Bud Freeman Improvisation Tips – Phantom Dancer 22 June 2021

Bud Freeman, is the Phantom Dancer feature artist this week. You’ll hear his Summa cum Laude Orchestra from a 1940s radio broadcast. He was known for his improvisations on tenor sax and I quote from some of his tips on improvisation below.

The Phantom Dancer is your non-stop mix of swing and jazz from live 1920s-60s radio and TV hosted presented by me, Greg Poppleton.

Hear past Phantom Dancer mixes online now at https://2ser.com/phantom-dancer/.

Meanwhile, this Phantom Dancer mix will be online after 2pm AEST, Tuesday 22 June, at https://2ser.com/phantom-dancer/

BUD

In 1922, Freeman and some friends from high school formed the Austin High School Gang. Freeman played the C melody saxophone with band members such as Jimmy McPartland and Frank Teschemacher before switching to tenor saxophone the next year. The band was influenced by the New Orleans Rhythm Kings and Louis Armstrong. 

In 1927, he moved to New York City, where he worked as a session musician and band member with Red Nichols, Roger Wolfe Kahn, Ben Pollack, and Joe Venuti. One of his most notable performances was a solo on Eddie Condon‘s 1933 recording, The Eel, which became Freeman’s nickname for his long snake-like improvisations.

Freeman played with Tommy Dorsey‘s Orchestra (1936–1938) and Benny Goodman‘s band in 1938 before forming the Summa Cum Laude Orchestra (1939–1940). About this band, Freeman said,

“I had this band and the guys were late all the time. I didn’t want to have to hassle with them. I didn’t want to mistreat them, so I said, “Fellas, should we quit?”… we were good friends. They started to come on time.”

Freeman joined the U.S. Army during World War II and headed a U.S. Army band in the Aleutian Islands.

After the war, Freeman returned to New York and led his own groups. He also worked with Buck Clayton, Ruby Braff, Vic Dickenson, and Jo Jones. In 1960, he wrote the book and lyrics for the Broadway musical Beg, Borrow or Steal,  which included the ballad “Zen Is When”, later recorded by the Dave Brubeck Quartet on Jazz Impressions of Japan (1964). He was a member of the World’s Greatest Jazz Band in 1969 and 1970. In 1974, he moved to England and continued to record and perform. He returned to Chicago in 1980 and continued to work into his eighties.

He wrote two memoirs (You Don’t Look Like a Musician (1974) and If You Know of a Better Life, Please Tell Me (1976)) and an autobiography (Crazeology) with Robert Wolf.

IMPROVISATION

In a 1970 interview with Studs Terkel, Freeman said about jazz and improvisation,

“Jazz is a music that came out of the black man’s oppression, yet it allows for great freedom of expression.”

“There’s been a lot of untruths told about improvisation. Men just don’t get up on stage and improvise on things they’re not familiar with. True improvisation comes out of hard work. When you’re working at home, you work on a theme and you work out all the possibilities of that theme. Since it’s in your head, it comes out of you when you play.”

“I practice because I want to play better. I’ve never been terribly interested in technique, but I’m interested in facility. To feel comfortable, so when the idea shoots out of my head I can finger it, manipulate it. Something interesting happens. You’ll hear a phrase and suddenly you’re thrown into a whole new inspiration.”

22 JUNE PLAY LIST

Play List – The Phantom Dancer 107.3 2SER-FM Sydney LISTEN ONLINE Community Radio Network Show CRN #497
107.3 2SER Tuesday 22 JUNE 2021 12:04 – 2:00pm (+10 hours GMT) and Saturdays 5 – 5:55pm National Program 5GTR Mt Gambier Monday 2:30 – 3:30am 3MBR Murrayville Monday 3 – 4am 4NAG Keppel FM Monday 3 – 4am 2SEA Eden Monday 3 – 4am 2MIA Griffith Monday 3 – 4am 2BAR Edge FM Bega Monday 3 – 4am 2BRW Braidwood Monday 3 – 4am 3VKV Alpine Radio Monday 6 – 7pm 7MID Oatlands Monday 6 -7pm 6GME Radio Goolarri Broome Tuesday 12am – 1am 2MCE Bathurst Wednesday 9 – 10am 1ART ArtsoundFM Canberra Friday 10 – 11am 2ARM Armidale Friday 12 – 1pm 5LCM Lofty FM Adelaide Friday 1 – 2pm 7LTN Launceston Sunday 5 – 6am 3MGB Mallacoota Sunday 5 – 6am 3BBR West Gippsland Sunday 5 – 6pm
Set 1	1940s One Night Stand Radio
Apurksedy (theme) + Hop, Skip and Jump	Gene Krupa Orchestra (voc) Carolyn Gray	‘One Night Stand’ Meadowbrook Ballroom Culver City Ca AFRS Re-broadcast 31 Mar 1946
You’re My Thrill	Charlie Barnet Orchestra (voc) Betty Perry	‘One Night Stand’ Casino Gardens Ocean Park Ca AFRS Re-broadcast 3 Jan 1947
How High the Moon + Brahm’s Lullaby (theme)	Buddy Morrow Orchestra	‘One Night Stand’ Blue Room Hotel Lincoln NYC AFRS Re-broadcast 27 May 1946
Set 2	Jimmie Grier Orchestra
After All Is Said and Done	Jimmie Grier Orchestra (voc) Dick Webster	‘Cocoanut Grove’ Radio Transcription Los Angeles 1933
A Secret Love	Jimmie Grier Orchestra (voc) Kenny Allen	‘Cocoanut Grove’ Radio Transcription Los Angeles 1933
Kiss by Kiss + Music in the Moonlight (theme)	Jimmie Grier Orchestra (voc) The Three Cheers	‘Cocoanut Grove’ Radio Transcription Los Angeles 1933
Set 3	Trad Radio
Have Your Chill	Coot Grant and Kid Socks Wilson	‘This is Jazz’ WOR Mutual NYC 3 May 1947
Yellow Dog Blues	Coot Grant	‘This is Jazz’ WOR Mutual NYC 3 May 1947
A Good Man is Hard to Find	George Brunies	‘This is Jazz’ WOR Mutual NYC 5 Apr 1947
Set 4	Bud Freeman
Theme + I Ain’t Gonna Give You None Of My Jelly Roll	Bud Freeman’s Summa cum Laude Orchestra	Hotel Sherman WMAQ NBC Red Chicago 20 May 1940
Secrets in the Moonlight	Bud Freeman’s Summa cum Laude Orchestra	Hotel Sherman WMAQ NBC Red Chicago 20 May 1940
Shake Down the Stars + Medley	Bud Freeman’s Summa cum Laude Orchestra	Hotel Sherman WMAQ NBC Red Chicago 20 May 1940
Sierra Sue	Bud Freeman’s Summa cum Laude Orchestra	Hotel Sherman WMAQ NBC Red Chicago 20 May 1940
Set 5	Benny Goodman 1938-39
Chicago	Benny Goodman Orchestra	‘Camel Caravan’ WBBM CBS Chicago 6 Sep 1938
Lilacs in the Rain	Benny Goodman Orchestra (voc) Mildred Bailey	‘Camel Caravan’ WEAF NBC Red NYC 18 Nov 1939
Open + The Spring Song	Benny Goodman Orchestra	‘Camel Caravan’ WEAF NBC Red NYC 9 Sep 1939
Set 6	1930s-40s Swing Discs
Popcorn Man	Ray Ventura Orchestra (voc) Betty Allan	Comm Rec Paris 1938
Rumba Azul	Lecuona Cuban Boys (voc) Alberto Rabagliati	Comm Rec Paris 1936
Le Boogie de Paris	Jacques Helian Orchestra	Comm Rec Paris 1946
Cafunga	Bruguera	Comm Rec Paris 1936
Set 7	Chamber Music Society of Lower Basin Street
Winnin’ Boy	Jelly Roll Morton	‘Chamber Music Society of Lower Basin Street’ WJZ NBC Blue NY 14 Jul 1940
Open + Get Happy	Esquire All Stars	‘Chamber Music Society of Lower Basin Street’ WJZ NBC Blue NY 16 Jan 1944
Body and Soul	Bobby Hackett	‘Chamber Music Society of Lower Basin Street’ WJZ NBC Blue NY 23 Jun 1940
Honeysuckle Rose + Close	Esquire All Stars	‘Chamber Music Society of Lower Basin Street’ WJZ NBC Blue NY 16 Jan 1944
Set 8	Medleys
Twilight in Teheran	Buck Ram All-Stars	Comm Rec New York City 18 Sep 1944
High On an Open Mike	Frank Navarro	‘Saturday Night Swing Club’ WNEW New York City 12 Apr 1947
Sabroso	Slim Gaillard	‘Symphony Sid Show’ Birdland WJZ ABC NY 7 Jul 1951

Linda Keene: The Singer Who Should Have Made It – Phantom Dancer 8 June 2021

Linda Keene, is this week’s Phantom Dancer feature artist. You’ll hear three songs by Linda singing with Jack Teagarden’s Orchestra in an aircheck from 1939.

She’s the singer that should have made it in the Big Band Era. Though she sang with many of the top name bands in the 1940s, her career never gained momentum, despite her huge vocal talent. Discover her story below. It’s one of the rare stories of those with all that it takes not making it for reasons unknown.

The Phantom Dancer is your non-stop mix of swing and jazz from live 1920s-60s radio and TV hosted presented by myself, Greg Poppleton.

There’s a whole library of Phantom Dancer mixes online now for you to enjoy at https://2ser.com/phantom-dancer/.

This Phantom Dancer mix will be online after 2pm AEST, Tuesday 8 June, at https://2ser.com/phantom-dancer/

Here’s a photo of Linda Keene, with Pee Wee Russell on clarinet and Eddie Condon, guitar

THE LINDA KEENE STORY 

For the full Linda Keene big band singer story, compiled through extensive research by The False Ducks Blahgger, check these links. Each article is a chronology of Linda’s career painstakingly sorted with newspaper clippings, photos and audio. The False Ducks Blahg is a rich source of archival material about bands from the 1930s and 40s. Happy reading!

http://falseducks.com/theblahg/?p=1668

http://falseducks.com/theblahg/?p=1815

http://falseducks.com/theblahg/?p=2111

http://falseducks.com/theblahg/?p=3317

8 JUNE PLAY LIST

Play List – The Phantom Dancer 107.3 2SER-FM Sydney LISTEN ONLINE Community Radio Network Show CRN #494
107.3 2SER Tuesday 8 JUNE 2021 12:04 – 2:00pm (+10 hours GMT) and Saturdays 5 – 5:55pm National Program 5GTR Mt Gambier Monday 2:30 – 3:30am 3MBR Murrayville Monday 3 – 4am 4NAG Keppel FM Monday 3 – 4am 2SEA Eden Monday 3 – 4am 2MIA Griffith Monday 3 – 4am 2BAR Edge FM Bega Monday 3 – 4am 2BRW Braidwood Monday 3 – 4am 3VKV Alpine Radio Monday 6 – 7pm 7MID Oatlands Monday 6 -7pm 6GME Radio Goolarri Broome Tuesday 12am – 1am 2MCE Bathurst Wednesday 9 – 10am 1ART ArtsoundFM Canberra Friday 10 – 11am 2ARM Armidale Friday 12 – 1pm 5LCM Lofty FM Adelaide Friday 1 – 2pm 7LTN Launceston Sunday 5 – 6am 3MGB Mallacoota Sunday 5 – 6am 3BBR West Gippsland Sunday 5 – 6pm
Set 1	1940s One Night Stand Radio
Cirribirribin (theme) + Loveless Love	Harry James Orchestra	‘One Night Stand’ Casino Gardens Ocean Park Ca AFRS Re-broadcast 29 Jun 1944
All of Me	Jimmy Dorsey Orchestra (voc) Claire Hogan	‘One Night Stand’ Cafe Rouge Hotel Statler NYC AFRS Re-broadcast 7 Apr 1949
Annie Laurie + Memories of You (theme)	Sonny Donham Orchestra	‘One Night Stand’ Palladium Ballroom Hollywood AFRS Re-broadcast 1 Aug 1944
Set 2	1932 Jimmy Grier Radio
Music in the Moonlight (theme) + Shadows on the Swannee	Jimmy Grier Orchestra (voc) Frank Foster	‘Cocoanut Grove’ Radio Transcription Hollywood 1932
I Couldn’t Tell Them What To Do	Jimmy Grier Orchestra (voc) Gogo Delys	‘Cocoanut Grove’ Radio Transcription Hollywood 1932
My Love + Music in the Moonlight (theme)	Jimmy Grier Orchestra (voc) Dick Webster	‘Cocoanut Grove’ Radio Transcription Hollywood 1932
Set 3	1920s Commercial Sides
Hot Town	Fess Williams and the Royal Flush Orchestra	Comm Rec New York City 17 Apr 1929
If I Could Be With You One Hour Tonight	Mound City Blues Blowers (tb) Glenn Miller	Comm Rec NYC 14 Nov 1929
All Muggled Up	Blue Steele and his Orchestra	Comm Rec Memphis 15 May 1930
Set 4	Linda Keene
The Sheik of Araby	Jack Teagarden Orchestra (voc) Linda Keene and Jack Teagarden	‘Young Man with a Band’ WEAF NBC Red NYC Nov 1939
Tears From My Inkwell	Jack Teagarden Orchestra (voc) Linda Keene	‘Young Man with a Band’ WEAF NBC Red NYC Nov 1939
The Lady’s in Love with You	Jack Teagarden Orchestra	‘Young Man with a Band’ WEAF NBC Red NYC Nov 1939
Yankee Doodle + Close	Jack Teagarden Orchestra (voc) Linda Keene	‘Young Man with a Band’ WEAF NBC Red NYC Nov 1939
Set 5	1950s – 60s Radio Dance Bands
Theme + Tea for Two	Leon Kellner Orchestra	‘Treasury Bandstand’ Blue Room Roosevelt Hotel WWL CBS New Orleans 1964
Muskrat Ramble	Jimmy Dorsey ‘Dorseyland’ Jazz Band	‘All-Star Parade of Bands’ Magnolia Roof Hotel Claridge WMC NBC Memphis 1956
Whatever Lola Wants + Close	Prado Perez Orchestra	‘All-Star Parade of Bands’ Birdland WNBC NBC NYC 24 Jul 1953
Set 6	Trad Radio
Salty Dog	Southern Jazz Group	5AD Adelaide 18 Jun 1949
Bay City + New Orleans Shuffle	Turk Murphy	Easy Street KCBS San Francisco 7 Nov 1958
The World is Waiting for the Sunrise	Vic Lewis	‘Swing Session’ BBC London 13 Feb 1945
Shine + Close	Kid Ory	Club Hangover KCBS San Francisco 10 Oct 1954
Set 7	Radio Jazz Stars
Theme + Coversation While Dancing	Johnny Mercer and Jo Stafford	‘Johnny Mercer’s Music Shop’ WEAF NBC NY 1943
Theme + Pennsylvania 6-5000	Glenn Miller Orchestra	Aircheck 20 Apr 1940
Sweet Georgia Brown	Nat King Cole Trio	Trocadero KHJ Mutual Los Angeles 26 Apr 1945
Cherokee	Harry James Orchestra	Blue Room Hotel Lincoln WABC CBS NYC 20 May 1941
Set 8	Breakout Radio
She’s the Ginchiest	Lee Gordon	Comm Rec Sydney 1959
Brown Betty	Elliot Lawrence Orchestra	Palladium Ballroom KNX CBS LA 2 Dec 1947
Mel’s Idea	Benny Goodman Sextet	‘One Night Stand’ The Click Phildelphia AFRS Re-broadcast 3 Jun 1948
Sound Lee	Lee Konitz	Storyville Copley Square Hotel WHDH Boston 5 Jan 1954

