“Gee, But It’s Great to Meet a Friend (From Your Home Town)” (1937)

Composed by Tracey, McGauisk and Fisher; probably arranged by Abe Osser.

Recorded by Bunny Berigan and His Orchestra for Victor on September 3, 1937 in New York.

Bunny Berigan, first and solo trumpet; Steve Lipkins and Irving Goodman, trumpets; Thomas “Sonny” Lee first trombone; Al George, trombone; Robert “Mike” Doty, first alto saxophone; Joe Dixon, alto saxophone; Georgie Auld and Clyde Rounds, tenor saxophones; Joe Lippman, piano; Tom Morganelli, guitar; Frederick “Hank” Wayland, bass; George Wettling, drums; Gail Reese, vocal.

The story:

Professionally, Bunny Berigan had grown up as a jazz musician. But unlike most jazz musicians of his time, he also possessed the skills to be a superb studio musician. As a result, he had been forced to sublimate his jazz nature, and perform for the better part of six years basically as a studio musician, which allowed him to earn a handsome income in the depths of the Great Depression. But the ongoing confinement, regimentation, and frustration of doing this, and his sense that his career was going nowhere, had caused him to become an alcoholic. By the time he was very dependent on alcohol (1934), circumstances had combined to allow him, and several other very talented musicians, to start jazz-oriented dance bands that the public supported sufficiently to allow their ongoing existence and, in a few  instances, commercial success.

After Bunny Berigan formed his own band, he was allowed to be himself musically more than at any other time in his professional life. Indeed, most of his happiness for the remainder of his life was derived from leading and playing with his own bands. He became obsessive about maintaining his various bands, and stubbornly continued to lead them when, during tough times, a more prudent person would have laid off for a while, and regrouped when circumstances were more favorable. In addition, Bunny Berigan not only wanted to lead a band, he also wanted success in the music business, and he worked very hard to achieve success.

One of the constant conflicts a person faces when he or she makes music a professional career, is the unending tension between the business of music and the making of music. Bunny Berigan was always fully engaged in the making of music. He devoted almost all of his attention, time, energy, and experience to making his band the best performing unit possible. He was passionate about leading his band, and investing as much as he had to offer at any given time into his trumpet playing. By July of 1937, he had accomplished a great deal musically in building and directing his new band, and by shaping that band in his own musical image and likeness.

On the business side, he certainly understood that his band had to exist and survive in a business/economic environment that he neither understood completely nor liked. He accepted the business/economic realities that surrounded him, as most musicians did, with mild resentment. His way of dealing with business issues was to hire competent people, pay them well, and rely on them to take care of whatever business matters had to be taken care of. He wanted as little to do with the business side of his band as was possible. Unlike his mentor, Tommy Dorsey, Bunny trusted his business associates to do what needed to be done competently and honestly. Unfortunately, this would prove to be a major mistake on his part.

There has been very little written about the business end of the swing era over the years. Almost all commentators have taken the position that whatever happened with this band or that, happened more or less in a vacuum because of the music of that band, or as in the case of Bunny Berigan, because of the music and behavior of the bandleader. Berigan often has been characterized as a simpleton drunkard, who did what he was told by others, and sort of bumbled his way through his career as the leader of a big band. This is a gross oversimplification—indeed a distortion. I cannot assert that Berigan was a businessman. He wasn’t. He was first, last, and always a musician. Although he had little interest in business matters, he was aware of them, and at first(1), he delegated them to others who were well qualified to handle them. Otherwise, despite his great talent, he could never have had a big band in the first place, or maintained the various bands he would continue to lead  (except for one six-month hiatus) for the rest of his life.

The Berigan band’s income during the first eight months of 1937 was derived from their sponsored radio show, Fun in Swingtime, on the Mutual network, location jobs, and recordings. This offset about 40 to 50 percent of their ongoing expenses. They played very few one-night dance jobs during this time, and no theaters. The overall plan initially devised by the Rockwell-O’Keefe booking agency (then taken over by MCA) and Arthur Michaud for Bunny Berigan was to keep him on radio from April 18, when Fun in Swingtime debuted, as long as possible to build up his name, then send him out on one-nighters and theater jobs to earn the remaining 50 to 60 percent every successful band needed to balance income with expenses.

