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Hearing the Americas

Sheet music cover for "O'Brien Is Tryin' to Learn to Talk Hawaiian," a novelty song by Al Dubin and Rennie Cormack, featuring an illustration of a man in a striped suit talking with three women in Hawaiian dress by a tropical lagoon.
O'Brien is Tryin' to Learn to Talk Hawaiian label

O'Brien is Tryin' to Learn to Talk Hawaiian

Title

O'Brien is Tryin' to Learn to Talk Hawaiian

Date

1916

Performer

Horace Wright

Writer

Rennie Cormack

Recording Technology

disk

Description

In a song reflecting multiple layers of ethnic nonsense, here Louise and Ferara back up a singer imitating an Irishman whose friend O’Brien is so taken with Hawaiian music that he’s teaching himself the language.
In a song reflecting multiple layers of ethnic nonsense, here Louise and Ferara back up a singer imitating an Irishman whose friend O’Brien is so taken with Hawaiian music that he’s teaching himself the language.