When The Red, Red Robin Comes Bob, Bob Bobbin' Along: A Song History

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Harry Woods supplied both the words and the music for this song, which Irving Berlin, Inc. published in New York in 1926.[1] Woods, born in North Chelmsford, Massachusetts, in 1896, came into the world with a malformed left hand, but his mother, a concert singer, steered him toward the piano all the same.[2] He studied at Harvard and broke into songwriting in 1923 with "I'm Going South," written with Abner Silver and later a hit for Al Jolson.[3]

A young woman reclines in a hammock on a shaded porch

Winslow Homer, The Robin's Note, wood engraving, 1870. A young woman in a porch hammock, engraved after Winslow Homer in 1870 under the title The Robin's Note, shown for the robin of the song's title; the engraving has no connection to the song.

Recordings came quickly: "Whispering" Jack Smith sang it for Victor on April 28, 1926.[4] On June 1, 1926, Jolson cut it for Brunswick with Carl Fenton's Orchestra, and on that same date Edison recorded baritone Frank Braidwood singing it to Irwin Dash's piano.[5][6] Paul Whiteman's orchestra followed with a Victor fox trot version, complete with a vocal refrain, in September.[7] The Songwriters Hall of Fame counts it an immediate success for Whiteman, "Whispering" Jack Smith, Cliff Edwards and the Ipana Troubadors, with Jolson's record the most successful of all, and notes that Doris Day brought it back onto the charts in 1953.[2]

Dana Gruber gives the song a chromatic dulcimer solo setting in Speakeasy And Tin Pan Alley Tunes For Chromatic Dulcimer, a Fingers Of Steel download of early twentieth-century popular songs arranged in DAD tuning, with each piece also supplied as its own PDF.[8]

Our book that contains the song "When The Red, Red Robin Comes Bob, Bob Bobbin' Along"

Sources

  1. Connecticut College, Historic Sheet Music Collection: "When the Red Red, Robin Comes Bob, Bob, Bobbin' Along".
  2. Songwriters Hall of Fame: "Harry M. Woods".
  3. Chelmsford Historical Society: "Songwriter Harry M. Woods".
  4. Discography of American Historical Recordings: "Victor 20069 (Black label (popular) 10-in. double-faced)".
  5. Discography of American Historical Recordings: "Brunswick 3222 (10-in. double-faced)".
  6. Discography of American Historical Recordings: "Edison matrix 11018. When the red, red robin comes bob, bob, bobbin' along / Frank Braidwood ; Irwin Dash".
  7. Discography of American Historical Recordings: "Victor matrix BVE-36091. When the red, red robin comes bob, bob, bobbin' along / Paul Whiteman Orchestra".
  8. Fingers Of Steel: "Dana Gruber, Speakeasy And Tin Pan Alley Tunes For Chromatic Dulcimer".
  9. Image: Winslow Homer, The Robin's Note, wood engraving, 1870. The Cleveland Museum of Art.

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