How The Victor Company & A Camden County NJ Native Helped Build Carole King’s Recording Career
By Samantha Ferrara
Pictured: Al Nevins, Carole King Gerry Goffin, and Paul Simon.
What do you get when you put Carole King and Paul Simon in a Victor recording studio? Well, a 45rmp single of “Short Mort” and “Queen Of The Beach” of course.
In 1959, Carole King entered Studio B of Victor’s Gramercy Recording Studio in New York City to lay down her single, “Short Mort,” co-written by Gerry Goffin and featuring Jerry Landis (the session artist name of Paul Simon) on guitar.
“Queen Of The Beach,” King’s and Goffin’s attempt at a surf tune, filled the B Side.
Carole King recording “Short Mort.”
The location of this “Short Mort” recording session - Gramercy - is still a monumental location in Victorville. From 1921 until 1969, The Victor Talking Machine Company, and later RCA Victor, built and operated the Victor Gramercy Recording Studio in NYC.
Located at 155 E. 24 St., Victor Gramercy Studios A and B saw their fair share of talented artists in the near-fifty years that the studio was in active operation. Iconic hits such as “Don’t Be Cruel,” by Elvis, “Get Together,” by Youngbloods, and “Shout” by The Isley Brothers came out of these two recording rooms designed by John E. Volkmann - a Camden County native of Haddon Heights, NJ that worked for The Victor Co. designing crucial elements of the company’s most legendary recording studios - helping establish acoustic standards for all recording studios to come.
The Victor Gramercy Studios, like many of Victor’s recording studios, were given Volkmann’s signature polycylindrical diffuser treatment for top-notch acoustics and clearer recording quality during his tenure with the company from 1928 until 1970.
Elvis Presley during the recording of “Hound Dog” and “Don’t Be Cruel” in 1956.
Volkmann, a great contributor to Victor’s recording studios around the country, allowed for hundreds of legendary artists to create hit records. Besides Carole King, Paul Simon, and the artists mentioned above, recording giants such as The Guess Who, Charlie Parker, Nina Simone, and Miles Davis all frequented the Victor Gramercy Recording Studios.
Carole King and Paul Simon. Photo courtesy of Sony Music Entertainment Archive.
Although “Short Mort” and “Queen Of The Beach” would be Carole King’s only recordings on the Victor label recorded at this location, these records represent the unstable start to her now-momentous songwriting and recording career.
John E. Volkmann’s architectural contribution to The Victor Talking Machine Company (and the Victor Gramercy Recording Studios) is just one example of the impact that Victor’s largely Camden County workforce have had on the music industry. In combination with RCA/Victor’s foresight into Carole King’s now-historic career, Victor and Volkmann helped to bring her first songs to the homes of music lovers across the country.
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