78rpm musicians autographs

[JHolmesesq]

I was wondering if anyone else has any autographs of artists from the 78rpm era? I'm proud to own Hoagy Carmichael's which I picked up off eBay for £10.

I've found a few online, a friend of mine owns Whispering Jack Smith's autograph, and I've taken a print screen of Al Bowlly's autograph which is going on eBay for the princely sum of £350

[Lenoirstreetguy]

Congrats on the Carmichael! And the price for Bowlly is amazing! Here's Maud Powell's signature. I got this years ago at Goodspeed's bookstore in Boston which practically gave the stuff away! She was an American and the first Red Seal violinist. This is on a plain visiting card. Her little musical signature are of course the open strings of a violin, and her underline is a violin bow. I like her recordings a lot, but Andre Benoist , who accompanied here from time to time was very bitchy about her in his book. He worked with Albert Spalding so maybe he couldn't give credit where credit was due. Powell gave the American premier of the Sibelius concerto and Benoist was savage about it. And I am prepared to believe that her very 19th century technique wasn't quite up to the challenge.

Jim

[Guest]

I was calling around to find reliable 78 dealers in my area who have good stock at reasonable prices. I found an antique dealer several hours away, who had a "record room" with several thousand records. I was hopeful, and went up this last weekend. The state of the "record room" was atrocious. There were broken records, in disarray, dirty, no record covers, just piled in boxes. I set to going through each box, and found about 20 suitable records. I had just about given up, when I found an absolute gem way in the corner ready to be broken by a bunch of records teetering by it....A 78 autographed by Frank Sinatra on the label. I couldn't figure out how to post my picture of it, but it looks consistent with signatures I have seen on the internet. Sending it to PSA at some point in the near future to authenticate. Guess it goes to show you can find greatness even in such an environment.

[epigramophone]

This thread has been dormant for years, but here are a couple more autographs from my record collection.

John McCormack needs no introduction, but Isobel Baillie (1895-1983) may be less familiar to our American members. She was one of the finest oratorio and concert singers that Britain ever produced, and her records on UK Columbia are well worth seeking out.