Thursday, November 20, 2008

Al Jolson 'Toot toot tootsie Goodbye'

My Dad's got this on a wax 78 rpm (the flip is 'Back in Your Old Backyard' if I remember correctly) and as a kid I used to play it to death and tried to copy the whistling solo and I can still sing it by heart - it's a brilliant song if you don't know Jolson give it a whirl. I suppose (adopting an old-timer's voice) there must be hundreds of teenagers around today who haven't seen 'The Jolson Story' biopic or its sequel 'Jolson Sings Again' and so I must do what I can to redress that balance. I suppose a lot of the mastery is in the songs themselves - 'Watch for the mail, I'll never fail - If you don't get a letter then you know I'm in jail' . They don't write them like that anymore...