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Cliff Edwards was known on the vaudeville circuit as “Ukulele Ike.” He was born in 1895 in Hannibal Missouri and left home at the age of 15, earning a living by singing in saloons in St. Louis. He learned to play the uke because the pianos in those saloons were often out of tune and, needing something to accompany himself, he found that the ukulele was the cheapest instrument in the music store. Edwards made his way to Chicago and onto the vaudeville stage and then motion pictures, when, in 1929, the “talkies” came out.

If Cliff looks and sounds familiar to you it is probably because he provided the voice for Jiminy Cricket in the 1940 Disney film Pinoccio. As you can see, Disney’s artists modeled Jiminy’s appearance on Cliff’s facial features. He also sang When I see An Elephant Fly in Dumbo, although not in his natural singing voice. Edwards appeared in 74 films in his long career and sold millions of records in the 20s and 30s.

One of Edwards’ earliest film appearances was in the 1929 film Hollywood Review. In this clip he sings the song which became the title to Gene Kelly’s 1952 film: Singin’ In The Rain. The song was written by Arthur Freed and Nacio Herb Brown. The Kelly film is a musical comedy about the transition from silent film to talkies. Here, Edwards is a living example of that actual transition.

Photo from classicimages.com.

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