What’s the most offensive/non-PC record you’ve come across?

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epigramophone
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Re: What’s the most offensive/non-PC record you’ve come across?

Post by epigramophone »

[/quote] drh :

"Well, after all, Edison had the Scottish Maggie Teyte, who would go on to be her generation's supreme interpreter of French art song and a noted exponent of Debussy's Peleas et Melisande (which she studied with the composer), record something called "I'se Gwine Back to Dixie" and George Clutsam's dreadful "Ma Curly-Headed Babby."

Dame Maggie Teyte was not Scottish. She was born in Wolverhampton in 1888 and died in London in 1976.
Debussy hailed her as the successor to Mary Garden, who was of Scottish ancestry.

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Re: What’s the most offensive/non-PC record you’ve come across?

Post by Wolfe »

Harry C. Browne recorded "I’ll Make Dat Black Gal Mine" which uses the N and C word. Harry C. Browne seems to have had a propensity for recording racist songs.

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Re: What’s the most offensive/non-PC record you’ve come across?

Post by drh »

epigramophone wrote: Fri Dec 03, 2021 1:07 pm
drh :

"Well, after all, Edison had the Scottish Maggie Teyte, who would go on to be her generation's supreme interpreter of French art song and a noted exponent of Debussy's Peleas et Melisande (which she studied with the composer), record something called "I'se Gwine Back to Dixie" and George Clutsam's dreadful "Ma Curly-Headed Babby."

Dame Maggie Teyte was not Scottish. She was born in Wolverhampton in 1888 and died in London in 1976.
Debussy hailed her as the successor to Mary Garden, who was of Scottish ancestry.
[/quote]

Oops--memory was mixing up the ancestry of the two. It's been a long time since I read Maggie Teyte's bio. Suffice it to say, though, that she was not a terribly likely candidate to be "Gwine Back to Dixie"! (Any more than Alma Gluck was likely, in real life, to have been pining for Ol' Virginny, I suppose.)

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Re: What’s the most offensive/non-PC record you’ve come across?

Post by VanEpsFan1914 »

"I'se Gwine Back to Dixie" is a Southern dialect song--and the 1876 sheet-music cover had a black guy on it--but that's not necessarily what I'd call offensive. It's one of my favorite records but then again I have the 1906 recording by the Haydn Quartet, and it's not like the sheet music cover was included--

Billy Murray's "Dixie Dan" is a positive spin on black representation in these records-- "Coal black color all except my teeth / With a loving disposition underneath"
and though it's a 'coon song' it doesn't mock people like 'Abraham Jefferson Washington Lee' does.

But the absolute most offensive record I've come across is 'A Coon's Attempted Suicide.' It was a 12" Columbia record from maybe around 1915. I don't believe it's on the Internet, and I'm actually kinda OK with that. It was included in a huge pile of classical and orchestral records, oddly enough. It's around here somewhere but I have forgot where I put it. Considering, though, I'm not in a hurry to go dig it back up either!

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Re: What’s the most offensive/non-PC record you’ve come across?

Post by paradroid1793 »

In Michigan, 2 girls from our school's Dear Asian Youth gave a presentation about the history of some of these racist stereotypical songs about Asian-Americans on records. They showed though Victor offered music to the East-Asian market, they also produced stereotypical songs such as "Ching-Chong (One Step for Dancing)", they also showed the infamous "Party Records" released a disgusting song that sexualizes women different ethnicities while also adding racist stereotypes and lyrics titled "Is it True about Chinese Women?", which after hearing their presentation, has to be the most messed up 78 I've heard & seen.
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Re: What’s the most offensive/non-PC record you’ve come across?

Post by edisonplayer »

I have the sheet music of "Mammy's Chocolate Soldier" also a 12 inch Columbia of the song by Nora Bayes.I like WW1 items.edisonplayer.

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Re: What’s the most offensive/non-PC record you’ve come across?

Post by phonograph guy3435 »

"But the absolute most offensive record I've come across is 'A Coon's Attempted Suicide.' It was a 12" Columbia record from maybe around 1915. I don't believe it's on the Internet, and I'm actually kinda OK with that. It was included in a huge pile of classical and orchestral records, oddly enough. It's around here somewhere but I have forgot where I put it. Considering, though, I'm not in a hurry to go dig it back up either!"

i found it on i78s, and there's two different recordings :shock:

https://i78s.org/

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Re: What’s the most offensive/non-PC record you’ve come across?

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"Uncle Josh and Aunt Nancy Put Up the Kitchen Stove"

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Re: What’s the most offensive/non-PC record you’ve come acro

Post by Governor Flyball »

Curt A wrote: Thu Feb 13, 2020 9:22 am An anti-Semitic socialist propaganda favorite from the German WWII swing band Charlie and His Orchestra...
"Making Whoopee"... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XsPOKoNKii4
Correction: Anti-Semitic and far right but not socialist!

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Re: What’s the most offensive/non-PC record you’ve come across?

Post by Curt A »

CORRECTION: "Nationalsozialistische," which is the German word for "National Socialist".
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