Real Men Don't Sing: Crooning in American Culture

Modern "crooning" came into being in the 1920s as the microphone made it possible for singers, especially men, to sing softly and intimately (and usually in a high register) and still be heard. The result was a phenomenon spearheaded by Rudy Vallée and the young Bing Crosby. McCracken (American studies, DePaul Univ.) begins by examining the roots of crooning in the "mammy" lullaby of the latter 19th century, which eventually metamorphosed into more romantic fare. Despite—or because of—its popularity, crooning was seen by some critics, most notably Cardinal O'Connell, as "imbecile slush" and as an attack on true masculinity. In an early salvo in the culture wars, the fluidity of expression, seen by some as gender indeterminacy, was celebrated in the Twenties but often repudiated in the Thirties. As befits an academic author, McCracken is primarily concerned with the social aspects of the phenomenon, especially the sexual implications as the style developed in the late 1920s. A more anecdotal and biographical approach is taken by Michael Pitts and Frank Hoffman in The Rise of the Crooners.