Memorable mono media: The (Original) Red Tops, June Valli, Tony Bennett, Peggy King, more!

 

Twenty memorable mono sides, ripped from 45 rpm discs in my collection.  As usual, no unifying theme, save that all but two are from the 1950s, starting with the 1957 paean to marital fidelity, Hello, Is That You? by the (Original) Red Tops, recorded (I seem to recall) at Sun.  Then, a jazzy Capitol country side from 1951--a pre-Maybellene take on Ida Red called Freight Train Breakdown.  And I made sure to use the correct pre-RIAA response curve for the early-50s Columbia and Capitol singles.  (To my slight surprise, Columbia was still using a 300 Hz bass turnover as late as 1954!)

And... the original 1950 Tony Bennett Boulevard of Broken Dreams, which Google's AI describes as Tony's breakthrough hit on Columbia.  (His 1958 Greatest Hits LP utilizes a different arrangement altogether.)  I prefer this original, if only for the way Tony belts it out.  Then, Steve Lawrence does his best Bobby Vee impression with the King-Goffin Poor Little Rich Girl, whose lyrics portray a class-divided romance as doomed--in contrast to June Valli's From the Wrong Side of Town, which asserts (in so many words) that class distinctions are irrelevant.

Way to the Stars (from the 1945 movie) is magnificent 1954 (?) mood music by George Melachrino, while Sometimes is too-smooth-to-be-doo-wop doo-wop.  (Think the Four Lads crossed with the Five Satins.)  The Four Voices' 1962 remake of their 1956 hit Lovely One is especially elegant doo-wop, though it does register as/in that style.  Further in the list, we have "real" doo-wop from Lee Andrew and the Hearts (the brilliant Nobody's Home).  An incredibly tight performance, backed by the famous Pancho Villa Orchestra, best known for the 1957 hit, After School Rock (not in this list).

Brother Fats is a fascinating hybrid: Not quite rock and roll, but not quite big band, either.  Peggy King's 1957 Zero Hour is a movie theme gorgeously (and seductively) crooned, while Rock, Pretty Baby pushes all the right 1956 American Bandstand buttons.  Which is logically impossible, actually, since AB didn't start until the next year.  And the songwriter was Sonny Burke!

Tamboo is a superb 1955 piece of concert exotica, while the Leiber-Stoller Bazoom! is a fine Larry Elgart cover of the Cheers hit.  And for anyone wondering what Rock Around the Clock sounded like before it was revamped by Bill Haley, we have Bill Coates sticking to the original verse and chorus (with piano embellishments) from... well, I don't know.  Sometime in the '50s, surely.

Rosemary Clooney's rockin' version of Tennessee Ernie Ford's Shot Gun Boogie has an R&B-style backing led by none other than Mitch Miller, and Kay Star's "pop" cover of the Clovers' Fool, Fool, Fool is almost as good as the original (penned by the co-founder of Atlantic Records).  And there's fine middle-of-the-road jazz vocalizing on The Glow-Worm, followed (two entries later) by the weird but fun Tokyo Melody, the second 1960s side in our list. 

DOWNLOAD:  Memorable Mono Media.zip FLAC

Hello, Is That You?--The (Original) Red Tops, V: Rufus McCay, 1957

Eddie Kirk--Freight Train Breakdown, 1951

The Boulevard of Broken Dreams--Tony Bennett, Orch. directed by Marty Manning, 1950

Poor Little Rich Girl (Goffin-King)--Steve Lawrence, 1963

Way to the Stars (Nicholas Brodszky)--The Melachrino Orch., 1954

Sometimes--The Bachelors, 1958

From the Wrong Side of Town--June Valli w. Joe Reisman's Orch. and Chorus, 1956

Lovely One--The Four Voices, 1962

Brother Fats--Ray Anthony and His Orch., V: Gloria Craig, The Skyliners, 1951

Zero Hero--Peggy King w. Frank De Vol and His Orch., 1957

Tamboo--American Symphonic Band of the Air, Dir. Willliam D. Revelli, 1955

Bazoom! (I Need Your Lovin')--Les Elgart and Orch., 1954

Rock, Pretty Baby (Sonny Burke)--Jimmy Daley and the Ding-a-Lings, 1956

Rock Around the Clock--Bill Coates at the Console

Fool, Fool, Fool--Kay Starr w. The Lancers, Lee Young and His Band, 1952

Hesitation (Winterhalter)--Hugo Winterhalter and His Orch., 1952

Nobody's Home--Lee Andrews and the Hearts, 1958

The Glow-Worm--The Paulette Sisters and Dick Style, Larry Clinton Orch., 1952

Shot Gun Boogie--Rosemary Clooney, Orch. under direction of Mitch Miller, 1951

Tokyo Melody--Helmut Zacharias and His Orch., 1964

Lee

Happy Semiquincentennial! Grofe, Gould, Gottschalk, Sousa, more!

