Bartley Costello

Bartley Costello was one of the original American Tin Pan Alley hitmakers, publishing songs as part of various collaborative teams as far back as 1910. Anyone assuming the man was a travel agent would be easily forgiven their error, however, given song titles such as "Coral Sands of My Hawaii", "Egyptland" and "My Own Home Town in Ireland". Like representatives of many other generations of commercial songwriters, Costello's job was to come up with ditties that either suited or predicted popular public notions and sentiments. At times composers of his ilk would come up with an original idea that would launch 1,000 imitators; at other times, he and his partners would be the ones whose efforts bordered on plagiarism. Despite the tossed-off nature of many such ventures, a great deal of Costello's work has continued to be treasured by various artists through subsequent musical eras. A hit from the '20s might wind up reinterpreted in the '40s by the likes of Perry Como, while in the '60s and '70s artists as diverse as the lyrical but miserable pianist Bill Evans and the bilingual, ex-jailbird Tex Mex singer Freddy Fender would find Costello's vintage sentiments appealing. " If You Had All the World and Its Gold" is perhaps the most famous of Costello's songs, created in partnership with Harry Edelheit and Al Piantadosi and featuring the following famous stanza: "You can't buy your way into heaven, though you may possess wealth untold. And just like your mother, you can't buy another, if you had all the world and it's gold." This song launched a wave of "mother" songs in the '20s, allowing Costello a chance to imitate himself with tear-jerkers such as "No Mother to Guide Her". When songs about states became popular Costello was right there with "Look For Me in Tennessee",...