Max Roach Most Important Drummer – Phantom Dancer 20 April 2021

Max Roach was one of the most important drummers in history. The bebop pioneer was also a composer and is this week’s Phantom Dancer feature artist.

The Phantom Dancer – your non-stop mix of swing and jazz from live 1920s-60s radio and TV hosted by me, Greg Poppleton.

Enjoy a whole library of Phantom Dancer mixes online now at https://2ser.com/phantom-dancer/.

This show will be online after 2pm AEST, Tuesday 20 April at https://2ser.com/phantom-dancer/

 

1940s

Max Roach began playing drums in his church at age 10. At 18, in 1942, Duke Ellington booked him to fill in for Ellington drummer, Sonny Greer, at the Paramount Theatre, NYC. He made his first professional recording backing Coleman Hawkins in 1943.

In 1945 he played on Charlie Parker’s pioneering bop records and he backed bop pioneers Dizzy Gillespie, Miles Davis, Thelonius Monk and Bud Powell on radio and discs. Radio airchecks of these collaborations will be heard on this week’s show.

STUDY

In the late 1940s, Roach traveled to Hailti to study with the traditional drummer Ti Roro.

He studied classical percussion at the Manhattan School of Music from 1950 to 1953, working toward a Bachelor of Music degree. The school awarded him an Honorary Doctorate in 1990.

 

Long involved in jazz education, in 1972 Roach was recruited to the faculty of the University of Massachusetts Amherst. He taught at the university until the mid-1990s.

 

1950s

In 1952, Roach co-founded Debut Records with bassist Charles Mingus. The label released a record of the 1953 Massey Hall Concert featuring Parker, Gillespie, Powell, Mingus, and Roach. The label also put out the groundbreaking bass-and-drum free improvisation, Percussion Discussion.

In 1954, Roach and trumpeter Clifford Brown formed a quintet that also featured tenor saxophonist Harold Land, pianist Richie Powell (brother of Bud Powell), and bassist George Morrow. Land left the quintet the following year and was replaced by Sonny Rollins. You’ll hear this band with Sonny Rollins on this week’s Phantom Dancer from a live radio broadcast.

In 1955, he played drums for vocalist Dinah Washington at several live appearances and recordings. He appeared with Washington at the Newport Jazz Festival in 1958, which was filmed, and at the 1954 live studio audience recording of Dinah Jams, considered to be one of the best and most overlooked vocal jazz albums of its genre.

1960s-70s

In 1960 he composed and recorded the album We Insist! (subtitled Max Roach’s Freedom Now Suite), with vocals by his then-wife Abbey Lincoln and lyrics by Oscar Brown Jr., after being invited to contribute to commemorations of the hundredth anniversary of Abraham Lincoln‘s Emancipation Proclamation. In 1962, he recorded the album Money Jungle, a collaboration with Mingus and Duke Ellington. This is generally regarded as one of the finest trio albums ever recorded.

During the 1970s, Roach formed M’Boom, a percussion orchestra. Each member composed for the ensemble and performed on multiple percussion instruments. Personnel included Fred King, Joe Chambers, Warren Smith, Freddie Waits, Roy Brooks, Omar Clay, Ray Mantilla, Francisco Mora, and Eli Fountain.

1980s-90s

In the early 1980s, Roach presented solo concerts, demonstrating that multiple percussion instruments performed by one player could fulfill the demands of solo performance and be entirely satisfying to an audience. He created memorable compositions in these solo concerts.

Roach also embarked on a series of duet recordings. Departing from the style he was best known for, most of the music on these recordings is free improvisation, created with Cecil Taylor, Anthony Braxton, Archie Shepp, and Abdullah Ibrahim. Roach created duets with other performers, including: a recorded duet with oration of the “I Have a Dream” speech by Martin Luther King Jr.; a duet with video artist Kit Fitzgerald, who improvised video imagery while Roach created the music; a duet with his lifelong friend and associate Gillespie; and a duet concert recording with Mal Waldron.

He also wrote music for theater, including plays by Sam Shepard. He was composer and musical director for a festival of Shepard plays, called “ShepardSets”, at La MaMa Experimental Theatre Club in 1984. The festival included productions of Back Bog Beast Bait, Angel City, and Suicide in B Flat. In 1985, George Ferencz directed “Max Roach Live at La MaMa: A Multimedia Collaboration”.

Roach found new contexts for performance, creating unique musical ensembles. One of these groups was “The Double Quartet”, featuring his regular performing quartet with the same personnel as above, except Tyrone Brown replaced Hill. This quartet joined “The Uptown String Quartet”, led by his daughter Maxine Roach and featuring Diane Monroe, Lesa Terry, and Eileen Folson.

Another ensemble was the “So What Brass Quintet”, a group comprising five brass instrumentalists and Roach, with no chordal instrument and no bass player. Much of the performance consisted of drums and horn duets. The ensemble consisted of two trumpets, trombone, French horn, and tuba. Personnel included Cecil Bridgewater, Frank Gordon, Eddie Henderson, Rod McGaha, Steve Turre, Delfeayo Marsalis, Robert Stewart, Tony Underwood, Marshall Sealy, Mark Taylor, and Dennis Jeter.

Not content to expand on the music he was already known for, Roach spent the 1980s and 1990s finding new forms of musical expression and performance. He performed a concerto with the Boston Symphony Orchestra. He wrote for and performed with the Walter White gospel choir and the John Motley Singers. He also performed with dance companies, including the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, the Dianne McIntyre Dance Company, and the Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Dance Company. He surprised his fans by performing in a hip hop concert featuring the Fab Five Freddy and the New York Break Dancers. Roach expressed the insight that there was a strong kinship between the work of these young black artists and the art he had pursued all his life.

Though Roach played with many types of ensembles, he always continued to play jazz. He performed with the Beijing Trio, with pianist Jon Jang and erhu player Jeibing Chen. His final recording, Friendship, was with trumpeter Clark Terry. The two were longtime friends and collaborators in duet and quartet. Roach’s final performance was at the 50th anniversary celebration of the original Massey Hall concert, with Roach performing solo on the hi-hat.

In 1994, Roach appeared on Rush drummer Neil Peart‘s Burning For Buddy, performing “The Drum Also Waltzes” Parts 1 and 2 on Volume 1 of the 2-volume tribute album during the 1994 All-Star recording sessions.

In the early 2000s, Roach became less active due to the onset of hydrocephalus-related complications.

DRUMMING STYLE

Roach started as a traditional grip player but used matched grip as well as his career progressed.

Roach’s most significant innovations came in the 1940s, when he and Kenny Clarke devised a new concept of musical time. By playing the beat-by-beat pulse of standard 4/4 time on the ride cymbal instead of on the thudding bass drum, Roach and Clarke developed a flexible, flowing rhythmic pattern that allowed soloists to play freely. This also created space for the drummer to insert dramatic accents on the snare drum, crash cymbal, and other components of the trap set.

By matching his rhythmic attack with a tune’s melody, Roach brought a newfound subtlety of expression to the drums. He often shifted the dynamic emphasis from one part of his drum kit to another within a single phrase, creating a sense of tonal color and rhythmic surprise. Roach said of the drummer’s unique positioning, “In no other society do they have one person play with all four limbs.”

While this is common today, when Clarke and Roach introduced the concept in the 1940s it was revolutionary. “When Max Roach’s first records with Charlie Parker were released by Savoy in 1945”, jazz historian Burt Korall wrote in the Oxford Companion to Jazz, “drummers experienced awe and puzzlement and even fear.” One of those drummers, Stan Levey, summed up Roach’s importance: “I came to realize that, because of him, drumming no longer was just time, it was music.”

In 1966, with his album Drums Unlimited (which includes several tracks that are entirely drum solos) he demonstrated that drums can be a solo instrument able to play theme, variations, and rhythmically cohesive phrases. Roach described his approach to music as “the creation of organized sound.”

