Sunday, February 12, 2023

a black history month moment: Irving Berlin and the little black man

By N.S.

Steve Sailer: “It didn’t always used to be like that. Irving Berlin’s two most famous songs, ‘Alexander’s Ragtime Band’ and ‘White Christmas’ were written about 30 years apart.”

N.S.: Steve, you can’t count Irvie, because he didn’t write his own songs. He kept a little black man in the closet, who wrote them for him! Didn’t you know about that?!

Yes, that was a story Berlin’s enemies retailed, when he was the most successful songwriter in the English language.



2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I'm dreaming of a WHITE Christmas??

Anonymous said...

Duke Ellington had a little gay black man (Billy Strayhorn) who actually wrote most of his music (even "Take the A-Train"!). And most of the Latin-flavored music that made Herb Alpert famous was written by a Jewish guy (i think his name was Sol Lake). -RM