THE LAST DAYS OF AL BOWLLY

Here is our final installment on the life and times of Al Bowlly...

Jimmy Mesene and Al Bowlly had formed a singing and guitar playing duo to work the music halls in 1940 at a time when both of their careers seemed stalled. They worked as 'The Radio Stars with Two Guitars' or 'The Anglo-Greek Ambassadors of Song'. Al Bowlly's untimely death may have been the last straw for Jimmy Mesene who would have seen his living disappear and had lost a friend as well as a partner.

Al and his partner of the day Jimmy Mesene were booked for one week to do "Cine Variety" at the Rex Theatre at High Wycombe starting Monday April 14th, 1941. The engagement at the Rex, which was in Oxford Street, High Wycombe, and which was closed some time after the war, turned out to be Al’s last theatre date. The Rex Theatre was running Cine-variety that week, and the top-of-the-bill was Al Bowlly and Jimmy Mesene billed as "the Anglo-Greek Ambassadors of Song – Two voices and Guitars in Harmony".

John Watsham, manager of the theatre recalled:
"Little did we guess what the week would have in store for us! After the second house on Wednesday night, 16th April, we were having a little private party in a nearby hostelry – Al, Jimmy, my manager Captain Talbot Bullock, my wife and myself. The night wore on, and it was a good party, Al ..... suddenly told us that he was leaving to catch the last train to London. He was adamant, despite all our efforts to make him change his mind. Little did we realize then that we should never see him again."

Geoff Nash who was the projectionist at the Rex Theatre has his own memories of Al Bowlly:
"I must have been one of the last to talk to Al, which I remember clearly. Most artistes took the advantage of staying in High Wycombe for the week, in which way they could get a reasonable night’s sleep; things were not too hectic here. Al was the exception, as far as my memory allows, deciding to travel back to London on the last train, 10.34pm from High Wycombe station for Marylebone."

So Bowlly returned to his flat in Dukes Court in the West End at a time when London was being bombed nightly, and fatally decided not to bother to go to the safety of an air raid shelter. Both were offered the opportunity of an overnight stay in the town, but Bowlly opted to take the last train home to his flat at 32 Duke Street, Dukes Court, St James, London. His decision proved to be fatal, as he was killed by a Luftwaffe parachute mine that detonated outside his flat later that evening. His body appeared unmarked: although the massive explosion had not disfigured him, it had blown his bedroom door off its hinges and the impact against his head proved fatal. He was buried with other bombing victims in a mass grave at the Hanwell Cemetery (originally City of Westminster Cemetery), Uxbridge Road, Hanwell, London, where his name is spelled Albert Alex Bowlly.

Jimmy Mesene telephoned John Watsham at the Rex Theatre to break the news of Al Bowlly’s death. John’s instinct was the cancel the remainder of the show. However, Jimmy persuaded him to open again on the Friday with "A Tribute To Al Bowlly".

Bowlly died in the early hours of April 17, 1941 and a tribute did not appear in the "Melody Maker" until the 25th which announced that his funeral would be on Saturday 26th at Westminster City Council Cemetery, Uxbridge Road, Hanwell. No special memorial for Bowlly exists, there was just one tombstone for the communal grave erected on what was then a barren piece of land. Although Jimmy Mesene had intended to erect a memorial he could not do it because he was unrelated to Bowlly and could not get the necessary permission.

Al Bowlly is invariably credited with inventing crooning, or "The Modern Singing Style", releasing a book of the same name. Bowlly experimented with new methods of amplification, not least with his Melody Maker advert, showing him endorsing a portable vocal megaphone. With the advent of the microphone in 1931, Al adapted his singing style, moving away from the Jazz singing style of the 20s, into the softer, more expressive crooning singing style used in popular music of the 30s and 40s. It was Al's technique, sincerity, diction and his personality that distinguish him from many other singers of the 30s era.

Al is also credited with being the first "pop star". Prior to the advent of Bowlly, the bandleaders were the stars and the main attractions, with the records being sold as "Ray Noble and his orchestra (with vocal refrain)", a phenomenon that can be seen on 78s of the period. Most singers were all but anonymous; however, Al's popularity changed this, with him being the first singer to be given a solo spot on BBC radio due to popular demand, and records appearing featuring his own name. Bowlly's personality, good looks, charisma, and above all his voice, earned him the nickname "The Big Swoon", with Al finding himself being mobbed by female fans for autographs and photos after his performances. One of the first places I remember hearing Bowlly's voice was in the 1980 movie The Shining - his recording of "Midnight, The Stars, And You" was featured prominently in the movie background.

Al Bowlly died tragically young, and like other stars such as Carole Lombard, Leslie Howard, Glenn Miller, and Chick Henderson - he became a casuality of war. His voice was silenced that day in 1941, but his hundreds of recordings live on in the records and now compact discs that still remind us that Al's was the sweetest thing - just like the Ray Noble song said...

AL BOWLLY: THE POPULAR YEARS

Here is part 2 of three of my look at singer Al Bowlly...

