Description

The Pirates of Titipu. The writers.

Vibrul and Gallstein may not be the most celebrated of musical collaborations, but they were a persistent part of the glittering Hollywood era of the 1940s. They presented their first major stage musical to the moguls of Hollywood on the 6^th December, 1941. On the 7^th December, Japan raided Pearl Harbor and plans for all future productions were temporarily shelved. But when the industry wheels started rolling again and it was Lights! Camera! Action! once more, their work was revived and made into their first film. The young composers were vibrant, full of exuberance, and this first foray into the spotlight, ‘Shoutin’ in the Rain’ was seen as an overly robust piece and didn’t score highly at the box office.

Abraham ‘Abe’ Vibrul was a talented pianist from the Bronx, who quickly rose to fame after winning the All-American Ragtime Competition in 1927.  This surprised many people at the time, as Abe refused to play any of the black notes. It was a unique style, and one that he maintained throughout his life, despite widespread speculation that it was attributable to racial prejudice, an accusation Abe consistently denied. This technique often proved a cause of friction between himself and his writing partner Hyman Gallstein, whose compositions were entirely in D# minor. Gallstein had also been a keyboard virtuoso as a child, though his talents were purely in the arena of piano-smashing contests, and wherever he went in his global career, he always carried a reinforced baseball bat, which due to airport restrictions severely limited any global flying that his career demanded.

After that first splash of success, they produced many other works, of wide-ranging variety and quality. ‘My Fare Lady’, the love story of a female bus conductor, a rare position for a woman to hold in that era, was an initial success, in that the rehearsals went very well. But their confidence was boosted, and the pair went on holiday to Wales, where they found inspiration for a later piece called ‘The King and Dai’ set in the royal palaces of the Rhondda Valley. And perhaps their most controversial piece, highlighting the subject of homosexuality, ‘Seven Brides for Eight Brothers’ did particularly well in the State of Alabama.

Together they wrote over 400 musicals, some longer than others, and as the Second World War came to an end they decided to call it a day. It had been a short but frantic ride, the ride itself mostly being undertaken by Abe Vibrul, who flew to many foreign destinations to wait for his partner with his baseball bat to follow.