More Mr. C.!!

Fifteen more goodies by one-time Bobbysoxer favorite Perry Como (mostly from the Fifties and Sixties), including a number inspired by Debussy (Moonlight Love) and Schumann (Wild Horses). But first, let's enjoy this 1953 photo of Mr. C. and a few of his young fans, who had yet to defect to Elvis, Pat, and/or Fabian:





















Domenico Savino, the man who adapted Moonlight Love from Debussy's Clare de Lune, was a songwriter and dance band leader who wrote some arrangements for Paul Whiteman and who sometimes showed up in label credits as "D. Onivas." (Shouldn't it have been "O. Onivas"?)

Moonlight Love (Mitchell Parish--Adapt. Domenico Savino), with Mtichell Ayres Orch. and Ray Charles Chorus, 1956 .

Papa Loves Mambo (Hoffman-Manning-Reichner), with Mitch Ayres, Ray Charles Chorus, 1954.

Wild Horses (Based on music by R. Schumann) (K.C. Rogan), with Hugo Winterhalter's Orch. and Chorus, 1953.

Two Lost Souls (Adler-Ross), with Jaye P. Morgan, Mitch Ayres Orch., 1955.

Make Someone Happy (Comden-Green-Styne), with Mitch Ayres, Ray Charles Singers, 1960.

(I Love You) Don't You Forget It (Stillman-Mancini), with Mitch Ayres, Ray Charles Singers, 1963.

Chincherinchee (John Jerome), with Mitchell Ayres, Ray Charles Chorus, 1956.

Love Me or Leave Me (Kahn-Donaldson), with Russ Case and His Orch., 1947.

Dream On Little Dreamer (Crutchfield-Burch), with The Anita Kerr Quartet. Produced by Chet Atkins, 1965.

I Looked Back (Eaton-Wagner), with Nick Perito's Orch., Ray Charles Singers, 1967.

This next number, Delaware, was produced by Charles Grean, who wrote Phil Harris hit The Thing, produced Merv Griffin's I've Got a Lovely Bunch of Coconuts, and had a hit of his own in 1969 with Quentin's Theme (as The Charles Randolph Grean Sounde):

Delaware (Irving Gordon), Mitch Ayres Orch., Ray Charles Singers; recorded in 1959.

The Things I Didn't Do (Koslo-Jay-Reid), with Mitch Ayres, Ray Charles Chorus, 1955.

Because (Guy d'Hardelot-Edward Teschemacher), with Russ Case's Orch.; recorded in 1947.

The following number was written by Burt Bacharach and Bob (Any Day Now) Hilliard:

You're Following Me (Hilliard-Bacharach), with Mitch Ayres Orch., Ray Charles Singers, 1961.

The Father of Girls (Drake), with Nick Perito's Orch.; recorded in 1967.

More P.C. on the way!




Lee

666! Aieeeee!!!

As I type this, my site counter reads 355, 666. (Shrieking violins, fade.)

The Devil didn't want me to pay tribute to Perry, or something. Dunno.

Well, Old Scratch can go jump on his trident. At MY(P)WHAE, Perry rules. And Merv. And HAL's Dad. Here, by the way, is a really cool Como cover. Great scan (not mine, by any means):


















I've owned maybe four copies of that LP. It shows up....

And here's my cat Perry, who was named after the great crooner:













Perry has a complete tail. That was just me being careless with the photo cropping....

And here's a great item--Perry at RCA, with fellow label crooners Vic Damone, Eddie Fisher, and Merv Griffin! Merv's caption reads, "I wish I could remember the name of that song." Circa 1951.

Happy Birthday, Mr. C.!

Pierino (a.k.a. Perry) Como (1912-2001) was a busy hit-maker. As Colin Escott reported in 1998, "The statistic books tell us that Perry Como has scored 150 hits. That's more post-War hits than anyone but Elvis. More than the Beatles, and more than Crosby and Sinatra combined."

Everyone knew that, right? (No??) Neither did I, until I read Escott's essay. Amazing, isn't it, the facts that get buried owing to inadequate--or (ahem) biased--historical reporting.

Anyway, here are twenty terrific sides by Mr. Como, including a few of his pre-RCA-Victor sides as a vocalist with the Ted Weems Orchestra. Wish I'd had time to get more of his stuff up, but the month's not over yet....

Temptation (Brown-Freed), with Ted Steele's Orch., 1945.

Prisoner of Love (Columbo-Gaskill-Robin), with Russ Case's Orchestra, 1945.

Till the End of Time (Mossman-Kaye), with Russ Case's Orch., 1945.

