Music is an essential part of everyday life. It is everywhere. Music helps to entertain us on long car rides, it lets us know how to feel watching a movie, it allows us the freedom to express ourselves, and to make connections with others based on the kinds we like. Music can be labeled as country, rock, slow, fast, motivational, chill, romantic, sad, techno, classical, and hundreds more. In fact, as of 2013, iTunes made available over 35 million songs to subscription members, and that is just a fraction of all the music that has been created. However, not all songs are made equal. Whether it is because of shared culture and experiences of the time or the beauty of the song itself, certain songs stand out from year to year, decade to decade. In valuing music and its history, this blog is dedicated to a decade by decade look of the most popular songs of the past century starting with the 1920s. However, these posts will not require the understanding of the intricacies of music theory. All terminology used will be explained in the hopes of making this topic more accessible for all interested.
The most popular song of the roaring 20s, according to Digital Dream Door (a company that aggregates and sorts music for educational and entertainment purposes), was ”Swanee” by Al Jolson.
Now I understand that this song is almost a century old and therefore not what one might listen to, but studying “Swanee” and why it became so popular can give just as much insight into the 20s as The Great Gatsby.
In fact, just like the dazzling parties of Fitzgerald’s masterpiece, “Swanee” has an upbeat and energetic feel that comes from Al Jolson’s arpeggios, an ascending or descending (in this case ascending) succession of musical notes, and word painting (while referring to birds singing he tweets like a bird and sings at a higher pitch). However, there is a need to clarify who deserves credit for this song. Yes, Al Jolson recorded the most popular version of this hit show tune, but the musical notes were written by George Gershwin, one of the most significant and popular composers in American history.
To distribute the credit even further, the lyrics were written by Irving Caesar whose 20th century fame is surpassed only by his ego. He claims to have come up with the lyrics for “Swanee” in just 11 minutes, which aroused much skepticism. But I digress, the point of this tangent is to make it clear that the credit for this masterpiece should be shared. Al Jolson may have hit the arpeggios wonderfully, but it was Gershwin who put it there and Caesar who accompanied it with meaningful lyrics.
However, Jolson was a crucial part of the trio. The show tune was originally seen as an entertaining piece but not anything noteworthy. It was only when Al Jolson heard the song and added it to “Sinbad”, his show, that “Swanee” made it on the charts for almost five months and spent half of those at the number one spot. Some say that this song topped the charts for so long because it appealed to such a broad audience. This song appealed to jazz enthusiasts (helping to kick off the era of jazz), those in a happy mood (with its energetic vibe), and even those with nolstalgic feelings whether it be a place or a person. For if one follows the story laid out by the lyrics, the singer longs to go back to the familiarity and the people waiting back “south”. As such, this song appeals to a wide variety of individuals.
Thanks to Al Jolson’s beautiful voice, Gershwin and Caesar’s masterful work with the songwriting, and the broad audience they were able to reach, “Swanee” became the most popular song of the Roaring 20’s, an age of endless parties. This is truly a remarkable accomplishment especially considering that the song was released in January of 1920. The show tune managed to stay popular for an entire decade. It will take a lot for the most popular song of the 1930s to beat out “Swanee”.