Cleveland children's TV host Linn Sheldon dies

Linn Sheldon, who played the character Barnaby on Cleveland, Ohio television, died on April 24. He was 86. Last Christmas, MY(P)WHAE featured Sheldon's wonderful holiday novelties Boofo Goes Where Santa Goes and Rabbits Have a Christmas (both 1960), and here they are once again:

Boofo Goes Where Santa Goes, Linn Sheldon, 1960. From Cosmo label 45.

Rabbits Have a Christmas, Linn Sheldon, 1960. From Cosmo label 45.

Click here to read the Columbus Dispatch obit for Linn Sheldon.

Former Plain Dealer TV critic George Condon called Sheldon "the only authentic genius I've seen on the air." Comedian Tim Conway had similar praise for the TV veteran: "Linn could take 20 cents worth of props and make your imagination run. That's what talent is all about."


Lee

Cowboy and western numbers from Merv and Lorne

I know about the Golden Throats series--which features "some of the most embarrassing musical moments from celebrities you thought would know better," in Rhino's words--and you won't be surprised to learn that I have limited patience with that concept. Why? Because many of the "celebrity" singers in question either weren't that bad, or were singers as well as actors and/or personalities. Some started out as vocalists--Merv Griffin, for instance, had his day in the hit parade in the late 1940s and early 1950s and, for several years following his vinyl success, was a well-known TV singer. Mike Douglas had at least one monster hit during his days as a band singer with Kay Kyser. Eddie Albert could sing. Robert Mitchum could sing. Jim Nabors sang hellaciously well. Joel Grey is a professional singer. And so on.

I suspect that Rhino is trying to be cute, moreso than I suspect the label heads are tonedeaf, though I never rule out that possibility wherever "pop"-bashing is happening.

No, the real point is that the music in question isn't rock and roll and, therefore, deserves to be ridiculed. That's the mentality. And so many Boomers suffer for their musical bigotry--doomed to listen to 50,000 versions of Stairway to Heaven, while the whole wide and wonderful spectrum of music remains, ideologically, off reach to them.

Am I suggesting that Ringo is a great piece of music? Hardly. But it's probably the best production of its type (imho)--just one hell of a good novelty western side, in spite of the outrageous dangling participle at the start ("Shot in the back, I thought he was dead." The narrator hadn't been shot in the back; Ringo had been. Big difference). And the flip is equally superb, with Greene demonstrating that he could more than hold a tune. So this stuff isn't rock and roll--so freaking what?

Ringo (Don Robertson-Hal Blair)--Lorne Greene, 1964 From RCA Victor single, which confused young listeners like me at the time, because Ringo, after all, was The Beatles' drummer, not some gunslinger!

Bonanza (Jerry Livingston-Ray Evans)--Lorne Greene, 1964. From same single. The words, though silly, work well.

Note that Livingston and Evans gave us tons of other stuff, including Silver Bells, the theme from Mr. Ed, and so on.

And here are two excellent oater numbers by Merv Griffin, the first having reached the 1951 Top 40 as the flip of 23 Starlets. (My apologies to all who were led to believe by Rhino, or any other Boomer propaganda outlet, that Griffin wasn't an actual singer.) Stick with me--you'll get pop music history as it happened, not as it's been reinvented. I promise:

The Lord's Ridin' with Me Tonight (Jeri Sullivan-Bob Carroll), with Hugo Winterhalter's Orch. and Chorus, 1951. From RCA Victor 45.

Wringle Wrangle (Stan Jones, from "Westward Ho the Wagons!"), Merv Griffin with Marion Evans' Orch. and Chorus, 1956. From Decca 45.

I'm sure you noticed how Ghost Riders-esque the first number was. And note that the author of Wringle Wrangle, Stan Jones, was the very man who gave us GR. See? It all fits together in its own odd way.

