"The Laughing Policeman" is a music hall song recorded by British artist Charles Penrose , initially published under the pseudonym Charles Jolly in 1922. It is an adaptation of " The Laughing Song " first recorded in 1890 by American singer George W. Johnson with the same tune and form, but the subject matter was changed from a "dandy darky" to a policeman. Both "The Laughing Policeman" and "The Laughing Song" were highly popular songs in their times, and "The Laughing Policeman" remained popular in later decades as a children song.
31-467: The Laughing Policeman may refer to: "The Laughing Policeman" (song) , a 1920s music-hall song by Charles Jolly (Charles Penrose) The Laughing Policeman (novel) , a 1968 detective novel by Maj Sjöwall and Per Wahlöö The Laughing Policeman (film) , a 1973 film based on the 1968 novel The Laughing Policeman , a 1970s British children's television series starring Deryck Guyler Topics referred to by
62-576: A case of cylinders and his dog, named Nipper . Barraud's original painting depicts Nipper staring intently into the horn of an Edison-Bell while both sit on a polished wooden surface. The horn on the Edison-Bell machine was black and after a failed attempt at selling the painting to a cylinder record supplier of Edison Phonographs in the UK, a friend of Barraud's suggested that the painting could be brightened up (and possibly made more marketable) by substituting one of
93-481: A fourth story is that Johnson took the name from the popular 'Victor' bicycle, which he had admired for its superior engineering. Of these four accounts, the first two are the most generally accepted." The first use of the Victor name was on a letterhead, dated March 28, 1901. Herbert Rose Barraud's deceased brother, a London photographer, willed him his estate, including his DC-powered Edison-Bell cylinder phonograph with
124-545: A policeman, he's never known to frown, and everybody says he's the happiest man in town. Victor Talking Machine Company The Victor Talking Machine Company was an American recording company and phonograph manufacturer, incorporated in 1901. Victor was an independent enterprise until 1929 when it was purchased by the Radio Corporation of America (RCA) and became the RCA Victor Division of
155-469: A popular figure in Leicester . In June 1922, Penrose made the first recording of this song, which was released on Regal Records (cat. G-7816. He released the song under the pseudonym of Charles Jolly. This version only had modest sales, and the version more usually heard was recorded on 22 April 1926 and released on Columbia Records (4014 and later FB 1184) under his own name. The version became one of
186-466: Is a continuation of the Encyclopedic Discography of Victor Recordings (EDVR) project by Ted Fagan and William Moran to make a complete discography of all Victor recordings as well as adding the recordings of Columbia, Brunswick and other historic American labels now controlled by Sony Music Entertainment . The Victor archive files are the main source of information for this project. In 2011,
217-411: Is different from Wikidata All article disambiguation pages All disambiguation pages The Laughing Policeman (song) In 1890, George W. Johnson started his recording career in the fledgling phonograph industry, and one of the songs he recorded was "The Laughing Song". The song features Johnson in the persona of a "dandy darky" who laughs in time to the music. An early song where
248-562: Is remembered today, having sold over a million copies in total. The popularity of the song continued in later decades as a children song. It was a staple on the BBC Light Programme 's Children's Favourites in the 50s and 60s, and it continued to be a frequently requested recording on its successor radio show Junior Choice on BBC Radio 1 in the 1970s. It remained one of the recordings most-frequently included in children's choice compilations and Radio 2 annual broadcasts even into
279-421: Is thought to have become the best-selling phonograph ever recorded by 1894, and it was claimed to have sold over 50,000 copies by the late-1890s. Such sales figure was very high for its time given that it was not possible to mechanically duplicate a record in the early years of the recording industry, and a singer had to record the same song four or five copies at a time over and over again, meaning that he recorded
310-459: The 21st century. In 1955, Stikkan Anderson gave the song lyrics in Swedish , as "Den skrattande polisen" ("The laughing police officer"), which was recorded and released by Ove Flodin. A dance mix was made, released on a 10-inch 45rpm disc, resembling an old-style 78rpm record, with the original version on the other side. Bernard Cribbins recorded a parody version called 'Giggling Gertie
