DESCRIPTION:
SAVOY CHRISTMAS MEDLEY – Part 1 [0:00]
SAVOY CHRISTMAS MEDLEY – Part 2 [2:39]
Don Porto’s Accordion Band (Harry Bidgood) with vocalist and chorus
Eclipse SC60 (from the matrix numbers, very probably late October 1932)

This is my third, annual, Christmas upload of a version of the SAVOY CHRISTMAS MEDLEY, a collection of traditional tunes and songs which were arranged by Debroy Somers during his time leading the Savoy Orpheans from 1923 to 1926. This version is bizarre: an accordion band directed by Harry Bidgood. It predates his fame as Primo Scala with an accordion band on Rex. The lead vocalist sounds like John Thorne.

Eclipse was Woolworth’s six-penny 8-inch-record label. It was recorded and pressed by the Crystalate Gramophone Record Manufacturing Co Ltd, using their studios at Broadhurst Gardens in West Hampstead and their pressing plant at Tonbridge in Kent. Eclipse matrix numbers begin ‘JW’; presumably because Jay Wilbur was Crystalate’s musical director.

Harry Bidgood, who was much associated with the Broadcast label, came to Crystalate when they acquired the ailing Vocalion Co Ltd in early 1932. Later, as Primo Scala, he recorded for Crystalate’s low-price Rex label; and continued under Decca’s ownership after they acquired Crystalate’s UK record business in March 1937.

That acquisition provided Decca with an excellent studio complex at Broadhurst Gardens; and the services of recording systems engineer Arthur Haddy who was responsible for the technical quality of Crystalate’s recordings and went on to do great work, such as ffrr and ffss, for Decca.

The 2015 upload is: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sLXLlwGoEVo

The 2014 upload is: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N6WqckWqrGQ