Annette Hanshaw was a popular singer and radio star of the 1920s and early Thirties who had many Jazz overtones in her singing style. She stepped out of her role of a torch singer and improvised and had a great deal of swing that harkened to the Big Band singers of the 1930s. She was viewed by the public as the epitome of a flapper. Many of her early records feature many of the hot White players of the day like Red Nichols, Miff Mole, Phil Napoleon, Joe Venuti, Eddie Lang, Adrian Rollini, Vic Berton, Benny Goodman, Jimmy Dorsey, Tommy Dorsey and Jack Teagarden. Hanshaw was billed as "The Personality Girl," and her trademark was girlishly saying "That's all" at the end of a lot of her records. Hanshaw recorded under a number of pseudonyms which included Ethel Bingham, Dot Dare, Gay Ellis, Marion Lee, Janet Shaw, Lelia Sandford and Patsy Young. Annette never thought much of her abilities as a singer and retired from showbiz in 1935. Joe Venuti was born on a ship on the way to the USA from Italy and became, in many circles, THE great jazz violinist. Eddie Lang (who was also known as Blind Willie Dunn) was a boyhood friend of Venuti, and was the first great jazz guitarist. Lang died in 1933 as the result of a botched tonsillectomy, which operation had been taken at the urging of his friend, Bing Crosby. Eddie Lang (October 25, 1902 - March 26, 1933) was an American jazz guitarist, considered by many[citation needed] to be the finest of his era, and to be the greatest rhythm ...
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