Cat up a tree: Or, There's Buster

So, here's a photo of our adorable second new cat, Buster. Somehow (he won't tell us how), Buster got outside, where he decided to run straight up our big white pine by the bank. This is likely his first trip up a tree, which probably explains why he has no idea how to descend. "Meow, meow," he keeps saying down to us. He just can't get the idea to come down rump-first.

If only he'd gone up our crabapple tree--it would have been an easy matter of putting up the ladder and coaxing him down. But, noooo. So, we've got a fun situation--he's impossibly high, and the ground is covered with snow and ice. Our ladder can be extended to reach him, but I haven't climbed that high since my Navy days, back when I was, oh, a wee bit lighter than I am now. Lithe, I'm not. I'm also not good with heights, due to nearly no stereo vision. (I live in a 2-D reality mostly.) Too risky.

I have visions of me yelling "Aieeeeeeee!!" as the force of gravity pulls me to the snow-covered bank. No thanks.

Who said a cat-filled life was boring? Not me.

So, now that it's dark, we have the problem of raccoons--the ones who hang around our yard after the sun sets. Said raccoons might very well consider Buster a tempting snack, and they might very well go on up after him. (Unlike cats, of course, raccoons can come down face-first.) So, Bev and I will be standing watch from the studio, where we can keep an eye on the tree. Operation: Keep Buster Safe.

Meanwhile, we've put food in the yard (off to the other side) as a diversion. The hope being that our night friends will go for the ground-level munchies and leave Buster alone.

Oh, well. This is my first-ever cat-up-a-tree experience. I've read about these situations, heard about them, watched them on TV, but now... I'm there. Or, rather, he's there. Now, how to get him down?


Lee

Now, THIS could come in handy....

"Please select from the following hold-music titles: So Tired of Waiting; Forever and Ever; Wait a Little Longer; Hold On, I'm A-Comin...."

Check out Please Read Carefully Because Your Options Have Changed at Don Brockway's always amusing and fun Isn't Life Terrible blog. He writes about an amazing free resource that takes some of the agony out of man's endless quest for signs of human life beyond the customer-service voice menu.



Lee

Duo-ing Pianos: Whittemore and Lowe, 1946

Wow. For nearly three years, I've been giving the real story behind easy listening/space age pop/mood/pop orchestral music. I've demonstrated, with any number of examples, that the music existed long before the mid 20th century. 1935 Andre Kostelanetz, anyone? Percy Faith and Morton Gould, circa 1945? Pop-ified Classics from the 1920s? Thirties Exotica? I've featured it all, and then some.

So, has Internet scholarship on the subject lined up behind my findings? Have my posts worked toward abolishing the nonsense that "semi-Classical" pop came about during the era of bachelor dens and hi-fi sets? Yes.

No, of course not. So, why do I keep trying, you ask? Simple: I'm nuts. Hoo hoo!! Hee hee!! Ha haaaaaaa!!

However, my spirits are kept up by folks like Steven Strauss, Andy Senior, Brad the Impaler, and any number of vintage lounge fans in my readership, all of whom know that the history of pop music we've been collectively handed doesn't always operate in the best interests of factuality. Our job: to cut through the misinformational haze. To boldly go where no van has gone before.

And, so, I present Arthur Whittemore and Jack Warren Lowe's 1946 78 set Two Grand, which was redone around 1952 (with a new orchestra) under the same title, with the same track line-up, and with the same album art--but featuring a new orchestra. I've decided that the golden age of easy listening/pop instrumental/lounge/mood was the Forties--that's when the music reached its highest level of variety and sophistication. What we've been hearing since that decade are rehashes, with many of them, of course, shaped around the popular music and movie soundtrack trends of later eras. Some of it has been louder and flashier than the vintage stuff, but volume and flash new musical forms do not make. Yes, quote you me can.

These superb performances--all arranged by Whittemore and Lowe--aren't much different than the piano pop we associate with later periods of EZ. Some period touches in the orchestral arrangements (conducted by the great Russ Case), but otherwise these could be from 1960. I spent hours on these files, believe it or not--successive EQ settings and judicious filtering did the trick, though a couple of the numbers are still a little noisy. I did what I could. Enjoy:

Click here to reach zip file: Two Grand--Whittemore and Lowe with Russ Case Orch. (1946).

PLAYLIST

LOVER (Rodgers-Hart)
THE SONG IS YOU (Kern-Hammerstein II)
IN THE STILL OF THE NIGHT (Cole Porter)
THE CONTINENTAL (Conrad-Magidson)
FALLING IN LOVE WITH LOVE (Rodgers-Hart)
BRAZIL (Ary Barroso)
THEY DIDN'T BELIEVE ME (Kern-Reynolds)
THAT OLD BLACK MAGIC (Arlen-Mercer)

Ripped from the following 78s: RCA Victor 20-1821/1822/1823/1824.



