Unlike Mel Brooks’ “History of the World, Part 1,” some things having to do with the world do get a sequel. The day before Christmas in 2012 I wrote a blahg with the title WHAT IS WRONG WITH THE WORLD? and thought I would not need to revisit the theme. Little did I know that almost 9 years later I would be thinking about those words again…or rather uttering them out loud. I thought it was time to ask the question again and to see if my solutions have held up or if I have better ones to offer.
My blahg last time had to do with the Sandy Hook massacre and other world issues as well as the fact that someone had hacked my website and inserted malicious code. Here’s what I offered up as solutions at that time:
So what can we do to make this world a better place? Speak out! Everyone has an opinion and a voice and it’s your duty to speak out against injustice and stupidity. Many voices raised in song have done better to heal than those who sit at the back of the room and just mouth the lyrics…The last time I checked, we are all free to be. Free to be whatever we wanted, believe what we wanted, worship how we wanted, love how we wanted. You get the message…Look at your loved ones, your relatives, your friends, and tell me you wouldn’t want more time with them if it meant giving up your stubborn opinions. I think we all know the answer to that. Let’s move on…There are some good things in this world. There is love and family and laughter and we need to embrace it during these troubling times. I don’t want to be preachy but sometimes we forget to think of all we are blessed with.
I could go on listing all of the problems in the world and war and death and Covid 19 but I think everyone is tired of hearing about it. I’d rather focus on the solutions.
News flash. I don’t have any solutions. I thought love, laughter, and happiness were the cure-alls but many people don’t have those in their lives. Sometimes when I’m looking for an answer, I turn to music. You know a lot of my blahgs are full of music and I thought I would look at some songs that give inspiration or hope or maybe offer up some suggestions that might lead to solutions.
I really like the artist, Sara Groves. I discovered her from the soundtrack to the movie “The Ultimate Gift.” If you want to see a really inspirational movie, check it out. I’m not going to use her song “Something Changed”, from that movie, in this scenario because it’s more a religious experience and one person’s religion should be that one person’s religion. I’ve been thinking more lately about her song “Roll To The Middle.” Essentially the song is about a couple who just had a huge fight and the singer is wondering how they will get beyond the hurt. Part of the lyrics go “All the complicated wars, they end pretty simple. Here when the lights go down, we roll to the middle.” Rolling to the middle is where we find compromise and begin to heal. Here’s the video to that song:
I’m going to be a little sappy for a moment. “What A Wonderful World” by Louis Armstrong is uplifting as well. It’s not about “What’s Wrong With The World?” but more about What’s Right. I won’t go on about it but will instead offer up a live performance of Louis singing the song. Not only is the song infectious but Louis’ smile could melt a hardened heart down to butter.
I’m going to sneak The Weepies in here. Readers of my blahgs, if there are any, know that I’m a huge fan of Steven Tannen and Deb Talan, husband and wife team, better known as The Weepies. The following video is for the song “The World Spins Madly On,” which is true but it fits the theme.
The song that cheers me the most is their song, “I Was Made For Sunny Days.” I used to hear this song piped into a local thrift store and found myself singing along. I’ve seen The Weepies twice in concert but I can’t remember if they sang this song. At the core is the theme that sunny days are better than grey days.
I could go on filling this blahg with songs that mean well and mean a lot to me but we might disagree on some of these. The last song is one I think we can all agree on. It’s just fun and it was part of our culture and our history. If you don’t like the Monkees then look away but it doesn’t matter because they’re too busy singing to put anybody down.
Okay, okay, just one more. I know you didn’t ask for it but if I’m going to put forward one more World song then it has to be the one that’s so basic in message that we shouldn’t forget. It’s a Coca Cola commercial and I’m not a fan of the drink but the song “I’d Like To Teach The World To Sing” still packs a punch.
The world is full of hate and fear and confusion and depression and loathing and terrorism and nepotism and nimbyism (look it up) and shouting and crying and living and dying. But those are all words. Chop up the words and they’re just letters and those letters spell better things like loving and hope and resilience and caring and trust and future. Try it for yourself. Take all the bad words and twist them around to make good ones.
I was looking for something to end this blahg with that wasn’t a song. I looked back through my own writing, even further back than the original blahg WHAT IS WRONG WITH THE WORLD?, and I found a poem that I wrote on March 25th, 1986. Surprisingly, it’s about taking apart words to find an all purpose cure. I don’t know what that cure is or what you’ll use it for but if you put in the effort to make positive change then the result is its own reward. Try not to read too much into the poem. I was 23 at the time and the following year I would be married and on another March 25th, being 1994, my son would be born. Take apart the poem if you like and reuse the words. Kinder words spread thicker than all the negative comments stacked together.
AN ALL PURPOSE CURE
Don’t think I
don’t care about
all the world’s illnesses
because I do and
I want to do something about them.
It’s not all physical
I know
but then all the answers
aren’t either.
It’s not all broken bodies
and worn out organs
and dead tissues
but then all the cures
aren’t whole.
I think I’ve got a cure
that’ll better any problem
but it involves some work
and I’m not sure it
might not cure things
you want left as are.