20 APRIL PLAY LIST

Play List – The Phantom Dancer 107.3 2SER-FM Sydney LISTEN ONLINE   Community Radio Network Show CRN #486
107.3 2SER Tuesday 20 April 2021 12:04 – 2:00pm (+10 hours GMT) and Saturdays 5 – 5:55pm National Program 5GTR Mt Gambier Monday 2:30 – 3:30am 3MBR Murrayville Monday 3 – 4am 4NAG Keppel FM Monday 3 – 4am 2SEA Eden Monday 3 – 4am 2MIA Griffith Monday 3 – 4am 2BAR Edge FM Bega Monday 3 – 4am 2BRW Braidwood Monday 3 – 4am 3VKV Alpine Radio Monday 6 – 7pm 7MID Oatlands Tuesday 8 – 9pm 1ART ArtsoundFM Canberra Friday 10 – 11am 2ARM Armidale Friday 12 – 1pm 5LCM Lofty FM Adelaide Friday 1 – 2pm 4RPH Brisbane Sunday 3 – 4am 7LTN Launceston Sunday 5 – 6am 3MGB Mallacoota Sunday 5 – 6am 6GME Radio Goolarri Broome Sunday 5 – 6am 3BBR West Gippsland Sunday 5 – 6pm
Set 1	Swing Bands 1944 Radio
Theme + Kentucky	Bob Strong Orchestra (voc) Bob Fiola	‘One Night Stand’ Glen Island Casino New Rochelle NY AFRS Re-broadcast 20 Aug 1944
Blue Skies	Boyd Raeburn Orchestra	‘One Night Stand’ Roosevelt Hotel Washington DC AFRS Re-broadcast Feb 1944
Isle of Capri + Close	Gay Claridge Orchestra (g) Mary Osbourne	‘One Night Stand’ Chez Paree Chicago AFRS Re-broadcast 7 Aug 1944
Set 2	Vincent Valsanti (Ted Fio Rito)
Your Blase + Sophisticated Lady	Vincent Valsanti Orchestra	Cocoanut Radio Transcription TRANSCO Los Angeles 1934
Dreaming + Was It a Dream? + It’s June in January	Vincent Valsanti Orchestra (voc) Bill Thomas	Cocoanut Radio Transcription TRANSCO Los Angeles 1934
OK Toots + Close	Vincent Valsanti Orchestra (voc) Don 1, 2 and 3	Cocoanut Radio Transcription TRANSCO Los Angeles 1934
Set 3	Trad Radio and TV
Open + Sweet Georgia Brown	Al Hirt	‘Jazz Band Ball’ WWL CBS New Orleans 18 Aug 1956
Down Among The Sheltering Palms	Eddie Condon Group (voc) Johnny Mercer	‘Eddie Condon’s Floor Show’ WPIX TV NYC 1948
Blues	Eddie Condon Group (voc) Johnny Mercer (piano) Mary Lou Williams	‘Eddie Condon’s Floor Show’ WPIX TV NYC 1948
Set 4	Max Roach
Koko (theme) + Hot House	Barry Ulanov’s All-Star Modern Jazz Musicians (drums) Max Roach	‘Bands for Bonds’ WOR Mutual NYC 13 Sep 1947
Daahoud	Max Roach – Clifford Young Quintet	‘Basin Street’ WCBS CBS NY 6 May 1956
Oo Bop Sh’Bam	Charlie Parker Quintet (drums) Max Roach	‘Symphony Sid Show’ Royal Roost WMCA NY 22 Jan 1949
Scrapple From The Apple	Charlie Parker Quintet (drums) Max Roach	‘Symphony Sid Show’ Royal Roost WMCA NY 22 Jan 1949
Set 5	1930s Dance Bands
Open + Goody Goodbye	Ted Weems Orchestra	‘Beat the Band’ WMAQ NBC Red Chicago 1940
Way Down Yonder in New Orleans	Ray Noble Orchestra	‘Coty Hour’ WEAF NBC Red NY 13 Mar 1935
Alice Blue Gown	Ozzie Nelson Orchestra	Blackhawk Restaurant WGN Mutual Chicago 30 Mar 1940
White Star of Sigma Nu	Joe Haymes Orchestra	Grill Room Hotel McAlpen WABC CBS NY 29 Jan 1935
Set 6	Sydney Swing Singers 1938-44
Annie Laurie	Jim Davidson and his ABC Dance Orchestra (voc) Alice Smith	Comm Rec Sydney 2 Jun 1938
Say a Prayer for the Boys over There	George Trevare Orchestra (voc) Joan Blake	Comm Rec Sydney 1943
A-Tisket A-Tasket	Jim Davidson and his ABC Dance Orchestra (voc) Alice Smith	Comm Rec Sydney 2 Jun 1938
Jungle Jive	George Trevare Orchestra (voc) Elsie Wardrope	Comm Rec Sydney 1944
Set 7	Hal Kemp
When Summer is Gone (theme) + Did You Ever See a Dream Walking?	Hal Kemp Orchestra (voc) Skinnay Ennis	‘Lavena Program’ Radio Transcription New York City 1934
There’s a Small Hotel	Hal Kemp Orchestra (voc) Maxine Gray	‘Lady Esther Serenade’ WEAF NBC Red NY 26 Aug 1936
Penny Serenade	Hal Kemp Orchestra (voc) Audience	Aircheck 1938
42nd Street + When Summer is Gone (theme)	Hal Kemp Orchestra	‘Lavena Program’ Radio Transcription New York City 1934
Set 8	Charlie Parker
S.K. Blues	Joe Turner	‘Jubilee’ AFRS Hollywood Oct 1945
Empty Head Blues	Ivie Anderson	‘Jubilee’ AFRS Hollywood Oct 1945
Love My Baby	Joe Turner	‘Jubilee’ AFRS Hollywood Oct 1945
Improvised Blues	Johnny Otis and ‘Jubilee’ All-Stars Orchestras	‘Jubilee’ AFRS Hollywood Oct 1945

Lester Young Genius Killed By Alcohol – 13 March 2021 Phantom Dancer

Lester Young, jazz tenor saxophonist called ‘The Prez’, is this week’s Phantom Dancer feature artist from live 1940s-50s broadcasts. Young was one of the most influential saxophonists, playing “a free-floating style, wheeling and diving like a gull, banking with low, funky riffs that pleased dancers and listeners alike”. Alcohol killed him.

The Phantom Dancer – your non-stop mix of swing and jazz from live 1920s-60s radio and TV hosted by me, Greg Poppleton.

Enjoy a whole library of Phantom Dancer mixes online now at https://2ser.com/phantom-dancer/.

This show will be online after 2pm AEST, Tuesday 6 April at https://2ser.com/phantom-dancer/

 

1920s-30s

Lester Young grew up in a musical family. His brother, Lee, was a drummer. (You’ll hear a broadcast by Lester and Lee on this week’s Phantom Dancer). His father lead the family band in which he played trumpet, alto sax, drums and violin.

Joining Walter Page’s Blue Devils Orchestra, Lester switched saxes from alto to tenor. He also doubled clarinet, until his clarinet was stolen at a gig in 1939. (He was given a replacement clarinet in 1957).

One of Young’s key influences was Frank Trumbauer, who was famous in the 1920s Paul Whiteman Orchestra and who played the C-melody saxophone (between the alto and tenor in pitch)

Young moved to Kansas City in 1933 to play in the Count Basie Orchestra. During the 1930s he also played in the bands of Andy Kirk and Fletcher Henderson. He also played in small groups that included pianist Teddy Wilson and singer Billie Holiday who gave him the nickname, Prez.

1940s

Young left the Basie band in late 1940. He played in small groups often with his brother, drummer Lee Young, including more studio sessions with Billie Holiday and Nat “King” Cole in June 1942. 

In December 1943 Young returned to the Basie Orchestra for a 10-month stint before he was drafted into the army during World War II.

PLASTIC REEDS

Lester Young was beginning to make much greater use of a plastic reed in the early 1940s. They gave his playing a heavier, breathier tone. He never abandoned the cane reed, but used the plastic reed a significant share of the time from 1943 until the end of his life. His tone also thickened from this time with a change in saxophone mouthpiece from a metal Otto Link to an ebonite Brilhart. In August 1944 Young appeared alongside drummer Jo Jones, trumpeter Harry “Sweets” Edison, and fellow tenor saxophonist Illinois Jacquet in Gjon Mili’s short film Jammin’ the Blues.

In 1946 Young joined Norman Granz’s Jazz at the Philharmonic (JATP), touring regularly with them over the next 12 years. He made many studio recordings under Granz’s supervision, including more trio recordings with Nat King Cole. Young also recorded extensively in the late 1940s for Aladdin Records (1946-7) and for Savoy (1944, ’49 and ’50), some sessions of which included Basie on piano.

 

KILLED BY PLONK

The quality and consistency of Lester Young’s playing ebbed gradually in the latter half of the 1940s.

And from 1951, his playing declined precipitously as his drinking increased. 

He began to rely on a small number of clichéd phrases and reduced creativity and originality, despite his claims that he did not want to be a “repeater pencil” (Young coined this phrase to describe the act of repeating one’s own past ideas. Young also coined the hipster words, ‘cool’ for good and ‘bread’ for money). 

In November 1955 he was admited to hospital a ‘nervous breakdown’.

On December 8, 1957, Young appeared with Billie Holiday, Coleman Hawkins, Ben Webster, Roy Eldridge, and Gerry Mulligan in the CBS television special ‘The Sound of Jazz’, performing, ‘Fine and Mellow’. You’ll hear this reunion with Holiday, with whom he had lost contact over the years, on this week’s Phantom Dancer. Young’s solo was brilliant, acclaimed by some observers as an unparalleled marvel of economy, phrasing and extraordinarily moving emotion. Nat Hentoff, one of the show’s producers, later commented, “Lester got up, and he played the purest blues I have ever heard…in the control room we were all crying.”

Young made his final studio recordings and live performances in Paris in March 1959 with drummer Kenny Clarke at the tail end of an abbreviated European tour during which he ate almost nothing and drank heavily. On a flight to New York City, he suffered from internal bleeding due to alcoholism and died in the early morning hours of 15 March, 1959, only hours after arriving back in New York. He was only 49.

13 APRIL PLAY LIST

Play List – The Phantom Dancer 107.3 2SER-FM Sydney LISTEN ONLINE   Community Radio Network Show CRN #485
107.3 2SER Tuesday 13 April 2021 12:04 – 2:00pm (+10 hours GMT) and Saturdays 5 – 5:55pm National Program 5GTR Mt Gambier Monday 2:30 – 3:30am 3MBR Murrayville Monday 3 – 4am 4NAG Keppel FM Monday 3 – 4am 2SEA Eden Monday 3 – 4am 2MIA Griffith Monday 3 – 4am 2BAR Edge FM Bega Monday 3 – 4am 2BRW Braidwood Monday 3 – 4am 3VKV Alpine Radio Monday 6 – 7pm 7MID Oatlands Tuesday 8 – 9pm 1ART ArtsoundFM Canberra Friday 10 – 11am 2ARM Armidale Friday 12 – 1pm 5LCM Lofty FM Adelaide Friday 1 – 2pm 4RPH Brisbane Sunday 3 – 4am 7LTN Launceston Sunday 5 – 6am 3MGB Mallacoota Sunday 5 – 6am 6GME Radio Goolarri Broome Sunday 5 – 6am 3BBR West Gippsland Sunday 5 – 6pm
Set 1	ONS Swing Bands
Theme + Sunday	Charlie Spivak Orchestra	‘One Night Stand’ Palladium Ballroom Hollywood AFRS Re-broadcast Oct 1943
Every Time	Sonny Dunham Orchestra (voc) Mary Ann	‘One Night Stand’ Terrace Room Hotel New Yorker NYC AFRS Re-broadcast 16 Jul 1945
All Or Nothing At All + Close	Boyd Raeburn Orchestra (voc) Ted Travers	‘One Night Stand’ Roosevelt Hotel Washington DC AFRS Re-broadcast Apr 1944
Set 2	Jimmy Grier
Tired	Jimmy Grier Orchestra (voc) Loyce Whiteman	Cocoanut Grove Ambassador Hotel TRANSCO Radio Transcription 1932
Time Alone Will Tell	Jimmy Grier Orchestra (voc) Donald Novis	Cocoanut Grove Ambassador Hotel TRANSCO Radio Transcription 1932
What Did You Do With It? + Music in the Moonlight (theme)	Jimmy Grier Orchestra (voc) Margaret Lawrence	Cocoanut Grove Ambassador Hotel TRANSCO Radio Transcription 1932
Set 3	Glenn Miller Radio
Wham Re Bop Boom Bam	Glenn Miller Orchestra (voc) Marion Hutton	Cafe Rouge Hotel Pennsylvania WJZ NBC Blue NY 7 Jan 1940
The Man With The Mandolin	Glenn Miller Orchestra (voc) Marion Hutton	Meadowbrook Ballroom Cedar Grove NJ WJZ NBC Blue NY 5 Dec 1939
Tuxedo Junction	Glenn Miller Orchestra	Cafe Rouge Hotel Pennsylvania WJZ NBC Blue NY 5 Apr 1940
Set 4	Lester Young
Benny’s Bugle	Lester and Lee Young Orchestra	Club Capri KHJ Mutual-Don Lee Los Angeles 2 Dec 1941
These Foolish Things	Lester Young with Nat King Cole Trio and Buddy Rich	‘Jubilee’ AFRS Hollywood 20 Mar 1946
Be Bop Boogie	Lester Young	‘Symphony Sid Show’ Royal Roost WMCA NY 4 Dec 1948
Intro + Fine and Mellow	Lester Young (voc) Billie Holiday	‘Seven Lively Arts’ The Sound of Jazz CBS TV 1957
Set 5	Swing Band Radio Transcriptions
I’ve Had This Feeling Before	Harry James Orchestra (voc) Helen Ward	Radio Transcription 1943
I’m Gonna Lock My Heart and Throw Away the Key	Dick Jurgens Orchestra (voc) Ron Kemper	Radio Transcription 1938
Sentimental Jorney	Les Brown Orchestra (voc) Doris Day	Radio Transcription 1944
I’ll See You In My Dreams	Jan Garber Orchestra	Radio Transcription 1938
Set 6	Eddie Condon
Love Nest	Eddie Condon Group	‘Town Hall Jazz Concert’ WJZ Blue NY 9 Sep 1944
Yesterdays	Eddie Condon Group	‘Town Hall Jazz Concert’ WJZ Blue NY 21 Oct 1944
Keep Smiling at Trouble	Eddie Condon Group	‘Town Hall Jazz Concert’ WJZ Blue NY 30 Sep 1944
Sister Kate	Eddie Condon Group	‘Town Hall Jazz Concert’ WJZ Blue NY 10 Feb 1945
Set 7	Jubilee
Rockin’ in Rhythm	Charlie Barnet Orchestra	‘Jubilee’ AFRS Hollywood 1945
Mister Beebe	Erskine Hawkins Orchestra (voc) June Richmond	‘Jubilee’ AFRS Hollywood 1943
Save Your Sorrows	Eddie Heywood Orchestra	‘Jubilee’ AFRS Hollywood 1945
Blues in the Night	Larry Adler	‘Jubilee’ AFRS Hollywood 1943
Set 8	Charlie Parker
Wahoo	Charlie Parker	‘Symphony Sid Show’ Birdland WJZ ABC NY 30 Jun 1951
Groovin’ High	Charlie Parker	‘Symphony Sid Show’ Royal Roost WMCA NY 29 Jan 1949
Confirmation	Charlie Parker	‘Symphony Sid Show’ Royal Roost WMCA NY 12 Feb 1949
Fine and Dandy	Charlie Parker	‘Bands for Bonds’ WOR Mutual NY 13 Sep 1947

Jan Savitt and his Top Hatters – Phantom Dancer 1 Dec 2020

Jan Savitt, child prodigy classical violinist and popular dance band leader is this week’s Phantom Dancer feature artist. You’ll Jan Savitt and his Top Hatters in broadcasts from 1937-39.

