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After “knocking it out of the park” in 1931 at the age of 17 with the iconic “Blue Moon,” how was it that Edward W. Roman just disappeared? Didn’t this young man write other songs?
In fact, he had. The first clue were poems penned by Ed and found eight decades later in a portfolio in the attic. They read as if they could be set to music.
Then came lyrics handwritten on paper, and melodies notated on sheet music. And, finally, a songwriting collaboration.
Enter Henry R. Dutton. . .
From the Memoir:
“A young club manager and aspiring songwriter, Henry R. Dutton—whose name I’d never heard until slipping his letter to my father out of its envelope—proposed right after the article about the lawsuit appeared in The Knickerbocker Press that they collaborate. He empathized with my father’s “difficulties,” and bemoaned “this vicious circle that steals artistic effort so brazenly.”
“In a letter of agreement, they agree that Dutton was to write the melodies, my father the lyrics, although some of the songs appear with my father’s name. . .on the music as well.”
This tantalizing photo of Henry R. Dutton with actor Gregory Peck in the 1948 Brown University Alumni Monthly is the only image of Dutton we have come across so far in our ongoing research. The photo is from 12 years after the known collaboration.
From the Memoir:
“It’s been part of my family for all of my growing-up years, the source of whispers about ‘that “Blue Moon” thing’ among the adults—clearly, it was a sore spot—permeating our family gatherings, a matter of curiosity among the more curious of the youngsters, of which I was perhaps the most curious. I was typically the first to be angling up to the perimeters of such conversations: that Ed sold the song for $900 to buy a car; or was it that he ‘settled for’ the $900 to buy the car?”
The Memoir gives a detailed account. After Edward W. Roman’s death, many papers and documents were found in the attic which support the notion that he wrote “Blue Moon,” and much energy has been expended to make sense out of all of the discovered poetry, music, and scraps of paper in an effort to see what other songs he had written.
For instance, the collaboration of Ed Roman and Henry R. Dutton produced a song with two titles: “Are You Really in Love?” and “I Am Really in Love,” each with different lyrics. Were they different songs? Or a duet?
Then there were lyrics but no music for a song called “I Gambled and Lost,” and a full score, but only a few lines of lyrics, for “A New Star Was Born.” Also found were music and scraps of lyrics for songs entitled “Stains of Love” and “Broken Hearts That Weep at Evening.”
It was all a bit confusing and hard to know what we had actually found. It was a mystery we thought we had solved, but had we?
Professor Graham is an ethnomusicologist who teaches and conducts research at Babson College in Babson Park, MA. She is Past President (2017-2019) of the Society for American Music.
During a project conducted by Dr. Graham and Jackson Williams in 2019, we gained some important insights regarding the music and scraps of paper found in the attic. Many of our assumptions and conclusions were shown to be in error, and more scholarly explanations were presented. These findings are shared below.
Jackson Williams, baritone, performs throughout the Mid-Atlantic region as both a soloist and ensemble singer. He holds a B.M. in Vocal Performance/Opera from Westminster Choir College, an M.M. in Voice from Eastman School of Music, and has been a young artist at SongFest in Los Angeles.
(It’s Not Quite What We Thought)
This is the song with two titles from the collaboration of Ed Roman and Henry Dutton. We presumed it was a duet, with the lyrics for “Are You Really in Love?” penned by Dutton, and an accompanying set of lyrics, “I Am Really in Love,” written by Roman as the response to the query posed by the title of Dutton’s version.
Dutton copyrighted the music, as well as the lyrics, in 1936, to “Are You Really in Love?” (Scroll to the bottom of this page to view the material that was copyrighted.)
The following score and lyric versions were found in the attic. . .
The score and music below are from the 2019 research done by Ethnomusicologist Sandra J. Graham and Baritone Jackson Williams, who have notated the scores and recorded them. (Dr. Graham edited the notations for all of the songs.)
Performance by Sandra J. Graham and Jackson Wilson
The two sets of lyrics were not meant to be a duet. “Really in Love” was actually a single song. Roman had simply written a second, and likely better, set of lyrics for Dutton’s music.
Listen to a performance by Sandra J. Graham and Jackson Williams, bringing to life perhaps the world debut of Edward Roman’s 1930’s composition of “I Am Really In Love.”
“All Because of You” appeared to us to be a fully developed song. Dutton copyrighted the music in 1936 (available at the bottom of this page), and Roman penned the lyrics. There was no mystery involved.
The following score and lyrics were found in the attic. . .
The notated score produced by Sandra J. Graham and Jackson Williams. . .
The experts seemed to concur and have notated the score and performed the music, which you can hear below.
In this audio, Sandra J. Graham and Jackson Williams perform the song “All Because of You.”
We had found Ed Roman’s lyrics for “I Gambled and Lost,” but the music was missing, and presumed lost. As for “A New Star Was Born,” while we found the score and the few lines of lyrics, it turns out we didn’t have a clue.
The following score and lyric versions were found in the attic. . .
The notated score produced by Sandra J. Graham and Jackson Williams. . .
“I Gambled and Lost” lists Dutton as the composer of the music, which couldn’t be found amid the papers in the attic. Then scholar Sandra J. Graham discovered that Roman’s lyrics for “I Gambled and Lost” aligned precisely with Dutton’s melody for “A New Star Was Born.” Mystery solved.
In this audio, Sandra J. Graham and Jackson Williams perform the available portion of the song, “I Gambled and Lost,” retrieved in the attic.
We had thought that “Broken Hearts That Weep at Evening” and “Stains of Love” were two separate songs.
“Broken Hearts That Weep at Evening,” we figured, was a work-in-progress. It cites Roman—rather than Dutton—as the composer of the music as well as the lyrics.
“Stains of Love” was thought to be the only other composition known to exist by Ed Roman. His name is on both the music and the lyrics.
The songs are undated, and may have been written prior to the collaboration between Dutton and Roman. Curiously, Ed’s beau, whom he met in 1935, is listed as co-author of the melody on both.
The following score and lyric versions were found in the attic. . .
The notated score produced by Sandra J. Graham and Jackson Williams. . .
The experts believe these two songs are actually one and the same. On the notated version, they went with the title, “Stains of Love,” as well as the lyrics from that iteration.
These materials—known as “deposits”—are what Dutton actually registered for copyright as unpublished works in 1936. His copyright on “Are You Really in Love?” predates the collaboration with Ed Roman by a month. His copyright on “All Because of You,” for which Roman wrote the lyrics, was for the melody only.
Deposit Reference: “Are You Really in Love?” words and melody by Henry R. Dutton, Albany, NY, September 23, 1936, Eunp #132380
Deposit Reference: “All Because of You,” melody by Henry R. Dutton, Albany, NY, December 2, 1936, Eunp #13594
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