This is a well-known wartime song Ac-Cent-Tchu-Ate the Positive, written by Harold Arlen with lyrics by Johnny Mercer. It was originally recorded by Mercer with The Pied Pipers and Paul Weston’s orchestra, on 4th October 1944. The record first reached the Billboard magazine charts on January 4, 1945 and lasted 13 weeks on the chart, peaking at number 2.
It was then recorded by Bing Crosby and the Andrews Sisters, Kay Kyser and then Artie Shaw, all within weeks of the original recorded. Another version was recorded by Johnny Green in the United Kingdom on April 6, 1945, and released by Parlophone Records. Despite the British version released during the war, the Bing Crosby version is the one most are familiar with now and it is known as a quintessentially American upbeat wartime song.
When I started reading about the song, I came across this video. It shows Bing Crosby and Sonny Tufts performing the song in 1944 as part of the show Here Comes the Waves, performed at U. S. S. Traverse Bay Aircraft Carrier in a Pacific port. Crosby and Tufts are performing in blackface, which is shocking, but it’s a fascinating little window into Wartime American culture – the kind of footage that you rarely see these days.