Cabaret Torch Singer Helen Morgan

Helen Morgan

Source: Jonathan Bogart

Born on 2 August 1900 in Danville, Illinois, Helen Morgan (Helen Riggins) began her career as a hard drinking torch singer in Chicago speakeasies at about age twenty (1920), her style to lounge atop the piano while getting sauced. Dying some thirty years earlier, she isn't the same Helen Morgan who killed her husband, trumpeter, Lee Morgan, in 1972. This Morgan comes with multiple accounts of her childhood, most of which have her born to a farmer named Frank Riggins, to become Morgan upon her mother's (Lulu Lang) remarriage while she was a youth.

Ruhlmann (All Music) has Morgan performing in a railroad roundhouse (locomotive garage) in Danville as early as age 12, whence she picked up a manager named Amy Leslie who took her to Montreal to sing at the French Trocadero nightclub, that foray into the entertainment business soon brought to a close by running afoul of the Gerry Society, a child labor watchdog. Sources have Lulu's second husband disappearing as well before she took Helen to live in Chicago in time to quit school before the ninth grade. It likely no easier then than it is now to be a single mother, Lulu's daughter worked various jobs including as a film extra [Wikipedia]. Ruhlmann has her working at the Green Mill nightclub in 1918, the year her natural beauty won her the Miss Illinois pageant. Ruhlmann also has her acquiring the $1,500 prize as Miss Mount Royal of the 1918 Winter Sports Festival in Montreal.

Come 1923 Morgan found herself in the chorus of the Florenz Ziegfeld production of 'Sally' (uncredited if in the Broadway edition). [Some sources mention Morgan in 'Sally' as early as 1920, the year 'Sally' premiered.] Howsoever, IMDb has her in minor uncredited roles in silent film as early as 1923 per 'The Heart Raider' and 'Six Cylinder Love'.

Films aside, the music business for Morgan meant the speakeasy, she performing at Billy Rose's Backstage Club in 1925. It was here that she assumed her performing style, lifted up and set atop the piano by author, Ring Lardner, because she was allegedly too drunk to stand that evening. Morgan's first credits on Broadway arrived that year as well per 'George White's Scandals' staged from June into November. That was followed by a trip to London in 1927 where she put down tracks for the British Brunswick 100 series in June: 'Me and My Shadow' / 'When I Discover My Man' (British Brunswick 104) and 'Just Like a Butterfly' / 'You Remind Me of a Naughty Springtime Cuckoo' (British Brunswidk 110). Several more tracks like 'A Tree in a Park' / 'Where's That Rainbow?' (British Brunswick 111) went down in July. Circa September saw 'Do Do Do' / 'Maybe' toward British Brunswick 129 [Rust; DAHR prefers July]. Those tunes by the Gershwin brothers earlier performed in 1926 by Gertrude Lawrence in the Broadway musical, 'Oh! Kay'.

Morgan was back in NYC in time to appear as Julie in Ziegfeld's production of 'Show Boat' in December 1927. By that time she had become so popular an entertainer that speakeasies were being named after her: The House of Morgan, Chez Helen Morgan, Helen Morgan's Summer House and Helen Morgan's 54th Street Club. She was arrested at the Chez Morgan for liquor law violations on 30 December 1927. The club, shut down, reopened as Helen Morgan's Summer House, after which she was arrested the following year a second time and stopped performing in speakeasies. Both violations had arrived to acquittals.

In 1929 Morgan appeared in the films, 'Show Boat' and 'Applause'. As Morgan's greater fame gravitated to the nightclub scene with productions of 'Show Boat' along the way, she wasn't the superstar on radio or disc that others of her period were, though she did release several highly popular songs. Using Music VF as a general gauge (no actual national Billboard chart until 1936), Morgan's early release of 'A Tree in a Park' for British Brunswick (above) in 1927 ranked at #9. In 1928 'Bill' reached #4 followed by 'Can't Help Lovin' Dat Man' at #7. It was 'Mean to Me' at #11 in 1929. In 1930 'Body and Soul' rose to #16 and 'Why Was I Born?' to #8.

