“Blue-Chip” Lang Fluffed PW’s Dough

By Paul Whiteman 

In the all-American band I named some time ago in “Colliers”, I selected Carl Kress as the best rhythm plunker this side of heaven. If I ever get to heaven and have to choose a post-mortem all-celestial band, I’m afraid angel Eddie Lang would get the call before angel Carl Kress. With all due respect to all the guitar men living today, the fine improvisations of musicians like Django Reinhardt, Artie Ryerson, Van Epps, the steady strokes of the Kresses and the Reusses, the man who inspired soloists to their greatest choruses was and remains Eddie Lang.

Eddie played with our band over a long period of time during which I had less trouble with the rhythm than at any other time except perhaps the present, when, with George Wettling, Artie Shapiro, and Artie Ryerson, were breezin’ along on all four-fours.

“Eddie No Thriller-Diller” 

Now, get this straight, Eddie Lang never thrilled an audience in his life.  He had a short, crisp stroke, and that was all. The only person he ever thrilled were the instrumentalists behind whom he played his solid rhythm. No jitterbug would ever listen to him twice. But to the men in the band, Eddie was a God-send. In my eyes, Land was one of the greatest musical geniuses we ever had in the orchestra. I never saw him look at a note of music. I don’t even know if he could read or not. It made no difference. What’s the use of bothering with those pesky black blotches when you can anticipate the next chord change five bars in advance. No matter how intricate the arrangement was, Eddie played it flawlessly the first time without having ever heard it before, and without looking at a sheet of music. It was as if his musically intuitive spirit had read the arranger’s mind and knew in advance everything that was going to happen. Of course, it’s no secret that although Eddie played in my band, he never regarded me as the leader. His leader was Joe Venuti. Whatever Joe did, Eddie did. Wherever Joe went, Eddie tagged along. In more ways than one, Eddie Lang was the greatest accompanist Venuti ever had. Once a year, the fishing bug would bite Joe, and he’d give up his $250 a-week-job for an $18 weekly job on the ocean at Atlantic City. The next day, Eddie Lang would follow the fiddler and the two would cast for fish all day and play for chicken feed all night.

Drove Eddie To Tears 

I never will forget the time Joe almost broke Eddie’s heart in one of his numerous orgies of throwing things away. As you all know, Venuti had an infallible way of “getting even” with objects that irked him. He’d just pick up the thing and throw it away, preferably in water. I once saw him drive ten golf balls into a water hazard, throw his set of clubs in after them, and dive in himself!

 Well, one New Year's Eve, some of the boys in the band were reveling at my country house, which was perched on a cliff about 300 feet high. At 4 a.m. Venuti and Lang decided to pack up their instruments and go home. At that time, Joe used to carry his fiddle in an old case I had given him. The case didn’t have a lock, and unless you held your hand over the opening, the violin would pop out. On this New Year's Eve, Joe was pretty much fed up with the old coffin. The fiddle had fallen out twice that evening. He threatened to drop-kick his instrument over the cliff if it fell out once more. Poor Lang was horrified at the thought. He loved Joe’s best violin as much as he worshipped Joe, himself. Before the two reached their car, the inevitable happened. Joe’s fingers relaxed, and the violin plopped to the ground. Grabbing the instrument off the ground, Joe assumed the position of a football player about to kick the ball over the goal post. “Please, Joe,” pleaded Eddie. “That’s your best violin, don’t ruin it, if you want to kick one, let me go back and get Paul Whiteman’s for you.” “No”, said Joe, “I said I was going to drop-kick over the mountain, and I’m a man of my word.” So saying, he booted the fiddle over the side of the cliff. Poor Lang was grief-stricken. With tears in his eyes, he scrabbled down the cliff to look for the remains. It was dark, and the going was rough. After about fifteen minutes, Eddie reappeared, bedraggled and forlorn. He held aloft all that remained of what was Joe Venuti’s best violin, a G-string hanging from a peg. Lang didn’t talk to Venuti for a week thereafter. (1)

It was a sad day for me when I had to tell Joe that the $250-a-week boys in the band had to take a salary cut. I knew that if Joe decided to leave, Lang would follow suit, and I hated to lose either of them. Joe, as I had anticipated, said it was against his principles to accept a salary cut, and he wouldn’t let Lang take one either. One day, Lang came up to me for a furtive conversation. “I’d like to stay with the band very much, but you won’t stay without Joe. I’d like you to keep Joe’s salary as it is. Just cut mine. I’ll play for nothing.” “But Eddie”, I objected, “you know we don’t have people working for nothing around here.” “Well, Pops, you just don’t understand,” replied Lang, “You see, my salary doesn’t mean a thing to me anyway; I’m making from 600 to 700 a week just playing poker with the boys. Just let me continue having the gambling rights  in the band, and I’ll be satisfied.” So I kept them both! (2)

NOTE:

1.       Whiteman hosts a party for his band at his rented house in the Hollywood Hills. Tuesday, December 31, 1929, Hollywood Hills, California.

SOURCE: Paul Whiteman, Volume 1, 1890-1930, Don Rayno.

2.       The timing of this is questionable, as the issue of salary cuts didn’t come to light until May 1930, due to poor box office receipts during the band's Roxy Theatre engagement (NYC), which featured the premiere of the King of Jazz film, along with George Gershwin performing Rhapsody In Blue with the Roxy Symphony Orchestra.

·       Thursday, May 8, 1930, NYC. Whiteman is forced to let 10 band members go (including Venuti, Lang, Challis, and Hayton) and to reduce the remaining musicians’ salaries by 15 percent.

SOURCE: Paul Whiteman, Volume 1, 1890-1930, Don Rayno.