341-480: The Laughing Traffic Warden', with the laughter provided by Miriam Margolyes . The song describes a fat jolly policeman who cannot stop laughing and has a chorus in which the sound of laughter is made in a sustained semi musical way by the singer. The first verse is: I know a fat old policeman, he's always on our street, a fat and jolly red faced man he really is a treat. He's too kind for
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#1733093395234372-636: The Mask and Wig Club, released in April, 1925. On March 21, 1925, Victor recorded its first electrical Red Seal disc, twelve inch 6502 by pianist Alfred Cortot , of works by Chopin and Schubert. In 1926, Johnson sold his controlling (but not holding) interest in the Victor Company to the banking firms of JW Seligman and Speyer & Co. , who in turn sold Victor to the Radio Corporation of America in 1929. The Discography of American Historical Recordings (DAHR)
403-567: The Radio Corporation of America until late 1968, when it was renamed RCA Records . Established in Camden, New Jersey , Victor was the largest and most prestigious firm of its kind in the world, best known for its use of the iconic " His Master's Voice " trademark, the design, production and marketing of the popular "Victrola" line of phonographs and the company's extensive catalog of operatic and classical music recordings by world famous artists on
434-492: The Victor imprint. Victor recorded the first jazz and blues records ever issued. The Victor Military Band recorded the first recorded blues song, " The Memphis Blues ", on July 15, 1914, in Camden, New Jersey. In 1917, The Original Dixieland Jazz Band recorded " Livery Stable Blues ". The advent of radio as a home entertainment medium in the early 1920s presented Victor and the entire record industry with new challenges. Not only
465-454: The brass-belled horns on display in the window at the new gramophone shop on Maiden Lane . The Gramophone Company in London was founded and managed by an American, William Barry Owen. Barraud paid a visit with a photograph of the painting and asked to borrow a horn. Owen gave Barraud an entire gramophone and asked him to paint it into the picture, offering to buy the result. On close inspection of
496-483: The company to the verge of bankruptcy, Victor switched from the acoustical or mechanical method of recording to the new microphone -based electrical system developed by Western Electric in 1925. Victor called its version of the improved fidelity recording process "Orthophonic", and marketed a new line of phonographs referred to as " Orthophonic Victrolas ", scientifically developed by Western Electric to play these new records. Victor's first electrical recordings, issued in
527-504: The melody of "The Laughing Song" as well as the same hook of using laughter in the chorus, but changed the lyrics to be about a policeman, recording it under the title of "The Laughing Policeman". The composition of the song is, however, credited entirely to Billie Grey, a pseudonym of Penrose's second wife Mabel. It is thought that the character of the Laughing Policeman was inspired by real-life police officer PC John 'Tubby' Stephens,
558-463: The most successful songs of the period, with 120,000 copies sold by 1933. "The Laughing Policeman" was also reissued in 1935. Penrose released another version of the song with Kaye Connor in 1929 titled "The Laughing Policeman Up to Date" (Columbia 5532), and that song sold 91,000 copies. Penrose and his wife wrote numerous other laughing songs ( The Laughing Major , Curate , Steeplechaser , Typist , Lover , etc.), but only "The Laughing Policeman"
589-449: The name in "His Master's Voice" In America , he writes, "One story claims that Johnson considered his first improved Gramophone to be both a scientific and business 'victory.' A second account is that Johnson emerged as the 'Victor' from the lengthy and costly patent litigations involving Berliner and Frank Seaman's Zonophone . A third story is that Johnson's partner, Leon Douglass , derived the word from his wife's name 'Victoria.' Finally,
620-548: The new technology and introduced its new records and the Orthophonic Victrola on November 2, 1925, dubbed "Victor Day". Victor's first commercial electrical recording was made at the company's Camden, New Jersey studios on February 26, 1925. A group of eight popular Victor artists, Billy Murray , Frank Banta, Henry Burr , Albert Campbell, Frank Croxton , John Meyer, Monroe Silver , and Rudy Wiedoeft gathered to record "A Miniature Concert". Several takes were recorded by
651-513: The old acoustical process, then additional takes were recorded electrically for test purposes. The electrical recordings turned out well, and Victor issued the results that summer as the two sides of twelve inch 78 rpm disc, Victor 35753. Victor's first electrical recording to be issued was Victor 19626, a ten-inch record consisting of two numbers recorded on March 16, 1925, from the University of Pennsylvania 's thirty-seventh annual production of