'It Can't Go On Like This'   Helen Morgan   Film w Jimmy Durante

From the film 'Roadhouse Nights' released 23 Feb 1930

Directed by Hobart Henley   IMDb   Wikipedia

Music: Jay Gorney   Lyrics: E.Y. Harburg

'Body and Soul'   Helen Morgan

Recorded 12 Sep 1930 in NYC   Matrix BVE-63625   Victor 27683

Orchestra led by Leonard W. Joy

Music: Johnny Green   Lyrics: Edward Heyman / Robert Sour

'Something to Remember You By'   Helen Morgan

Recorded 12 Sep 1930 in NYC   Matrix BVE-63626   Victor 22532 / 27683

Orchestra led by Leonard W. Joy

Music: Arthur Schwartz   Lyrics: Howard Dietz

It was Broadway again in 1931, Morgan joining the last edition of the Ziegfeld Follies. Wikipedia has her studying opera around that time. She was included among others like the Three Stooges in the 1934 documentary, 'Screen Snapshots' (Series 14 #1). It is thought that Morgan made her last recordings in 1935 in Los Angeles: 'The Little Things You Used to Do' / 'I Was Taken by Storm' (Brunswick 7424). With several films now under her belt, she starred in the 1936 version of 'Show Boat'.

'Song of a Dreamer'   Helen Morgan   Film

From the film 'Marie Galante' released 26 Oct 1934

Directed by Henry King   IMDb   Wikipedia

Music: Jay Gorney   Lyrics: Don Hartman

'The Little Things You Used to Do'   Helen Morgan

Recorded 9 Jan 1935 in Los Angeles   Matrix LA309A   Brunswick 7420 / 02086

Orchestra led by Leonard W. Joy

Music: Harry Warren   Lyrics: Al Dubin

'I See Two Lovers'   Helen Morgan   Film w Rudy Vallee

From the film 'Sweet Music' prob made in 1934   Released 23 Feb 1935

Directed by Alfred E. Green   IMDb   Wikipedia

Music: Allie Wrubel   Lyrics: Mort Dixon

'The Little Things You Used to Do'   Helen Morgan   Film

From the film 'Go into Your Dance' released 20 April 1935

Directed by Archie Mayo / Michael Curtiz / Robert Florey   IMDb   Wikipedia

Music: Harry Warren   Lyrics: Al Dubin

'Bill'   Helen Morgan   Film

From the film 'Show Boat' released 17 May 1936

Directed by James Whale   IMDb   Wikipedia

Music: Jerome Kern   Lyrics: Oscar Hammerstein II

Ruhlmann has Morgan performing in England in 1937-38. In 1939 she played clubs in New York City, then the Famous Door in 1940, the same year she appeared in the stage production of 'Show Boat' in Los Angeles before marrying her third husband, Lloyd Johnston, in July of 1941. Ruhlmann has her with NBC radio in NYC in the summer of 1941, performing in Miami Beach as well.

Morgan died young at only age forty-one on 9 October 1941 of liver cirrhosis upon twenty years of heavy alcohol consumption, she collapsing on stage during a performance in Chicago.

Video of Morgan: YouTube

Further Reading:

Ron Green (Most Popular Helen Morgan Songs)

The Mob Museum (Queens of the Speakeasies)

Paul Mroczka (Broadway Scenes Remembered / 2013)

Bibliography:

Christopher S. Connelly (The Original Torch Singer and Ziegfeld's Last Star / University Press of Kentucky / 2024)

Ross Laird (Brunswick Records: A Discography of Recordings 1916-1931 / Greenwood Press / 2001)

Ross Laird (Moanin' Low: A Discography of Female Popular Vocal Recordings 1920-1933 /
Bloomsbury Academic / 1996)

Ellen NicKenzie Lawson (Smugglers, Bootleggers and Scofflaws: Prohibition and New York City / State University of New York Press / 2013)

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