I have a Disney 45 of kids singing Wringle Wrangle, and the "cook... and things" part sounds downright wrong. Couldn't they have changed that line for the children's version?

I like Griffin's version--it has the precise light feel needed to make it work. Too bad his recording didn't chart.


Lee

I haven't skipped town....

I've been working on a number of files that are now ready (and willing and able) to go up at this site and at my other blog (Vintage Lounge), except that my upload attempts to Box.net have been in vain. I contacted the site and Box.net is trying to figure out what is/isn't happening.

I blew my cool just slightly after the second mid-upload freeze. "Slightly" includes yelling.

I had resolved to be patient about such things, but May probably isn't the best month to initiate resolutions. It's too far from January.

Speaking of January, there's a frost warning for tonight. A frost warning! And I'm sick with some sort of bug. A cold or something. No fever, but I feel feverish. And I'm having body aches, an upset stomach, and weird dreams.

Other than that, this has been the perfect Saturday! (Rim shot)

Our cats are all fine, except that Pete seemed concerned about all my yelling.


Lee

177...

...is the number of times "Google and ye shall find" shows up on Google. Dang. I figured I wasn't the first person to come up with that.

I'm also not the first person to notice that the cliched minor-mode base line of Stairway to Heaven--the one that starts out the damn thing--had previously appeared in Michelle, Chim Chim Cheree and A Taste of Honey. It had yet to show up in Feelings and Time in a Bottle. Thanks, Moneychords.

It works best in Michelle, I think--partly because it's not used as a main device. It opens the song and closes the last A of the AABA. It extends the last A, in fact. It almost makes the song AABAC. ("AFLACK!!!!"--TV duck) No, no. AABAC. ("AFLACK!!!!"--TV duck) All right, all right.

I'm not going to argue with a duck.

The chromatically-lowering bass line can just as easily be stuck in the top voice, of course--it still works. The melody to Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite comes to mind, though it stops on the sixth of the scale--I, VII, bVII, VI, then right to V.

As I type these words, my MAGIX program is refusing to close. I'm going to have to reboot.

If I lose the file-editing I just did, I'm going to... say nasty things. I will, I tell you.

I hope everything saved. Was saved, I mean. (I'm starting to talk Ohio. I've got to stop that.)

My brain is trying to justify "rebootal" as word play, but it's too tired for the task.


Lee

Merv and Mindy

Merv Griffin duets with Mindy Carson on these 1952 sides, which I've decided to present forwards and without editing the rhythms into straight quarter notes. Both songs feature lyrics by none other than Bob Hilliard, the sometime partner of Burt Bacharach who also gave us The Coffee Song, Our Day Will Come, Any Day Now, Mexican Divorce, and Istanbul. The sort of male-female duets that dominated '50s TV. That generation's luck, our loss:

Be My Life's Companion (Hilliard-DeLugg)--Merv Griffin and Mindy Carson with the Rampart Street Boys, 1952. From RCA Victor 45.

Tuh Pocket, Tuh Pocket (Mississippi River Boat) (Hilliard-Jordan)--Merv Griffin and Mindy Carson with the Rampart Street Boys, 1952. From RCA Victor 45.

Dang--I have the sheet music to that second title, complete with a photo of Merv and Mindy. But it's stuck away in storage. Rats.

Thank you, Mindy and Merv. (Hm. I should keep those on hand for cat names....)

More Merv to come.


Lee

Four Frankie Laine oaters

Killer western fare from Frankie Laine, courtesy of MY(P)WHAE reader Bob Linn. Thanks, Bob!

All are terrific, especially Gunfight at the O.K. Corral, which was penned by (who else?) Dmitri Tiomkin and Ned Washington. Oh, and the theme from Blazing Saddles is a delight, too:

Gunfight at the O.K. Corral (Tiomkin-Washington), Frankie Laine.

Bowie Knife, Frankie Laine.

Along the Navajo Trail, Frankie Laine.

