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Japanese
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04:43 |
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J01 |
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Words and Their Stories -- a program in Special English. Every word has
its own story. Where did it come from? How did it get into the language?
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J02 |
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Our words today are "Tin Pan Alley."
For many years the phrase "Tin Pan Alley," has stood for American popular
music, and the composers and publishers who made it great. It started in
the late 1800's on busy, crowded 28th Street in New York City. At that
time, the offices of music publishers lined the street. Music from pianos
inside the offices filled the air. The music was played by piano
demonstrators, song pluggers . . . people who tried out new songs. They
played
and sang the songs for orchestra leaders, vaudeville singers, and stars of
operettas and musical comedies . . . anyone who could bring the songs to
the public.
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J03 |
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One day, 70 years ago, a newsman from a New York paper visited the
publishing house of Harry Von Tilzer. The newsman, Monroe Rosenfeld, was
planning a series of stories on American popular music. During the visit,
he heard someone playing Mr. Von Tilzer's piano. The piano was old and
played with a rasping sound. To Mr. Rosenfeld, the piano sounded like tin
pans clashing together. "Tin Pan Music!" he commented, rolling the phrase
on the tip of his tongue. "Why," he said at last, "the whole street is a
Tin Pan Alley."
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J04 |
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Mr. Rosenfeld used this phrase when he printed his stories about the
publishing business. And from that time on, New York's 28th Street was
known as Tin Pan Alley. But Tin Pan Alley became much more than just a
street of music publishers. It produced a period of American popular music
that lasted from about 1880 to around 1930. Songwriters developed a new
way of writing songs, publishing them, selling them, and keeping them
alive in the public mind.
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J05 |
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In earlier years, American publishing houses chiefly handled serious
music, but toward the end of the century, some young men decided to change
this to take a chance and go into the music publishing business. Some were
salesmen or printers of sheet music. Others were songwriters who felt that
the easiest way for a composer to publish his song was to do it himself.
So, they went to New York City where they could find the performers to
sing and sell their songs.
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J06 |
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Here on Tin Pan Alley, American popular music developed. Here were
published ballads and love songs, sad songs and silly songs, songs for
operettas and for musical comedies, and also ragtime, jazz, and blues.
From Tin Pan Alley came such great composers as George Gershwin, Irving
Berlin. Jerome Kern, Cole Porter, and Richard Rodgers. On Tin Pan Alley
the composers learned their trade -- learned what the public wanted and
what would make a song sell.
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J07 |
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The end of Tin Pan Alley as the center of American music came around 1930,
after records, radio, and talking pictures were born. But the name, "Tin
Pan Alley," is still used to mean the American music business, and the
great composers of popular music who got their start on the street of
songs.
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Voice of America
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