 

Happy Semiquincentennial!

We start with an excerpt from a larger concert setting of William Billings' Revolutionary War hymn, Chester (1770/1778), as scored by Samuel Loboda.  Here are the words:

When God inspir’d us for the fight, 

Their ranks were broke, their lines were forc’d, 

Their ships were Shatter’d in our sight, 

Or swiftly driven from our Coast. 

Lord Halleluiahs let us Sing, And praise his name on ev’ry Chord.

Then, Ferde Grofe's 1929 Over There Fantasie, as also performed by The United States Army Band under Samuel Loboda in 1975 or 1976, followed by a rousing 1961 rendition of Morton Gould's famous American Salute.  Next, a lighter, joyous mood by way of Harry J. Lincoln's Midnight Fire Alarm (1900), as performed by the Medallion Concert Band on a Kapp label subsidiary.

The National Symphony Orch. returns with Hershy Kay's 1951 ballet suite, Cakewalk: Grand Walkaround, featuring themes by Louis Moreau Gottschalk (1829-1869), and then we move on to the second half of Reclamation's Golden Jubilee, a movement from Grofe's Valley of the Sun Suite--then, a street-organ performance of John Philip Sousa's Gladiator march, from 1959.

The Rock Around the Clock Polka follows, and is in turn followed by Grofe's Desert Water Hole from his 1949 Death Valley Suite.  We'll hear the main portion of that movement--lively variations on Oh! Susanna.

We stick with Stephen Foster for Ferrante and Teicher's 1952 novelty, Susanna's Last Stand, and then it's on to Budd McCoy's rocking The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere (Longfellow-Davie, 1959).  We close very ironically with an alternate take of The Five Satins' In the Still of the Night.  Fourth of July fireworks celebrations, needless to note, make for anything but a still night.

DOWNLOAD: Fourth of July 2026.zip

Chester (Billings, Arr. Loboda)--The United States Army Band, c. Samuel Loboda
Over There Fantasie (Grofe)--The United States Army Band, c. Samuel Loboda

American Salute--National Symphony Orch., c. Howard Mitchell, 1961

The Midnight Fire Alarm (Lincoln)--Medallion Concert Band

Cakewalk: Grand Walkaround (Gottschalk, A: Hershy Kay)--National Symphony O., 1961

Reclamation's Golden Jubilee (Grofe)--Arizona State College (Tempe) Symph. O., c. Ferde Grofe

The Gladiator (Sousa)--The Thunderer, Netherland's Greatest Street Organ, 1959

Rock Around the Clock Polka--Adam Nowicki and His Polka Band

Desert Water Hole (Death Valley Suite; Grofe)--National Symphony Orch., c. Howard Mitchell, 1961

Susanna's Last Stand (A: F&T)--Ferrante and Teicher (1952)

The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere (Bob Davie)--Budd McCoy, 1959

In the Still of the Night (Fred Paris; alt. take)--The Five Satins, 1956

Lee

Percy Faith, 1944-1947: Fifteen Majestic and Decca classics!

 

Eight terrific (though not always terrific-sounding) Percy Faith Majestic reissues across two Royale EPs (to not have to spend money, Royale opted to use the same jacket photo for both sets), along with five terrific 1944-1946 sides ripped from Decca 78s in my collection.  I'd have included the 1946 Decca Stardust, but that side proved to be not restorable.  In fact, the mid-1940s Decca pressing quality was generally less than outstanding, though I did manage more than adequate fidelity, I think.  That is, only after determining the right response curve, what with Google's AI giving me two answers (250Hz bass turner vs. 400Hz).  I went with the latter (400), and the results are pleasing.  400Hz it was.

Several of the Decca sides feature a rumba clave/Bo Diddley beat, including the two "Bolero Instrumental" selections: Negra Consentida (My Pet Brunette) and Stars in Your Eyes.  These are of the Bizet, not Ravel, type (not sure how Temptation, Tia Juana, and Nocha Caribe were designated, beat-wise, though the first sounds like a Bizet-style bolero).  Hopefully, my Decca rips sound cleaner than the less-than-excellent Royale remastering job on the 1947 Majestic set, which includes too much reverb and inflated bass--but is otherwise atypically decent by Record Corp. of America standards!  (The ultimate Record Corp. of America compliment: Sound that doesn't suck!)  It's a slight surprise to discover that early Percy Faith often happened in an Xavier-Cugat mode, though Faith's sound was a great deal more elegant (as much as I like Cugat).  It had to be elegant: It was mood music, after all.

