SwingDJs

After the Christopher Columbus thread, I decided to find out more about Teddy Stauffer (who produced a great version of CC). According to this site, his pre-war German band was one of the Swing Kids' favourites.

I know it is useful to search different countries' Amazon sites, so I had a look on Amazon Germany, and there are lots of CDs listed. (Some of these are also listed on Amazon UK and US, but the German site has more, and has a lot more sound samples).

Check out, for example, his version of Wednesday Night Hop on this CD

According to this source, European swing was 'rhythmically more accentuated' than US. Anyway, I love some of this music

(Note to non-Germany residents: It's quite safe to buy from Amazon Germany if you want to - just follow the instructions as you normally would. Understanding a little German might help).

I have long been a fan of Teddy Stauffer & his Original Teddies - Teddies - named for Bern in Switzerland where the band comes from.

They did a lot of recording in Germany in the mid - late 30s of American & English songs with Billy Toffel singing mostly in English - occasionally in German.

They got away with this because of the band being Swiss. They even recorded Whistle While You Work, a song banned in all of fascist Europe.

TS & His O Teddies also worked on transatlantoc ocean liners and herr Stauffer had close contacts in the music business in America. His music becomes especially interesting because he recorded some American pop songs before any American bands did, making his interpretations highly original.

I have a Teddy Stauffer CD posted on the OTR CDs page of http://www.gregpoppleton.com

Cheers
Greg