Tuxedo Orchestra (Harry Reser) 1925

From the Edward Mitchell collection, here are two recordings from a 1925 Vocalion record made just a few months after Brunswick Records had acquired the Vocalion label in November 1924.

At the time these were recorded,  Brunswick was still in the early stages of setting up its studios for the pallophotophone-based, so-called “Light Ray” electric recording system that it licensed from General Electric to compete with the microphone-based system licensed by Victor and Columbia, which they had already started using.

Thus, these recordings were made using the older acoustic recording horn technology.

The Tuxedo Orchestra credited on this record is merely a recording pseudonym and was in no way associated with the New Orleans-based  Original Tuxedo Jazz Orchestra.  Nor was it related to the Tuxedo Orchestra that appeared on Pathe and its subsidiary label Perfect, which was also a recording pseudonym.

The Tuxedo Orchestra pseudonym on Vocalion was used mostly for its in-house band, though a few recordings were made by bands such as Red Nichols’s, Charlie Straight’s, or, in the case of these two recordings, Harry Reser’s.

“Just A Little Drink” is a 1925 prohibition-themed novelty song with music and lyrics by Byron Gay.

“I Love You California,” composed by Abraham Franklin Frankenstein with lyrics by Francis Beatty Silverwood, dates back to 1913.  In 1951, the California State Legislature passed a resolution proclaiming it to be “an official state song.”  Additional legislation passed in 1987 further clarified it as the official state song.

Irving Kaufman provides the vocals on both recordings.

This recording of “I Love You California” was also issued under different pseudonyms on low-priced British labels: Washington Dance Players on Aco, Southern States Dance Orchestra on Beltona, and Maryland Dance Orchestra on the Coliseum label.