If I Loved You (Rodgers-Hammerstein II), with Russ Case's Orch., 1945.

(A Hubba-Hubba-Hubba) Dig You Later (McHugh-Adamson), with Russ Case's Orch., 1945.

Mister Meadowlark (Donaldson-Mercer), with Ted Weems' Orch., 1940.

It All Comes Back to Me Now, with Ted Weems, 1941.

Goody Goodbye, with Ted Weems' Orch., 1939 or 1940.

Goodbye, Sue (Rule-Ricco-Loman), with mixed chorus, 1943.

I Love You (Porter), with mixed chorus, 1944.

More and More (J. Kern), with Lou Martin's Orch., 1944.

Long Ago (And Far Away) (J. Kern, I. Gershwin), with mixed chorus, 1944.

I'm Always Chasing Rainbows (Carroll-McCarthy), with Russ Case's Orch., 1945.

All Through the Day (Kern), with Russ Case's Orchestra, 1945.

Don't Let the Stars Get in Your Eyes (Slim Willet), with Hugo Winterhalter's Orch., 1952.

My Love and Devotion (M. Carson), with Mitchell Ayres' Orch., 1952.

Round and Round (Shapiro-Stallman), with Mitchell Ayres and the Ray Charles Singers, 1957.

Fooled (M. Curtis-D. Tauber), with Mitchell Ayres' Orch., 1955.

Catch a Falling Star (Vance-Packriss), with Mitchell Ayres' Orch., 1957.

Some Enchanted Evening (Rodgers-Hammerstein II), with Mitch Ayres' Orch., 1949.

Como's Some Enchanted Evening was one of the first 78s I ever owned, and I loved it. Because of Perry, John McCormack, and Bill Murray, my shellac kick started early--age 11, maybe. I thought 78s were the coolest things in the world. I still do, sometimes.

More to come, especially since I forgot (I can't believe it) to upload Papa Loves Mambo with this bunch.

Enjoy!

Lee

"Let It Be Me," "Tokyo Boogie Woogie," plus five more classics for tonight.

"Tonight. Tonight. We'll hear some songs tonight...."

And what songs. We'll hear tonight, I mean. We begin with Let It Be Me, which everyone is sick of hearing. I know I am. Except in this, the original (American) version, which is vastly, vastly better than any of those damn duets that followed in its hit-parade wake. Jill Corey is perfect. From the CBS TV show Climax, says the label. Music (and arrangement, we can assume) by Sing Along with Mitch's own Jimmy Carroll:

Let It Be Me (M. Curtis-Becaud), Jill Correy with Jimmy Carroll, 1957. From Columbia 45.

When I first played that record, it was like hearing the song for the first time. No other version is fit to tie its shoes....

For an abrupt change of mood, we have The New Vinton County Frogwhompers (Marching, Singing, Strumming & Plucking Society) with Done Stomped on My Heart. I'd meant to get this up earlier, but things don't always transpire as planned. This is the flip side of the same group's hilarious version of Rocky Raccoon:

Done Stomped on My Heart (Mason Williams), The New Vinton County Frogwhompers, year unknown. From Mus-i-Col label 45.

As I suspected--Mason Williams, the song's author, was the Classical Gas guy. And he wrote for the Smother Brothers' TV show. Far out. I just looked him up.

Now we know.

We move on to the vocal charms of Shizuko Kasagi, who belts out M. Suzuki and R. Hattori's Tokyo Boogie Boogie on this 1953 Columbia 45 (though it may have been recorded in 1948--not sure):

Tokyo Boogie Woogie (M. Suzuki, R. Hattori), Columbia Tokyo Orchestra, vocal by Shizuko Kasagi, 1953. (Poss. recorded in 1948)

From Shizuko to Merv--1954's Much Too Young to Die is a good example of the kind of vigorous pop that existed prior to Elvis' entry into the pop charts in 1956. It wasn't all Doggie in the Window, in spite of the deliberately dishonest rock propaganda to that effect:

Much Too Young to Die (Gabbard), Merv Griffin with Mitch Miller's Orchestra, 1954. From Columbia 45.

From 1956, George Hamilton IV with his very own If You Don't Know, a catchy piece of rockabilly that appeared on the flip side of A Rose and a Baby Ruth:

If You Don't Know (Hamilton), George Hamilton IV, 1956. From ABC-Paramount 45.

Hm--did I already post that one? It's already set up for public sharing, so maybe I did. Oh, well. Two links never hurt anything.

We close with two sides that would have gone to Vintage Lounge, except that I'm about to dump seven Otto Cesana tracks at that very blog. So, we're going to here them here. I mean, hear them hear. I mean....

