Roaring 1920: Vincent Lopez & His Orch. - I'm a Dreamer Aren't We All, 1929

Vincent Lopez & His Orchestra - I'm a Dreamer, Aren’t We All? Fox-troit from „Sunny Side Up” (DeSylva-Brown-Henderson), Oriole 1929 (USA) NOTE: Vincent LOPEZ dance orchestra was one of the most popular East Coast dance bands in the US during the Jazz Age and through the 1940s. Vincent Lopez was born in a Portuguese immigrant family in Brooklyn, NY and early in his life he started playing piano. He was leading his own dance band in New York City from 1917. His Orchestra was successful and from 1921 began broadcasting on Newark, NJ station WJZ. His program boosted and Vincent Lopez soon became one of America's most popular bandleaders and radio personalities who used to begin his programs by announcing "Lopez speaking!" (this preface is quoted in the beginning of many of his recordings). The Great Depression and birth of the Swing era made him give up his „hot playing” style of the Roaring 20s and turn towards a „sweeter” kind of playing. He also appeared in feature films, e.g. The Big Broadcast (1932) and in the Max Fleischer cartoon I Don't Want to Make History (1936). His flamboyant style of piano playing influenced later pop-piano masters as Eddy Duchin and Liberace and many noted musicians played in his orchestra including Artie Shaw, Xavier Cugat, Dorsey Bros., Mike Mosiello, Glenn Miller. In 1941 Lopez's orchestra began a residency at the Taft Hotel in Manhattan that would last 20 years. He died in Miami in 1975. Appropriate to the title, the slideshow presents several portraits of dreamers from different times.