My favorites are Dancing in the Dark, That Old Black Magic, Temptation, Embraceable You, I Love You, Stars in Your Eyes, and Long Ago.  Listening to these, I came up with various phrases to describe Faith's style of orchestration: Fluttering (and swirling) chromatic flute passages; inverted I-6/9 tonics; minor 9ths.  And lots of strings!  A highly-evolved mood music style for the mid-1940s (in the popular realm).  Excellent music, if not always of the highest in high fidelity.

DOWNLOAD: Percy Faith Royale Decca.zip

Begin the Beguine--Royale EP 119

Dancing in the Dark (same)

That Old Black Magic (same)

The Touch of Your Hand (same)

All Through the Night--Royale EP 198

Tia Juana (same)

Temptation (same)

Noche Caribe (same)

Embraceable You--Decca 23535, 1946

Long Ago (And Far Away)--Decca 23352, 1944

I Love You (same)

Stars in Your Eyes--Decca 23445, 1945

Negra Consentida (My Pet Brunette),  (same)

Amor--Deca 23244, 1944

Spring Will Be a Little Late This Year (same)

Lee

Don Richardson's 1916 country fiddle sides, plus more old-time country

 

Above is the Don Richardson listing from the 1924 Columbia Records catalog, minus the labels and numbers (which didn't show up in my scan).  Today, all six of Don's 1916 country fiddle sides for that label, minus an alternate take of Mississippi Sawyer (which I think I have, but I cannot find) and the second take (5/16/1916) of Mrs. McLeod's Reel, recorded prior to the Columbia A2575 performance of 11/3/1916.  And I've discovered that I have six or seven copies of Arkansas Traveler, which suggests that the record sold quite well back in the day.  (And that people kept it.)  Exactly how I ended up with seven copies, I can't say for sure.  At Wikipedia, Don gets a tiny entry which posits that Don "may have made the first country music recording in 1914, eight years before the first generally recognised country recording was made in 1922."  Actually, no--Don's 1914 A Perfect Day is a mainstream dance side for the time, with no hint of country.

In addition to Don, we have three more Arkansas/Arkansaw Traveler (or Traveller) variants, the most recent from 1941, and the earliest from between 1901 and 1908: The original AT skit, pared down and with narration by Harry Spencer, with George Schweinfest on fiddle.  Things conclude with Maine-born fiddler Mellie Dunham (1853-1931) and his "orchestra" performing Lady of the Lake, with calls by N.A. Noble. I was sort of hoping that Mellie himself had provided the vocal portion, but 'twas not to be.

However, Shorty McCoy provides the calls for the 1941 Bluebird Arkansas Traveler (designated with the modern label, "square dance")--calls with are light-hearted in nature (to the extent I can make them out!).  Meanwhile, the Henry C. Gilliland-A.C. (Eck) Robertson Arkansaw Traveler of 1922 (on Victor) is a solid candidate for the first country record ever recorded, and it's quite unmistakably a folk performance, as opposed to Richardson's formally-trained, highly accomplished musicianship, but then we have the problem of "first" vs. "folk."  Namely, if we regard any and all appearances of country music on sound recordings, regardless of "authenticity," as genuine country, then country recordings date back at least as far as 1901.  Or, if we're going by Richardson's contributions, 1916.  Anyway, to the vintage barn dances... 

DOWNLOAD: Don Richardson and Friends, 1916-1941.zip

Arkansas Traveler--Don Richardson, Violin Solo, piano: Samuel Jospe (Col. A2140; 5/8/1916)

Old Zip Coon (Intro: Old Folks at Home)--Same (Col. A2140; 5/6/1916)

Mississippi Sawyer--Same (Col. A2018; 5/5/1916)

Durang's Hornpipe (Intro: Little Brown Jug)--Same (Col. A2018; 5/8/1916)

Mrs. McLeod's Reel--Same (Col. A2575; 11/3/1916)

The Devil's Dream--Reel--Same (Col. A2575; 5/6/1916)

The Arkansaw Traveller--Descriptive--Harry Spencer w. Gorge Schweinfest, Violin (Col. A406; between 1901 and 1908)

Arkansas Traveler--Square Dance--Shorty McCoy and His Southern Playboys (Bluebird B-8948; 9/12/1941)

Arkansaw Traveler (Country Dance)--Henry C. Gilliland-A.C. (Eck) Robertson (Vic. 18956; 6/30/1922)

Lady of the Lake (Contra Dance)--Mellie Dunham and His Orch. (Vic. 19940; 1/9/1926)

Lee

Vintage Polkas, Part 2! Polish, German, Czech, and Spanish classics, 1904/1905-1930.

