Waiting at the End of the Road
78 rpm Victor 22073-A
The great songwriter Irving Berlin is the man behind this sad but beautiful song. We played and recorded it with my band Paul and his Gang, and last year I played it at a dear friend’s funeral.
My first encounter with it was when I saw the 1929 King Vidor film Hallelujah, where the tune is exposed a lot. You could probably call it the “leitmotif” of this Metro-Goldwin-Mayer produced picture.
I have had this 78-rpm record, where an “All Star Orchestra” plays it, for many years. You can see that under the label that says “Dance music,” there is the normal Victor logo. I suppose that it was exported to South America since the title is translated into Spanish.
It’s recorded in the summer of 1929, according to Brian Rust’s American Dance Band Discography, which also tells us that it’s Carl Cress on guitar, very effective behind the vocal trio, and that Joe Tarto is on tuba, among other more or less well-known musicians.