mildred irwin alamo bar britney britney

MUSIC THAT SELLS

The greatest saloon piano player of all time

A musical re-creation by Charles M. Von Rosa

The year is 1938, the place -The Alamo Bar in North Platte, Nebraska, home of Buffalo Bill. At the piano, the fabulous Mildred Irwin, playing solo piano and four-handed piano duets with Marjorie Winslow. On bass, Buffalo Pete, and on drums, Omaha Slim. As pointed out in Charles Maria von Rosa's extensive liner notes, Mildred Irwin was no ordinary saloon piano player. Influenced by modernists Stravinsky, Bartok and Schoenberg, Mildred injected adventurous harmonic intricacies into the popular tunes of the day. The results were like nothing you've ever heard. Thanks to research materials provided by Omaha Slim and expert studio engineering by Charles Maria von Rosa, the marvelous piano artistry of Mildred Irwin has been rescued from oblivion. So return with us to the chambers of the Alamo Bar where Mildred and her cohorts delighted the enthusiastic patrons with progressive interpretations of popular melodies. This is a recording that you will treasure and want to share with your family and friends. So, while supplies last, buy several copies and spread the good times around.

the folks at the Alamo Bar .............................. Omaha Slim & Marjorie Winslow.......... Buffalo Pete

across the alley from the alamo, dannyboy, my gal sal, dardanella, im confessing, irish lullabye, little rock getaway, cold cold heart, sweet georgia brown, tennessee waltz

Photos by John Vachon.

Notes by C. M. Von Rosa

Omaha Slim was the name he went by, and was the only name that I knew him by. We were working a little joint just south of Hoboken. Slim walked in one night and took a seat at the bar. When you've been in this business as long as I have, you can spot a hard luck story a mile away, and it was obvious that Slim was carrying a heavy one. Be that as it may, Slim seemed to enjoy our music and graciously bought us a round, so I sat with him at the bar and chatted a bit, knowing that I risked hearing the story of his life, which came out in bits and pieces, mostly pieces, I guess, but it wasn't as boring as most hard luck stories, and it yielded the information that led to the music on this disc.

It seems that once upon a time, Slim was in the feed storage business, a job that required spending a lot of time on the road. In the fall of 1938, while visiting a customer in North Platte, Nebraska, Slim happened to stop by the Alamo Bar for a drink. An entertainer by the name of Mildred Irwin was playing the piano. Having seen Mildred perform back in Omaha, Slim was pleasantly surprised. Mildred had a way of making the customers feel good with her romping piano style and warbling voice. On this particular evening, another woman was sitting on the piano bench next to Mildred and joining her in playing four handed duets. It was this other woman who caught Slim's eye and subsequently broke his heart and ruined his life. The other woman's name was Marjorie Winslow. Marjorie was in North Platte researching the life of Buffalo Bill for a Hollywood movie company. It appears that Buffalo Bill hailed from North Platte, which was a surprise to me because I thought that Buffalo Bill was from Buffalo. Not so, according to Omaha Slim, who said that I was probably thinking of Buffalo Bob or his mother, Buffalo Emma.

In any event, Marjorie captured Slim's heart that night at the Alamo Bar, but the romance wasn't to be because Marjorie was affianced to some big wheel at the movie studio, which meant that Slim didn't stand a chance from the gitgo. But, fool that he was, Slim courted Marjorie anyway. Eventually, of course, she shot him down, but not before they had some good times at the Alamo Bar, Marjorie playing duets with Mildred, Omaha sitting in on an old drum set, and a local bass player by the name of Buffalo Pete rounding out the rhythm section. (Buffalo Pete wasn't from Buffalo either. He was from Woonsocket, Rhode Island.)

From the way Slim told it, Mildred Irwin was not just your ordinary run of the mill saloon piano player. An admirer of Stravinsky and Schoenberg, Mildred sometimes played far out variations on the popular tunes of the day, leaving her listeners somewhat befuddled and the boss scratching his head. But her popularity never waned. Her fans remained loyal and the Alamo Bar was generally packed whenever Mildred performed. Marjorie tried to persuade Mildred to come to Hollywood, but to no avail. Mildred loved her gig at the Alamo Bar and her room next door at the Palace Hotel. Marjorie did succeed, however, in getting Mildred to cut some piano rolls, and from those rolls we were able to re create the music on this compact disc.

We are extremely grateful to Omaha Slim for providing us with the photographs of Mildred and the piano rolls. We dedicate this recording to Slim, wherever he may be. He left one evening as we were playing the Tennessee Waltz, the only song he ever requested, and hasn't been seen since. Whether Mildred Irwin ever played the Tennessee Waltz, we don't know. It was not among the tunes on the piano rolls, but we include it here for Slim, and for Marjorie, without whose help Mildred Irwin's piano artistry would have remained faded echoes in the chambers of the Alamo Bar. - Charles Maria Von Rosa

DISCLAIMER The music on this compact disk is a studio re-creation. It is not an actual recording. We do not wish to mislead anyone into believing that Mildred Irwin -- a real entertainer who played the piano at the Alamo Bar, a real bar in North Platte, Nebraska -- actually played the music you hear on this disk. She did not. As described in Charles M. Von Rosa's notes included in the booklet inside, this music was re-created using the limited information available. Like the bulk of the music heard on the radio these days, this music is fake. However, as our purpose is to honor a long neglected fabulous entertainer, here it is. We sincerely hope you enjoy this recording as much as we enjoyed putting it together. - Croscrane™

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