Dolly and Millie Good were sisters from a farm in Illinois, but they reinvented themselves as cowgirls from Muleshoe Texas and became the Girls of the Golden West in the early 1930s -- naming themselves after the Puccini opera. Very popular through the 30s and into the 40s, they cut a ton of sides for 5 different labels, yet no-one seems to have collected much of their output in modern times. Perhaps that's because their stuff is pretty mellow - it's just the two of them and a single guitar, so even for cowboy music of the time it's a bit stripped down. Plus they sing ballads. But every so often they get a bit goofy with songs like "Cross Eyed Beau":
They also sing about wanting to be real cowgirls (rather than cowboy's sweethearts):
And while you can't find them on too many compilations, you can find a small collection of tracks at the internet archive, ready to download! To read more about the Good sisters (and to see a full track listing), go here.
I have to invoke my former music librarian superpowers and I wonder if they really based their name on the opera. Puccini based it on a popular David Belasco play of the same name (Puccini was the pop culture adapter of his day). Also, there were several versions of the play filmed in the silent era.
ReplyDeleteThat being said, I do like the songs!
Dan