Marion Harris

Marion Harris was a popular singer of early Twentieth century vaudeville and Broadway shows. In July of 1917 she recorded "When I Hear That Jazz Band Play" which can be considered the first rendition of a jazz song that was recorded by a woman or at least the first song recorded by a woman that included "Jazz" in the title. To the general public she must have seemed the epitome of a flapper with her blonde bobbed hair and Jazz themed songs such as "Jazz Baby", Take Me to the Land of Jazz" and "I'm A Jazz Vampire". Little is known about Marion's background but her life on the stage is thought to have begun sometime in the 1910s singing in movie theatres and in vaudeville. Show business legend has it that she was discovered by dancer Vernon Castle. She was brought to New York by Broadway producer Charles B. Dillingham who supposedly gave her a small role in his production at the Globe Theatre of "Stop! Look! Listen!" in December of 1915. In 1918 she appeared in the Broadway musical "Listen Lester" at the Knickerbocker Theatre. Harris' recording career began in 1916 with the Victor label. She left Victor for the Columbia label in 1920 allegedly because Victor wouldn't allow her record W.C. Handy's "St. Louis Blues" which she recorded soon after joining Columbia and again in 1923 after she had switched to the Brunswick label. W.C. Handy remembered it this way in his autobiography;

Related Topics:
Vaudeville - Broadway - 1917 - Flapper - Jazz - Vernon Castle - New York - Charles B. Dillingham - Globe Theatre - 1915 - 1918 - Knickerbocker Theatre - 1916 - Victor - Columbia - 1920 - W.C. Handy - St. Louis Blues - 1923 - Brunswick

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"Marion Harris, celebrated White Blues singer, left a recording company that objected to her making a record of "St. Louis Blues". Miss Harris had used our numbers in vaudeville for a long time, and she sang blues so well that people sometimes thought that the singer was colored."

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Throughout her recording career Harris tended to record Blues or Jazz flavored tunes and featured the songs of many African-American songwriters. By the mid-1920s Harris had become a star of vaudeville and regularly played the Palace Theatre, appeared in Zeigfeld's Midnight Frolic in New York and toured the country with vaudeville shows. She got married in 1924 and had two children but divorced in 1928. She briefly left show business during this period. Marion appeared in "Yours Truly" at the Shubert Theatre and starred in "A Night In Spain" at the 44th Street Theatre in New York in 1927 and "The Second Little Show" at the Royale Theatre in 1930. In 1928 Marion appeared in her first film entitled "Marion Harris, Songbird Of Jazz". It was an eight minute early sound film of her singing. In 1929 she made her feature-length motion picture debut in MGM's early all-talking picture "Devil-May-Care" with Ramon Novarro and Dorothy Jordan. The film was a musical romance set in Napoleonic France and Marion played the heartbroken girlfriend whom Ramon Novarro left for Dorothy Jordan's character. The film was one of the very first motion picture musicals and also featured a short color dance sequence. When Variety magazine reviewed the film on December 25th, 1929 and they had this to say about Marion's performance:

Related Topics:
Blues - Jazz - African-American songwriters - Palace Theatre - Zeigfeld's Midnight Frolic - New York - 1924 - 1928 - Shubert Theatre - 44th Street Theatre - 1927 - Royale Theatre - 1930 - Marion Harris, Songbird Of Jazz - 1929 - MGM - Ramon Novarro - Dorothy Jordan - Napoleonic France - Variety magazine - December 25

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"Miss Harris may have been cast for this picture to help work out a contract. For she seemed in a strange role for this popular singer and had but one song which wasn't and won't be popular. Her make up looked odd, although perhaps that was in the Napoleonic period."

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She appeared in a few other films including "Gems of M-G-M" in 1930 and "Trouble Ahead" in 1936, but her greatest success was as a vaudeville singer. In the early 1930s she was singing on the radio in New York and continued to do vaudeville and cabaret work. In 1931 she went to England and performed at London's Café de Paris (3 Coventry Street). She spent a lot of time in London during the 1930s and sometime in the mid-1930s she moved there, where she performed in cabarets and on BBC radio shows. Harris recorded ten songs between 1931 to 1934 on the Columbia and Decca labels. In the late 1930's she retired from show business and married English theatrical agent Leonard Urry. During World War II her house was destroyed in a German rocket attack during the Blitz. She returned to the United States in 1944 and tragically died from burns after falling asleep in bed with a lit cigarette at the Le Marquise Hotel in New York (12 East 31st Street) on April 23, 1944.

Related Topics:
Films - 1930 - Vaudeville singer - Cabaret - 1931 - England - London - Café de Paris - BBC radio - Columbia - Decca - Leonard Urry - World War II - German - United States - 1944 - Le Marquise Hotel - April 23

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