LISTEN HERE

The Phantom Dancer is your non-stop mix of swing and jazz from live 1920s-60s radio and TV which I’ve been bringing you every week on 107.3 2SER Sydney since 1985. Listen here

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From his IMDB Bio and other sources,
“Jacob Sarvetnick was a child prodigy on the violin, destined to become Jan Savitt, leader of a popular swing band. Of Russian-Jewish ancestry, his father had variously worked as a motor mechanic and as a drummer in Tsar Nicholas II‘s Imperial Regimental Orchestra. In the U.S. from the age of fifteen, Jan became the youngest musician to play in the Philadelphia Symphony Orchestra, and, from there, he advanced to concert master for the great Leopold Stokowski.

In the wake of multiple scholarships and being recipient of the Philharmonic Society’s Gold Medal Award, he was soon leading his own string quartet.

In 1935, after graduating from the Curtis Institute of Music with a B.A., Jan suddenly decided to forsake classical for popular music and organise a dance band. He was eventually engaged by Philadelphia radio station KYW as musical director.

In 1938, Jan Savitt & His Top Hatters broadcast from 5–5:30 pm every Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday as the KYW staff orchestra at KYW/NBC in Philadelphia. Saturday’s weekly broadcast was one hour, coast-to-coast. The group also played at the Earl Theatre and performed with The Andrews Sisters and The Three Stooges.

The resulting national broadcasts proved popular with audiences and ‘Jan Savitt & His Top Hatters’ (so named, because their ensemble uniform consisted of white tie, tails and top hat) soon became one of the most highly rated big bands in America, playing the swank hotels, theatres and ballrooms. The band featured a unique beat called ‘shuffle rhythm’ (which may, or may not, have been originated by another bandleader, Henry Busse).

The ‘Top Hatters’ comprised between fifteen and eighteen musicians, plus vocalists. Famous sidemen included trombonist and future television composer Earle Hagen, drummer Nick Fatool and trombonist Urbie Green. Among the vocalists were Carlotta Dale, future movie actress Gloria DeHaven and Bon Bon (aka George Tunnell), the first black musician to work long-term in a white orchestra.

Jan’s theme song was “Quaker City Jazz”. Other unique compositions for the band included the swinging “720 In the Books” (by arranger Johnny Watson), “Meadowbrook Shuffle”, “It’s a Wonderful World” and “Now and Forever”. Jan also had noteworthy hits with his interpretation of “Tuxedo Junction” and “Make Believe Island”.

By the early 1940’s, he added swing versions of classical compositions (mostly arranged by Jack Pleis), such as “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice”, “Prelude to Carmen” and Claude Debussy‘s “Afternoon of a Faun” to his repertoire. The band was featured in several B-movies, released by Warner Brothers and Columbia.

After World War II, Jan was forced to reduce the size of his band (now based on the West Coast) to eight musicians, due to tax debts. In 1948, on his way to a one-nighter in Sacramento, he suffered a cerebral haemorrhage and later died in a local hospital at the age of just thirty-six.

Savitt was married to model Barbara Ann Stillwell from 1940 until his death in 1948, and had two daughters with her, Devi Marilyn and Jo Ann. Jo Ann was married to Joel Douglas, son of Kirk, from 2004 until her death in 2013.

Credits on IMDB

Soundtrack (5 credits) 

2015Stalker (TV Series) (writer – 1 episode) – Love Hurts (2015) … (writer: “It’s a Wonderful World” – uncredited) 
1995The Immortals (“It’s a Wonderful World”)
1995The Bridges of Madison County (writer: “It’s A Wonderful World”)
1947That’s My Gal (music: “720 in the Books”)
1946Jan Savitt and His Band (Short) (performer: “I’ll Always Love You”, “Some Sunday Morning”, “Too Marvelous for Words”, “Dearest Darling”, “Avalon” – uncredited) 

Actor (4 credits) 
1947That’s My Gal Jan Savitt (uncredited) 
1946Betty Co-Ed Orchestra Leader Jan Savitt (as Jan Savitt and His Orchestra) 
1946High School Hero Jan Savitt 
1942Jan Savitt’s Serenade in Swing (Short) Orchestra Leader

Music department (2 credits) 
1946King of the Forest Rangers (composer: stock music – uncredited)
1945Rough Riders of Cheyenne (composer: stock music – uncredited)

Self (2 credits) 
1946Jan Savitt and His Band (Short) Self – Band Leader 
1946Swing High, Swing Sweet (Short) Self- Orchestra Leader

1 DECEMBER PLAY LIST

Play List – The Phantom Dancer 107.3 2SER-FM Sydney, Live Stream Community Radio Network Show CRN #444
107.3 2SER Tuesday 1 December 2020 12:04 – 2:00pm (+11 hours GMT) and Saturdays 5 – 5:55pm National Program  5GTR Mt Gambier Monday 2:30 – 3:30am 3MBR Murrayville Monday 3 – 4am 4NAG Keppel FM Monday 3 – 4am 2SEA Eden Monday 3 – 4am 2MIA Griffith Monday 3 – 4pm 2BAR Edge FM Bega Monday 3 – 4pm 3VKV Alpine Radio Monday 6 – 7pm 7MID Oatlands Tuesday 8 – 9pm  1ART ArtsoundFM Canberra Friday 10 – 11am 2ARM Armidale Friday 12 – 1pm 5LCM Lofty FM Adelaide Friday 1 – 2pm 7LTN Launceston Sunday 5 – 6am 3MGB Mallacoota Sunday 5 – 6am 6GME Radio Goolarri Broome Sunday 5 – 6am 3BBR West Gippsland Sunday 5 – 6pm
Set 1	Women on 1940s Radio
Theme + Down By The Riverside	Sister Rosetta Tharpe (voc) Lucky Millinder Orchestra	‘Jubilee’ AFRS Hollywood 2 Aug 1943
I Can’t Give You Anything But Love	Rose Murphy ‘The Chi-Chi Girl’	‘Jubilee’ AFRS Hollywood 18 Jan 1945
Sweet Georgia Brown	The International Sweethearts of Rhythm	‘Jubilee’ AFRS Hollywood 1945
Prelude in C#m + One O’Clock Jump (close)	Dorothy Donnegan	‘Jubilee’ AFRS Hollywood 5 Jun 1944
Set 2	Paul Whiteman 1936
Theme + Cosi Cosa	Paul Whiteman Orchestra (voc) The King’s Men	‘Musical Varieties’ WJZ NBC Blue NY 12 Jan 1936
The Music Goes Around	Paul Whiteman Orchestra (voc + tb) Jack Teagarden	‘Musical Varieties’ WJZ NBC Blue NY 12 Jan 1936
More Than You Know	Paul Whiteman Orchestra (voc) Morton Downey	‘Musical Varieties’ WJZ NBC Blue NY 12 Jan 1936
Soap Ad and Station ID	Paul Whiteman Orchestra	‘Musical Varieties’ WJZ NBC Blue NY 12 Jan 1936
Set 3	Midday Music 1945
News + My Dog Has Fleas	Dave Rose Orchestra	WOR Mutual NY 10 Aug 1945
Lady of the Evening	Dave Rose Orchestra	WOR Mutual NY 10 Aug 1945
Holiday for Strings	Dave Rose Orchestra	WOR Mutual NY 10 Aug 1945
Fascinating Rhythm	Piano Duo	WOR Mutual NY 10 Aug 1945
Time On My Hands + Close	Unidentified Orchestra	WOR Mutual NY 10 Aug 1945
Set 4	Jan Savitt
Quaker City Jazz	Jan Savitt and the Top Hatters	Arcadia Restaurant KYW NBC Philadelphia 2 Dec 1938
Monday Morning	Jan Savitt and the Top Hatters (voc) Carlotta Dale	KYW NBC Philadelphia Studios 17 Oct 1938
On The Road to Mandalay	Jan Savitt and the Top Hatters (voc) Bon Bon	Radio Transcription New York City 1939
Old Man Moon + Rigamarole + Close	Jan Savitt and the Top Hatters	KYW NBC Philadelphia New Studio Opening 14 Sep 1937
Set 5	Spotlight Bands
Open + Hallelujah	Ina Ray Hutton Orchestra	‘Spotlight Bands’ Blue Network Fort Monroe Va 13 Apr 1943
Taboo	Tommy Tucker Orchestra	‘Spotlight Bands’ Blue Network Biloxi Miss. 15 Feb 1945
Rose of the Rio Grande	Hal McIntyre Orchestra	‘Spotlight Bands’ Blue Network Miami Beach Fl 20 Nov 1943
Dark Eyes + Close	Jimmy Joy Orchestra	‘Spotlight Bands’ Blue Network Harlingen Tx 6 Jan 1945
Set 6	Trad Jazz Radio
Basin Street Blues	Jimmy Dorsey’s Dorseyland Band	Radio Transcription Los Angesles 1950
Riverside Blues	Muggsy Spanier	Club Hangover KCBS San Francisco 18 Apr 1953
Maryland, My Maryland	George Lewis Jazz Band	‘Dixieland Jambake’ WDSU ABC New Orleans 20 Apr 1951
Set 7	1930s-40s British Dance Bands
Ellingtonia Medley	Jack Hylton Orchestra	London 18 Nov 1933
My Bonnie Lies Over The Ocean	Johnny Claes Claepigeons (voc) Irene King	London 1941
Here Lies Love	Ambrose Orchestra (voc) Sam Browne	London 8 Nov 1932
It’s a Pair of Wings for Me	Nat Gonella Orchestra (voc) Nat Gonella	London 1940
Set 8	1950s Mod Radio
The Duke	Dave Brubeck	Basin Street WCBS CBS NY Feb 1956
Move	Miles Davis	‘Stars of Modern Jazz Concert’ Carnegie Hall Voice of America 25 Dec 1949
Night in Tunisia	Dizzy Gillespie	‘Symphony Sid Show’ Birdland WJZ NY 31 Mar 1951

Your Hit Parade – Phantom Dancer 9 June 2020

Your Hit Parade is this week’s Phantom Dancer feature of the week.

The Phantom Dancer has been produced and presented by 1920s-30s singer and actor Greg Poppleton since 1985. It can be heard online from 12:04pm AEST Tuesday 9 June at https://2ser.com/phantom-dancer/

The finyl hour is vinyl.

YOUR HIT PARADE

Your Hit Parade wass a US radio and TV music program broadcast 1935 – 1953 on radio and seen on TV between 1950 – 59. During the show’s 24-year run it had 19 orchestra leaders and 52 singers or groups.

Every Saturday evening, the program offered the most popular and bestselling songs of the week. The earliest format involved a presentation of the top 15 songs. Later, a countdown with fanfares led to the top three finalists, with the number one song for the finale. Occasional performances of standards and other favorite songs from the past were known as ‘Lucky Strike Extras.’

Listeners were informed that the “Your Hit Parade survey checks the best sellers on sheet music and phonograph records, the songs most heard on the air and most played on the automatic coin machines, an accurate, authentic tabulation of America’s taste in popular music.” However, the exact procedure of this ‘authentic tabulation’ remained a secret.

ALAN JAY LERNER

Your Hit Parade began on NBC 20 April 1935, as a 60-minute program with 15 songs played in a random format. Initially, the songs were more important than the singers, so a stable of vocalists went uncredited and were paid only $100 per episode, equal to $1900 today. In 1936-37, it was carried on both NBC and CBS. Script continuity in the late 1930s and early 1940s was written by Alan Jay Lerner before he found fame as a lyricist. The first number one song on the first episode was ‘Soon’ by Bing Crosby.

SINATRA

Some years passed before the countdown format was introduced, with the number of songs varying from seven to 15. Vocalists in the 1930s included Buddy Clark, Lanny Ross, Kay Thompson and Bea Wain (1939–1944), who was married to the show’s announcer, French-born André Baruch. Frank Sinatra joined the show in 1943, and was fired for messing up the No. 1 song, ‘Don’t Fence Me In’ by interjecting a mumble to the effect that the song had too many words and missing a cue. An AFRS transcription survives of this show. One source says his contract was not renewed due to demanding a raise and the show being moved to the West Coast. He returned to show at a low point in his career (1947-49), when Doris Day was also singing on the show, paying the $2000 (1949 money) weekly studio costs to call in his songs from Los Angeles asthe show was transcribed in New York City.

The first half of a  Your Hit Parade TV show in 1958…

LUCKY DAY

Hugely popular on CBS through the WWII years, Your Hit Parade returned to NBC in 1947. The show’s opening theme, from the musical revue George White’s Scandals of 1926, was ‘This Is Your Lucky Day’.

