Earl Burtnett and His Biltmore Hotel Orchestra

Earl Burtnett and his sixteen-piece orchestra play three popular songs, including "What'll I Do?" and a very well-mannered version of "Tiger Rag" in this Vitaphone musical short.

Burtnett must have been the bee's knees in 1928, because he made four of these shorts released that year. He had appeared in the Ziegfeld Follies in 1920, and would continue to ply until his death in 1936 just shy of his fortieth birthday. His movie is jazz-influenced, but far too polite to e considered any sort of jazz.

In 1928, Earl Burtnett and his band produced four different sound shorts for the Vitaphone Corporation. Oddly, all four have the same title and the only way to know which is which is to read the production reel number at the beginning of the short--this one is 2294.

The film is very typical of a Vitaphone short of the time. A mostly stationary camera films the band and pans in on a trio as they croon. Sadly, while the instruments are vibrant, the trio's volume is too low--overwhelmed by the zippy tune by Biltmore Hotel Orchestra. The next song, the problem is just as pronounced. This next tune is far less enjoyable (to me) as it is very slow...pretty but very slow. The zippier opening song seemed to hold up better today. And, the closing tune also was equally enjoyable. Technically speaking, it's what you'd expect--well filmed and with sound well ahead of its time...even with the poor balance.

Sadly, apart from a few Vitaphone films and records, Burtnett is hard to find...and much of it is likely due to his dying at age 39 during a appendectomy.