By the way, Wide, Wide World, a Dave Garroway series, is explained here: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0212709/

Theme from Wide, Wide World (Broekman), David Broekman and His Orch.--Lois Winter, vocalist. From RCA Victor 45, 1956.

Samba of the Orchids (Broekman), David Broekman and His Orch., 1956. From same 45.

Seven classic tunes, and not one of them by Zepp....


Lee

Stairway to Conformity

AdSense was offering a "Laine frankie ringtone" just before I came to this page. I'll have to check my AdSense earnings--they might be past $25 now. Woo-hoo!

Four Birthdays of note this month--my foster mom's, Perry Como's, mine, and this blog's. Vintage Lounge is probably one (year old), too. I'll have to check when I started that. VL was my original blog, but it's way behind this site in terms of counter clicks.

I think I'll celebrate my (49th) Birthday with a post of my musical compositions and some of my comedy skits. By the way, when did the tradition of capitalizing "birthday" come in? As in "It's your Birthday!"? English isn't a noun-capitalizing language, after all. Except when tradition trumps style. No biggee--just wondering. I'm not one of those perpetually pissed off word cops, like the guy on NPR who once went ballistic over the word "infidel," which, he hissed, bin Laden would NEVER use. A great choice of issues to blow out own's temple veins over, Leethinks.

"Why is this man in the hospital?" "He got angry about the press' misuse of the word 'infidel.' The veins in his temple ruptured." "Oh. Makes sense to me." "Yeah, me, too. My veins almost ruptured over that one." "Yeah, I had to take a Xanax."

Well, that wasn't very nice. But I can't help laughing at the over-the-topness of NPR. They don't know when to stop, those people. Zero sense of style. And their rants are all delivered in that patented show-no-expression radio style of, what, the 1930s? A style that originated in the days announcers had to intone like a Bell Lab flexi-disc to be discerned over radio-receiver static. Hence, no inflection. Hey, NPR, radio receivers have come a long way since then. Some receivers even feature STEREO, for instance. Come, join the 21st century. (Er, I mean "cen-tu-ry.")

Beware of the Blog reached its 100-versions-of-Stairway-to-Heaven goal, so they're done. Which is why I haven't submitted my excellent efforts to the cause. That, plus BOTB has banned me from posting at their site. Two good reasons, no? (Smile face)

And, a third reason--my efforts are meant as a parody of their ridiculous post.

I just listened to Joe Wolfe's Stairway Suite (linked at BOTB), or part of it, as played by the University of South Wales Orchestra. Frankly, I like my fugue and cowboy hop better than his more conventional efforts. If you must know. Not because I have Mr. Wolfe's chops, by any means--hardly. But because I tried to make STH sound Classical, not vice-versa, being weary of efforts to make Classical music sound like Zepp. Let Zepp come to Bach, not vice-versa. It's about time.

Anyway, this is where parody has a hell of a hard way to go--i.e., when the thing being lampooned is so f'ing ridiculous to begin with. And rock sychophancy is disgusting as well as funny--tough combo, that. My Zepp variations are meant as a Bronx cheer amid the worshipful din. I may as well be farting into a windstorm, but better to have a lost cause than none.

Which, by the way, is why I'm a Democrat. I'm part of a dying breed of losers who believe that doing what's right is always better than selling out to The Man.

Lee

More political stuff

"More political than what?" you ask. Ha, ha.

It's just that "Additional political stuff" doesn't make for as snappy a title. And, as I type this, Earl Fuller's 1917 orchestra is playing in my ears, and it's hard to even focus on politics. Politics--what are those?

Oh, yeah, now I remember. Bribes. Golfing trips to Scotland. Registered voters at the right polling places nevertheless forced to use provisional ballots. "9/11, 9/11, 9/11, 9/11...." (Three hours later): "9/11, 9/11, 9/11."

Yeah, I remember. Now, how do I forget again?

Btw, you'll have to admit I take a more creative approach to dissing government than most other blogs. They're all, "Those idiots in Congress, etc., etc." while I focus on the real problem, with is corruption. Dishonesty. The shameless use of propaganda for self-gain. We WISH the guilty parties were stupid, but if only they were. The problem is that Cheney, Rove, Delay, et al. aren't the least bit dumb. Morally dumb, yeah. We're talking moral dumbness bordering on sociopathology. But they're operating in a milieu in which borderline sociopathology is something you list under "Special Talents" on your resume.

Those idiots in Washington, grumble, grumble. There. I feel SO cutting-edge now. I are cool.

