Was able to track down hints as to when these were recorded. Back on March 5th, 1950, columnist Ed Fisher for The Sunday Times Signal of Zainesville, Ohio reported that Abbey Records "have taken a jump back in time and cut a record in which a player piano is the star." The record being The Old Piano Roll Blues / Do They Always Say No? ; confirming that Cook is an arranger for QRS. Also noting that there's a uptick in demand for piano rolls, mostly in rural areas, because there's more than 100,000 pianolas left, and they've become popular once more since the war. Later on May 28th, The World-Herald of Omaha, Nebraska put out an ad for a record by Cook, Hoop-Dee-Doo / If You Can't Get A Drum With A Boom, Boom, Boom being released on 45 & 78. Lastly, on June 9th, 1951, Ottawa, Canada's paper The Evening Citizen has a column by one "C. C. H." that mentions Cook making a 10" LP for Quality Records, featuring Missouri Waltz, Goodnight Irene, and The Old Millstream. In the attempt the bring back Piano Rolls into popularity. Quality often borrowed masters from tons of other labels, so this isn't surprising that they might do that to make a compilation album for Canadian consumers. So sometime between the summer of '51 and May of the previous year, most likely is when Goodnight Irene was recorded for Abbey, and subsequently the flipside too. Regardless of if it kickstarted the popularity of piano rolls again, they sound good either way!
"The Old Piano Roll Blues" was issue on disc 15003, it was the first Cook disc on the label, and the first and biggest hit Abbey ever had. It charted for 11 weeks, peaking at number 13. Cook was the best-selling artist for Abbey, and most of his discs were reissued in Canada on Quality. I only have three discs on Abbey, two of them being by Lawrence Cook.
Was able to track down hints as to when these were recorded. Back on March 5th, 1950, columnist Ed Fisher for The Sunday Times Signal of Zainesville, Ohio reported that Abbey Records "have taken a jump back in time and cut a record in which a player piano is the star." The record being The Old Piano Roll Blues / Do They Always Say No? ; confirming that Cook is an arranger for QRS. Also noting that there's a uptick in demand for piano rolls, mostly in rural areas, because there's more than 100,000 pianolas left, and they've become popular once more since the war. Later on May 28th, The World-Herald of Omaha, Nebraska put out an ad for a record by Cook, Hoop-Dee-Doo / If You Can't Get A Drum With A Boom, Boom, Boom being released on 45 & 78.
Lastly, on June 9th, 1951, Ottawa, Canada's paper The Evening Citizen has a column by one "C. C. H." that mentions Cook making a 10" LP for Quality Records, featuring Missouri Waltz, Goodnight Irene, and The Old Millstream. In the attempt the bring back Piano Rolls into popularity. Quality often borrowed masters from tons of other labels, so this isn't surprising that they might do that to make a compilation album for Canadian consumers. So sometime between the summer of '51 and May of the previous year, most likely is when Goodnight Irene was recorded for Abbey, and subsequently the flipside too.
Regardless of if it kickstarted the popularity of piano rolls again, they sound good either way!
"The Old Piano Roll Blues" was issue on disc 15003, it was the first Cook disc on the label, and the first and biggest hit Abbey ever had. It charted for 11 weeks, peaking at number 13. Cook was the best-selling artist for Abbey, and most of his discs were reissued in Canada on Quality. I only have three discs on Abbey, two of them being by Lawrence Cook.
@theshellacstation78 good to know