Blazing Saddle (Mel Brooks-John Morris), Frankie Laine, 1974.

Aren't you glad Brooks was able to get Laine to sing that theme? Would it have worked nearly as well, otherwise? Doubtful.

Thursday night cowboy songs... only at MY(P)WHAE.

Lee

Stephen Colbert link

See Stephen Colbert's brilliant and gutsy White House performance here, if you haven't yet had the opportunity. Prepare to laugh long and hard.

Stephen made a lot of people unhappy. Well--wahh, wahh, wahh.



Lee

My copy of an ancient hymnbook

The photo shows my ancient copy of the 1956 Stamps-Baxter hymnal Heavenly Highway Hymns. I switched the color photo to black and white so that it would look old. Along with everything in it. Except for my hand. My hand isn't that old.

Well, actually, my hand is only one year younger than Heavenly Highway Hymns--so, yes, I guess it is old.

Johnny Cash, talking about his mother's old copy of this old songbook: "My mother had an old book called Heavenly Highway Hymns. She used to sit and play those songs in it--old church songs, country gospel songs, dozens of them--all the way through, over and over in her lifetime."

Old. Say it after me: "Old." Olllllllllld. Not new. Old.

Interesting. Let's see--in 1956, when HHH was published, Cash was at Sun recording his big hit Folsom Prison Blues. He was all grown up and away from home, and his mom was... what age? Fascinating. Is it possible that American Recordings is playing us for fools?

American Recordings is the outfit that released the Cash CD in question, a feast for the cliche-hungry called My Mother's Hymn Book. I'm afraid to look up the reviews for the thing, because I'm afraid I'll laugh myself to death. Bev and I sat through two titles before calling it quits--just awful. And we love 19th- and early-20th-century gospel songs. As in, very much. I even have the 1926 Columbia 78 of Where We'll never Grow Old by Smith's Sacred Singers--recorded thirty years before the publication of the ancient songbook pictured above! As far as that goes, I have an 1860 William Bradbury tunebook containing the melody to Just as I Am, only with different words. So there.

The CD credits are the usual joke--Cash gets "arranger" credit for the oldest (i.e., public-domain) titles like When the Roll Is Called Up Yonder and In the Sweet Bye and Bye (which I have in 1860s sheet music form--aren't I cool?), while arranger V.O. Foccett is credited as the "writer" of I Shall Not Be Moved and Do Lord. I guess they hired NPR to do their music research.

Sure enough, this CD gets four and a half out of five stars at Amazon. I'm in the wrong business. I need to produce "American" roots music and hype it by way of moronic journalistic cliches, all the while making absolutely sure my gullible customers realize they're getting something that's very, very esoteric. And old. "Old," in packaging terms, means black and white photography, a simple musical 'production,' and a minimum of three cliches per liner-note sentence. People don't listen to music anymore--they listen to cliches. Tell them what they're hearing, why they're hearing it, and how special they are for hearing it, and they'll gladly fork out the dough.

That's how it works anymore. These days, we're supposed to believe that the "majors" are the greatest threat to the future of popular music, yet it's the small labels who are putting out stuff like this. And, scarier still, garnering rave reviews for it. (Oops. Turns out American Recordings has been part of Warner Brothers since July of last year. Thanks, Jake, for correcting me. )

Not too long ago, a flea market dealer tried to sell me his entire pile of Heavenly Highway Hymns songbooks--no one was buying. I said, sorry, I already have two. He wanted $4 each. Had the Red Barn patrons known how ancient those things were, they would have grabbed them up right off. A museum would probably have raced an agent over there before it was too late.














Oops. I forgot to switch this to b&w. Dang...

If I ever use my copy of HHH for a CD cover, I'll throw it around the yard for a while. And maybe let the cats play with it. It doesn't look nearly "old" enough.

