Hawaiian Lullaby Vintage Sheet Music Composer Ethel Bridges

Vintage sheet music copy of Hawaiian Lullaby
by Dorothy Terriss and Ethel Bridges

Hawaiian Lullaby
Words by Dorothy Terriss, Music by Ethel Bridges
Leo. Feist, Inc., 1919. Number 4269
Cover Artist: Rosenbaum Studios

Blog post by Mary Katherine May of QualityMusicandBooks.com.

1. Biographical Information
2. Copyrighted works by Ethel Bridges

This blog post was sparked while researching my sheet music copy of Hawaiian Lullaby by Dorothy Terriss (words) and Ethel Bridges (music).  I've enjoyed both the effort and the result.

1. Biographical Information
Ethel Bridges was born Ethel Cooper in San Francisco, California on November 10, 1891. Newspaper articles in the San Francisco Chronicle that she was naturally gifted, having only a few hours of instruction when a child. 

First Published Work?

The Advance of Portola
Source: Univ. of Oregon
Historical Sheet Music Collection

Ethel's first published composition may have been in 1909 when she self-published The Advance of Portola: March and Two-Step.  Written for The Portola Festival and Pageant, few extant copies remain. 

In 1914, Ethel married Nebraska-born Thomas Sheldon Bridges, a graduate of West Point who served in Panama, Mexico and France in World War I, as well as many other places.

"Bridges has been attentive to Miss Cooper for the past year, so the engagement is not precisely a surprise, although few knew that the wedding date was so near. Miss Cooper is a talented musician and a charming, pretty girl. Mr. Bridges is a graduate of West Point and has been one of the most popular of the young officers ever since the Sixth came from the Philippines three years ago" San Francisco Examiner, April 25, 1914

In 1920, Captain Thomas Bridges on May 14, 1920, died after surgery for appendicitis, leaving Ethel and a young son only four-years old. Ethel was married a second time to Richard Winfield, who was also a military officer, and bore a second son. 

Mrs. Ethel Bridges
Source: San Francisco Examiner, 1918

Some time in 1918, Mrs. Bridges traveled east for a vacation and was discovered by publisher Leopold Feist when he heard, or saw, her composition Hawaiian Lullaby.  Feist hired Ethel, after which many works followed. 

Most of her music pieces were written in collaboration with other songsters. The lyrics Hawaiian Lullaby were written by Dorothy Terriss, which was a pseudonym for Alfreda Theodora Strandberg Morse (1883-1953). 

"Success is the sweetest thing in the world," she says, "but it takes work to keep it.  I worked twelve years before I got even a look in and now am only just arriving.  When I have written a truly good light opera I will consider myself successful." San Francisco Examiner, April 1, 1920.

At the time of her death on June 21, 1982, at the age of 90 years, Ethel Cooper Bridges Winfield had been, and was wife, mom, grandma and great-grandma. Her legacy lives on through family who loved her, and and her music that brought joy to so many across America and around the world. (source: Obituary for Ethel Bridges Winfield, The Press Democrat)


Works by Ethel Bridges 
as found in Catalog of Copyright Entries: Musical Compositions, Worldcat, and internet search)

The Advance of Portola: March and Two-Step (1909)

An Old Fashioned Rose (with Gus Kahn, 1925)

And the Rain Came Down (1941)

Aviation Cadets (with Gladys Shelley, 1943)

Beautiful Hawaiian Love (with Dorothy Terriss, 1920)

Brown Gardenias (with Thomas B. Woodburn, 1941)

The Democrats Are Winning the Day (with Zora Laman, 1941)

Dreamy Alabama (with Marry Earl and Dorothy Terriss, 1919)

Ching-a-Ling’s Jazz Bazaar (with Joseph H. Santley, 1920)

Hawaiian Lullaby (with Dorothy Terriss, 1919)

Here You Are (with Tom B. Woodburn, 1941)

I Give This Lei to You and I Sing Aloha (1940)

It’s the Infantry: Military March (1941)

Just Like the Rose (with Harold Cool and Dorothy Terriss, 1920)

The Laughing Trombone (with Howard Johnson, 1919)

Maria Luisa (1953)

My Fever’s Up Again (1941)

My Spanish Rose (with Leo Wood), 1920.

One Little Moment for Two: Fox Trot (1943)

Our Hostess (1941)

Sighing (1921)

Soldier’s Life (with Tom B. Woodburn, 1941)

To My Boys (with Ned Wever, 1943)

Whispering (with Dorothy Terriss, 1920)

You Are All My Dreams Come True (with Dorothy Terriss, 1920)