No Letup

Over three independent Manhattan stations (WNEW, WMCA, WHN) ASCAP last week aired a batch of Cole Porter music on a Tums Pot o' Gold program. On hand was Porter himself, who made a speech defending ASCAP's position in its war with B. M. I. One purpose of the show: to find out whether the lure of ASCAP music would attract more listeners in Manhattan than the networks (vowed to B. M. I. tunes) could entice. This week ASCAP will continue its test, guest-starring Oscar Hammerstein 2nd. On the national front, meanwhile, ASCAP will put on a weekly hour-long coast-to-coast program of ASCAP songs over some 110 independent stations. Produced by Billy Rose, with music by a 26-piece orchestra under Director Russell Bennett, singing by a mixed chorus of 18, and a commentary by Deems Taylor, ASCAP expects its program to be quite a show. Adding lustre to the hour will be such famed ASCAPers as Irving Berlin, George M. Cohan, Oley Speaks and Richard Rodgers.

While ASCAP planned this succulent banquet, many were the gags about B. M. I.'s musical mashed potatoes. So often had B. M. I.'s Jeannie With the Light Brown Hair been played that she was widely reported to have turned grey. While crooners moaned tunes the old cow died of, ASCAPers rattled the barn doors with parody titles such as: "When the swallows come back to ASCAP-istrano," such rhymes as:

Little Jack Horner sat in a corner--

His radio tuned up high.

He listened aghast, then turned it off

fast,

And said, "What a bad B. M. I."

Annoyed by radio's Oberon-&-Titania quarrel was many a big-league radio showman who agreed with the description of B. M. I. as "a pain in the ASCAP." ASCAP's President Gene Buck complacently permitted the BMIred networks to broadcast such patriotic ballads as Stars and Stripes Forever, Anchors Aweigh and God Bless America at the President's inauguration. Meanwhile Arthur Murray introduced B. M. I. tunes in his dancing schools, on the theory that his customers would have to learn them if they wanted to practice by radio at home. Among the sillier consequences of the airy civil war, which at week's end showed no signs of letting up: the possible banning of auto toots on the air, for fear they might infringe some ASCAP tune.

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