The musical short (a.k.a. musical short film, a.k.a. musical featurette) can be traced back to the earliest days of sound films. Performers in the Lee de Forest Phonofilms of 1923-24 included Eddie Cantor, George Jessel,

Abbie Mitchell __NOTOC__ Abriea "Abbie" Mitchell Cook (25 September 1884 – 16 March 1960), also billed as Abbey Mitchell, was an American soprano opera singer. She performed the role of Clara in the premiere production of George Gershwin's ''Porgy and Bes ...

("The Colored Prima Donna") and comic singer-dancer

Molly Picon Molly Picon ( yi, מאָלי פּיקאָן; born Malka Opiekun; February 28, 1898 – April 5, 1992) was an American actress of stage, screen, radio and television, as well as a lyricist and dramatic storyteller. She began her career in Yidd ...

, plus the team of Noble Sissel and

Eubie Blake James Hubert "Eubie" Blake (February 7, 1887 – February 12, 1983) was an American pianist and composer of ragtime, jazz, and popular music. In 1921, he and his long-time collaborator Noble Sissle wrote '' Shuffle Along'', one of the first B ...

. The husband-and-wife vaudeville team of Eva Puck and Sammy White (billed as Puck and White) starred in the Phonofilm ''Opera vs. Jazz'' (1923).

Max Fleischer Max Fleischer (born Majer Fleischer ; July 19, 1883 – September 25, 1972) was an American animator, inventor, film director and producer, and studio founder and owner. Born in Kraków, Fleischer immigrated to the United States where he became ...

used the Phonofilm process in 1924 when he introduced his animated '' Song Car-Tunes'' series.

Vitaphone

The nearly 2,000

Vitaphone Vitaphone was a sound film system used for feature films and nearly 1,000 short subjects made by Warner Bros. and its sister studio First National from 1926 to 1931. Vitaphone was the last major analog sound-on-disc system and the only one ...

short subjects produced by

Warner Bros. Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. (commonly known as Warner Bros. or abbreviated as WB) is an American film and entertainment studio headquartered at the Warner Bros. Studios complex in Burbank, California, and a subsidiary of Warner Bros. D ...

and its sister studio First National from 1926 to 1930 included vaudevillians, opera singers, Broadway stars, dancers, bands and popular vocalists. One and two-reel short musical films were valuable to the movie studios as springboards for new talents. Performers who made their film debuts in short films include

Joan Blondell Joan Blondell (born Rose Joan Bluestein; August 30, 1906 – December 25, 1979) was an American actress who performed in film and television for 50 years. Blondell began her career in vaudeville. After winning a beauty pageant, she embarked on ...

, Humphrey Bogart,

Burns and Allen Burns and Allen was an American comedy duo consisting of George Burns and his wife, Gracie Allen. They worked together as a successful comedy team that entertained vaudeville, film, radio, and television audiences for over forty years. The duo ...

Sammy Davis Jr. Samuel George Davis Jr. (December 8, 1925 – May 16, 1990) was an American singer, dancer, actor, comedian, film producer and television director. At age three, Davis began his career in vaudeville with his father Sammy Davis Sr. and the ...

Judy Garland Judy Garland (born Frances Ethel Gumm; June 10, 1922June 22, 1969) was an American actress and singer. While critically acclaimed for many different roles throughout her career, she is widely known for playing the part of Dorothy Gale in '' The ...

(as Baby Gumm),

Cary Grant Cary Grant (born Archibald Alec Leach; January 18, 1904November 29, 1986) was an English-American actor. He was known for his Mid-Atlantic accent, debonair demeanor, light-hearted approach to acting, and sense of comic timing. He was one o ...

, Bob Hope,

Bert Lahr Irving Lahrheim (August 13, 1895 – December 4, 1967), known professionally as Bert Lahr, was an American actor. He was best known for his role as the Cowardly Lion, as well as his counterpart Kansas farmworker "Zeke", in the MGM adaptation of ...

and

Ginger Rogers Ginger Rogers (born Virginia Katherine McMath; July 16, 1911 – April 25, 1995) was an American actress, dancer and singer during the Classical Hollywood cinema, Golden Age of Hollywood. She won an Academy Award for Best Actress for her starri ...

