“Three o’clock in the morning”
One hundred years ago today … “Three O’Clock in the Morning” by the Paul Whiteman Orchestra was a hit. The waltz was featured in newspaper advertisements, such as this one for Victrolas on sale at Abraham and Strauss, Brooklyn.
Brooklyn Daily Eagle, 17 October 1922, p. 12. Library of Congress.
“Three O’Clock in the Morning”
It's three o'clock in the morning
We've danced the whole night through
And daylight soon will be dawning
Just one more waltz with you
That melody so entrancing
Seems to be made for us two
I could just keep on dancing forever dear with you
There goes the three o'clock chime, chiming, rhyming
My heart keeps beating in time
Sounds like an old sweet love tune
Say that there soon will be a honeymoon
It's three o'clock in the morning
We've danced the whole night through
And daylight soon will be dawning
Just one more waltz with you
That melody so entrancing
Seems to be made for us two
I could just keep on dancing forever dear with you
The record was so popular that it caused a stir in a Long Island courtroom, during a hearing about disorderly conduct at … three o’clock in the morning.
Edward T. Neu, Justice of the Peace in Lynbrook, held court this morning with wide open windows, through which wafted the strains of a phonograph which was being operated almost constantly in a music store on the post floor of the building.
Several times the Justice had to send down Constable William Strohson to stop the music, because it set the court spectators into an uproar.
Edward Clark and his wife Ella and Alfred Schuman of Grimm place, Baldwin, were being attained on charge of disorderly conduct on the complaint of a neighbor, who said they sang and shouted at 3 o'clock A.M. last Sunday.
When the phonograph began playing 'Three o'clock in the Morning” everybody in the courtroom laughed and Justice Neu hastily reserved decision and sent down the constable.
(“Lynbrook Judge Works to Music” The Brooklyn Daily Times . 4 October, 1922, p. 2. Library of Congress)
“Three O’Clock in the Morning” was written by Spanish-Argentine composer Julián Robledo in 1919. The tune first became famous in 1921 when performed in the Greenwich Village Follies (click here) with lyrics by Dorothy Teriss.
The Whiteman Orchestra, which we have featured here and mentioned here, recorded their hit instrumental version on August 21st. Listen to it at the Library of Congress website by clicking the image below.
Robledo, Julián, Paul Whiteman Orchestra, and Paul Whiteman. “Three O'Clock in the Morning.” 1922. Audio. Retrieved from the Library of Congress.
Part of the song’s legacy is that it appears in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, as one of the title character’s parties is winding down and his paramour, Daisy Buchanan, is saying her good nights.
(Fitzgerald, F. Scott. The Great Gatsby. New York: Scribner’s, 1925. 132. Hathitrust.)
– Jonathan Goldman, Oct. 17, 1922.
TAGS: popular music, records, songs, law, literature