Orchestra leaders over the years included Al Goodman, Lennie Hayton, Abe Lyman, Leo Reisman, Harry Salter, Ray Sinatra, Harry Sosnik, Axel Stordahl, Peter Van Steeden, Mark Warnow and Raymond Scott (1949–1957). The chorus was led by musical director Lyn Murray.

Dozens of singers appeared on the radio program, including “Wee” Bonnie Baker, Dorothy Collins, Beryl Davis, Gogo DeLys, Joan Edwards (1941–1946), Georgia Gibbs, Dick Haymes, Snooky Lanson, Gisèle MacKenzie, Johnny Mercer, Andy Russell, Dinah Shore, Ginny Simms, Lawrence Tibbett, Martha Tilton, Eileen Wilson, Barry Wood, and occasional guest vocalists. The show featured two tobacco auctioneers, Lee Aubrey “Speed” Riggs of Goldsboro, North Carolina and F.E. Boone of Lexington, Kentucky.

On this week’s Phantom Dancer you’ll hear Tommy Leonetti (singer of ‘My City of Sydney’) singing the Number 1 Song, ‘Dream, Dream, Dream’, on a 1958 Your Hit Parade. (It’s at the end of this clip)

1950s RADIO SERIES

From the summer of 1950 to the start of summer of 1951 (the first year of the Hit Parade television show), the stars of the TV show—Eileen Wilson, Snooky Lanson, and Dorothy Collins—also starred on the Hit Parade radio show. (Wilson had sung on the radio show since 1948.) Beginning in the fall of 1950, the radio show and the TV show both aired on Saturdays; the radio program was heard from 9:00-9:30 p.m., Eastern time, and the TV show was seen from 10:30-11:00 p.m., Eastern time. Both shows featured the Lucky Strike Orchestra, led by Raymond Scott.

In late 1951, the radio show moved to Thursday nights, and its personnel and format were changed. The show, still sponsored by Lucky Strike, now starred Guy Lombardo and his Royal Canadians. Vocalists from Lombardo’s orchestra sang on the new version of the radio show, which also featured a guest female vocalist each week; the guest vocalist was called the “Lucky Star of the Week.” Guy Lombardo was host of the show until January 16, 1953, when the Hit Parade radio program aired for the last time.

1950s TV SERIES

André Baruch continued as the announcer when the program arrived on NBC television in summer 1950 (Del Sharbutt succeeded him in the 1957-58 season), written by William H. Nichols, and produced, in its first years, by both Dan Lounsbery and Ted Fetter. Norman Jewison and Clark Jones (nominated for a 1955 Emmy Award) directed with associate director Bill Colleran. Tony Charmoli won a 1956 Emmy for his choreography, and the show’s other dance directors were Tom Hansen (1957–58), Peter Gennaro (1958–59) and Ernie Flatt (uncredited). Paul Barnes won an Emmy in 1957 for his art direction. In 1953, the show won a Peabody Award ‘for consistent good taste, technical perfection and unerring choice of performers.’ Here’s Dorothy Collins receiving her Peabody Award…

The seven top-rated songs of the week were presented in elaborate TV production numbers requiring constant set and costume changes. However, because the top songs sometimes stayed on the charts for many weeks, it was necessary to continually find ways of devising a new and different production number of the same song week after week. After the show was revamped in September 1957, the top songs were reduced to five, while extras were increased.

On the TV series, vocalists Dorothy Collins (1950–1957, 1958–59), Russell Arms (1952–1957), Snooky Lanson (1950–1957) and Gisèle MacKenzie (1953–1957) were top-billed during the show’s peak years. During this time, MacKenzie had her own hit record in 1955 with ‘Hard to Get’ which climbed to the #5 ranking in June 1955 and stayed on the charts for 16 weeks. She also starred in her own NBC variety program, The Gisele MacKenzie Show from 1957–1958, a series produced by her mentor, Jack Benny. Russell Arms also enjoyed a hit record during his stint on the show – ‘Cinco Robles (Five Oaks)’.

The line-up of the show’s other singers included Eileen Wilson (1950–1952), Sue Bennett (1951–52), June Valli (1952–53), Alan Copeland (1957–58), Jill Corey (1957–58), Johnny Desmond (1958–59), Virginia Gibson (1957–58), and Tommy Leonetti (1957–58). All were performers of standards, show tunes or big band numbers. Featured prominently were the Hit Parade dancers and the Hit Paraders, the program’s choral singers, who sang the opening commercial jingle (composed by Raymond Scott):

BOB FOSSE

During the 1950-1951 season Bob Fosse – dancer, musical-theatre choreographer, actor and theatre and film director – appeared as a guest dancer on several episodes, with partner Mary Ann Niles. From 1950 until 1957, the orchestra was led by well-known bandleader and musician Raymond Scott (who married Dorothy Collins in 1952); the show’s other music supervisors were Dick Jacobs (1957–58) and Harry Sosnik (1958–59). During the 1957-58 season, sponsor American Tobacco pitched Hit Parade filter cigarettes instead of Lucky Strikes. Alternate sponsors included Avco Manufacturing’s Crosley division (1951–54), Richard Hudnut hair care products (1954–57), and The Toni Company (1957–58).

See Bob Fosse with his wife Mary Ann Niles dance on Your Hit Parade in 1952…

The show faded with the rise of rock and roll when the performance became more important than the song. It is said that big band singer Snooky Lanson’s weekly attempts to perform Elvis Presley’s ‘Hound Dog’ hit in 1956 hastened the end of the series. The series went from NBC (where it became the first TV show to contain the living color peacock) to CBS in 1958 and expired the following year. While Your Hit Parade was unable to deal with dull, uninspired rock songs, the show’s imaginative production concepts had an obvious influence on the wave of music videos that began in the decade that followed.

Here’s Snooky Lanson on a 1956 ‘Your Hit Parade’ singing ‘Heartbreak Hotel’…

1970s – 80s

CBS also brought it back for a brief summer revival in 1974. That version featured Kelly Garrett, Sheralee and Chuck Woolery. The 1974 version of Your Hit Parade also featured hit songs from a designated week in the 1940s or 1950s. Milton DeLugg conducted the orchestra and Chuck Barris packaged this series.

During the early 1980s, André Baruch and Bea Wain hosted a syndicated radio version of Your Hit Parade, reconstructing the list of hits of selected weeks in the 1940s and playing the original recordings.

The show’s familiar closing theme was ‘So Long for A While’.

VIDEO OF THE WEEK

1952 TV. Dorothy Collins, Snooky Lanson, Eileen Wilson, Raymond Scott and the Lucky Strike Orchestra. Aired 1 March 1952. Bob Fosse was a featured dancer. Enjoy!

9 JUNE PLAY LIST

Play List – The Phantom Dancer 107.3 2SER-FM Sydney, Live Stream, Digital Radio Community Radio Network Show CRN #440
107.3 2SER Tuesday 9 June 2020 After the 2SER 12 noon news, 12:04 – 2:00pm (+10 hours GMT) and Saturdays 5 – 5:55pm National Program: 1ART ArtsoundFM Canberra Sunday 10 – 11pm 5GTR Mt Gambier Monday 2:30 – 3:30am 3MBR Murrayville Monday 3 – 4am 4NAG Keppel FM Monday 3 – 4am 2SEA Eden Monday 3 – 4am 2MIA Griffith Monday 3 – 4pm 2BAR Edge FM Bega Monday 3 – 4pm 3VKV Alpine Radio Monday 6 – 7pm 7MID Oatlands Tuesday 8 – 9pm 2MCE Bathurst / Orange / Central West NSW Wednesday 9 – 10am 2ARM Armidale Friday 12 – 1pm 7LTN Launceston Sunday 5 – 6am 3MGB Mallacoota Sunday 5 – 6am 6GME Radio Goolarri Broome Sunday 5 – 6am
Set 1	Your Hit Parade
Open + Stop Beating Around The Mulberry Bush	Al Goodman Orchestra (voc) The Hit Paraders	‘Your Hit Parade’ WABC CBS NY 22 Oct 1938
So In Love	Frank Sinatra (voc) Axel Stordahl Orchestra	‘Your Hit Parade’ KFI NBC Hollywood 20 Apr 1949
Moonlight Becomes You + Love Me Or Leave Me	Mark Warnow Orchestra (voc) Barry Wood	‘Your Hit Parade’ AFRS Re-broadcast 23 Jan 1943
Set 2	Jazz Moderne from live 1952 – 1960 Radio
Open + Route 66	Bobby Troup (voc) Trio	‘All-Star Parade of Bands’ The Cameo WRCA NBC NY 1956
Without A Song	Wild Bill Davis Trio	‘Stars in Jazz’ Birdland WNBC NBC NY 1952
Sleep + Close	Chico Hamilton Quintet	‘Jazz International’ AFRTS Hollywood 16 Jan 1960
Set 3	The Supper Club broadcasting from a Plane over New York
All Through The Day	Art van Damme Quintet	‘The Supper Club’ TWA Constellation 24,000′ over New York City NBC/AFRS 4 Apr 1946
Blue Skies + Got Me A Seat Upon The California Sunbeam + Doctor, Lawyer, Indian Chief + Temptation	Perry Como and the Satisfiers (voc) Ray Bloch Orchestra	‘The Supper Club’ TWA Constellation 24,000′ over New York City NBC/AFRS 4 Apr 1946
Sweet Georgia Brown + I’m Forever Blowing Bubbles	Art van Damme Quintet	‘The Supper Club’ TWA Constellation 24,000′ over New York City NBC/AFRS 4 Apr 1946
Set 4	1930s Swing on the Radio
Bumpy Weather Over Newark	Raymond Scott Quintette	Comm Rec New York Apr 1939
There’s a Lull in My Life	Benny Goodman Trio	‘Saturday Night Swing Club’ from Pittsburgh WABC CBS NY 12 Jun 1937
Stay in My Arms, Cinderella	Bob Chester Orchestra (voc) Stu Bradon	Mayfair Restaurant Hotel van Cleve Dayton OH 21 Sep 1939
Set 5	Swinging 1944 Radio
Blue Lou	Count Basie Orchestra	Blue Room Hotel Lincoln WABC CBS NY 21 Apr 1944
Hawaiian War Chant	Tommy Dorsey Orchestra	Casino Gardens Ocean Park Ca KFI NBC LA Oct 1944
Oh So Good	Glenn Miller Orchestra	ABSIE (American Broadcasting Station in Europe) London 12 Oct 1944
Keep The Home Fires Burning	Charlie Barnet Orchestra	‘For The Record’ WEAF NBC Red NY 11 Sep 1944
Set 6	Shuffle Rhythm Live on 1935-45 Radio
Futuristic Shuffle	Jan Savitt and his Top Hatters	Radio Transcripotion New York 22 Jul 1938
Instrumental	Henry Busse Orchestra	Rose Room Palace Hotel CBS San Francisco 28 Dec 1944
Quaker City Jazz	Jan Savitt and his Top Hatters	Arcadia Restaurant KYW NBC Red Philadelphia 2 Dec 1938
Sidewalks of Cuba + When Day Is Done (theme)	Henry Busse Orchestra	Radio Transcription Chicago 1935
Set 7	The Dixie Revival on the Air
Winnin’ Boy	Jelly Roll Morton	‘Chamber Music Society of Lower Basin Street’ WJZ NBC Blue NY 14 Jul 1940
Big Butter and Egg Man	Miff Mole and his Nixieland Six	Aircheck 30 Oct 1944
Yesterdays	Eddie Condon Group	‘Eddie Condon Jazz Concert’ Town Hall NY WJZ Blue Network 21 Oct 1944
Ride Red Ride + Close	Red Allen Dixielanders	‘Doctor Jazz’ WMGM NY 1950
Set 8	Progressive Jazz Live on the Air, Daddy-o!
Perfume Counter	Dave Brubeck Quartet	Birdland WJZ ABC NY Dec 1953
Jumpin’ With Symphony Sid (theme) Perdido	Howard McGee	Birdland WMCA NY Sep 1951
Little Girl Blue	Stan Getz Quartet	Basin Street WCBS CBS NY 1956
Smoke Signals + The Gentle Art of Love	Oscar Pettiford Band	Birdland WRCA NBC NY 26 May 1957

Johnny Green, You’ve Heard Him. Have You Heard Of Him? – Phantom Dancer 12 May 2020

Johnny Green was a U.S composer, songwriter, pianist, band leader and orchestra conductor. His most famous song is ‘Body and Soul’.

On this week’s Phantom Dancer we’ll be hearing a few of the 1930s radio orchestras lead by Johnny Green. And below, on your Phantom Dancer Video of the Week you can see a short film of the Johnny Green band in action. The short was made in 1935.

This week you’ll also hear sets with Patti Page, Johnny Ray and Erroll Garner from live 1957 TV and some of the great swing bands from the 1930s live on the 1938-39 BBC series, ‘America Dances’.

Produced and presented by Australia’s only authentic 1920s-30s singer, Greg Poppleton, The Phantom Dancer is your non-stop mix of swing and jazz from live 1920s-1960s radio and TV every week.

