Take Your Pick + Get Going (1926) Pete Mandell with Savoy Havana Band + Savoy Orpheans

TAKE YOUR PICK { 0:00​ }
GET GOING { 3:01​ }
- Pete Mandell (banjo)
Savoy Havana Band (Take Your Pick: 17 March 1926)
Savoy Orpheans (Get Going: 16 March 1926)
HMV B-5035 (issued May 1926)
This upload is timed to coincide with my biography of Pete Mandell in the Summer 2021 edition of Memory Lane. His signature on the image above is his signed endorsement on the reverse of a $17 cheque made out to him by Rudy Vallée in New York on 1 February 1932.
Both tunes were composed by Mandell. He penned several others.
These are the only two sides with a Savoy band where Mandell is credited (and, presumably received royalties as the performer as well as the composer). Why both bands were used, on consecutive days, is a puzzle. Mandell was the Orpheans’ banjoist; Paul Spector, the Havana’s, and he took a break when TAKE YOUR PICK was cut. Debroy Somers wielded the baton for the Orpheans; and Reg Batten (no pun intended) for the Havana Band.
Was the equipment for Studio B at Hayes in need of servicing? The sound on both days is congested on the forte passages. By the end of TAKE YOUR PICK, on the second day, there is an audible electronic oscillation. It would be interesting to audition a copy of ‘Just Drifting’ which was cut next at that session.
I have worked on the biographies of several Savoy band musicians (another is in the pipeline) and they are always rather sad. Of course, there is the inevitable end each time, which is not exactly cheery to research and report, particularly at my age; but there is also the trajectory of the individual careers. Having spectacularly hit the top of the game at the Savoy in the 1920s whilst in their 20s or early 30s, there is only one way that it can go - down and out of the business. So sad.

[@MikeThomas78]

I always think the gain of the Gramophone Company recordings is so high, they are nearly distorted and maybe that's what causes the congestion?
Just a minor point - the other banjoist isn't Phil Spector, it's Paul Spector! Rust has mistyped the name. He's quite obscure, though - I've not seen any other references to him.

[@6dBperOctave]

I thought 'Phil Spector' sounded a bit suspicious. Being Rust, we all follow it. I have proof that the Orpheans' 2nd trumpet was not called 'Walter' Lyme. But revealing that awaits a future article about Vernon Ferry getting into Memory Lane.

[@MikeThomas78]

@@6dBperOctave The previous page in "Rust" has Spector's correct name!

[@davidglow3]

So many musicians in the dance band era were financially irresponsible..No wonder parents discouraged their offspring to ever venture into that vocation.. Gambling,drugs,booze, womanising were relatively common..Bowlly was a spendthrift,Browne,Ammy,Gonellla,Fox and many more earned truly vast sums of money but wasted it on gambling.No thought for how they would cope in old age..Are these two sides the same band,but with accidental mislabelling,l wonder??

[@6dBperOctave]

They are on separate days, and each in a session which recorded other sides, presumably issued under the relevant band's name. There is a page in Rust where he quotes Jimmy Wornell, who he had consulted in preparing the discography. JW's comment (apropos the Havana Band) was taken by Rust (see p864) to indicate that "the members of these two bands were interchangeable" (when in the studio).