Perhaps a very niche question but I thought I'd give it a go. I watched the movie in question a short time ago and was curious whether it portrayed the musical style of the 1910s accurately. It was a question I had thought of a while ago when I saw another Judy Garland musical set in the same era and about the same vaudeville era, Easter Parade.
The music in both these films seemed very jazzy to me in a way which would naturally be totally anachronistic as early as the mid-1910s, but yet it surprises me that movies made in the 1940s, when a great many people in the audience would remember the vaudeville era (and would likely have seen these movies as nostalgic evocations of that time) and I'd imagine would be annoyed if the music was updated unrealistically as such.
On a side note was tap dancing as widespread by this same point in the 1910s as these films portray? I've always been meaning to look more into the history of this dance form but the Internet doesn't seem to be too knowledgeable about (book recommendations perhaps anyone?).
Thanks all!
Vaudeville wasn't really a style of music or genre as it was a way of booking or managing theatrical acts. A modern equivalent would be a tv channel.
According to Groucho Marx in his autobiography Groucho and Me there were two booking agencies, both based in New York, that controlled the theater circuits. Acts got hired through them or they didn't get hired at all. Theater managers booked performances through them or they didn't book anyone.
Acts were responsible for their travel and lodging, not to mention props and costumes, but line-ups varied from theater to theater. According to Harpo Marx in his autobiography, Harpo Speaks, sometimes a bunch of acts were all booked together at once, sometimes they were more independent. All involved cheap hotels, terrible meals and interminable train travel.
The acts themselves were incredibly varied, as well.
The Marx Brothers started off singing popular songs and dancing and evolved into what we would now call sketch comedy with some musical numbers and then finally their proto-improv they took to Broadway and film.
According to Harpo, over the years they performed with burlesque shows, a couple that milked a cow on stage, drag queens (Groucho got fired as MC one night for calling a drag queen who performed as the Creole Fashion Plate the Queer Old Fashion Plate) and a guy called Mons Herbert, who blew up a rubber turkey and played tunes by releasing air out of it. They performed on bills with ballet troupes, animal acts, escapology, magic, even a boxer called Benny Leonard who did exhibition bouts. The music ranged from bits of opera to the day's popular music.
To answer your specific quesation, anything that existed in 1910 would find its way into vaudeville.