Once the band got out on the road, their popularity there could be reinforced by their records and any radio broadcasts (usually sustaining, that is non-paying) they could garner. This was the famous “Three R” formula of the band business: first (in terms of revenue) was the road; and then radio (a sponsored show was the only kind that paid money; sustaining broadcasts served only as promotion, but promotion was essential to keep a band’s music and name before the public); and then records. Without all three Rs in their proper proportion sustaining a band, its very existence was in jeopardy. As September of 1937 began, everyone connected with the Berigan band knew that it was only a matter of time before they would have to begin to tour in order to survive.

But after the band left the Pennsylvania Hotel in early July, they did not tour. Instead, they began a lengthy engagement at the Pavilion Royal, on the Merrick Road, in Valley Stream, Long Island, New York on July 8. Although the organization of the Berigan band was now in place, on both the music and business sides, there undoubtedly was not enough money coming in to offset the expenses of running such a high-priced outfit. Nevertheless, Bunny’s management evidently thought that his name had not yet been built up enough to command substantial fees on the road, so he and his band settled-in at Pavilion Royal, that had an all-important radio wire. But the broadcasts of the Berigan band from that venue were only on a sustaining basis. Consequently, every day the Berigan band remained at Pavilion Royal, Bunny’s debt increased.

It is not known how the shortfall between the expenses and income of the Berigan band were handled. I suspect that shortfalls were covered by loans from either MCA and/or Michaud and/or John Gluskin(2) (and/or possibly Tommy Dorsey) to Bunny. On the one hand, this scenario proved the faith MCA and Michaud had in Bunny as a bandleader; on the other, he was beginning to go from a condition of not having any personal money to creating substantial and increasing personal debt. This threatening development was something that most if not all bandleaders had to deal with effectively at one time or another in order to survive and succeed. So Bunny did what MCA and Michaud told him to do, which was to stay in the greater New York area while he was still on the Fun in Swingtime radio show, stay in a place at Pavilion Royal with its sustaining radio connection to keep the band’s music (and the Berigan name) before the public, and make records as time permitted. All the while, his personal debt increased. (3)

The music:

Although Bunny Berigan’s debt was continuing to increase through the first eight months of 1937, the quality of the music his band produced was also increasing. And Bunny’s trumpet playing was great through this time, indeed often inspired. But when it came to making records, Berigan, like all other bandleaders, was limited in controlling the music his band would record. At Victor Records, Bunny had to work with Eli Oberstein, to decide what music he and his band would record. Oberstein was an aggressive man who thought he knew what was best for the bands he recorded. Consequently, Bunny most often simply went along with Oberstein’s decisions. In retrospect, those decisions seem questionable at best. (3A) Thus we confront the Berigan band making a recording of the song “Gee, But It’s Great to Meet a Friend (From Your Home Town).”

The song is something of an oddity in that it was used by Oberstein and the Berigan band as essentially a promotional recording for the 1939-1940 New York World’s Fair. Plans for the 1939 World’s Fair were first announced in September of 1935, and the New York World’s Fair Corporation (WFC) began constructing the fairground in June of 1936. The fair opened on April 30, 1939, coinciding with the 150th anniversary of the first inauguration of George Washington. When World War II began in Europe on September 1, 1939, four months into the 1939 World’s Fair, many exhibits were affected, and some were forced to close after the first season. Although the Fair attracted over 45 million visitors over the summers of 1939 and 1940, it recouped only 32% of its costs. After the Fair ended on October 27, 1940, most pavilions were demolished or removed, though some buildings were relocated or retained for the 1964 New York World’s Fair, which took place on the same site.(4)

The contract Bunny Berigan had signed with Victor Records in March of 1937 (5) stipulated that Victor, not Berigan, would decide which music would be recorded. What it did not stipulate is how the music would be presented. That was largely controlled by Bunny, though Victor’s producer, Eli Oberstein, usually had a lot to say to Berigan about how he wanted the music to be presented. Thus, the recording we hear of “Gee, It’s Great to Meet a Friend…”) is a hodgepodge: Vocalist Gail Reese tries to invest the lyric/advertisement with some enthusiasm, the band then sings in unison for a bit, (listen for Tom Morganelli’s great guitar support through this sequence), and then the unique contribution of Bunny Berigan is heard. And what a contribution it is!

