Recorded music from 1923
Posted: Wed Jul 09, 2025 9:46 am
Recorded sound enters the public domain on a different schedule, and this year we’re welcoming music from 1923.
Looking at our collections, it seems like the only song anyone really cared about was “Yes! We have no bananas” which was recorded by a silly number of musicians (including in Italian and Yiddish!) and even led to them trolling themselves with the “I’ve Got the Yes! We Have No Bananas Blues. Here’s the same artist, Billy Jones, both with bananas and annoyed about the bananas.
The Jazz Age was really swinging, and 1923 saw the first recordings by King Oliver’s Jazz Band, including early work from Louis Armstrong on Dipper Mouth Blues. The first recorded example of jazz band boogie-woogie also came out that year, The Fives by Tampa Blue Jazz Band. And dancing the Charleston became a craze in 1923, thanks to Charleston from the 1923 musical “Runnin’ Wild.”
While the entrance to Tutankhamun’s tomb was found in 1922, it wasn’t until February of 1923 that the tomb was unsealed and of course the event was memorialized in song, including Old King Tut phone number library by Billy Jones and Ernest Hare, and Tut-Ankh-Amen (In the Valley of the Kings) by S. S. Leviathan Orchestra.
Some popular songs from 1923 that are have joined the public domain include:
Down Hearted Blues by Bessie Smith
Parade of the Wooden Soldiers by Paul Whiteman and His Orchestra
Who’s Sorry Now by Isham Jones Orchestra
That Old Gang of Mine by Billy Murray and Ed Smalle
Bambalina by Paul Whiteman and His Orchestra
Swingin’ Down the Lane by Isham Jones Orchestra
Love Sends a Little Gift of Roses by Carl Fenton’s Orchestra
Dreamy Melody by Art Landry and his Call of the North Orchestra
No, No, Nora by Eddie Cantor
Come celebrate the public domain with us in person in San Francisco on January 24th, or virtually on January 25th.
Looking at our collections, it seems like the only song anyone really cared about was “Yes! We have no bananas” which was recorded by a silly number of musicians (including in Italian and Yiddish!) and even led to them trolling themselves with the “I’ve Got the Yes! We Have No Bananas Blues. Here’s the same artist, Billy Jones, both with bananas and annoyed about the bananas.
The Jazz Age was really swinging, and 1923 saw the first recordings by King Oliver’s Jazz Band, including early work from Louis Armstrong on Dipper Mouth Blues. The first recorded example of jazz band boogie-woogie also came out that year, The Fives by Tampa Blue Jazz Band. And dancing the Charleston became a craze in 1923, thanks to Charleston from the 1923 musical “Runnin’ Wild.”
While the entrance to Tutankhamun’s tomb was found in 1922, it wasn’t until February of 1923 that the tomb was unsealed and of course the event was memorialized in song, including Old King Tut phone number library by Billy Jones and Ernest Hare, and Tut-Ankh-Amen (In the Valley of the Kings) by S. S. Leviathan Orchestra.
Some popular songs from 1923 that are have joined the public domain include:
Down Hearted Blues by Bessie Smith
Parade of the Wooden Soldiers by Paul Whiteman and His Orchestra
Who’s Sorry Now by Isham Jones Orchestra
That Old Gang of Mine by Billy Murray and Ed Smalle
Bambalina by Paul Whiteman and His Orchestra
Swingin’ Down the Lane by Isham Jones Orchestra
Love Sends a Little Gift of Roses by Carl Fenton’s Orchestra
Dreamy Melody by Art Landry and his Call of the North Orchestra
No, No, Nora by Eddie Cantor
Come celebrate the public domain with us in person in San Francisco on January 24th, or virtually on January 25th.