Hear this week’s Phantom Dancer (after 12 May) and past Phantom Dancers online at radio 2ser.com

JOHN ‘JOHNNY’ WALDO GREEN

He won four Academy Awards for his film scores and a fifth for producing a short musical film. And he went by the name of John or ‘Maestro’ in his later years.

As you’ll hear on today’s live 1930s radio broadcasts of Johnny Green and his Orchestra, Green couldn’t help but be self-assured.

He entered Harvard at age 15. You’ll hear him talk today on a 1939 aircheck about his early music schooling and his first song as a kid.

Indeed, by the time he was at Harvard, bandleader Guy Lombardo had heard Green’s Gold Coast Orchestra and hired him to create dance arrangements for his nationally famous Lombardo orchestra.

JAZZ STANDARDS

Green’s first song hit was written for the Lombardo orchestra. It was Coquette (1928), which Green wrote when he was 19.

Two years later, in 1930, Green wrote ‘Body and Soul’ which is now a jazz standard.

In the early 30s he was the radio and recording accompanist and arranger to singers James Melton, Libby Holman and Ethel Merman, and as you’ll hear on this week’s Phantom Dancer, Ruth Etting. He was also arranger and conductor for Paramount Pictures.

In this period he also wrote the standards ‘Out Of Nowhere’ (which you’ll hear in play today), ‘Rain Rain Go Away’, ‘I Cover the Waterfront’, ‘You’re Mine You’, ‘I Wanna Be Loved’ (his 1934 Oldsmobile show theme song), ‘Easy Come Easy Go’, ‘Repeal The Blues’ and the theme for Max Fleischer’s Betty Boop cartoons.

Nathaniel Shilkret and Paul Whiteman commissioned Green to write larger works for orchestra, including ‘Night Club: Six Impressions for Orchestra with Three Pianos’.

After spending 1933 in London, where he wrote the first musical comedy ever for BBC Radio, Green returned to New York City where, William S. Paley, president of the Columbia Broadcasting System and an investor in New York’s St. Regis Hotel, encouraged him to form what became known as Johnny Green, his Piano and Orchestra.

And he continued to lead his orchestra in top ranking radio shows into the 1940s, backing singers such as Fred Astaire and Alan Jones.

In the early 40s, Green moved to Hollywood. He became one of the people central to changing the overall sound of the MGM Symphony Orchestra.

ACADEMY AWARDS

He was Music Director at MGM from 1949 to 1959 and was nominated for an Oscar thirteen times. He won the award for the musical scores of Easter Parade, An American in Paris, West Side Story, and Oliver!, as well as for producing the short “The Merry Wives of Windsor Overture”, which won in the Short Subjects (One-Reel) category in 1954.

After leaving MGM, Green guest-conducted the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Denver Symphony Orchestra, Philadelphia Orchestra, San Francisco Symphony Orchestra, and Hollywood Bowl Orchestra. He also continued to compose the occasional filmscore, including the critically acclaimed They Shoot Horses, Don’t They? in 1969. He conducted the orchestra for the 1961 United Artists’ film version of West Side Story, for which he won a Grammy.

Green was a chairman of the music branch of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, leading the orchestra through 17 Academy Award telecasts.

VIDEO OF THE WEEK

Your Phantom Dancer Video of the Week is a short film from 1935 of the Johnny Green Orchestra with sly dig at Johnny Green’s musical achievements. Enjoy…

12 MAY PLAY LIST

Play List – The Phantom Dancer 107.3 2SER-FM Sydney, Live Stream, Digital Radio Community Radio Network Show CRN #436
107.3 2SER Tuesday12 May 2020 After the 2SER 12 noon news, 12:04 – 2:00pm (+10 hours GMT) and Saturdays 5 – 5:55pm National Program: 1ART ArtsoundFM Canberra Sunday 10 – 11pm 5GTR Mt Gambier Monday 2:30 – 3:30am 3MBR Murrayville Monday 3 – 4am 4NAG Keppel FM Monday 3 – 4am 2SEA Eden Monday 3 – 4am 2MIA Griffith Monday 3 – 4pm 2BAR Edge FM Bega Monday 3 – 4pm 3VKV Alpine Radio Monday 6 – 7pm 7MID Oatlands Tuesday 8 – 9pm 2MCE Bathurst / Orange / Central West NSW Wednesday 9 – 10am 2ARM Armidale Friday 12 – 1pm 7LTN Launceston Sunday 5 – 6am 3MGB Mallacoota Sunday 5 – 6am 6GME Radio Goolarri Broome Sunday 5 – 6am
Set 1	1944-46 Swing Bands on One Night Stand
Theme + Boyds Nest	Boyd Raeburn Orchestra	‘One Night Stand’ Club Morocco LA AFRS Re-broadcast 19 Aug 1946
New World Jump	Bobby Sherwood Orchestra	‘One Night Stand’ Avodon Ballroom LA AFRS Re-broadcast 3 Jun 1946
Fellow on a Furlough + Blue Skies	Bob Chester Orchestra (voc) David Allyn	‘One Night Stand’ Panther Room Hotel Sherman Chicago AFRS Re-broadcast 8 Oct 1944
Set 2	Johnny Green Composer and Bandleader
Open + Sweet Little Heartache	Johnny Green Orchestra (voc) Jimmy Farrell	‘Fitch Summer Bandwagon’ WEAF NBC Red NY 9 Apr 1939
In the Evening + I Wanna Be Loved (theme)	Johnny Green Orchestra	‘Oldsmobile Program’ WABC CBS NY 20 Feb 1934
So Far So Good	Johnny Green Orchestra	‘Rhymo’ WABC CBS NY 26 May 1940
Set 3	Miles Davis on 1957 Radio
	Miles Davis Quintet	‘Bandstand USA’ Cafe Bohemia WOR Mutual NY 20 Jul 1957
Set 4	The Three Ambassadors, 1931-33 TRANSCO Cocoanut Grove Radio Shows
Sweet and Lovely + Down Among The Sleepy Pines	Jimmie Grier Orchestra (voc) Jean Shark and The Three Ambassadors	‘Cocoanut Grove Show’ Radio Transcription Los Angeles 1932
I Found a Million Dollar Baby in a Five and Ten Cent Store	Gus Arnheim Orchestra (voc) The Three Ambassadors	‘Cocoanut Grove Show’ Radio Transcription Los Angeles 1931
Seven Little Steps To Heaven	Phil Harris Orchestra (voc) The Three Ambassadors	‘Cocoanut Grove Show’ Radio Transcription Los Angeles 1933
Set 5	English Dance Bands
Let’s Put Out The Lights And Go To Sleep	Ambrose and his Orchestra	Comm Rec London 26 Oct 1932
My Bonnie Lies Over The Ocean	Johnny Claes and his Claepigeons (voc) Irene King	Comm Rec London 1941
Ya Got Love	Roy Fox Orchestra (voc) Al Bowlly	Comm Rec London 1932
We Shall Have Music	Jack Hylton Orchestra	AEF Programme BBC London 7 Sep 1944
Set 6	New Orleans Jazz on Radio
Running Wild	George Lewis Jazz Band	‘Dixieland Jambake’ WDSU ABC New Orleans 7 Oct 1950
Struttin’ With Some Barbeque	Red Allen Dixielanders	‘Doctor Jazz’ Stuyvesant Casino WMGM NY 1954
September in the Rain + I Got Rhythm	Eddie Condon Group	‘Eddie Condon’s Jazz Concert’ Town Hall WJZ Blue NY 25 Nov 1944
Eh, La Bas	Papa Celestin	‘Dixieland Jambake’ WDSU ABC New Orleans 1950
Set 7	A Date With The Duke on ABC 1945
Caravan + Fickle Fling	Duke Ellington Orchestra	‘A Date With The Duke’ Apollo Theatre WJZ ABC NY 30 Jun 1945
Hop, Skip and Jump	Duke Ellington Orchestra	‘A Date With The Duke’ Toldeo OH ABC 9 Jun 1945
C Jam Blues	Duke Ellington Orchestra	‘A Date With The Duke’ Paradise Theatre Detroit ABC 19 May 1945
Blue Skies + Things Ain’t What They Used To Be	Duke Ellington Orchestra	‘A Date With The Duke’ Battle Creek Michigan ABC 2 Jun 1945
Set 8	Modern Jazz on the Air
Move	Stan Getz (ts) Kai Winding (tb) Al Haig ℗ Tommy Potter (b) Roy Haynes	‘Jazz Club USA’ Carnegie Hall Voice of America 25 Dec 1949
How High The Moon	Allen Eager	Birdland WJZ ABC NY Jun 1953
Mel’s Idea + Body and Soul	Benny Goodman Sextet	‘One Night Stand’ Click Phildelphia AFRS re-broadcast 3 Jun 1948

Harry The Hipster Gibson Plays Bix – Phantom Dancer 5 May 2020

Harry ‘ The Hipster’ Gibson is your feature artist on this week’s Greg Poppleton Phantom Dancer. You’ll hear him play two of Bix Beidebecke’s famous piano compositions, In a Mist and Candlelight on live 1944 radio.

The Phantom Dancer, your non-stop 2 hour mix of swing and jazz from live 1920s-60s radio, is produced and presented by 1920s-30s singer and actor Greg Poppleton can be heard online from 12:04pm AEST Tuesday 5 May at https://2ser.com/phantom-dancer/

The last hour is all vinyl.

1920s-30s

Harry “The Hipster” Gibson was a jazz pianist, singer, and songwriter. Gibson played New York style stride piano and boogie woogie while singing in a wild, unrestrained style. His music career began in the late 1920s, when under his real name, he played stride piano in Dixieland jazz bands in Harlem. He continued to perform there throughout the 1930s, adding the barrelhouse boogie of the time to his repertoire.

Gibson was fond of playing Fats Waller tunes, and when Waller heard Gibson in a club in Harlem in 1939, he hired him to be his relief pianist at club dates. Between 1939 and 1945, Gibson played at Manhattan jazz clubs on 52nd Street (“Swing Street”). Harry took the name “Gibson” from brand of gin.

1940s

Gibson was known for writing unusual songs considered ahead of their time.

He recorded often but there are very few visual examples of his work. In 1944 he filmed three songs in New York for the Soundies film jukeboxes, and he went to Hollywood in 1946 to appear as himself in the feature-length film musical Junior Prom. He preceded white rock-and-rollers by a decade: the Soundies he recorded are similar to Jerry Lee Lewis’s raucous piano numbers of the 1950s.

For all his wild-man theatrics, Gibson demonstrated remarkable discipline. While working on “Swing Street” at night, he was a fellow at the Juilliard Graduate School during the day. At the time, Juilliard was strictly a classical music academy; Gibson excelled there.

Like Mezz Mezzrow, Gibson consciously abandoned his ethnicity to adopt black music and culture. Gibson grew up near Harlem in New York City and his constant use of black jive talk was not an affectation; it was simply something he picked up from his fellow musicians. In his autobiography, Gibson claims he coined the term hipster between 1939 and 1945 when he was performing on Swing Street, and he started using “Harry the Hipster” as his stage name.

1950s

He recorded “Who Put the Benzedrine in Mrs. Murphy’s Ovaltine?”, released in January 1946 and radio stations across America refused to play it, resulting in his being blacklisted in the music industry. Although Gibson’s mainstream movie appearance in Junior Prom was released that same year, it couldn’t overcome the notoriety of the “Benzedrine” record. Gibson’s own drug use led to his decline.

1960s-80s

In the 1960s, when Gibson saw the huge success of the Beatles, he switched to rock and roll. By the 1970s, he was playing hard rock, blues, bop, novelty songs and a few songs that mixed ragtime with rock and roll. His hipster act became a hippie act. His old records were revived on the Dr. Demento radio show, particularly “Benzedrine”, which was included on the 1975 compilation album Dr. Demento’s Delights.

His comeback resulted in three more albums: Harry the Hipster Digs Christmas, Everybody’s Crazy but Me, (its title taken from the lyrics of “Stop That Dancin’ Up There”) (Progressive, 1986), and Who Put the Benzedrine in Mrs. Murphy’s Ovaltine (Delmark, 1989). Those two include some jazz, blues, ragtime, and rock and roll songs about reefer, nude bathing, hippie communes, strip clubs, male chauvinists, “rocking the 88s”, and Shirley MacLaine.

Gibson may have been the only jazz pianist of the 1930s and 1940s to go on to play in rock bands in the 1970s and 1980s.

VIDEO OF THE WEEK

‘Handsome Harry the Hipster’ from 1944. Enjoy.