Lee

Two versions of "I Taut I Taw a Puddy Tat"

What, you were expecting just one? Yes, two mouth-watering versions of I Taut I Taw a Puddy Cat, a novelty number written by Alan W. Livingston, Warren Foster, and Billy May. We begin with Mel Blanc's hit version, ripped from an original 45:

I Taut I Taw a Puddy Tat, Mel Blanc, Music by Billy May, 1951. From Capitol 45.

I tink I tee a lot of puddy tats around here, but I don't merely tink I'm seeing them--they're real. All twenty of them. And when they come after me, it's for one of two things: 1) food, or 2) affection.

Or to be let out. Or to be let in. Four things, rather.

Anyway, here's the second of my total Puddy Tat holdings, which I wish I had a year for. Most likely, 1951, like the Blanc:

I Taut I Taw a Puddy Tat, Benny Lee and Mary, vocal--with The Stargazers and Nat Temple and His Orchestra.

That is to say, I didn't have time to Google any info for that--the info may be out there, it may not be. For all I know, there's an entire site devoted to Puddy Tat covers. (That would be something, wouldn't it?)

Items three and four are by Stepin Fetchit, whose real name was Lincoln Perry. On one hand, I don't feel comfortable presenting a single by (ahem) Stepin Fetchit. On the other hand, the selections are offbeat and extremely well-done, and Perry/Fetchit is a joy to listen to. His delivery has something of a Bill Cosby style and feel--in fact, one of Cosby's Fat Albert cartoon voices was like Fetchit's, if my memory isn't fooling me. These are strange, uncommon (as far as I can tell), and highly entertaining numbers, both written by Fetchit himself. They deserve to be heard:

Jet--Zoom (S. Fetchit), Stepin Fetchit and Orchestra. Year unknown. From Ferris label 45.

Dancin' Bill Bo'Jangles, Stepin Fetchit and Orchestra. Year unknown. From Ferris label 45.

I wonder if Perry did other sides for Ferris? And I wish I could find something out about the label. It turned up at my favorite Columbus, Ohio thrift store.

MY(P)WHAE--your home for strange playlists.































Lee

Cats just want to have sun

I'm looking at a local Democratic voting guide that says, "The best team to turnaround Ohio!" Turnaround. Is that anything like "turn around"?

You thought I was kidding when I made fun of Ohio English. To the extent that there is such a thing....

I'm still voting for the people on the card, though. So there.

We have this weird thing in our country about never, ever, under any circumstances letting people know who we're going to vote for. That's private information!! Yet, think of the stuff people are willing to divulge:

"So, how's the sex counseling coming?" "Just great! And it wouldn't have worked without the Viagra®!" "That's great. And it was so good of you to forgive your wife for cheating on you." "Hey, what's over is over." "By the way, who are you voting for tomorrow?" "Hey! None of your business!!!!"

Anyway, I'm voting for the team that's going to turnaround Ohio. It's abouttime that somebody didthat. Ithink.

Oh, and I was wrong about my piece (Daisy Chain) getting little notice--I'm already the featured article in the Really Weird Music on-line magazine. Hooray for me! Things happen fast on the Internet.

Anyway, tomorrow's voting will be on (gulp, Diebold) touch-screen machines, at least around these parts. People not used to computers are going to have a time, I'm sure. People will come on TV and talk about "learning curves." Experts always do that whenever there's new technology around. "Well, there's a learning curve."--Expert. Never mind that this is a totally illiterate use of that phrase. (Grrrrrr!!) Sorry.

My big question--and I have tried in vain to get a damn answer to it--is, am I going to have to cast a provisional (sound of toilet flushing) ballot because my "driver license" doesn't have my current address? No one seems to know. I do know that I was told by a BMV person on the phone that, for $8.50, I can get an address update form to attach to my license, but when I went to the BMV place (on the east side, not far from the now-famous junk shop), the clerks looked at me like I was nuts. No such form, BUT I can get a new "driver license" for $20. And I thought to myself, No way am I paying $20 for the right to vote.

