Gus Haenschen

Walter Gustave Haenschen (later called Gus) was born to a family of Swedish-German extraction in St. Louis. At age 13, Haenschen was helping support his family through playing ragtime piano in St. Louis nightclubs; ultimately, Haenschen befriended composer Scott Joplin. At Washington University, Haenschen led a popular dance band that played a mixture of ragtime and salon music, and through the influence of family friend, the brewer Augustus Stroh, helped Haenschen's band get a gig playing during the breaks at St. Louis Cardinals baseball games. By 1916, Haenschen was leading a string band billed as W.G. Haenschen's Banjo Orchestra. That year, this group made Columbia Personal recordings for distribution at the band's gigs in St. Louis; among the titles was "Maple Leaf Rag" in one of just a few records made of the number during Scott Joplin's lifetime. Before Haenschen entered into the Army, he worked a day job managing the record department of a large department store in St. Louis. Haenschen's combined experience as a working musician, music merchandiser, and composer ("La Rosita," written under the pseudonym of Paul Dupont, was Haenschen's biggest hit) made him a natural choice for work in the early record industry. When Haenschen returned from the overseas conflict in 1919, he accepted an offer from the newly organized recording division of the Brunswick-Balke-Collender Company (maker of bowling balls, billiard supplies, and phonographs) to work as its musical director. Haenschen was the chief musical director at Brunswick from the start of its U.S. operation in the fall of 1919 until his resignation on July 1, 1927. During this time, Gus Haenschen supervised and/or arranged literally hundreds of dance records by a variety of orchestras, including those of Ben...