The First RCA Victor Recording of 1948: Petrillo, Truman and the AFM Recording Ban of 1948

On 14 December 1948 an unusual combination of 12 operatic and popular artists met at an RCA-Victor recording studio to make a record celebrating the end of an 11.5-month recording ban by the American Federation of Musicians (AFM). The ban was led by James C. Petrillo, president of the AFM. The following day, this event was described in The New York Times. (1) The Times, showing photos of Petrillo and David Sarnoff, head of RCA Victor, reported: At the RCA-Victor studios a chorus of Metropolitan Opera stars made a special non-commercial recording of 'I'm Just Wild About Harry' to be presented to President Truman. Mr. Petrillo led the singers in their rendition of the song and also recorded a greeting to the President. The recording referred to in the Times is a 10-in., one-sided, red-vinyl, 78-rpm custom-pressing titled 'The First RCA Victor Recording of 1948.' The label (2) (Fig. 1) provides the following information: recorded at 5:26 p.m. on 14 December 1948; matrix no. D8-MB-4077 (3); selections: 'I'm Just Wild About Harry' by a chorus of 12 vocalists, and a 'Greeting to President Truman by James C. Petrillo.' The identified vocalists are Perry Como (1912-2001); Marilyn Cotlow (1924-); Tommy Dorsey (1905-1956); Cloe Elmo (1910-1962); Thomas Hayward (1918-1995); Dorothy Kirsten (1910-1992); Jan Peerce (1904-1984); Gladys Swarthout (1900-1969); Ferruccio Tagliavini (1913-1995); Lawrence Tibbett (1896-1960); Fran Warren (1926-); and Leonard Warren (1911-1960). In addition to members of the Metropolitan Opera, as noted in the Times, this list also included well-known popular artists Tommy Dorsey and Perry Como, and band-vocalist Fran Warren. This record is not found in artist discographies reviewed by the author. (4) Not all the operatic vocalists could be considered Met "stars," as described by the Times. Certainly, Kirsten, Peerce, Swarthout, Tagliavini, Tibbett and Leonard Warren were first-rate headliners and fit this description. Among the lesser-known artists, Cotlow was a winner of the 1948 Metropolitan Opera Auditions of the Air and had made her Met debut 4 December of that year as Philine in Thomas's Mignon. Hayward was also a winner of the Met Auditions, in 1945, and was with the Met for 12 seasons in leading tenor and comprimario roles. (5) Elmo was a member of the Met for two seasons in leading mezzo-soprano roles. (6) The recording session was described in an article in TIME magazine, 'One for Harry.' (7) It described "nine headliners from the Metropolitan Opera House" and other artists rehearsing words to 'I'm Just Wild About Harry' in RCA's Studio One at the end of the recording ban. According to the article, Petrillo made a mistake in the first version of his Christmas greeting to Truman and blamed it on the attractiveness of the women present. TIME reported that the Met singers were "helped out" by Perry Como and Fran Warren. Afterwards, Como was said to have "rushed into Studio Two" where he recorded RCA's first commercial disc after the ban - 'Missouri Waltz,' said to be Truman's favorite. (8, 9) How did this record come into being, and why were Petrillo and the artists grateful to Truman? The answer to these questions involves several related events: Petrillo's battles with the recording industry to prevent the displacement of musicians' jobs; the Taft-Hartley Act of 1947; and intercessions on behalf of the President to resolve differences between the AFM and labor laws. James Caesar Petrillo and the Recording Bans The key person in the AFM recording bans of 1942 and 1948 was James Caesar Petrillo (1892-1984). Petrillo grew up in a poor tenement district of Chicago. He had only a fourth-grade education, and as a child sold newspapers to help support his family. He played trumpet in his early years, but soon discovered his skills were as a union organizer and labor leader. (10) He was elected president of Chicago Local 10 of the AFM in 1922 and remained president until 1962. …