Note, please, that I don't consider a provisional ballot safe. As in, something that will be COUNTED. Anyway, tomorrow I'm going to bring my county Board of Elections card that has my name AND CURRENT ADDRESS on it and say, "This is me. No way this can't be a valid I.D.!" And if they hand me a provisional ballot form, I'm going to do my best David Spade imitation and say, "No, no, no, no, no." "But...." "No, no, no, no, no, no."

If it comes to point where I'm being dragged off, I'm going to start yelling "But Frankie Yankovic was the TRUE polka king!!!!" because I've always wanted to yell that while being dragged off.

It could get ugly.

Anyway, cats just want to have sun. If these photos don't prove that to you, no photos ever will:













Bingo and Tuffy just want to have sun.













Tuffy likes some shadow with his solar rays.













Mo (Geronimo) loves to roll in the sunshine.

















Bill and Tucker, however, just want to have shade....

Lovely weather for cats today.


Lee

Daisy Train

Though not nearly as entertaining as Lee Govatos' remix, this is my take on Harry Dacre's 1892 classic Daisy Bell, a.k.a. Bicycle Built for Two. The idea was to turn it into a train song with a Space Age Pop sound. And who hasn't wanted to turn a classic pop song into a train song with a Space Age Pop sound?

Bicycles-trains. Transportation. Wheels. Passengers. Not a totally illogical association.

Plus, it gives me a chance to make a pun on "daisy chain." Not a funny one, necessarily, but a pun, nonetheless.

I'm getting pretty good with my Noteworthy Composer® software, which is pretty durned complicated, though I'm still stuck with separate staves (one per voice)--seven, in this case. That's why I didn't go as far with this as I would have. You'll notice that the first sixteen bars simply repeat, with a final cadence tacked on for resolution purposes. This allowed me to copy and paste a lot, though I still had to do it on a per-line basis. If there's a way to move everything at once, I haven't found it. Something tells me I won't....

Oh, the piece. Yes. Hello:

Daisy Train (Hartsfeld), Composed onto software by Lee Hartsfeld, 2006.

I'm sure this isn't going to attract another swarm of readers, but I like it!

And Boxnet IS back. A little slow, but it's here. As they promised!


Lee

Files not available at the moment (7:12 PM EST)

This, at my storage site's blog: "Sorry to anyone experiencing login troubles on Monday. We have isolated the issue, and it should be resolved by this evening. If you have any immediate issues, please feel free to always email us or call.

Thanks,

Box.net Team."

This is why we're getting "File not found." But I have complete faith Box.net will recover--it always does. So please give it a while--the music will return. Later this evening is my guess.

And I'll be back with some cat photos that will have everyone saying "Awwwww...."

By the way, I just noticed that Blogger's Spell Check still doesn't include "blog." Very odd.


Lee

E-mail from a first-rate service

Do you know what Box.net just did? They removed all charges for my upgraded account and apologized for my continued problems. I'll share Aaron Levie's note:

"Lee,

I wanted to inform you that there will be some access issues for a few hours today. I understand that you have run into continued problems with Box.net, and as a small form of compensation for your troubles, we are going to provide you with a free pro account for the rest of the year. Please disregard the previous payment link that our sales manager has sent out."

I've never experienced more awesome customer service (Aaron, especially, is one super dude), and it's time I stop griping every time there's a problem at the site. I need to c-h-i-l-l! I can be too excitable for my own good, which I'm (ahem) sure you've never noticed. Not obvious in the least, I'm certain. My apologies to Box.net, which has provided an amazing service--tons of storage space and the ability to link to any and all the uploads. On top of that, courtesy of Google, I have a FREE site that has proven it can hold up during (at least) 120,000 nonstop hits. The fact is, I have no right to complain. None. Zip. Please accept my humble apologies for my nagfests.

A million thanks to Box.net and Google for making this wonderful blogging experience possible.


Lee