I scare myself....

Sometimes, anyway. What happened is, I just put the needle on a Victor Military Band 78, listened to 40 seconds or so, and guesstimated the year to be 1916.

I checked the online 78 discography--4/13/1916. Right on the money. And it wasn't the catalog number that clued me to the year, my number memory not being that good. It was simply the sound.

Years ago, at the Gramophone Emporium in Edinburgh, Scotland (when it was run by Mike Levy), I would guess recording dates the same way--by ear. It spooked me out then, too. Thirty years later, I'm still dating by ear. So to speak.

And my brain remains fuzzy regarding practical details. My late foster father John had the same kind of brain--he could remember words to Cole Porter songs but couldn't remember what he went to the hardware store to find. Story of my life, too.

Maybe there's a support group someplace.


Lee

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

Hong Kong and Taiwan Christmas stuff I found at Goodwill this season. The elves may have been made in Japan--I didn't check the labels. 1970-ish.

Soon, 1970 will have been forty years ago.

In other news, Google's holiday icons are less lame than last year's, which may be the smallest compliment ever issued.

Merry Christmas!

Lee

Christmas 2009, Part 22--Sing-a-Long Christmas Carols

To my astonishment, a Google check didn't show this LP as being up someplace as a Christmas share. Which doesn't mean it isn't--things hide from searches, sometimes. But I think I've got first dibs on this.

Is that a cool cover, or what? (Label: Oak.) The cover art is cool, anyway. Track-list-wise, not so. It promises twenty titles; the LP delivers 18. And the label roster (out of order and inaccurate, to boot) is different from the LP's. What a mess!

I had to Google-I.D. at least two titles, including the lovely Of Our Father's Love Begotten. And I had to add While Shepherds Watched..., From Heaven on High (Vom Himmel Hoch), and two others. Way to go, Oak label. Your attention to detail is appreciated.

I cloned out the red-grease-pencil price ("50") because it took away from an otherwise perfect cover. Otherwise, I like to "leave" price stickers in my images. It's all about authenticity. And about over-thinking things.

Sing-a-Long Christmas Carols is a delight. I doubt we're hearing the same group (The Boston Caroleers) on every track, and I have to wonder what happened during the mastering process to make some tracks sound extremely hi-fi and others less so. Two or three numbers have that soundtrack-slipping-in-the-projector fidelity that people my age (and older) remember from the classroom. "J-j-o-woy-oy-oyyy-yy to the w-w-w-wee-orrr-l-l-ld-d..."

In spite of all that, I won't hesitate to snap up any other Oak label Christmas LPs that come my way. This is a very artsy-chintzy outfit, and I believe I may have just coined a new hyphenated phrase.

My sleighlist is as close to accurate as can be, under the circumstances. Deck the Hall, by the way, is not a typo. Well, not on my part, anyway.

To the sing-a-long: Christmas 2009, Part 22

SLEIGHLIST

OH COME ALL YE FAITHFUL
SILENT NIGHT, HOLY NIGHT
O HOLY NIGHT
DECK THE HALL
GOD REST YE MERRY GENTLEMEN
THE FIRST NOEL
HARK THE HERALD ANGELS SING
GOOD KING WENCESLAS
O LITTLE TOWN OF BETHLEHEM
ALLELUIAH CHRIST IS BORN
DING DONG, MERRILY ON HIGH
ANGELS WE HAVE HEARD ON HIGH
FROM HEAVEN ON HIGH
OF OUR FATHER'S LOVE BEGOTTEN
O COME, O COME, EMMANUEL
AWAY IN THE MANGER
WHILE SHEPHERDS WATCHED THEIR FLOCKS BY NIGHT
JOY TO THE WORLD



Lee

More Christmas music? Is that possible?

Yes. I have a post nearly ready to go up. Can't remember what stage it's at. Probably, the sleighlist waits to be written.

More than once this posting season, I've swapped sleighlists, making it necessary to retitle my posts and/or zip files (as in, from "Part 19" to "Part 20"). The renaming option on zip files is a right handy feature. I've done this whenever one post got finished ahead of another. I try to work ahead, you know.

