Donald's Encyclopedia of Popular Music

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

MAYERL, Billy

(b 31 May '02, London; d 26 March '59, Beaconsfield) Pianist, composer, bandleader. From a poor family, his father a violin teacher; played piano in the Queen's Hall at age six and put himself through school with scholarships, discovering ragtime in nickelodeons (amusement arcades). He played in cinemas, dance bands and theatre orchestras and in variety; he made piano rolls, then records beginning '25. Began writing songs for West End shows '24; he said he played and recorded his 'Georgie Porgie' with Paul Whiteman in the USA that year. His first complete score was Nippy '30, followed by work in ten more by '40. He worked for the BBC '46--9, quit to tour Australia, returned '51--6; music was his whole life and he loved hard work, but he smoked and drank too much and suffered poor health. He will be remembered for his piano pieces, which are harmonically interesting, impressionistic and full of syncopation, resembling American piano 'novelties' (see Zez Confrey) yet uniquely English. His music seemed to have gone out of fashion, but Robert Russell Bennett recorded some pieces in the mid-'70s and now there are over a dozen CDs available incl. Eric Parkin's three vols of piano pieces on Chandos (Marigold, Bats In The Belfry and Leprechaun's Leap) and two on Priory (Puppets and Scallywag), plus three of The Billy Mayerl Piano Transcriptions on Priory (totalling 72 of Mayerl's 120 editions of other people's songs); others by Peter Jacobs on Priory, Susan Tomes on Virgin, Philip Dyson on ASV. Mayerl's own recordings were once available on Folkways, now reissued on Grosvenor, Flapper and Conifer/ Happy Days. Lightning Fingers: Billy Mayerl 1902-- 1959, a symposium edited by Michael Harth, published '95.