Judy Garland "Bill" First Acetate Recording Jerome Kern "Show Boat" Remastered

This is the first acetate Judy Garland recorded as a child from the great box set "Lost Treasures", remastered and cleaned by me for this post. Highly recommended issue, which mostly is live radio and stage recordings never issued before, many in better sound if they were issued before. Like Julie Andrews Judy had an adult voice as a child that was almost freakish. She is doing a partial impersonation of the song's creator Helen Morgan, but amazing how much of her own voice is there. No rights implied, posted to hopefully boost this issue as well as show what improvements cleaning can do with such period recordings.

Category:

Entertainment

Tags:

• Judy Garland
• Jerome Kern
• Showboat
• Broadway
• Oscar Hammerstein
• P.G. Wodehouse
• Rare recording
• Helen Morgan

[jonthesYT]

I tried to work with this company when I found out they were doing this; it was short notice. As it is on the box set, amazing. The uploading actually added some minor haze, you can hear particularly at the start; process still a mystery to me in some ways. Interesting the much remarked on way Lonette McKee handled the last section (the Times noted it in their review of the Prince "Show Boat" is exactly what Judy does here.

[LiveStoryteller]

Really interesting, thanks so much for posting.

[SirRiehl]

@wdlarue

Judy was 12 going on 13 when she recorded this. She was Born in June 1922 and this song was recorded early 1935.

[wdlarue]

Any idea, at all, how old she was when this was recorded? Thanks for posting. Remarkable

[friendsfamilyaccount]

@ALJarman1 Yes, she'd sit on a piano just like Helen Morgan did, with a shawl over her head and body with just her face in the spotlight. When she was done, the audience was shocked to see a little 11 or 12 year old girl slip off the shawl and climb off the piano. It must have been particularly effective, as Judy was tiny to begin with especially if she hadn't reached her full height by that age, (which was only 4' 11" as an adult).

[FLBoy46]

Thank you for posting this much-cleaned and so rare version! I bought the box set and it really IS amazing!!!

[ALJarman1]

I've been reading now for close on fifty years that Judy sang this song back when she was Frances Gumm and then Frances Garland, but it was always something that I never dreamt had ever been 'captured' in any medium. Its recent emergence on CD surprised and thrilled me... now, to think that you've made it so ACCESSIBLE to everybody who owns a computer... well, it makes me glad that I'm still around. Thank you, thank you, thank you.

[burleq]

Terrific! I find it so excited that so many of these old recordings CAN be so beautifully restored...it makes the past alive, in color and 3-D, instead of scratchy, tinny and sepia toned! Thanks-

[ginger1961]

Excellent work as always.