Tim Gracyk's video: Gallillee Whitney Brothers Quartet on Victor 16372 1909 hymn s title is also spelled Galilee

"Gallillee" Whitney Brothers Quartet Victor 16372 1909 The hymn's title is also spelled "Galilee" Five Whitney boys were in the state of New York to Reverend Edwin J. and Myra C. (Bentley) Whitney. Edwin served in the Spanish-American war. In 1902 he graduated from the Emerson College of Oratory in Boston and commenced his career as an elocutionist and as second tenor of the Whitney Brothers Quartet. The four brothers in the quartet were first tenor Alvin, second tenor Edwin, baritone William, and bass Yale. A fifth brother named Casward never sang in the quartet. The quartet made its Victor debut with Eugene Field's poem "The Little Red Drum" set to music (5629). Their a cappella performance was recorded in late 1908 and issued in January 1909. Sam Rous wrote for Victor's catalog, "This fine organization, which is composed of four brothers, is quite well known to patrons of the various Lyceum courses, and the brothers have thousands of admirers, especially throughout the Middle West. It is rare to find in one family four gifted sons; and rarer still to find them with voices so placed that they can assume the several parts in a male quartet. The Whitney Brothers sing both classical and popular songs in a most artistic manner, and in their concerts give an entire evening's programme without other assistance." The disc stayed in the catalog only through May 1912. Victor released a string of recordings through April 1910. The Whitney Brothers' debut Edison recording was Standard 10230, "Santa Lucia," which is sung a cappella. In announcing its October 1909 release, the August 1909 issue of Edison Phonograph Monthly states, "This Record introduces a new combination of artists to the Edison public." The brothers' one other two-minute cylinder was "Forsaken" (10510), issued in August 1911. A four-minute cylinder, "Love's Old Sweet Song" (Amberol 225), was also issued in October 1909. These and succeeding releases were dropped from the catalog when Edison's wax cylinders gave way in late 1912 to celluloid Blue Amberols. In addition to working with his brothers, Edwin Whitney performed alone as a humorist and elocutionist. He recorded monologues, beginning in late 1908 with the successful "Darky and the Boys" (5636), which was issued in February 1909. Years later, Whitney told Jim Walsh that he had learned this story, subtitled "The Walnut Story," from humorist Ralph Bingham. In 1910 it was combined on Victor 16661 with "The Old Oaken Bucket Parody," a Nat M. Wills performance, and remained in the catalog until 1923. It was the most successful of all Whitney recordings. More "darky stories" followed, including "Roosevelt and the Darky" (5740), concerning President Theodore Roosevelt, and "A Phenomenon" (16459). Whitney continued his stage career, at one point appearing in Becky Sharp with Minnie Maddern Fiske. In 1912 he became a reader of plays. He founded and directed the Whitney Studios of Platform Art in 1914, fulfilling thousands of engagements in one-man stage performances. Jim Walsh recalls in the October 1957 issue of Hobbies that he attended around 1927 in his hometown a Chautauqua production (the Chautauqua movement, which began with Sunday-school assemblies on the shores of Chautauqua Lake, spread in the nineteenth century, peaked in the 1890s, remained strong for a few more decades--it brought cultural events to small towns), and the former recording artist gave a one-man production of a three-act play. Whitney joined the National Broadcasting Company in 1928, working as a program director and also creating the roles of Captain Jimmy Norton in Harbor Lights and Judge Whipple in Real Folks, which was one of radio's first dramatic series (it began in 1928). In retirement in Pawling, New York, Edwin Whitney suffered from a severe asthmatic condition and he died in a hospital there.