Larry Clinton and His Orchestra

Larry Clinton and His Orchestra was a great, though short-lived, dance band that thrived from 1938-1942. The band recorded 214 sides for RCA Victor and Bluebird. Larry Clinton himself was a great composer and arranger whose songs include "The Dipsy-Doodle," "Satan Takes A Holiday," "Study In Brown," and "Midnight In a Madhouse"

For much of the decade before he formed his own band in 1938, Clinton had been one of the top arrangers, writing for the Dorsey Brothers, then Jimmy Dorsey, the Casa Loma Orchestra, and finally for Tommy Dorsey. In 1937, he arranged for Bunny Berigan, Louis Armstrong and Tommy Dorsey, the latter scoring huge hits with Clinton's "Satan Takes a Holiday" and "The Dipsy Doodle." The Tommy Dorsey band's recording of "Dipsey Doodle" proved to be one of the biggest hits of the 1930s.

Dorsey and his label, RCA Victor, encouraged Clinton to form his own band, which he soon did (whenever Tommy Dorsey played "Dipsey Doodle", he would credit Clinton as the composer. The "plugs" made Clinton well known and helped launch Clinton' new band). Later that year Clinton laid down his first tracks with a studio orchestra before going on the road with a live band, Larry Clinton and His Orchestra, in the summer of 1938.

The band's repertoire, which typically featured Clinton's arrangements (in addition to Clinton's arrangements, Les Brown wrote some of the band's early arrangements while Van Alexander wrote some in the band's latter days), was clichéd and offered little variety, though the music was well performed. However, what was most important to the audience in the swing era was that Clinton's compositions were always lively and danceable. The band quickly caught on and became a popular attraction, though it never was in the first rank in terms of popularity as were the separate bands of the Dorsey brothers or Glenn Miller.

The band's biggest asset was singer Bea Wain, considered to be one of the very best vocalists of the era. However, she parted company with Clinton in 1939 to go sol and was replaced by Mary Dugan. She, in turn, was followed by Helen Southern and Peggy Mann. Other vocalists that appeared with the band included Terry Allen, Carol Bruce and Ford Leary.

The Larry Clinton Orchestra's introduction theme was "Dipsey Doodle" and its closing theme was "Study In Brown." Ironically, he was unable to record "Dipsey Doodle" because Tommy Dorsey had already recorded it on their label, RCA Victor (ditto his "Satan Takes a Holiday," another Tommy Dorsey hit on RCA Victor). He also was unable to record "Study In Brown" (originally composed for Glen Gray and The Casa Loma Orchestra) because Bunny Berigan had recorded it for RCA Victor.

Clinton was known for adapting melodies from the classical repertoire to create popular songs. "It goes in one ear and comes out his pen," one wag said of Clinton's facility for "swinging the classics" (which also entailed adding texts and light syncopation to the previously composed classical works). "My Reverie" was derived from Claude Debussy, while the theme of "Our Love" was borrowed from Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky.

Larry Clinton and His Orchestra officially broke up in 1942, the year he year joined the military. After being demobilized in 1946, Clinton went to work as the musical director for the small recording company Cosmo, recording several sides during his time there. He briefly toured in 1948 and remained active with a group until 1950. After leaving the performing end of the business, he spent the next decade in semi-retirement, remaining active in music publishing and recording. In the mid-1950s, he re-recorded his most popular numbers in stereo for RCA Victor.