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#1733093395234682-506: The original windows is located at the Smithsonian museum in Washington, D.C. In the company's early years, Victor issued recordings on the Victor, Monarch and De Luxe labels, with the Victor label on 7-inch records, Monarch on 10-inch records and De Luxe on 12-inch records. De Luxe Special 14-inch records were briefly marketed in 1903–1904. In 1905, all labels and sizes were consolidated into
713-482: The painting, the contours of the Edison-Bell phonograph are visible beneath the paint of the gramophone. In 1915, the "His Master's Voice" logo was rendered in immense circular leaded-glass windows in the tower of the Victrola cabinet building at Victor's headquarters in Camden, New Jersey. The building still stands today with replica windows installed during RCA 's ownership of the plant in its later years. Today, one of
744-468: The prestigious Red Seal label. After Victor merged with RCA in 1929, the company maintained its eminence as America's foremost producer of records and phonographs until the 1960s. In 1896, Emile Berliner , the inventor of the gramophone and disc record, contracted machinist Eldridge R. Johnson to manufacture his inventions. There are different accounts as to how the "Victor" name came about. RCA historian Fred Barnum gives various possible origins of
775-679: The same song many thousands of times. The song was still popular by the early 1900s, although by this time record companies had developed the technology to duplicate records from a single recording. At that time, there was no exclusive contract for recording a song, and singers were only paid for recording the song and no royalties were paid to the artists. Johnson recorded "The Laughing Song" for different recording companies, including New York's Metropolitan Phonograph Co, Columbia , and Edison . When disc records replaced cylinders, he continued to record for these companies as well as others such as Berliner and Victor until 1909 or 1910, by which time it
806-440: The same term [REDACTED] This disambiguation page lists articles associated with the title The Laughing Policeman . If an internal link led you here, you may wish to change the link to point directly to the intended article. Retrieved from " https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=The_Laughing_Policeman&oldid=892177178 " Category : Disambiguation pages Hidden categories: Short description
837-475: The singer sings with laughter in time to the music is " L'éclat de rire " (or the "Laughing Song") in the 1856 opera Manon Lescaut by Daniel Auber , and Johnson's song shows clear influence from that tradition. Johnson's "Laughing Song" proved highly popular with the public, and it was ranked number one on a reconstructed pop chart for ten weeks from April from June 1891. Johnson was the first black performer to appear on America's popular music chart, and it
868-438: The spring of 1925 were not advertised as such; in order to create an extensive catalog of records made by the new process to satisfy anticipated demand, and to allow dealers time to liquidate their stocks of old-style Victrolas, Victor and its longtime rival, Columbia Records , agreed to keep electrical recording secret until the autumn of 1925. Then, with the company's largest advertising campaign to date, Victor publicly announced
899-421: Was music becoming available over the air free of charge, but a live radio broadcast made using high-quality microphones and heard over amplified receivers provided sound that was startlingly more clear and realistic than a contemporary phonograph record. Victor was initially dismissive of the encroachments of radio, but after plummeting sales and much apathy and resistance from the company's senior executives brought
930-514: Was no longer as lucrative for him to record the song since he was only required to record a few times for the best recording to be duplicated. "The Laughing Song" was covered by a white performer Burt Shepard in 1900, and it was his version that became known round the world outside of the United States. According to Fred Gaisberg , it sold over half a million copies in India. Charles Penrose used
961-543: Was the first charted song known to have been written by an African American. However, the authorship of "The Laughing Song" has been questioned; sheet music of the song was published in 1894 and Johnson credited himself as the writer of both the words and music, but some doubted if he actually wrote the lyrics. Johnson also recorded a song entitled "The Whistling Coon" written in 1878 by minstrel Sam Devere, and that song reached number one in July and August 1891. "The Laughing Song"