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Singing, saxophone and banjo playing.
Bailey and Cowan and a woman stopped the show. Bill Bailey is the best banjo player
before the public today, and plays his instrument honestly, hypnotizingly and successfully,
The others shine when harmonizing with saxaphones. That got the big band. Cowan responded with some ill-timed talk when what the audience wanted was more music. Many
actors mistake an encore for a tribute, People are not always prone to get their hands sore
and tired merely to make performers feel good. Tho speech, In tho spot where it comes,
is audience-baiting, and should come out. So should Cowan's French ditty. He sings it with a cross between a Swede dialect and an Irish brogue. A grown up man should not select material that brings him into competition with the memories of Lottie Gilson and the shade of Anna Held. The whole act would improve If Cowan didn't sing at all, since he has only an ordinary voice and less than ordinary delivery. The main business of the trio is instrumental music, and at that it excels.
Source:
Variety, 54:5 (03/28/1919)