Title: Jolly Jingles Rag, Music By: F.H. Losey, Published By: Vandersloot Music Pub. Co., Location: Williamsport, PA, Year: 1913
Frank Hoyt Losey (March 18, 1870 – 3 May 1931) was an American musician, composer, and arranger of band and orchestra music. He is credited with over 400 compositions and 2,500 arrangements including his most recognized composition, Gloria March.
Losey was born in Rochester, New Jersey and raised in Lawrenceville. While it has been commonly cited that he was born in 1872 or 1875, his presence as an infant in the 1870 Census shows these references to be incorrect, as well as his correct age of 61 on his death certificate. Frank studied music at an early age, learning to play cornet, violin, and piano. Losey was a cornetist for local and regional bands until he suffered from lip paralysis which forced him to switch to trombone and euphonium and limited him to smaller theater performances.
Starting in 1902, Losey composed and arranged music for Carl Fischer and became editor-in-chief of the Vandersloot Music Publishing Company. In 1919, Thomas Edison selected Losey to be the music adviser for Edison’s phonograph company. He was also approached by Henry Ford to arrange music for the Ford Orchestra in Detroit. Losey died in Erie, Pennsylvania in 1931.
Vandersloot Music Publishing Company was an American publisher of marches, waltzes, rags, religious music, and popular music of the Tin Pan Alley genre. The firm was founded in 1899 by Frederick William Vandersloot, Jr. (1866–1931) and his brother, Caird Melvill Vandersloot (born 1869). F. W. Vandersloot was a gospel singer, composer, and choir director. In 1913, the firm was based at 233 West 3rd Street, Williamsport, Pennsylvania with an office in New York at 41 W 18th Street, an area ten blocks directly south of what then became known as Tin Pan Alley.
For many years, Harry James Lincoln served as the composer and general manager of Vandersloot Music. Cora E. Vandersloot, néeElwert (1869–1944), wife of F. W. Vandersloot, had also served as president and manager. In 1929, Harry J. Lincoln acquired part of the Vandersloot Music Publishing Company and moved it to Philadelphia and operated it under the same name. When F. W. Vandersloot died in 1931, the firm dissolved, with much of the inventory being acquired by New York publisher Jack Mills.
