Many of these tunesmiths started out annoying their parents by playing ragtime instead of Beethoven at the piano, but there were fortunes to be made in songwriting. At least one of Sheed’s subjects didn’t need the fortune; Cole Porter already had one. Irving Berlin had nothing but his wits, which were appreciable. You could argue that the great American popular song really began in 1911 when Berlin - the former Izzy Baline - wrote Alexander’s Ragtime Band .

He figured out early on that if he wrote both the music and the lyrics, he’d make double the money. Soon thereafter, he realized that if he became his own publisher he’d make even more. And he made plenty, enough to bail out his rich, disapproving father-in-law after the Crash.