Lee

Savio says, "Happy Leap Day!"

Savio is our new cream kitten. Well, post-kitten--he's a year old. He's one of two cats we got from a nice couple who recently moved to Ohio from Oklahoma. They'd taken him in as a stray two weeks before. He's as laid-back and friendly as any cat the world has seen. I'm in love.

Our other guy--as yet unnamed--is eight months old, brown and striped, as cute as Savio, and given to hiding under things, at least when I enter the room. He's bonded with Bev, however--Bev being, after all, the Mommy Cat. I did get to pet him on one or two occasions, though. He went absolutely nuts when we put him in the carrier to come here. Savio wasn't too pleased, either. But, several days later, both seem to be very happy to be here.

We couldn't be happier to have them. Happy Leap Day!

From last year, my original composition, Cats in Space:

CATS IN SPACE (Lee Hartsfeld, 2007)


Lee

Fun Sounds for Tuesday!--Hal Willis, Helmut Zacharias, Billy Thomas, Don Bauer, more!

Ten fun titles for our Tuesday--five from vinyl and five from shellac. Four of the five shellacs are products of the Big 4 Hits label, and they're cheap as can be--four for a buck, according to a Woolworth's price sticker affixed to two of them. Cheap but fun--hence their inclusion in this list. Some notes about the Big 4 sides:

In the Middle of the House is a cover of a Vaughn Monroe hit, and My Love Song to You is a cover of a number featured in "The Songwriters," a 1954 episode of The Honeymooners. The Carlisles' Female Hercules is expertly mimicked here by Billy Thomas and unidentified background singers (two, my ears tell me), and Whatcha Gonna Do Now covers Tommy Collins. Shake Rattle and Roll is a surprisingly fine version that's more in the spirit of Big Joe Turner than Bill Haley.

The remaining cheap cover (At the Hop) is from Enoch Light's Waldorf Music Hall label. It's not bad. Nor is it good. At the moment, the popular word for such fare is "ehh." The artist is Hal Willis, (Leonald Francis Gauthier).

Helmut Zacharias and His Magic Violins, The Roamers, and Ferlin Husky round out the playlist. The Roamers' terrible Hit label version of Be True to Your School is a single I cherish, and Husky's Electrified Donkey is one of my all-time favorite song titles. I believe Husky was the author--Johnny Horton recorded the song, also. Now you know.

Click here to reach the zip file: Fun Sounds for Tuesday!

FUN PLAYLIST

AT THE HOP--Hal Willis and The Woodchuckers.
THE TIPSY PIANO--Helmut Zacharias and His Magic Violins, 1959.
CRAZY VIOLINS--Helmut Zacharias and His Magic Violins, 1959.
MY LOVE SONG TO YOU--Don Bauer, c. 1954.
BE TRUE TO YOUR SCHOOL (Wilson/Love)--The Roamers.
ELECTRIFIED DONKEY--Ferlin Husky.
IN THE MIDDLE OF THE HOUSE--Gene Zimmerman, 1956.
FEMALE HERCULES--Billy Thomas, c. 1954.
SHAKE RATTLE AND ROLL--Bill St. Claire, c. 1954.
WHATCHA GONNA DO NOW--Billy Thomas, c. 1954.


Lee

Sunday morning gospel: Keep on the Sunny Side; Stairway to Heaven; A Picture from Life's Other Side; more!

Welcome to (the return of) the Sunday morning gospel series! A number of old favorites in the group, including three with tunes by Charles H. Gabriel--His Eye Is on the Sparrow, Send the Light, and Jesus, Rose of Sharon. And there's a nice version by the Johnson Family of the 1899 classic Keep on the Sunny Side of Life, penned by Ada Blenkhorn and Howard Entwisle and later stolen by A.P. Carter.

Click the following link to reach the zip file: Sunday Morning Gospel--Feb. 24, 2008.


PLAYLIST

HIS EYE IS ON THE SPARROW (Martin-Gabriel)--The Oak Ridge Boys, 1964.
ANGEL BAND--The Blue Ridge Quartet.
SEND THE LIGHT; THIS LITTLE LIGHT OF MINE--The Gospel Lads.
JESUS, ROSE OF SHARON (Gutrey-Gabriel)--The Family Altar Quartet.
STAIRWAY TO HEAVEN (Bill Grant)--Bluegrass Gospel Travelers.
PALMS OF VICTORY--J.D. Jarvis and Rusty York, 1968.
A PICTURE FROM LIFE'S OTHER SIDE--Carl Story.
GLORYLAND MARCH--Jimmy Swaggart, piano.
PALMS OF VICTORY--The Singing Revivers.
TURN YOUR RADIO ON--The Statesmen, 1959.
THERE'LL BE NO DARK VALLEY (Cushing-Sankey)--Family Reunion.
KEEP ON THE SUNNY SIDE (Blenkhorn-Entwistle)--The Johnson Family.


Lee