 

Digging through two crates that I haven't accessed in a while, I found a number of polka (or polka-related) sides I'd almost forgotten.  These include the very first vintage polka 78 I ever thrifted: Podloteck-Polka of 1927.  I remember at the time (about 25 years ago) being surprised by the smooth, expert, and "symphonic" sound of the selection (and its flip).  However, after having heard many selections in the same vein, it no longer sounds quite so exotic--just brilliantly performed and pleasing.  At any rate, this time we start back in the year 1904 or 1905--the Spanish Tipical Girl polka by the Columbia Mexican Band--and travel through 1909 and the early 1920s to John Wilfahrt's 1930 Aunt Ella's Polka.

I'm tempted to conclude that the earliest mainstream polka music was, like Wilfahrt's music, German in style, but I really can't make such a broad generalization from my own 78-rpm stash.  Therefore, I won't.

Some off-the-beaten-trail numbers for today: The Czech Trio from Prague (drums, violin, accordion) with a stylistically spare polka and polka-sounding march (to support Dave's observation that polkas and marches are closely related, which they are); Albert Roussell's turn-of-the-century Lerhone et la Saone--Polka, as performed in 1909(?) by the Banda de Artilleria, and Leonard Gautier's Le Secret, also composed during the late 1800s.  Though not designated as a polka, Le Secret is about as close to a polka as any non-polka can conceivably sound.  And La Tipica has me hoping that I find more Spanish polkas from the early 20th century.

Speaking of typical, the remaining selections are the "usual" Polish, German, and Swedish (Klackjarns Polka) sort, with the aforementioned John Wilfahrt's 1930 "oom-pah-pah" Aunt Ella's Polka taking us into the commercial period of polkas--i.e., when polkas went from specialized ethnic music into the pop mainstream.

Meanwhile, Nejde To means "It's not working" in Czech, and the 1922 "Victor-Orchester" selection (conducted by Nathaniel Shilkret!) Why Have a Pretty Garden is a German polka which I'm simply guessing means something closer to, The Reason for Having a Pretty Garden.  As for Nejde To, your guess is as good as mine.

And I forgot to mention the Vienna Civic Brass Band's 1909 Fruhlingstag (Spring Day) polka, which was recorded in Austria.  The opening grooves of this selection were damaged by (most likely) a loose gramophone soundbox, but the audio quickly recovers.

Possibly the most charming selection in our list is the Columbia Scandinavian Orch.'s Kalckjarns--exceptional sound quality for 1916, too.  In the context of the early recording industry, polkas occupy an interesting place: Whereas cakewalks and rags are generally considered the earliest examples of syncopated popular music, polkas (and, for that matter, waltzes and obereks) were just as likely to feature accented "weak" beats, and sometimes even more interestingly.

So, dance, drink, or just sit and enjoy today's helping of polkas past.  (Polkas past??)

DOWNLOAD: Vintage Polkas, Pt. 2!.7z

Zip file: Vintage Polkas, Pt. 2!.zip

Podlotek--Polka--Kapalka i Jego Orch. (6/20/1927)

On the Windmill Polka--Czech Trio from Prague (9/13/1910)

Klackjarns Polka--Columbia Scandinavian Orch. (Oct. 1916)

Krakowianka Polka--Orkiestra Ulenskiego (6/15/1928)

Fruhlingstag (Spring Day)--Polka--Vienna Civic Brass Band (June 1909)

Give Me a Kiss--Polka--Kapalka i Jego Orch. (6/20/1927)

My Little Horse--Czech March--Czech Trio from Prague (9/13/1910)

Nejde To--Polka--Czech Orchestra (December 1921)

Marynia Polka--Polska Orkiestra Columbia (approx. June 1923)

Srubka Polka--Same (June 1923)

Tipical Girl (La Tipica)--Polka (Spanish)--Columbia Mexican Band, leader: Carlos Curti (1904 or 1905)

As for Marjance So It Is for Zvonu--Polka--Prince's Military Band (Between 1907 and 1910)

Baruska--Polka--Edw. Krolikowki i Jego Radjowas Orkiestra (10/3/1929)

Beloved Country--Polka--The Merry Four (1924?)

Why Have a Pretty Garden--Polka (German)--Victor-Orchester, Male Trio, c. Nathaniel Shilkret (9/20/1922)

Lerhone et al Saone (Polka)--Banda de Artilleria (1909?)

Le Secret--Vessella's Italian Band (1/16/1914)

Aunt Ella's Polka (German)--John Wilfahrt's Concertina Orch. (11/2/1930)

Lee