5 MAY PLAY LIST

Play List – The Phantom Dancer 107.3 2SER-FM Sydney, Live Stream, Digital Radio Community Radio Network Show CRN #435
107.3 2SER Tuesday 5 May 2020 After the 2SER 12 noon news, 12:04 – 2:00pm (+10 hours GMT) and Saturdays 5 – 5:55pm National Program: 1ART ArtsoundFM Canberra Sunday 10 – 11pm 5GTR Mt Gambier Monday 2:30 – 3:30am 3MBR Murrayville Monday 3 – 4am 4NAG Keppel FM Monday 3 – 4am 2SEA Eden Monday 3 – 4am 2MIA Griffith Monday 3 – 4pm 2BAR Edge FM Bega Monday 3 – 4pm 3VKV Alpine Radio Monday 6 – 7pm 7MID Oatlands Tuesday 8 – 9pm 2MCE Bathurst / Orange / Central West NSW Wednesday 9 – 10am 2ARM Armidale Friday 12 – 1pm 7LTN Launceston Sunday 5 – 6am 3MGB Mallacoota Sunday 5 – 6am 6GME Radio Goolarri Broome Sunday 5 – 6am
Set 1	1930s Swing on the Wireless
Back Room Romp (A Contrapuntal Stomp)	Rex Stewart and his 52nd Street Sompers	Comm Rec NYC 7 July 1937
Margie	Benny Goodman Orchestra	‘Camel Caravan’ WABC CBS New York 6 Sep 1938
Here Comes Your Pappy Down The Own Dusty Road + Close	Bob Crosby Orchestra (voc) The Freshman	‘Ford V-8 Revue’ NYC 1936
Set 2	The Songs of Juan Tizol
Zambu	Harry James Orchestra featuring Juan Tizol	Meadowbrook Gardens Cedar Grove NJ WNBC NBC NY Feb 1946
Take The A-Train (theme) + Caravan	Duke Ellington featuring Juan Tizol (tb)	‘Stars in Jazz’ Birdland WNBC NBC NY 24 Nov 1952
Perdido + Lullaby of Birdland (theme)	Sarah Vaughan	‘Stars In Jazz’ Birdland WNBC NBC NY 31 Mar 53
Is There Life On Other Planets?	Various Learned Professors	‘University of Chicago Roundtable’ NBC Chicago 1948
Set 3	The Great Jazz Singers of the 1950s on Radio and Tv
Keeps On Raining	Billie Holliday	‘Eddie Condon’s Floor Show’ WPIX TV NY 1949
You’re My Thrill	Carmen McCrea	‘All-Star Parade Of Bands’ Birdland WRCA NBC NY 1956
Linger Awhile + Tenderly (Close)	Sarah Vaughan	‘All-Star Parade of Bands’ Sardi’s Hollywood KFI NBC LA 21 May 1956
Set 4	Cuban Rhythms – Cugie and Desi on the Radio
Open + Brazil	Xavier Cugat Orchestra (voc) Choir	‘Xavier Cugat Show’ AFRTS Re-broadcast 1944
Cachita	Desi Arnez Orchestra (voc) DA	Ciro’s Hollywood KNX CBS LA 1946
Chiu Chiu + Close	Xavier Cugat Orchestra (voc) Nita Rosa	‘Xavier Cugat Show’ AFRTS Re-broadcast 1944
Set 5	1944 – 1946 Radio Swing on One Night Stand
Cherokee	Charlie Barnet Orchestra	Radio Transcription 21 Jul 1944
Zanzi	Cab Calloway Orchestra	‘One Night Stand’ Club Zanzibar NY AFRS Re-broadcast 16 Jul 1945
On The Road To Mandalay	Jack Teagarden Orchestra	‘One Night Stand’ Joplin, Missouri AFRS Re-broadcast 18 Mar 1946
Holiday For Swing + Trinidad	Erskine Hawkins Orchestra	‘One Night Stand’ Blue Room Hotel Lincoln NY AFRS Re-broadcast 1 May 1946
Set 6	1930s Swing on the Radio
can You Take It?	Fletcher Henderson Orchestra	Comm Rec New York 18 Aug 1933
Let’s Dance (theme) + Te Object Of My Affection	Benny Goodman Orchestra (voc) Buddy Clark	‘Let’s Dance’ WEAF NBC Red NY 1 Dec 1934
Zonky	Glen Gray and the Casa Loma Orchestra	‘Camel Caravan’ WABC CBS NY 17 Dec 1935
Happy As The Day Is Long + Close	Tommy Dorsey Orchestra	‘Ford V-8 Show’ Texas Centennial Exposition Dallas Aug 1936
Set 7	Bix Beidebecke
Singin’ The Bluess	Frankie Trambauer Orchestra Orchestra, Bix Beidebecke (cnt) The 1st recorded jazz ballad?	Comm Rec New York 4 Feb 1927
In A Mist + Candlelight – both composed by Bix	Harry ‘The Hipster’ Gibson (piano)	‘Eddie Condon’s Jazz Concert’ Town Hall WJZ Blue Network NY 22 Jul 1944
You Took Advantage Of Me	Paul Whiteman Orchestra (voc) Bing Crosby (cnt) Bix Beidebecke	Comm Rec New York 28 Apr 1928
Set 8	Bop Singers On The Air
What’s The Matter Now?	Clyde Hart’s All-Stars (tp) Dizzy Gillespie (voc) Rubberleg Williams	Comm Rec NYC Jan 1945
Hurry Home + Deedle + Royal Roost Bop	Dave Lambert and Buddy Stewart (voc)	‘Symphony Sid Show’ Royal Roost WMCA NY 5 Mar 1949
I’m Forever Blowing Bubbles	Jackie Kane and Roy Kral (voc) Charlie Ventura Quartet	‘Symphony Sid Show’ WMCA NY 1949
Romance Without Finance	Charlie Parker Quintet (voc) Jimmy Butts	Comm Rec NYC 15 Sep 1944

Dixieland Revival – Phantom Dancer 21 April 2020

Your feature artists on this week’s Greg Poppleton Phantom Dancer are all (but one) broadcasting from San Francisco in the 1950s. They are Jimmy Dorsey (in a radio transcription), Muggsy Spanier, Kid Ory and Turk Murphy – all part of the Dixieland revival that went worldwide from the late 1930s into the 1960s (in Australia).

The Phantom Dancer, your non-stop 2 hour mix of swing and jazz from live 1920s-60s radio, is produced and presented by 1920s-30s singer and actor Greg Poppleton can be heard online from 12:04pm AEST Tuesday 21 April at https://2ser.com/phantom-dancer/

The last hour is all vinyl.

DIXIELAND REVIVAL

Was a movement of the late 1930s to the 1950s (in the US) reviving earlier improvisational jazz. It was a reaction to the arranged music of swing orchestras. The traditional front lines consisting of trumpets, trombones, and clarinets, and ensemble improvisation over a two-beat rhythm.

The term “Dixieland” was applied to early jazz by traditional jazz revivalists, starting in the 1940s and 1950s. The name is a reference to the “Old South”, specifically anything south of the Mason-Dixon line. The term encompasses earlier brass band marches, French Quadrilles, biguine, ragtime, and blues with collective, polyphonic improvisation. While instrumentation and size of bands varied, the “standard” band consisted of of a “front line” of trumpet (or cornet), trombone, and clarinet, with a “rhythm section” of at least two of the following instruments: guitar or banjo, string bass or tuba, piano, and drums. Louis Armstrong’s All-Stars was the band most popularly identified with Dixieland during the 1940s, although Armstrong’s own influence during the 1920s was to move the music beyond the traditional New Orleans style.

The definitive Dixieland sound is created when one instrument (usually the trumpet) plays the melody or a recognizable paraphrase or variation on it and the other instruments of the “front line” improvise around that melody. This creates a more polyphonic sound than the arranged ensemble playing of the big band sound or the straight “head” melodies of bebop.

During the 1930s and 1940s, the earlier group-improvisation style fell out of favor with the majority of younger black players, while some older players of both races continued on in the older style. Though younger musicians developed new forms, many beboppers revered Armstrong and quoted fragments of his recorded music in their own improvisations.

The Dixieland revival in the late 1940s and 1950s brought many semi-retired musicians a measure of fame late in their lives as well as bringing retired musicians back onto the jazz circuit after years of not playing (e.g., Kid Ory and Red Nichols). Many Dixieland groups of the revival era consciously imitated the recordings and bands of decades earlier. Other musicians continued to create innovative performances and new tunes. For example, in the 1950s a style called “Progressive Dixieland” sought to blend polyphonic improvisation with bebop-style rhythm. Spike Jones and His New Band and Steve Lacy played with such bands. This style is sometimes called “Dixie-bop”. Lacy went on to apply that approach to the music of Thelonious Monk, Charles Mingus, Duke Ellington, and Herbie Nichols.

Muggsy Spanier

CHICAGO STYLE

“Chicago style” is often applied to the sound of Chicagoans such as Jimmy McPartland, Eddie Condon, Muggsy Spanier, and Bud Freeman. The rhythm sections of these bands substitute the string bass for the tuba and the guitar for the banjo. Musically, the Chicagoans play in more of a swing-style 4-to-the-bar manner. The New Orleanian preference for an ensemble sound is deemphasized in favor of solos. Chicago-style Dixieland also differs from its southern origin by being faster paced, resembling the hustle-bustle of city life. Chicago-style bands play a wide variety of tunes, including most of those of the more traditional bands plus many of the Great American Songbook selections from the 1930s by George Gershwin, Jerome Kern, Cole Porter, and Irving Berlin. Non-Chicagoans such as Pee Wee Russell and Bobby Hackett are often thought of as playing in this style. This modernized style came to be called Nicksieland, after Nick’s Greenwich Village night club, where it was popular, though the term was not limited to that club.

Turk Murphy at Club Hangover

WEST COAST REVIVAL

The “West Coast revival” is a movement that was begun in the late 1930s by Lu Watters and his Yerba Buena Jazz Band in San Francisco and extended by trombonist Turk Murphy. It started out as a backlash to the Chicago style, which is closer in development towards swing. The repertoire of these bands is based on the music of Joe “King” Oliver, Jelly Roll Morton, Louis Armstrong, and W.C. Handy. Bands playing in the West Coast style use banjo and tuba in the rhythm sections, which play in a two-to-the-bar rhythmic style.

Much performed traditional Dixieland tunes include: “When the Saints Go Marching In”, “Muskrat Ramble”, “Struttin’ with Some Barbecue”, “Tiger Rag”, “Dippermouth Blues”, “Milenberg Joys”, “Basin Street Blues”, “Tin Roof Blues”, “At the Jazz Band Ball”, “Panama”, “I Found a New Baby”, “Royal Garden Blues” and many others. All of these tunes were widely played by jazz bands of the pre-WWII era, especially Louis Armstrong. They came to be grouped as Dixieland standards beginning in the 1950s.

Your Phantom Dancer Video of the Week is ‘Yes Suh!’ 26/Jul/32 NYC., THE RHYTHMAKERS: Red Allen (t) Jimmy Lord (cl) Pee Wee Russell (ts) Fats Waller (p,v) Eddie Condon (bj) Jack Bland (g) Pops Foster (b) Zutty Singleton (d) Billy Banks(v). Enjoy!