A visit to New York in 1934 with Ray Noble resulted in more success, and their recordings first achieved popularity in the USA; he appeared at the head of an orchestra hand-picked for him and Noble by Glenn Miller (the band included Claude Thornhill, Charlie Spivak, and Bud Freeman, among others).

During the mid-1930s, such songs as "Blue Moon", "Easy to Love", "I've Got You Under My Skin", and "My Melancholy Baby" were sizable American successes—so much so that Bowlly gained his own radio series on NBC and traveled to Hollywood to appear in the same movie as Bing Crosby, one of his biggest competitors, in The Big Broadcast (1935).

He had appeared with his own band, the Radio City Rhythm Makers, but they had split by late 1937 when his vocal problems were traced to a wart in his throat, which briefly caused him to lose his voice. With him and Marjie separated and his band dissolved, that year he was once again down on his luck. He was forced to borrow money from friends for a trip to New York for the surgery of which he was so in need. In 1938, he finally returned to the USA to undergo successful major throat surgery for the removal of his vocal wart, but still had difficulties later in his career.

His absence from the UK when he moved to the States in 1934 damaged his popularity with British audiences. His career also began to suffer as a result of problems with his voice from around 1936, which affected the frequency of his recordings. He played a few small parts in films around this time, yet never professed to be an actor. The parts he did play were often cut, and scenes that were shown were brief. Noble was offered a role in Hollywood although the offer did not, unfortunately, include Bowlly, as a singer had already been instated. Consequently, Bowlly moved back to London with his wife Marjie in January 1937, but never really explained why he had returned, with contemporaries and fans being treated to a variety of stories ranging from the fact that he missed London to claims that he got mixed up with a gangster's moll, so had been run out of America.

With his diminished success in Britain, he toured regional theatres and recorded as often as possible to make a living, moving from orchestra to orchestra, including those of Sydney Lipton, Geraldo, and Ken Johnson. He underwent a revival from 1940, as part of a double act with Jimmy Messene (whose career had also suffered a recent downturn), with an act called Radio Stars with Two Guitars, performing on the London stage. It was his last venture before his death in April 1941. The partnership was an uneasy one, as Messene suffered from a serious drinking problem by this stage, and was known to turn up incapable on stage, or to not turn up at all, much to Bowlly's consternation. His last recorded song, made two weeks before his death, was a duet with Messene of Irving Berlin's satirical song on Hitler, "When That Man is Dead and Gone".

TO BE CONTINUED...

AL BOWLLY: THE EARLY YEARS

A lot of people in the United States do not know who Al Bowlly is. Most people born after the World War II generation do not even know who Al Bowlly is in general. He did not have the greatest voice, but his crooning style made him one of England's most popular singers of the 1930s. His recording output is huge and often compared to the output of Bing Crosby. You may find it strange but I compare Bowlly often to Billie Holiday, like Holiday he had a voice you either loved or hated. I am one of the people that absolutely love his voice. Hopefully this three part series on Al Bowlly will introduce more people to his music and talent.

Al Bowlly was born Albert Allick Bowlly on January 7th,1898 in Lourenço Marques in the then Portuguese colony of Mozambique, to Greek and Lebanese parents who met en route to Australia and moved to South Africa. He was brought up in Johannesburg, South Africa. After a series of odd jobs across South Africa in his youth, namely as a barber and jockey, he gained his musical experience singing for a dance band led by Edgar Adeler on a tour of South Africa, Rhodesia, India and Indonesia during the mid-1920s. However, he fell out with Adeler, throwing a cushion at his head as he played piano on stage and was fired whilst the band was in Surabaya, Indonesia.

After a spell with a Filipino band in Surabayo he was then employed by Jimmy Liquime in India (Calcutta) and Singapore (Raffles Hotel). Bowlly had to work his passage back home, through busking. Just one year after his 1927 debut recording date in Berlin, where he recorded Irving Berlin's "Blue Skies" with Edgar Adeler, Bowlly arrived in London for the first time as part of Fred Elizalde's orchestra, though he nearly didn't make it after foolishly frittering away the fare which was sent to him by Elizalde. That year, "If I Had You" became one of the first popular songs by an English jazz band to become well known in America as well, and Bowlly had gone out on his own by the beginning of the 1930s. First, however, the onset of the Great Depression in 1929 resulted in Bowlly being made redundant and returning to several months of busking to survive.

In the 1930s, he signed two contracts—one in May 1931 with Roy Fox, singing in his live band for the Monseigneur Restaurant in London, the other a record contract with Ray Noble's orchestra in November 1930.

During the next four years, he recorded over 500 songs. By 1933 Lew Stone had ousted Fox as bandleader, and Bowlly was singing Stone's arrangements with Stone's band. After much radio exposure and a successful UK tour with Stone, Bowlly was inundated with demands for personal appearances and gigs—including undertaking a subsequent solo UK tour—but continued to make the bulk of his recordings with Noble. There was considerable competition between Noble and Stone for Bowlly's time as, for much of the year, Bowlly would spend all day in the recording studio with Noble's band, rehearsing and recording, only then to spend the evening playing live at the Monseigneur with Stone's band...

TO BE CONTINUED...