quiero decir,a nadie pero a ti mismo.
00:38¡Oh,me gusta eso!
00:40¡Así que estoy atrapada en mí mismo,¿eh?
00:42Bueno,hay una cosa sobre ti,Jimmy,
00:44que tengo que admirar.
00:46Y esa es...
00:47Tu buen gusto.
00:48¡Oh,oh!
00:49¿No sabes por qué,eh?
00:51¿Por qué,Maggie?
00:52Ese maldito chico tuyo,
00:54tiene un tipo de piel justo en mi corazón.
00:56¡Ja,ja,ja!
00:57¡Ja,ja,ja!
00:58¡Supongo que hay un montón de tipos de piel
01:00en ese corazón tuyo!
01:02¡Me equivocaste,chica!
01:04¿Por qué nunca sabía lo que era el amor
01:06hasta que me enamoré de ti?
01:08¡Ja,ja,ja!
01:09¡No me hagas reír!
01:10¡Mi libro es un campeón!
01:11¿Por qué,Jimmy?
01:12¡Muchos chicos me dan esa sensación
01:14de que lo he hecho para la música!
01:16¿Es así?
01:18¡Sí!
01:19¡Y va así!
01:22En el barrio de la casa del Partido de los Pesos
01:27¡Clic!
01:28¡Puso el número de la sacudira!
01:30¡Si!
01:31¡Pues,bueno!
01:32¡Muy bien!
01:33¡Bueno!
01:34¡Ahora sí!
01:35¡Tres!
01:36¡Como siempre!
01:37¡Otra vez!
01:38¡Vamos,hombre!
01:40¡Otra vez!
01:42¡Como siempre!
01:43¡Vamos,hombre!
01:44¡Vai!
01:45¡Bueno,bueno,bueno!
01:46¡Vamos!
01:47¡Vamos,hombre!
01:49¡Vamos,hombre!
01:50hasta que me enamoré de ti.

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