Alleymen's Show

Because Irvington House, a home on the Hudson for cardiac children, burned down two years ago and a new one is needed, Manhattan last week was treated to one of the best shows it has had in years. The evening started out like most expensive, long-winded benefits. Big, shambling Heywood Broun introduced famed playwrights and authors who stepped out on the platform, allowed the audience to look at them. Grover Whalen, the city's greatest handshaker, pompously read a paper describing the Cause and used all his superlatives to boost the talent which followed: Sopranos Evelyn Herbert and Hulda Lashanska (whose name Mr. Whalen could not pronounce), Violinist Francis MacMillen, Tenor Beniamino Gigli, Composer George Gershwin who carried along a lagging orchestra while he played the piano part of his Rhapsody in Blue.

But after the intermission Tin Pan Alley took over the show. The curtain went up, disclosed six grand pianos in a semicircle and a seventh in the centre. Two men were at each of the six pianos, ready to play 24 hands on. President Gene Buck of the American Society of Composers, Authors & Publishers had become master of ceremonies.

One by one President Buck introduced the twelve Tin Pan Alleymen. Then the Alleymen took turns at the piano in the centre to play one of their best known songs while the eleven other Alleymen and an orchestra joined in. The dressy audience in the new Waldorf-Astoria Ballroom could not contain itself. It managed to listen quietly to Percy Wenrich play "Put on Your Old Gray Bonnet" and to Raymond Hubbell's "Poor Butterfly," Arthur Schwartz's "Dancing in the Dark." But when Gus Edwards started "School Days" it was too much for them. They all started singing. They sang "You're My Everything" with Harry Warren, "Charmaine" with Erno Rapee, "Body & Soul" with Johnnie Green, "I'll See You Again" with Noel Coward, "My Song" with Ray Henderson, "Of Thee I Sing" with George Gershwin, "Old Man River" with Jerome Kern. Through it all little Irving Berlin was flying all over his keyboard with the most elaborate gestures. But people sitting near him could see that he was playing in cinema fashion, not touching the keys. When his turn came to solo, his colleagues started to snicker. Red as an apple he went to the front, started to play "Alexander's Ragtime Band" like a ten-year-old child. The Alley, of course, has known all along that the composer of a thousand hits could not play the piano, sharp is the only key he can manage at all but he has a sliding keyboard so that he can get the effect of playing in other keys. Irving Berlin creates his tunes by humming them. He sang "Alexander's Ragtime Band" in good Eddie Cantor fashion, after he had made a monkey of himself for Irvington House, walked away with the show.

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