This first selection is cool, too. In a campy way. (The adjective "retro," so far as this blog is concerned, does not exist.) It's a campaign song for Ted Kennedy sung by Mitch Miller and The Boys to the tune of Hey, Look Me Over.

Damn it. I just ruined it....

Hey Massachusetts, Mitch Miller and the Boys. From a 45 titled (at the top) Edward M. Kennedy. (I snapped a shot of the label, but it came out blurry. There's not much to look at, anyway.)

"Vote correct, elect E.K.!" I like the guy, personally, but I hate that damn tune. Google tells me it was introduced by Lucille Ball in 1960 in Wildcat. Far out. In the Navy, it was sung to the words, "Hey, f... me over, (something) in my ear. That's what we get for serving over here." All these years later, it still fails to amuse me. Military humor is like any other humor--some of it is funny, some of it isn't. And a lot of it is identical to, or simply a minor variation on, standard workplace humor. Most of which is just as bad.

I need to get out of aside mode, here. I can't help it, I tell you....

O.K., here's an item that's not the least bit uncommon, but... I'd never heard it before. And I really like it until the last stupid line, which I suspect was added by Red Skelton. I'm guessing the text came from one of Skelton's writers or else was a "traditional" recitation sitting around waiting to be swiped. It's too distinguished for Skelton to have dreamed up. What a shame--the meaning of democracy is so beautifully spelled out, and Skelton has to add the school prayer reference. Not only does it ruin the tone of the piece, it's downright illiterate by comparison. Thanks, Red:

The Pledge of Allegiance, Red Skelton, 1969. Burger King cardboard 33 1/3 record (with vinyl veneer, of course).

Here's my copy, though there are better images on Google:


















Whoever wrote the pre-ruined text, on the other hand--way to go. Seriously.

Here's some more conservative stuff, albeit the sort of Libertarian right-wingism that was more common circa 1970 than now. The far left has pretty much taken over this kind of thinking, but a fear of new things, a total opposition to law and order (or, "Why can't I do everything I feel like doing? Wah!"), and the like had yet to be co-opted by "hipsters," meaning that the cats who espoused these things were, by anyone's description (including their own), square. There might be a lesson there, hm?

The Fickle Finger of Fate Award (Rabbitt--Heard), Guy Drake, 1970. From an LP whose title stems from a still-current racist urban legend.

I have a decent amount of right-wing country stuff, but it frankly makes me sick to listen to it, and I'd feel even worse if I posted it. So... sorry if you had any requests in that area. There's some material even I can't stomach. Guy Drake, I can stand, partly because he's like a cross between Ray Stevens, Roger Miller, and Doodles Weaver. And Spiro Agnew.

The spring has sprung; the grass has riz. I wonder where the posies is.

Lee

Stairway to Counterpoint

My latest variation on that tacky Ledd Zeppelin number, which I'm presenting as a four-part fugue. (The last thing I'll ever do is cover this thing reverently, of course. ( <: )

Wrote this at my Casio keyboard while my cat, Rosie, was digging at the door. (Me: "Stop it, Rosie!" Rosie: "[Dig, dig]") I'd just let her out, but she heard Daddy playing his Casio, and she wanted back in. Daddy, however, wanted a few minutes to write music free of cat interference. He loves cats, but....

I entered it into my Noteworthy Composer software, did some note-fixing here and there, and repaired a couple errors in the fourth voice (consecutive octaves in the outer voices--aieeee!). I added two effects with MAGIX. I like the second one ("cathedral surround") best. There's some flutter in the eighth bar that probably happened during the transfer to cassette tape. My sound studio is not the fanciest, you know:

Stairway to Counterpoint (Lee Hartsfeld, 2006): Original patch/with "cathedral surround"/with reverb.


Lee

Mother's Day at MY(P)WHAE

O.K., this is working out nicely. I'm using a new service, and the cool thing is that it stores everything as a "project"--i.e., it offers access to multiple files via one link!! I like that.

Box.net, as yet, isn't working. Aaron Levie is trying to figure it out. Meanwhile, I like the way this new deal works.

First, let me try something. I'll post this link and see if it works. I hope, I hope:

http://savefile.com/projects.php?pid=360338

It works! Just go there and choose one, or all, of the six files you want. Pressing "download" will take you to that file's page. Click "Download the file now" at the bottom of the page. A download box comes up.

Beautiful!

Here are the six selections:

1) All Mama's Children (Carl Perkins/Johnny Cash), Carl Perkins (1956)

2) Boogie Woogie Mother-in-Law, Buddy Johnson and His Orch. (1941)

3) Bring Me a Letter from My Old Home Town, Lewis James and the Shannon Quartet (a.k.a. The Revelers), 1918. From Victor 78.