.Barrios, Richard. ''A Song in the Dark: The Birth of the Musical Film'', Oxford University Press, 1994.
/ref> Ruth Etting sang "My Mother's Eyes" (by Abel Baer and L. Wolfe Gilbert) and "That's Him Now" (by Milton Ager and Jack Yellen) in the Paramount Movietone ''Ruth Etting in Favorite Melodies'' (1929), filmed in a single take at the Astoria Studios in Queens, New York. Astoria Studios was built by Paramount in the early days of sound films to provide the company with an audio-capable facility close to the Broadway theater district. Many features and short subjects were filmed there between 1928 and 1933, including the 16-minute ''

St. Louis Blues The St. Louis Blues are a professional ice hockey team based in St. Louis. The Blues compete in the National Hockey League (NHL) as a member of the Central Division in the Western Conference. The franchise was founded in 1967 as one of the ...

'' (1929), the only film of Bessie Smith.

1930s

Orchestra leader

Phil Spitalny Phil Spitalny (November 7, 1890 – October 11, 1970) was a Russian Empire-born American musician, music critic, composer, and bandleader heard often on radio during the 1930s and 1940s. He rose to fame after he led an all-female orchestra, a nov ...

made a series of musical shorts beginning with ''Phil Spitalny'' (1929) at

MGM Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios Inc., also known as Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures and abbreviated as MGM, is an American film, television production, distribution and media company owned by Amazon through MGM Holdings, founded on April 17, 1924 a ...

, followed by shorts for both Vitaphone and Paramount, including ''Big City Fantasy'' (1929), ''Phil Spitalny and His Musical Queens'' (1934), ''Ladies That Play'' (1934), ''Phil Spitalny and His All Girl Orchestra'' (1935) and ''Sirens of Syncopation'' (1935). For promotional purposes, major film stars, including

Gary Cooper Gary Cooper (born Frank James Cooper; May 7, 1901May 13, 1961) was an American actor known for his strong, quiet screen persona and understated acting style. He won the Academy Award for Best Actor twice and had a further three nominations, ...

and Clark Gable, made guest appearances in such musical shorts as MGM's ''Star Night at the Cocoanut Grove'' (1934) and '' Starlit Days at the Lido'' (1935), while others featured a single band, such as '' Freddie Rich and His Orchestra'' (1938). Richard Barrios (author of ''A Song in the Dark: The Birth of the Musical Film'') provided notes for Kino Video's compilation, ''The Best of Big Bands and Swing'': :During the "Dawn of Sound," musical short subjects were the '' hors d'œuvre'' before the main feature, and an effective means for the studio to test their freshly signed talent in front of the camera. Aggressively pursuing the top singers, songwriters and musicians of Tin Pan Alley, Paramount's roster of contract players was composed of some of the top names in the world of entertainment. Cary Grant makes his film debut as a sailor cruising the Far East in search of whoopee in ''Singapore Sue''.

Artie Shaw Artie Shaw (born Arthur Jacob Arshawsky; May 23, 1910 – December 30, 2004) was an American clarinetist, composer, bandleader, actor and author of both fiction and non-fiction. Widely regarded as "one of jazz's finest clarinetists", Shaw led ...

presents a master class in the elementals of swingband construction (

's ''Class In Swing''). A very young Bing Crosby croons three ballads in ''Dream House'', a comedy-musical directed by slapstick impresario

Mack Sennett Mack Sennett (born Michael Sinnott; January 17, 1880 – November 5, 1960) was a Canadian-American film actor, director, and producer, and studio head, known as the 'King of Comedy'. Born in Danville, Quebec, in 1880, he started in films in the ...

. This collection showcases several top female vocalists, including

Ethel Merman Ethel Merman (born Ethel Agnes Zimmermann, January 16, 1908 – February 15, 1984) was an American actress and singer, known for her distinctive, powerful voice, and for leading roles in musical theatre.Obituary '' Variety'', February 22, 1984. ...

(''Her Future''), Ruth Etting (''Favorite Melodies'' and

Lillian Roth Lillian Roth (December 13, 1910 – May 12, 1980) was an American singer and actress. Her life story was told in the 1955 film '' I'll Cry Tomorrow'', in which she was portrayed by Susan Hayward, who was nominated for the Academy Award for Best ...