The list coming up is fun, both musically and track-list-wise. The latter, because I've never encountered a greater disconnect between list and content. The cover promises 20 titles--the LP has 18. Both the cover and label lists are at odds with the actual content. I had to i.d. three selections, which I did, in one case, by plugging a verse phrase into Google. Cool cover art, though, and fun performances, though at least two tracks are ruined by excessive flutter. Tape damage? Dirty play heads? It's not my turntable--I keep its heads cleaned.

In other news, hope everyone is having a great holiday. In spite of all indications to the contrary, I want this season to be whatever it is for each person. Religious? Fine. Nonreligious? Terrific. A non-Christmas celebration? Go for it. Without carols? Sure.

But, to paraphrase Garrsion Keillor, just don't censor Christmas. That's all.

Christmas 2009, Part 21--A sophisticated Christmas at MY(P)WHAE!

Click here to hear: Christmas 2009, Part 21



SLEIGHLIST

JINGLE BELLS--Dick Byron and the Sandpiper Chorus
PARADE OF THE WOODEN SOLDIERS--Sandpipers, Ann Lloyd, Mitch Miller O.
PAT-A-CAKE, THREE BLIND MICE, JINGLE BELLS--The Singing Dogs, 1955.
Jingle Bells--OBERNKIRCHEN CHILDREN'S CHOIR
COWBOY SANTA--Larry Cartell
THE CHRISTMAS CHOO CHOO TRAIN--Art Mooney O., feat. Laura Leslie, Skylarks, 1950.
MASSACHUSETTS MIXTURE (Jingle Bells)--Lawrence Joy w. Wilbur Waite's Pokeberry Promenaders, 1951.
RABBITS HAVE A CHRISTMAS--Linn Sheldon (Barnaby) w. Bob Lorence Orch., 1960.
BOOFO GOES WHERE SANTA GOES--Same.
JINGLE BELLS-1--Royale Concert Orch. (Rondolette 51500)
SANTA CLAUS IS COMING TO TOWN--Same.
JINGLE BELLS-2--Same.
KRINGLE'S JINGLE (Griffin)--Ken Griffin, organ, 1955.
THE CANDY LAND PARADE--Art Mooney Orch., Vocal: Laura Leslie, 1950.
PARADE OF THE WOODEN SOLDIER ROCK--No Artist Credited (Statler 1169)



Lee

Sign of the End Times?

Are the End Times near? Is the curtain closing on our little corner of existence?

I ask because, after standing for six days in fully-decorated mode, our Christmas tree has yet to be attacked. In a house of 18 cats, all of the ornaments are still in place. That's downright spooky.

Even Savio has paid little or no mind to the colorful and glittery branch adornments. Something is very, very wrong.

On the other hand, the usual suspects (Savio, Perry) have wasted no time putting their mark on things. To that extent, things are normal.

Guess we'll have to wait and see. If the world ends, we'll be the first to know, unless we're out of town.

Lee

Christmas 2009, Part 20--Yet more holiday shellac!

I would have gotten a more in-focus shot, but my camera battery ran out before I could take any more pics. Typically, I take five or six label shots and pick the best. Not this time. Thanks a lot, Energizer Bunny. You're off my list....

These are the last shellac rips for the 2009 season. No, wait--I have a couple New Years 78 rips. Never mind. Okay, these are close to the last shellac rips for the season. Good stuff, too. Now, even I am all Silent Night-ed out at this point, and my expectations were low to middling as I placed the 78 stylus on the starting grooves of the Columbia Mixed Quartet's 1926 version. Miracle of miracles--it's just absolutely cool. The flip, The Holy City, another "not again" Yule title, is even better. Sometimes it pays to have low to middling expectations.

Christmas Symphony is a delightful "descriptive" Christmas Pops novelty, and yes, these things get pretty repetitious, but welcome to pop culture. My previous copy was in Bad-minus condition, but this one arrived just in the nick of posting time.

