Uploaded April 2025 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
A children's record from 1938, narrated by Milton Cross, with lyrics by Madge Tucker, and music by Molly Donaldson, a pseudonym for Muriel Pollock. It tells the story of the 16th century French fairy tale best known for the 1959 Walt Disney Animation Studios adaptation of the same name.
Milton Cross also made a few other children’s records, namely, ‘Cinderella’, ‘Little Red Riding Hood’, ‘Little Black Sambo’, ‘Christmas Eve in a Toy Shop’, ‘Young Benjamin Franklin’, ‘Puss and Boots’, and ‘The Gingerbread Man’.
Muriel Pollock, most well known today for 'Rooster Rag' (1917), is perhaps the most underrated female ragtime composer. While Charlotte Blake and May Aufderheide are much more remembered, Pollock trumps them both with her prolific list of songs, dozens of recordings (many of which she was pianist), and career spanning the ragtime, novelty, and jazz eras. Most female composers composed only about a dozen songs in the 1910s and then retired, without a 78 rpm recording to their name.
More Muriel Pollock:
youtube.com/playlist?list=PLLMkuz4vEFoPvKAa27pgiw4GD3u9q9mgd&si=y2jpSJlKjzLU_0kb
A children's record from 1938, narrated by Milton Cross, with lyrics by Madge Tucker, and music by Molly Donaldson, a pseudonym for Muriel Pollock. It tells the story of the 16th century French fairy tale best known for the 1959 Walt Disney Animation Studios adaptation of the same name.
Milton Cross also made a few other children’s records, namely, ‘Cinderella’, ‘Little Red Riding Hood’, ‘Little Black Sambo’, ‘Christmas Eve in a Toy Shop’, ‘Young Benjamin Franklin’, ‘Puss and Boots’, and ‘The Gingerbread Man’.
Muriel Pollock, most well known today for 'Rooster Rag' (1917), is perhaps the most underrated female ragtime composer. While Charlotte Blake and May Aufderheide are much more remembered, Pollock trumps them both with her prolific list of songs, dozens of recordings (many of which she was pianist), and career spanning the ragtime, novelty, and jazz eras. Most female composers composed only about a dozen songs in the 1910s and then retired, without a 78 rpm recording to their name.
More Muriel Pollock:
youtube.com/playlist?list=PLLMkuz4vEFoPvKAa27pgiw4GD3u9q9mgd&si=y2jpSJlKjzLU_0kb
![Aframerican Hymn (1916) by W. C. Handy [Sung by Handys Sacred Singers, 1929]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/l3dSShHM1rY/mqdefault.jpg "Aframerican Hymn (1916) by W. C. Handy [Sung by Handys Sacred Singers, 1929]
A departure from his usual blues-centric output, here is an obscure hymn from the Father of the Blues. In 1919, it was dedicated to the 300th anniversary of the arrival of the first enslaved Africans in North America.
#blues #78rpm #blackhistory
They didnt call him Father of the Blues for nothing. William Christopher Handys contributions to the blues genre singlehandedly crafted it into what it is today. His Memphis Blues, Saint Louis Blues, Beale Street Blues, Ole Miss Rag, and Yellow Dog Rag are jazz standards and in the case of St. Louis, it has come to name a National Hockey League team and became the second most popular song of the first half of the 20th century (the first being White Christmas).
Handys music also has sentimental value for myself. When I was 12 years old, the coronavirus syndemic broke out and isolated me to the void of online schooling for 3 months. I made ragtime playlists to pass the time, and one of the composers I discovered was Handy. As my first exposure to 12 bar blues, I instantly found relatability- the dismal sympathy was common at the time.
Further information on the beginning of the slave trade in North America in 1619, courtesy of Colonial National Historical Park: https://www.nps.gov/jame/learn/historyculture/african-americans-at-jamestown.htm
More W. C. Handy:
https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLLMkuz4vEFoOO4o3aIp_47P3ok4f61FEW&si sr8JqfjELd4ueWz")
![We Will Trust You As Our Leader (1911) by Scott Joplin [1976 SMOOTH JAZZ SOLO]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/mskKU461Hu0/mqdefault.jpg "We Will Trust You As Our Leader (1911) by Scott Joplin [1976 SMOOTH JAZZ SOLO]
Mike Wofford plays a famed Treemonisha opera segment, the penultimate song, where Treemonisha is elected as leader of her community in the aftermath of her kidnapping. This is one of my favorite songs, not just in the opera, but in general. It reminds me of the last day of school back in 8th Grade, when we spent the day in the town park, one of the last times we were completely free of responsibility.
#ragtime #scottjoplin #smoothjazz
©1976 Flying Dutchman Productions, Ltd.
More Scott Joplin:
https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLbGAQvbfY3Z3FDwU5UdnwCnkd7zkbX4mS&si=dlDrjm5EjRfaaUKt
Full album of this song:
https://youtu.be/BL_43JExzVY?si=vnv4U-eSJCvV5Rxh")
