DESCRIPTION:
What'll I Do
Words and music by Irving Berlin
Frances Alda, soprano vocal solo
Orchestra conducted by Rosario Bourdon
Recorded June 12, 1924
Victrola 1032

Frances Alda was born at Christchurch, New Zealand, May 31, 1883. She was educated at Melbourne and studied singing with Mathilde Marchesi in Paris. Her debut was made in Massenet's Manon, at the Opera Comique in Paris in 1904. After highly successful engagements in Paris, Brussels, Parma and Milan (where she created the title role in the Italian version of Louise), she made her American Debut at the metropolitan Opera House in New York as Guilda in Verdi's Rigoletto. In 1910 she married Giulio Gatti-Casazza, manager of the Metropolitan Opera House. She also appeared with great success in London, Warsaw, Buenos Aries and other cities, in opera and in concert.

Alda toured Australia and New Zealand in 1927. She and Gatti-Casazza separated the following year and then divorced. In 1929, she left the Met but continued to give concerts, make radio broadcasts and appear in vaudeville.

Alda's 1937 autobiography was titled "Men, Women, & Tenors." The book reflects her fiery, forthright temperament and acerbic wit. She remarried in America in 1941 and traveled extensively in later life. She died of a stroke in Venice, Italy, aged 73.

The song "What'll I Do?" was first introduced in the New Music Box Review of 1923 by Grace Moore and John Steel. The song was also heard in the 1938 film "Alexander's Ragtime Band" sung by the chorus, and in the 1948 film "Big City" sung by Danny Thomas.