On July 6, 1937 the Benny Goodman Orchestra was in a Los Angeles recording studio making a two-sided 12-inch record with just one song on it. That song was Sing, Sing, Sing and lasted 8 minutes and 43 seconds. This was an oddity in a time when almost all jazz records were limited to one side and about 3 minutes in length.

The song Sing, Sing, Sing was written by Louis Prima and he and his New Orleans Gang recorded it for Brunswick Records in February of 1936. The better-known Goodman record was based on a Jimmy Mundy arrangement and included references to Christopher Columbus, a Chu Berry tune, along with the Prima composition. In his 1993 book “Sing, Sing, Sing: The Life and Times of Benny Goodman,” author Ross Firestone quotes vocalist Helen Ward describing the development of the tune. “One night Gene [Krupa] just refused to stop drumming when he got to the end of the third chorus, where the tune was supposed to end, so Benny blithely picked up the clarinet and noodled along with him. Then someone else stood up and took it, and it went on from there."

For some, the 1938 Carnegie Hall recording by the Goodman ensemble is the better-known performance, but the studio version preceded it by six months. Goodman said that no one-nighter was complete without the band playing Sing, Sing, Sing. The tune has been heard in numerous movies and televisions shows and for many is one of the tunes that defines the swing era.

Here is a link to the studio version of Sing, Sing, Sing as recorded by the Benny Goodman Orchestra 89 years ago today:

"SING, SING, SING"