21 APRIL PLAY LIST

Play List – The Phantom Dancer 107.3 2SER-FM Sydney, Live Stream, Digital Radio Community Radio Network Show CRN #433
107.3 2SER Tuesday 21 April 2020 After the 2SER 12 noon news, 12:04 – 2:00pm (+10 hours GMT) and Saturdays 5 – 5:55pm National Program: 1ART ArtsoundFM Canberra Sunday 10 – 11pm 5GTR Mt Gambier Mon 2:30 – 3:30am 4NAG Keppel FM 3 – 4am 2SEA Eden Monday 3 – 4am 2MIA Griffith Monday 3 – 4pm 2BAR Edge FM Bega Monday 3 – 4pm 3VKV Alpine Radio Monday 6 – 7pm 7MID Oatlands Tuesday 8 – 9pm 2ARM Armidale Friday 12 – 1pm 7LTN Launceston 5 – 6am 3MGB Mallacoota Sunday 5 – 6am
Set 1	Prehistoric Stan Kenton from 1941 Radio
Artistry in Rhythm	Stan Kenton Orchestra	Radio Transcription C. P. MacGregor Studios Los Angeles Nov 1941
A Setting In Motion	Stan Kenton Orchestra	Radio Transcription C. P. MacGregor Studios Los Angeles 20 Sep 1941
Blues in F Minor	Stan Kenton Orchestra	Radio Transcription C. P. MacGregor Studios Los Angeles 6 Jan 1942
El Choclo	Stan Kenton Orchestra	Radio Transcription C. P. MacGregor Studios Los Angeles Oct 1941
Set 2	Swing Band Leaders Speak on the Radio
Sunrise Serenade	Glenn Miller Orchestra	Glen Island Casino New Rochelle NY WEAF NBC Red NY 15 Nov 1938
When I Get It + Blue Lou + Close	Harry James Orchestra lead by Tommy Dorsey	Casino Gardens Ocean Park KECA ABC LA 12 Aug 1944
Hallelujah	Benny Goodman Quartet	‘For The Record’ WEAF NBC NY 1944
Set 3	Lounge Music on 1920s – 1950s Radio
Sugarloaf Mambo	Bernard ‘Whitey’ Berquist’ and the Chicago NBC Symphony Orchestra	‘Monitor’ WRCA NBC NY 19 Jun 1956
On The Wood Pile	Harry Bruer (xylophone) with the Colonial Club Orchestra	‘Brunswick Brevities’ WABC CBS NY 1929
White Sails + Time On My Hands	Johnny Saab (organ)	‘Musical Interlude’ WJSV CBS Washington DC 21 Sep 1939
Set 4	From Birdland over WNBC in 1952
Stuffy	Coleman Hawkins and Roy Eldridge Orchestra	‘Stars in Jazz’ Birdland WNBC NBC NY 1952
Stardust + Lady Be Good	Kai Winding Group	‘Stars in Jazz’ Birdland WNBC NBC NY 2 Sep 1952
Set 5	The 1950s Dixie Revival on Radio
Chicago	Jimmy Dorsey ‘Dorseyland Band’	‘Marine Corp Show’ Radio Transcription Los Angeles 1950
Squeeze Me	Muggsy Spanier and his Dixieland All-Stars	‘Club Hangover’ KCBS San Francisco 11 Apr 1953
St James Infirmary	Kid Ory’s Creole Jazz Band	‘Club Hangover’ KCBS San Francisco 10 Oct 1954
Memphis Blues + Bay City (close)	Turk Murphy’s San Francisco Jazz Band	‘Easy Street’ KCBS San Francisco 9 Dec 1958
Set 6	Early Radio Appearances By Famous Singers
Shine	The Hoboken Four (Frank Sinatra’s first radio appearance)	‘Major Bowes’ Original Amateur Hour’ WABC CBS NY 1935
From The Bottom Of My Heart	Frank Sinatra (voc) Harry James Orchestra	‘America Dances’ Famous Door WABC CBS NY / BBC London Jul 1938
I’m Happy About The Whole Thing	Doris Day (voc) Barney Rapp and his New Englanders	Sign of the Drum Cincinnati Ohio NBC 17 Jun 1939
I Cried For You	Bing Crosby	WABC CBS NY 7 Nov 1931
Set 7	Harmony Singers on 1930s – 1940s Radio
When My Dreamboat Goes Home	The King Sisters with Frank DeVol	‘Radio Transcription’ Los Angeles 1949
Chi Baba, Chi Baba	Lionel Hampton Orchestra (voc) Herman McCoy and the Hamp-Tones	Casa Manana Culver City Ca KFI NBC LA 20 Jul 1947
That Sly Ol’ Gentleman	Benny Goodman Orchestra (voc) Martha Tilton and the Quintones	‘Camel Caravan’ WABC CBS NY 4 Apr 1939
Tiger Rag	The Inkspots	WFIL NBC Red Philadelphia 12 Jul 1939
Set 8	Swinging on 1940s Radio
Open + Tea For Two	Bob Strong Orchestra	Glen Island Casino New Rochelle NY WOR Mutual NY 5 Aug 1944
Theme + Quiet Riot	Buddy Rich Orchestra	‘Spotlight Bands’ Quonset Naval Air Station Rhode Island Blue Network 25 Jan 1946
The Elks’ Parade	Bobby Sherwood Orchestra	Terrace Room New Jersey WCBS CBS NY 17 Feb 1945
Cottontail	Duke Ellington Orchestra	‘A Date With The Duke’ Evansville Indiana ABC 16 Jun 1945

Left Field 1953 Band Leaders on NBC Radio – 14 April Phantom Dancer

Sauter-Finegan, Stan Kenton and Billy May were three 1953 bands making way-out sounds on NBC radio and are this week’s Greg Poppleton Phantom Dancer feature artists. You’ll also hear from vocal group The Hi-Los, an influence on young pianist, Herbie Hancock. Read the three band leader stories below…

The Phantom Dancer is your non-stop 2 hour mix of swing and jazz from live 1920s-60s radio. On-air with Greg Poppleton since 1985.

The Phantom Dancer produced and presented by 1920s-30s singer and actor Greg Poppleton can be heard online from 12:05pm AEST Tuesday 14 April at https://2ser.com/phantom-dancer/

The last hour is all vinyl.

Sauter-Finegan Orchestra

SAUTER – FINEGAN

The Sauter-Finegan Orchestra was an American swing jazz band popular in 1953.
The orchestra was led by Eddie Sauter and Bill Finegan, who were both experienced big band arrangers. Sauter played mellophone, trumpet, and drums. He had attended Columbia University and Juilliard. Finegan had studied at the Paris Conservatory. They began recording together in 1952, using inventive arrangements that made use of a variety of unusual instruments, including many orchestral instruments as well as oddities like the kazoo and the beaten human chest.

A June 7, 1952, article in the trade publication Billboard described the new group as “a creative band, which will combine dance music as well as mood interpretations.”

The group initially had a three-year contract with RCA Victor, with plans “for about 16 sides a year.” Their first chart appearance was with “Doodletown Fifers”, their version of a Civil War tune called “Kingdom Coming and the Year of Jubilo”. “Nina Never Knew” (featuring vocalist Joe Mooney) and “The Moon is Blue” (with Sally Sweetland) soon followed on the charts. With the success of the singles, they put together a 21-member touring ensemble and began playing venues in 1953.  Because the group played in dance halls rather than concert venues, they encountered little success on the road, and quit touring in 1955 after having accrued much debt.

June Christie singing with the Stan Kenton Orchestra

STAN KENTON

In 1950 Kenton fput together the large 39-piece Innovations in Modern Music Orchestra that included 16 strings, a woodwind section, and two French horns. The music was an extension of the works composed and recorded since 1947 by Bob Graettinger, Manny Albam, Franklyn Marks and others. Name jazz musicians such as Maynard Ferguson, Shorty Rogers, Milt Bernhart, John Graas, Art Pepper, Bud Shank, Bob Cooper, Laurindo Almeida, Shelly Manne, and June Christy were part of these musical ensembles. The groups managed two tours during 1950–51, from a commercial standpoint it would be Stan Kenton’s first major failure.

In order to be more commercially viable, Kenton reformed the band in 1951 to a much more standard instrumentation: five saxes, five trombones, five trumpets, piano, guitar, bass, drums. The charts of such arrangers as Gerry Mulligan, Johnny Richards, and particularly Bill Holman and Bill Russo began to dominate the repertoire. The music was written to better reflect the style of cutting edge, be-bop oriented big bands like those of Dizzy Gillespie and Woody Herman. Young, talented players and outstanding jazz soloists such as Maynard Ferguson, Lee Konitz, Conte Candoli, Sal Salvador and Frank Rosolino made strong contributions to the level of the 1952–53 band. The music composed and arranged during this time, which you hear from live 1953 radio, was far more tailor-made to contemporary jazz tastes and was one of the high points in Kenton’s career as band leader.

Billy May, sousaphone

BILLY MAY

After playing tuba for a few local bands, May heard Charlie Barnet’s band on the radio in his hometown of Pittsburgh. In the summer of 1938, he approached the bandleader and asked if he could write arrangements for the band. From 1938–40, he wrote arrangements and played trumpet for Barnet’s big band.

His arrangement of the Ray Noble composition “Cherokee” became a major hit of the swing music era. During the Barnet days, May revealed a significant flair for satire on a composition, “The Wrong Idea”, composed with Barnet, ridiculing the bland “Mickey Mouse” style of safe big-band music, with specific aim at bandleader Sammy Kaye, known for his “swing and sway” trademark. May’s caustic lyrics to the song called it “swing and sweat with Charlie Barnet”. Bandleader Glenn Miller hired May away from Barnet in 1940. “May points out that he was not responsible for any of the [Glenn Miller] band’s signature hits, but he did write the beautiful left-field introduction to [Bill] Finegan’s [arrangement of] ‘Serenade In Blue'”.

May’s charts often featured brisk tempos and intricate brass parts. One distinctive feature of his style is his frequent use of trumpet mute devices; another, a saxophone glissando, is widely known as his “slurping saxes”. He wrote in slower tempos, sometimes using string arrangements.

LOOK AT THIS 1930s DRUM KIT

Your Phantom Dancer Video of the Week is from a Larry Clinton 1939 Vitaphone short with vocals by Bea Wain and Ford Leary. Also note the clear shots of the 1930s drum kit where the cymbals are on bent poles attached to the bass drum.

14 APRIL PLAY LIST

Play List – The Phantom Dancer 107.3 2SER-FM Sydney, Live Stream, Digital Radio Community Radio Network Show CRN #432
107.3 2SER Tuesday 14 April 2020 After the 2SER 12 noon news, 12:04 – 2:00pm (+10 hours GMT) and Saturdays 5 – 5:55pm National Program: 1ART ArtsoundFM Canberra Sunday 10 – 11pm 5GTR Mt Gambier Mon 2:30 – 3:30am 4NAG Keppel FM 3 – 4am 2SEA Eden Monday 3 – 4am 2MIA Griffith Monday 3 – 4pm 2BAR Edge FM Bega Monday 3 – 4pm 3VKV Alpine Radio Monday 6 – 7pm 7MID Oatlands Tuesday 8 – 9pm 2ARM Armidale Friday 12 – 1pm 7LTN Launceston 5 – 6am 3MGB Mallacoota Sunday 5 – 6am
Set 1	1930s True Crime, Fox and Gypsy
Calling All Cars Theme	Studio Orchestra	‘Calling All Cars’ KNX CBS LA 17 Nov 1938
Unidentified Song	Jaroslav Jezek Orchestra	Comm Rec Prague 1938
Hallelujah!	Svenskahotkvintetten	Comm Rec Stockholm Oct 1939
Set 2	1930s European Pop on 1930s US Radio
The Lambeth Walk	Benny Goodman Orchestra (voc) Martha Tilton	‘Camel Caravan’ WABC CBS NY 6 Sep 1938
Harbour Lights	Rudy Vallee (voc) Robert Ambruster Orchestra	‘Chase and Sanborn Hour’ WEAF NBC Red NY 3 Oct 1937
My Prayer	Paul Whiteman Orchestra (voc) Joan Edwards	‘Chesterfield Show’ WABC CBS NY 25 Oct 1939
Set 3	Spotlight Bands 1943-45 Blue Network
Open + Blue Skies	Jimmy Joy Orchestra	‘Spotlight Bands’ Harlingen Tx Blue Network 6 Jan 1945
Chatanoogo Choo Choo Boogie	Sammy Kaye Orchestra	‘Spotlight Bands’ Washington DC Blue Network 31 Jan 1942
Take It Down + What Is This Thing Called Love + Close	Leo Reisman Orchestra	‘Spotlight Bands’ National Press Club Washington DC Blue Network 23 Jan 1943
Set 4	Way-Out Sounds on 1953 Radio
Open + Tweedle-Dee Tweedle-Dum	Sauter – Finnegan Orchestra	‘All Star Parade of Bands’ Blue Note WMAQ NBC Chicago 12 sep 1953
Blue Eyes	Stan Kenton Orchestra (voc) Conte Condoli	‘Concert in Miniature’ Student Union Teachers’ College WBOW NBC Terre Haute Indiana 16 June 1953
Do You Ever Think Of Me?	Billy May Orchestra (voc) The Encores	‘All Star Parade of Bands’ Palladium Ballroon KFI NBC LA 21 Dec 1953
Set 5	Mellow Swing on 1940s Radio
Brahm’s Lullaby	Les Elgart Orchestra	Radio Transcription New York City 1946
Trouble, Trouble	Benny Carter Orchestra (voc) Betty Roche	‘Jubilee’ AFRS Hollywood 1944
It’s Mellow	Glen Gray and the Casa Loma Orchestra	Terrace Room Hotel New Yorker WABC CBS New York May 1944
Way Low	Duke Ellington Orchestra	‘A Date With The Duke’ 400 Restaurant WJZ ABC NY 28 Apr 1945
Set 6	Trad Jazz on 1930s-40s Radio
Won’t You Come Over To My House, Baby?	Lazy Ade’s Big 4 (voc) Ade Monsborough	3AW Melbourne 1949
Waiting For The Evening Whistle	Eddie Condon Group	‘Eddie Condon’s Town Hall Jazz Concert’ Town Hall WJZ Blue NY 30 Sep 1944
You’re Driving Me Crazy	Bob Crosby’s Bobcats	‘Camel Caravan’ WABC CBS NY 18 Jul 1939
Dixieland Band	Benny Goodman Orchestra (voc) Helen Forrest	Palomar Ballroom KFI NBC Red LA 22 Aug 1935
Set 7	1940s Radio Big Band Swing
Open + Jeep Rhythm	Jimmie Lunceford Orchestra	‘Spotlight Bands’ Jefferson Barracks, Missouri Mutual Network 23 Nov 1945
The New Look	Charlie Spivak Orchestra	Palladium Ballroom KNX CBS LA 4 Apr 1948
Mister Pastor Goes To Town	Tony Pastor Orchestra	Broadcast New York City 1945
One O’Clock Jump	International Sweethearts of Rhythm + Armed Forces Radio Service Orchestra	‘Jubilee’ AFRS Hollywood Mar 1945
Set 8	Mod Sounds on WHDH Boston 1953 – 54
Hi Beck	Lee Konitz	Storyville Copley Square Hotel WHDH Boston 5 Jan 1954
Them There Eyes	Billie Holliday	Storyville Copley Square Hotel WHDH Boston Oct 1953
Groovin’ High	Charlie Parker	Storyville Copley Square Hotel WHDH Boston 22 Sep 1953