{"id":1839,"date":"2025-04-13T19:04:58","date_gmt":"2025-04-14T00:04:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.early1900s.org\/notes\/?p=1839"},"modified":"2025-04-13T19:04:58","modified_gmt":"2025-04-14T00:04:58","slug":"dol-daubers-dance-orchestra-austin-egen-1930","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.early1900s.org\/notes\/2025\/04\/13\/dol-daubers-dance-orchestra-austin-egen-1930\/","title":{"rendered":"Dol Dauber’s Dance Orchestra\/Austin Egen – 1930"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"HMV<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Background information about the recordings can be found below the audio selections.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

“You Have Become So Terribly Blonde Lately”
\nDol Dauber’s Dance Orchestra; Austin Egen, vocal
\n(HMV B-5905 mx BW 3107)\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0January 6, 1930<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

“Oh Donna Clara”
\nDol Dauber’s Dance Orchestra; Austin Egen, vocal
\n(HMV B-5905 mx BW-3111)\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 January 7, 1930<\/p>\nhttps:\/\/www.early1900s.org\/notes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/Dol-Daubers-Dance-Orchestra-Oh-Donna-Clara.mp3<\/a><\/audio>\n

 <\/p>\n

Here’s a British HMV record I found in the Edward Mitchell Collection<\/a>.\u00a0 With a title like “You Have Become So Terribly Blonde Lately,” how could anyone resist giving such a record a spin to see what it was all about, especially since British labels tended to issue material that was far more risque than what American labels felt comfortable with?<\/p>\n

It turned out not<\/em><\/strong> to be anything near what I was expecting.\u00a0 \u00a0In fact, it isn’t even a British recording.\u00a0 And despite the English language title, the lyrics are actually in German!<\/p>\n

Both sides of this record were recorded in Vienna, Austria.<\/p>\n

This is not the first time I have come across a British pressing of a recording from a German-speaking country released with an English language title and no mention on the label that the lyrics are not in English.\u00a0 \u00a0Interestingly, it does not appear to have been issued in Germany by Gramophone Co.\/HMV’s German subsidiary label, Electrola – only on HMV in Great Britain and in the countries that had been part of the former Austro-Hungarian Empire.<\/p>\n

I was able to find an English translation<\/a> of the song’s lyrics:<\/p>\n

Lately you’ve become so terribly blond,
\nBecome so blond,
\nBecome so blond.<\/p>\n

Your hair has become more yellow than the pale moon,
\nBecome the moon.
\nHow come?<\/p>\n

Before you were once black like the night.
\nWho would have ever thought that?<\/p>\n

Lately you’ve become so terribly blond,
\nBecome so blond.
\nYes, how come?<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I also came across a comment someone put online explaining that the lyrics poke fun at a fad occurring at the time, which had ladies dying their hair blonde to emulate certain film stars, such as Lillian Harvey<\/a>, who was enormously popular.<\/p>\n

Originally titled “Du bist in letzter Zeit so schrecklich blond geworden,” the song was co-composed by Franz Grothe<\/a>, Fritz Rotter<\/a> and bandleader Dajos B\u00e9la<\/a>, whose band also made a recording of it.<\/p>\n

The flip side features a nice rendition of “Oh Donna Clara,” which achieved worldwide popularity and was recorded by countless artists in the early 1930s and the decades since.<\/p>\n

The song, originally titled “Tango Milonga,” was written by Polish composer Jerzy Petersburski<\/a> and was first performed in the 1929 musical revue Warszawa w kwiatach<\/em><\/a> (Warsaw in Bloom<\/em>).\u00a0 When the song made its way to Vienna, it caught the attention of the music publishing house Wiener Boheme Verlag<\/a>, which purchased its rights.\u00a0 \u00a0German librettist Fritz L\u00f6hner-Beda<\/a> provided it with German lyrics and renamed it “Oh, Donna Clara.”\u00a0 L\u00f6hner-Beda\u00a0would later be murdered at the Monowitz<\/a> concentration camp in 1942.<\/p>\n

“Oh, Donna Clara” was included in the musical production Die Wunder-Bar; ein Speil im Nachtleben<\/em> (The Wonder Bar, A Play About Night Life<\/em>) which opened on February 2, 1930 at Vienna’s Kammerspiel Theater<\/a>.\u00a0 \u00a0The recording here was made less than a month before the production’s opening.\u00a0 It was common for record labels to record songs from upcoming shows so that they would be available in time for audiences to purchase them.<\/span><\/p>\n

On December 5, 1930, Die Wunder-Bar<\/em> opened in London as The Wonder-Bar<\/em>, as well as in New York on May 17, 1931.\u00a0 As a result, several bands in the United States and Britain made 1931 recordings of “Oh, Donna Clara.”<\/p>\n

Violinist Dol Dauber<\/a> led a band that was popular during the 1920s and 1930s in Germany, Austria, and, particularly, Czechoslovakia.\u00a0 Despite being Jewish and spending World War II in Czechoslovakia under Nazi occupation, he somehow managed to avoid being sent to a concentration camp and survived the Holocaust.\u00a0 His son, however, was not so fortunate and perished at Dachau<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The vocals on both sides are provided by Austrian-American pianist, composer, and actor Austin Egen<\/a>. However, as was often the case at the time, no vocal credit is provided on the label.\u00a0 Egen made a very large number of vocal recordings, accompanying himself on the piano as well as with many top European bands of the 1920s and 1930s.\u00a0 He is one of my favorite German language crooners of the period.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

  Background information about the recordings can be found below the audio selections.\u00a0   “You Have Become So Terribly Blonde Lately” Dol Dauber’s Dance Orchestra; Austin Egen, vocal (HMV B-5905 mx BW 3107)\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1840,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"iawp_total_views":54,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[26,29,28,30,12,25,31,27],"class_list":["post-1839","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-1930s","tag-austin-egen","tag-austrian-composers","tag-austrian-recordings","tag-broadway-music","tag-dol-dauber","tag-london-stage-music","tag-polish-composers"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.early1900s.org\/notes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1839","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.early1900s.org\/notes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.early1900s.org\/notes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.early1900s.org\/notes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.early1900s.org\/notes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1839"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/www.early1900s.org\/notes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1839\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1851,"href":"https:\/\/www.early1900s.org\/notes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1839\/revisions\/1851"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.early1900s.org\/notes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1840"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.early1900s.org\/notes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1839"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.early1900s.org\/notes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1839"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.early1900s.org\/notes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1839"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}