Drummer George Wettling sets up Berigan’s entrance with a crackling rattle around his snare drum. Bunny starts his solo by playing a jazz fanfare, then he launches into a full chorus improvisation that the composers of this rather prosaic song, and most other people, would have never thought possible. Berigan’s playing in this most unlikely setting is quintessential: he covers much of the range of his instrument; his jazz ideas are cogent; the solo flows logically from its beginning through its middle, and it ends dramatically with a high note; and it is all delivered with Bunny’s big, warm trumpet sound, and irresistible swing. After this solo, Berigan also provides the exciting high-note lead trumpeting in the final few bars of the performance.

The terminology “diamond in the rough” can aptly be used to define Bunny Berigan’s playing on this recording.

The recording presented with this post was digitally remastered by Mike Zirpolo.

---

Notes:

(1) In early 1939, after suffering several financial losses due to various mistakes made by his personal manager Arthur Michaud, and his booking agency, Music Corporation of America, Bunny, without legal guidance, angrily “fired” Michaud. He then placed his father, William P. Berigan, who knew nothing about the band business, in the position of his personal manager. Unfortunately, Bunny, without legal assistance, neglected to deal with the contract he and Michaud had, and his “fired” manager continued to collect commissions from him even though he rendered no managerial services to Berigan. These moves soon resulted in Bunny becoming insolvent, and beset by chronic money problems.

(2) Joseph M. Herbert was Tommy Dorsey’s accountant, and through TD, he was introduced to Bunny Berigan, and then retained by Bunny. Herbert reported to Mort Goode, in the liner notes for The Complete Tommy Dorsey, Vol. III, 1936–1937, RCA Bluebird AXM2-5560 (1978) that “John Gluskin was a well-known litigating attorney, associated in those days with the Ferdinand Pecora Law Firm. He had a ten percent management interest in the (Tommy Dorsey) band’s income, and Tommy and Arthur Michaud (then TD’s personal manager also) owed him a good deal of commissions. They were in a business discussion one night when Tommy said (to Gluskin): ‘I’m going to pay you more money than I even owe you to settle my debt.’ Gluskin enthusiastically replied: ‘Okay Tom, that’s great kid.’ Tommy said, ‘Fine, here are all of the stock certificates for those oil wells I went into with Morton Downey and the boys. They’re all yours.’ That’s how he paid him off. Every one of those wells came in dry.” Such a gambit would never have occurred to Bunny Berigan. Indeed, Bunny would never have invested in oil wells. Despite the ongoing involvement of Gluskin in the Berigan band’s finances (at least through 1937), it appears that he never represented Berigan as an attorney.

(3) Fortunately, Bunny and his band did finally begin touring in mid-October 1937. From then through the end of that year, the work the band did, particularly in theaters, resulted in very substantial grosses each week. By Christmas, Berigan was able to pay off all of his debts, host a holiday party for his bandsmen, give each of them a lovely gift (a personally inscribed watch), and begin the new year with a cash reserve of many thousands of dollars.

(3A) In late 1938, Victor assigned a new A and R man (producer) to guide Berigan on records. He was the much-liked Leonard Joy, who understood Bunny’s unique talent, and allowed it to be presented on records much more frequently than Eli Oberstein had. Unfortunately, by that time, Bunny’s business miscalculations and several other bad-luck developments outside of his control had undermined finances of the Berigan band.

(4) Information about the 1939-1940 New York World’s Fair was extracted from the Wikipedia post on it.

(5) When it came time for renewal of Berigan’s Victor recording contract in mid-March of 1939, nothing happened largely because Bunny had no real personal manager at that time who could make things happen. Musically, the Berigan band then was excellent, and had acquired two fine singers: Kathleen Lane and Danny Richards. In essence, that band was largely unrecorded as a result. This unfortunate development was one of many that would befall Bunny during the first eight months of 1939.