Why Do You Think I Look So Gay?

 

 

Fred Godfrey & Billy Williams; or Billy Williams & R.P. Weston,1 1910.

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Gramophone advance copy Homophon 806
An advance copy
of the Zonophone
recording, this single-sided disc is titled
and signed in pencil
in Billy Williams’s
own handwriting,
and once belonged
to him.
 

Recordings

Billy Williams recorded five versions of this song: 18 February 1910 for Zonophone, ca. March 1910 for Homophon, ca. February 1911 for Pathé, ca. April 1911 for Edison Amberol, and ca. December 1911 for Beka Grand. Reissues appeared on several other labels.2

 

 

 

 

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Notes

1   Godfrey’s participation is uncertain; Frank Andrews and Ernie Bayly, Billy Williams’ Records: A Study in  Discography (Bournemouth,
     UK: Talking Machine Review, 1982), believe Weston was the writer. Weston does indeed assign his rights for the song to Williams in a
      letter dated 16 July 1911. Typewritten lyrics in a scrapbook that once belonged to Billy Williams Jr. and now in the author’s possession
     credit Weston and Williams.
2   For comprehensive discographies of recordings by Billy Williams, see Brian Rust, British Music Hall on Record (Harrow, UK:
     Gramophone, 1979); and Andrews and Bayly, Billy Williams’ Records.