(''Meet The Boyfriend''). There's also a two-edged homage to that icon of 1930s naughtiness, Betty Boop, with appearances by Betty's prototype, "Boop-a-Doop Girl"

Helen Kane Helen Kane (born Helen Clare Schroeder, August 4, 1904 – September 26, 1966) was an American singer and actress. Her signature song was " I Wanna Be Loved by You" (1928), featured in the 1928 stage musical ''Good Boy''. The song was written for ...

(''A Lesson In Love''), and Betty's actual voice,

Mae Questel Mae Questel (born Mae Kwestel, September 13, 1908 – January 4, 1998) was an American actress. She was best known for providing the voices for the animated characters Betty Boop (from 1931) and Olive Oyl (from 1933). She began in vaudeville, ...

(''Musical Doctor'', in which Dr. Rudy Vallee finds musical deficiencies to be the root of all ills). Perhaps the gem of this collection, however, is ''Office Blues'', in which a pre- Astaire and pre-stardom

cavorts with Broadway chorines in an Art Deco extravaganza. With artists like these on the bill it's clear that the short subject -- not the feature -- was often the highlight of the program!

1940s

In the late 1930s and early 1940s,

Betty Hutton Betty Hutton (born Elizabeth June Thornburg; February 26, 1921 – March 11, 2007) was an American stage, film, and television actress, comedian, dancer, and singer. Early life and education Hutton was born Elizabeth June Thornburg on February 2 ...

made a half-dozen musical shorts before her feature debut in '' The Fleet's In'' (1942) and then continued to make shorts for the war effort. She was seen in ''Paramount Headliner: Queens of the Air'' (1938), Vitaphone's ''Vincent Lopez and His Orchestra'' (1939), ''Broadway Brevities: One for the Book'' (1939), ''Paramount Headliner: Three Kings and a Queen'' (1939), ''Broadway Brevities: Public Jitterbug Number One'' (1939), ''Paramount Victory Short No. T2-1: A Letter from Bataan'' (1942), ''Army-Navy Screen Magazine #20: Strictly G.I.'' (1943), Paramount's ''Skirmish on the Home Front'' (1944) and ''Hollywood Victory Caravan'' (1945), produced on the Paramount lot by the Treasury Department for the 1945 Victory Loan Drive. Several of Hutton's musical shorts have been shown on

Turner Classic Movies Turner Classic Movies (TCM) is an American movie-oriented pay-TV network owned by Warner Bros. Discovery. Launched in 1994, Turner Classic Movies is headquartered at Turner's Techwood broadcasting campus in the Midtown business district of At ...

in recent years. Modern jazz was added to the mix in such films as the 16-minute ''Artistry in Rhytym'' (1944), with

Stan Kenton Stanley Newcomb Kenton (December 15, 1911 – August 25, 1979) was an American popular music and jazz artist. As a pianist, composer, arranger and band leader, he led an innovative and influential jazz orchestra for almost four decades. Though K ...

and

Anita O'Day Anita Belle Colton (October 18, 1919 – November 23, 2006), known professionally as Anita O'Day, was an American jazz singer and self proclaimed “song stylist” widely admired for her sense of rhythm and dynamics, and her early big band app ...

, later re-edited into another short, ''Cool and Groovy'' (1956), which also featured Chico Hamilton and

The Hi-Los The Hi-Lo's were a vocal quartet formed in 1953, who achieved their greatest fame in the late 1950s and 1960s. The group's name is a reference to their extreme vocal and physical ranges (Bob Strasen and Bob Morse were tall, Gene Puerling and Cla ...

. In the mid-1940s, Louis Jordan made short music films, some of which were spliced together into a feature-length musical Western, ''Look-Out Sister'' (1947).

Television

During the 1950s, musical shorts were revived for telecasting on local stations. Feature films in that decade were usually not edited to fit. Instead, if a feature ended 20 minutes before the hour, footage from musical shorts was used to fill the gap. Snader Telescriptions were musical shorts made for television from 1950 to 1954. There were thousands of these three- and four-minute films, covering various genres from jazz and pop to R&B and country. Louis "Duke" Goldstone directed for Louis D. Snader.

References

Sources

*Bradley, Edwin R. ''The First Hollywood Sound Shorts, 1926-1931'', McFarland, 2005.

External links

Teachers Paradise: "Music video"

{{Film genres Musical films Film genres 1920s in film 1930s in film 1940s in film