4) Mother's Last Farewell Kiss, Charlie Poole and the North Carolina Ramblers (1930)

5) My Mother's Hand Is on My Brow, William MacEwan (1911)

6) The Old Arm Chair, Williamson Brothers and Curry (1927)


Happy Mother's Day!


Lee

Had some cool Mother's Day stuff....

However, Box.net refuses to upload anything. So, too bad about the files.

Just not in the mood today to go through this today, is all.

Anyway, I notice that Google is willing to acknowledge Mother's Day. Far out. You never know what they're going to acknowledge and what they're going to ignore. I wouldn't be surprised if there are office betting pools devoted to that question.

I wish I hadn't gone to the trouble of getting all the files ready. I should've tested the site first. Live and learn.



Lee

Save the terminal

The song tells the entire story. Springer (born in England!) was a Cincinnati city council member when he sang this. As many of us know, Springer got in trouble for paying a prostitute by check. I'm not sure if his main crime is considered to be 1) seeing a prostitute or 2) paying her by check. Anyway, because Springer is not a Republican, the press has refused to forget about this incident, and people continue to be outraged by his behavior (Grrrrrr!). Springer should have done something acceptable, like running a stop sign and killing someone, going AWOL after his family got him into the Guard, denying 100,000s of Ohioans their right to cast a vote, or offering a blatantly racist explanation for skipping out of Vietnam duty. Things like that, people forget and forgive. Pay a prostitute by check, and you pay for the rest of your dang life.

And Jerry is a safe and easy target. Tough guys in and out of the press love easy targets, because they're... well, tough guys. Being tough means picking easy conflicts, and in gangs, if you can swing it.

Invariably, Springer's singing on this record is described as awful. Not by a long shot--Jerry's voice is quite adequate. He can count, and he can hold a tune. Possibly, his critics can't, and they're jealous. That's a possibility!

Oh, and the tune sounds a lot like One Tin Soldier, doesn't it?:

Save the Terminal (S. Flaharty-T. West-J. Elliot), early 1970s?. From 45 on Cincinnati Council label.


















See? It's not that bad of a record at all, and it was for a noble cause. I think it was cool of Springer to record it, so, nyaahhh.


Lee

Don Imus, Chad Mitchell, and Paul Lavalle

That's a line-up that screams "MY(P)WHAE," no? And we begin with Don Imus' adequate break-in novelty, Son of Checkers (The Watergate Case), from 1973:

Son of Checkers (The Watergate Case) (Don and Fred Imus), Don Imus, 1973. From RCA Victor 45. (Is there an echo in here?)

Hard to believe Imus was even mildly funny at any point. (Keyword: mildly.)

A couple years ago, on Howard Stern's pre-satellite-radio show, Artie Lange commented that nowadays Watergate seems like a college prank. Very true. Poor Nixon--he picked the wrong time to pull that stunt. If it happened today, the Bush folks would scold the press for reporting it, then tell them to go back to shilling for the White House like they're supposed to do.

Nixon, of course, was Eisenhower's VP. I've heard and/or read that Eisenhower didn't like him. Good for Ike. However, I haven't read or heard anything about Ike's opinion of Paul Lavalle's stirring Dwight D. Eisenhower March. Btw, dig the two dangling participles in Paul's intro. (Why stop at one?):

Dwight D. Eisenhower March (Lavalle), Paul Lavalle, conducting the Cities Service Band of America, 1955. From RCA Victor LP.

This next record, while it might sound like a collection of Nixon quotes, is actually a cut on the John Birch Society. And a cut about the John Birch Society. Multi-level comedy, here:

The John Birch Society (Michael Brown), Chad Mitchell Trio, 1962. From Kapp LP.

The Chad Mitchell Trio, of course, became the Mitchell Trio, whose members included one John Denver.

Jerry Springer coming up soon. Are you excited? Me, too!












Lee

One for Lady Domi

From 1961, this is Jack Ross' version of Sweet Georgia Brown. I haven't had time to find out who Jack is/was (Google brings up a bunch of JRs), but I'm guessing Domi will know. If Jack is the guy on trumpet, he's got to be a known jazz talent. His playing is nothing less than phenomenal:

Sweet Georgia Brown, Jack Ross, 1961. From Dot label 45.

This 45 turned up at my last thrift--the one that also yielded The Incredible Shrinking Man and the Seeburg Frankie Laine.

Oh, wait--I found Jack Ross: http://www.bsnpubs.com/dot/dotstoryc.html. Time to read up....


Lee