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 Lee de Forest (August 26, 1873 – June 30, 1961) was an American inventor and a fundamentally important early pioneer in electronics. He invented the first electronic device for controlling current flow; the three-element " Audion" triode ...

Phonofilms of 1923-24 included

Eddie Cantor Eddie Cantor (born Isidore Itzkowitz; January 31, 1892 – October 10, 1964) was an American comedian, actor, dancer, singer, songwriter, film producer, screenwriter and author. Familiar to Broadway, radio, movie, and early television audiences ...

, George Jessel, Abbie Mitchell ("The Colored Prima Donna") and comic singer-dancer Molly Picon, plus the team of

Noble Sissel Noble Lee Sissle (July 10, 1889 – December 17, 1975) was an American jazz composer, lyricist, bandleader, singer, and playwright, best known for the Broadway musical ''Shuffle Along'' (1921), and its hit song "I'm Just Wild About Harry". Ea ...

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 Eva Puck (November 25, 1892 – October 25, 1979) was an American entertainer, a vaudeville headliner who later found success performing in Broadway musical comedies and film. Early life She was born in New York City, the middle of three ...

and Sammy White (billed as Puck and White) starred in the Phonofilm ''Opera vs. Jazz'' (1923). Max Fleischer used the Phonofilm process in 1924 when he introduced his animated ''

Song Car-Tunes '' Ko-Ko Song Car-Tunes'', ''Song Car-Tunes'', or (some sources erroneously say) ''Sound Car-Tunes'', is a series of short three-minute animated films produced by Max Fleischer and Dave Fleischer between May 1924 and September 1927, pioneering th ...

'' 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 subject A short film is any motion picture that is short enough in running time not to be considered a feature film. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences defines a short film as "an original motion picture that has a running time of 40 minutes ...

s produced by Warner Bros. 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 d ...

, Sammy Davis Jr.,

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 Leslie Townes "Bob" Hope (May 29, 1903 – July 27, 2003) was a British-American comedian, vaudevillian, actor, singer and dancer. With a career that spanned nearly 80 years, Hope appeared in Bob Hope filmography, more than 70 short and ...

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 Golden Age of Hollywood. She won an Academy Award for Best Actress for her starring role in ''Kitty Foyle'' ...

.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 Paramount (from the word ''paramount'' meaning "above all others") may refer to: Entertainment and music companies * Paramount Global, also known simply as Paramount, an American mass media company formerly known as ViacomCBS. The following busin ...

Movietone ''Ruth Etting in Favorite Melodies'' (1929), filmed in a single take at the

Astoria Studios The Kaufman Astoria Studios is a film studio located in the Astoria section of the New York City borough of Queens. The studio was constructed for Famous Players-Lasky in 1920, since it was close to Manhattan's Broadway theater district. ...

Queens, New York Queens is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Queens County, in the U.S. state of New York. Located on Long Island, it is the largest New York City borough by area. It is bordered by the borough of Brooklyn at the western tip of Long Is ...

. 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'' (1929), the only film of

Bessie Smith Bessie Smith (April 15, 1894 – September 26, 1937) was an American blues singer widely renowned during the Jazz Age. Nicknamed the " Empress of the Blues", she was the most popular female blues singer of the 1930s. Inducted into the Rock an ...

1930s

Orchestra leader Phil Spitalny made a series of musical shorts beginning with ''Phil Spitalny'' (1929) at MGM, 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, a ...

and

Clark Gable William Clark Gable (February 1, 1901November 16, 1960) was an American film actor, often referred to as "The King of Hollywood". He had roles in more than 60 motion pictures in multiple genres during a career that lasted 37 years, three decades ...

, 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 Richard is a male given name. It originates, via Old French, from Old Frankish and is a compound of the words descending from Proto-Germanic ''*rīk-'' 'ruler, leader, king' and ''*hardu-'' 'strong, brave, hardy', and it therefore means 'strong ...

(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 An hors d'oeuvre ( ; french: hors-d'œuvre ), appetiser or starter is a small dish served before a meal in European cuisine. Some hors d'oeuvres are served cold, others hot. Hors d'oeuvres may be served at the dinner table as a part of the m ...

'' 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 Harry Lillis "Bing" Crosby Jr. (May 3, 1903 – October 14, 1977) was an American singer, musician and actor. The first multimedia star, he was one of the most popular and influential musical artists of the 20th century worldwide. He was a ...

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 th ...

. 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 (''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 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 ...

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 Ke ...

and Anita O'Day, later re-edited into another short, ''Cool and Groovy'' (1956), which also featured

Chico Hamilton Foreststorn "Chico" Hamilton (September 20, 1921 – November 25, 2013) was an American jazz drummer and bandleader. He came to prominence as sideman for Lester Young, Gerry Mulligan, Count Basie, and Lena Horne. Hamilton became a bandleade ...

and The Hi-Los. In the mid-1940s,

Louis Jordan Louis Thomas Jordan (July 8, 1908 – February 4, 1975) was an American saxophonist, multi-instrumentalist, songwriter and bandleader who was popular from the late 1930s to the early 1950s. Known as " the King of the Jukebox", he earned his high ...

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