Dajos Béla Tanz-Orchester: Baby Gaby und die Spieluhr, 1929

Baby Gaby und die Spieluhr (Baby Gaby and the Music Box), Foxtrot auf den schwarzen tasten (Foxtrot on the black keys) (E.Plessow) – Dajos Béla Tanz-Orchester, Odeon 1929 (Germany) NOTE: I don’t know who Baby Gaby was nor do I know what she (or he) was doing by the Spieluhr. In my slideshow, however, the role of the Music Box is played by a gramophone – a favorite toy and object of fascination of so many Baby Gabies of the beginning of the 20th century. I am presenting here some of them, with the appropriate music played by the infallible Maestro Dajos Béla. One more secret about this tune is the note below the title: Foxtrot played on the black keys… Such “experimental” foxtrots were then labeled as “novelty foxtrot” and for me, this one must have been inspired by Zez Confrey’s Kitten on the Keys – a very famous tune throughout the world in the Roaring Twenties.