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The first true music video

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mikephillips

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I got to wondering last night, when did music videos start. And by that I mean true 3, 4, 5 or so minutes of video for a song, not cut from a longer movie or tv or such performance. Saw one that may be one of the first, George Harrison's "Crackerbox Palace" from about 75-76. So you guys know any that would be considered a music video like what bands/individuals would do today for a song??
 
If we're not limiting this to internet/digital formats ... I'm thinking early music videos would be the film "short subjects" of the 1920s and early 1930s, featuring musicians like Bessie Smith, Cab Calloway, etc. These "shorts" were shown in movie theaters before the feature film. Here's "Mr. Hi De Ho", Cab Calloway.

 
NutmegCT said:
If we're not limiting this to internet/digital formats ... I'm thinking early music videos would be the film "short subjects" of the 1920s and early 1930s, featuring musicians like Bessie Smith, Cab Calloway, etc. These "shorts" were shown in movie theaters before the feature film. Here's "Mr. Hi De Ho", Cab Calloway.

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And the moral to this story is that even with the Homefire radio, your wife isn't safe from the charms of Cab Calloway.
 
and ... I love a parade!
 
I think we can all agree that the musical short is certainly the precursor to the music video. The Calloway video is a promotional piece of media, but since it is a one reel, it is much longer than a typical song, so it has that story element added to it. At the same time that the musical short is coming about we also have musical cartoons being made, first by the Fleischer bros called "song-car toon." Both of these serve the same purpose, a short shown before a feature film in a theater, with the main difference being that the musical short is a promotional piece.

Now, if we want to only look at videos that are the length of a song, and made as a promotion for just that one song, then I think we need to consider the Big Bopper's 'Chantilly Lace,' 'Red Riding hood,' etc. He made these as promotions and were recorded to be shown on television in the late 50s.

Of course, in the 1960s the Beatles started making promotional videos and even full length movies. These endeavors culminated with the roof top concert promoting their last album, 'Let it Be.'

A couple of years after this, and one year before Harrison's 'Crackerbox Palace,' Queen famously released this video for 'Bohemian Rhapsody.'

Hope this helps.
 
Oh, and here is the video for 'Crackerbox Palace,' which certainly puts that Beatles sense of humor on display.
 
And just because I love this particular clip and this film, here's Cab performing 'Minnie the Moocher' in The Blues Brothers, showing that nearly fifty years after his 'Hi De Ho' musical short he still had it. It's also an incredible example of magical realism in film.
 
This thread brings this to mind:

 
Lots of great stuff, some I remember and some I'd forgotten about. I do in my Beatles folder have both the Get Back movie, the expanded current version Peter Jackson made and the 1960s Magical Mystery Tour.

And speaking of Queen, here's a cover....

 
Loving this conversation. I suppose you could go al the way to 1928 and Disney's Silly Symphonies. The Skeleton Dance being an early version of Thriller. :smile:


To my mind part of this also has to do with determining what constitutes a Music Video. The Silly Symphonies are both video (film) and music. What it doesn't have is the artist involved. Not to say that every Music Video has to include the artist but that the artist is the originator and participant in the Music Video process. Otherwise it is just a musical short as per Walter's earlier comments.
 
And lest we forget - Lee DeForest's 1923 "Phonofilm" with Eddie Cantor:

 
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NutmegCT said:
And lest we forget - Lee DeForest's 1923 "Phonofilm" with Eddie Cantor:

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I'm impressed that they did such a good job with synchronizing the sound. I wonder if it was simply because it was a one reel and that for a film it was too difficult to keep the sound and film synchronized when changing the reels before the advent of placing the sound on the film.
 
JPSmit said:
Loving this conversation. I suppose you could go al the way to 1928 and Disney's Silly Symphonies. The Skeleton Dance being an early version of Thriller. :smile:


To my mind part of this also has to do with determining what constitutes a Music Video. The Silly Symphonies are both video (film) and music. What it doesn't have is the artist involved. Not to say that every Music Video has to include the artist but that the artist is the originator and participant in the Music Video process. Otherwise it is just a musical short as per Walter's earlier comments.
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Not to go too far from the subject at hand, but I am a big believer that most of Disney's early success was due more to Ub Iwerks than to Walt Disney. Iwerks was a terrific animator and innovative to boot. The opnly other animators who were as innovative as he was were the Fleischer's. Here are a couple of their Betty Boop cartoons with sections that are akin to music videos, starring our old pal Cab Calloway.

You can skip to 4:21 to see Cab take over the singing duties for Koko the Clown.

You can skip to 3:50 for Cab in this one.
 
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Walt - thanks for the posts. Lee deForest Phonofilm (patented 1919 and 1920, improved 1923) actually had a "light" track at the side of the film. Didn't use a synchronized disc record like other systems (Warner Brothers VitaPhone).

Let's hope this example from deForest's "The Bride" was a comedy!

phonofilm.jpg
 
NutmegCT said:
Walt - thanks for the posts. Lee deForest Phonofilm (patented 1919 and 1920, improved 1923) actually had a "light" track at the side of the film. Didn't use a synchronized disc record like other systems (Warner Brothers VitaPhone).

Let's hope this example from deForest's "The Bride" was a comedy!

View attachment 104116
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Tom, that explains why the synchronization was so good, I didn't realize that the light track was so early. I wonder why it took nearly a decade to really catch on, maybe the cost of doing an entire feature using it?
 
Now, if we are going to talk about earliest sound and film, and possibly even the earliest "music video" we can go all the way to 1894 or 95 and see this experiment from William Dickson trying to combine a phonograph with a film.


Then a bit better example of synchronizing sound and film from the same time period is from the 1900 Paris Exposition. Granted this one is far from being a "music video" so it is only shared here as an curio.

 
I think Edison actually had "kinetophone kinetoscopes" with musical numbers synchronized back in the 1880s.

edison kinetophone.jpg


Edison and Dickson worked together on that violin/dancing film.

And if we really loosen up the term "music video", you have to include all the silent movies which had live piano/organ players - even with sound effects like locomotive whistles, sleigh bells, drums, sometimes even with live singers and speakers, etc.
 
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Maybe even earlier ...

 
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