The rest are glorious repeats in improved rips, save for a 78 by Paul Weston "discovery" Bob Grabeau, famous for his demo recordings (Friendly Persuasion, The Shadow of Your Smile). The label is Spartan (never heard of it) and the titles are The Christmas Waltz (not the Jule Styne-Sammy Kahn tune) and Old New England Christmas. (The Lennon Brothers? Cool!)

Yule love these: Christmas 2009, Part 20

SLEIGHLIST

YULE-TIDE--A CHRISTMAS FANTASIA (Kappey)--Arthur Pryor's Band, 1917.
CHRISTMAS SYMPHONY (F.X. Chroatal)--Prince's Orch., 1912.
VOM HIMMEL HOCH (Luther)--Christmas Chorus w. Orch. and Chimes (German), 1918.
SILENT NIGHT, HOLY NIGHT--Columbia Mixed Quart, 1925.
THE HOLY CITY (Adams)--Same.
THE CHRISTMAS WALTZ (Motola)--Bob Grabeau w. the Lennon Bros., Don Shaw O. (Spartan 0002).
OLD NEW ENGLAND CHRISTMAS--Same.
JINGLE BELLS-Shannon Quartet, 1925.
CHRISTMAS TIME IN MERRIE ENGLAND, PT. 1--Regimental Band of H.M. Grenadier Guards, 1922.
CHRISTMAS TIME IN MERRIE ENGLAND, PT. 2--Same.
CHRISTMAS HYMNS AND CAROLS--No. 1--Trinity Choir, 1921.
CHRISTMAS HYMNS AND CAROLS--No. 2--Same.


Lee

Messiah--Hallelujah Chorus--Mark Andrews, pipe organ solo (1925)

I thought this deserved a post of its own. The performance, by Mark Andrews, is very fine, but the recording quality is even more amazing. You would be forgiven for thinking this was recorded much later than 1925.

Click here to hear: Hallelujah Chorus-- Mark Andrews, pipe organ solo, 1925.

The disc is fairly worn, and I wasn't expecting a file nearly this good. But I got it, anyway. The secret was using only the less damaged right track and very carefully applying a custom noise filter created by sampling start-up-groove hiss. And I've always wanted to type that previous phrase, of course. Otherwise, I have no idea what I just typed.

Whatever I did, it worked. Ages ago, I played a piano accompaniment for Hallelujah Chorus, and the parallel thirds at the end of this record bring me right back to that arrangement. I had them going at a pretty good clip. At the moment, I'm still trying to recover my technique. I'm getting there.

Christmas pageant tomorrow morning at church. Shepherds and angels, and no snowmen in sight.

Lee

Christmas 2009, Part 19--The Salvation Army Presents "Army of Stars, 1964"

A musically magnificent LP, featuring some of the top names in opera at the time (1964)--all, I'm sorry to say, now deceased. Also gone is arranger Rex Koury, whose work here is fabulous. I'm surprised to discover that he composed the radio and TV theme for Gunsmoke! How about that?

Notice the balance I've been maintaining between pop-Christmas material and seriously arty fare like this album (and all examples in between). This sleighlist will set me back two or three lighter posts....

Doing his usual good job as narrator is Ronald Reagan. (Wasn't he still a Democrat at this point? I should know, but I don't.)

To the music: Christmas 2009, Part 19--Army of Stars, 1964

SLEIGHLIST

ARMY OF STARS THEME (With Ronald Reagan introduction)--Army of Stars O., Ronald Reagan
THE HOLY CITY (Adams)--Glade Peterson
ERI TU CHE MACCHIAVI--The Masked Ball (Verdi)--John Shaw
THE LORD'S PRAYER (Karla Carey)--Dorothy Cole, Azusa College Choir
DI PROVENZA IL MAR--La Traviata (Verdi)--Thomas Stewart
FOR UNTO US A CHILD IS BORN--Messiah (Handel)--Azusa College Choir
CANTIQUE DE NOEL (Adolphe Adam)--Dorothy Cole
CLOSING THEME--Army of Stars Orch., Ronald Reagan

(The Salvation Army CPM-12-2487; 1964)

Lee