If you could chop up this poem
and swallow it
letter by letter
maybe it would spell out
and all-purpose cure
and surprise you with
the good it can do
In this poem
is every letter you’d need
to help you
and if it could survive
minor digestion
then maybe you’ll be alright
I know it’s a chance
but just being alive
is one of those
and who knows
if it might not give you something to believe in;
but that’s relying on
intelligence being a disease – q.z.x.
The inspiration for this blahg is two fold. I’ve been meaning to post a blahg about a certain jazz musician ever since my first blahg, THE BLAHG & THE MOST HAPPY SOUND. That was back in October of 2011. I mentioned in that first blahg the name of the artist and said a blahg dedicated to him was coming soon. I next referenced the band in a November 2013 blahg entitled ZOEY, FRANK, JUNE & ALL THAT JAZZ. I even promised in that blahg that I was going to dedicate a blahg very soon to the artist/band. The first inspiration for this blahg was when during this past week I pulled out some homemade CDs that someone sent me of the band many years ago and that got me thinking that I was overdue on dedicating a blahg to this artist/band.
The second inspiration is WHAT ON EARTH IS A SCOBEYFAN? which I derive from a recent video that was posted by my son on his Analog Resurgence YouTube page. I have mentioned my son, Noah, and his Analog Resurgence page in a previous blahg, 16 INCHES OF TROUBLE OR LIKE FATHER LIKE SON. Here’s what I had to say about him in that blahg:
So about now, you’re probably wondering about that alternate title to this blahg “Like Father, Like Son”. Well, recently my son Noah posted the first in his Youtube video series about Analog Resurgence. While I’m all about the old records and the technology to play them, Noah’s all about old cameras for filming and photography.
You can check out all of Noah’s videos at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCL9A6v7YSOOVXwCpao6Bszg. He makes money by the number of views so check out all of his videos and don’t skip through the ads because he makes more money if people view the ads as well. He also has a Patreon account where you can support him and get links for exclusive content. That’s also available through the above YouTube link.
Getting back to the second inspiration for this blahg, specifically with the title, I was inspired by one of Noah’s most recent videos:
About 49 seconds in Noah shows a clip of a 16mm film he had purchased at a thrift store. The film is “What On Earth And In The Sea”. There were a number of “What On Earth” shorts produced in the early 1970s and I remember seeing a few over the years. There’s a website, What on Earth… (partially lost animated shorts that is dedicated to the What On Earth series. Here’s some information from that website:
What on Earth… was a series of approximately 60 animated vignettes featuring postage stamps from around the world. The shorts were produced for Canadian television by Crawley Films in around 1970 and originally aired on CBC between programs. In the late 1980s, the series was repurposed as filler content for Canadian channels YTV and TVOntario.[1]
Concept:
In each 2-minute vignette, a narrator (possibly Chris Wiggins, according to some recollections) would recount a historic event or read through a poem over a musical background. The shorts were illustrated with postage stamps from around the world.
The vignettes’ production was sponsored by the Canada Post Corporation.
Apparently there are not many of these to view online so I’ve asked my son to do some sort of scan of the film and post it to YouTube. I think there are many fans of these shorts out there. I took the inspiration for this blahg from What On Earth and tipped it at the end to match the subject of this blahg. Here is one of the What On Earth films:
Okay okay, enough about the inspiration What On Earth Is Scobeyfan? I guess to be truthful, a third inspiration is the fact that the word Scobeyfan is my username on a number of websites. I have used Sinatrafan in the past but as the Internet has grown, there are more people using that one and I think I’m the only one that uses Scobeyfan. Nobody has ever asked me what it means but it’s a tribute to the late great trumpeter Bob Scobey. I don’t want to fill this blahg up with a full biography because that’s available elsewhere, which I will speak to in a little bit. Here’s an excerpt from Bob Scobey’s Wikipedia page:
Robert Alexander Scobey Jr. (December 9, 1916 – June 12, 1963) was an American jazz musician. He was born in Tucumcari, New Mexico, and died in Montreal, Quebec, Canada.
He began his career playing in dance orchestras and nightclubs in the 1930s. In 1938, he worked as second trumpeter for Lu Watters in the Yerba Buena Jazz Band. By 1949, he was leading his own band under the name Bob Scobey’s Frisco Band. From 1950 the group continued to play a three-year residency at the Victor & Roxie’s, where their popularity grew. Clancy Hayes joined the band to sing, play banjo and had his own compositions such as “Huggin’ and a Chalkin'” recorded. The collaboration recorded over two hundred tracks until he left in 1959 to follow a solo career.
From 1954-57, African-American blues singer Lizzie Miles recorded and toured with the band.
In 1955, Scobey and his band played dates at San Quentin Prison and at the Rancho Grande in Lafayette, California—a sizable roadhouse with a dance floor. In 1957 he recorded for Verve Records and RCA Victor. An important and successful album for RCA was Bing with a Beat recorded with Bing Crosby in 1957. From early in 1956, he toured colleges and universities, and in 1958 he recorded many of the student favorites in New York, the album College Classics (RCA Victor LPM 1700).
In 1959 Scobey opened the Club Bourbon Street, Chicago.
Death:
Scobey died of cancer in 1963 in Montreal, Canada. His wife Jan produced a biography entitled “He Rambled!” and arranged for his band to form again and record some blues songs. She also saw to the reissuing of his albums.
I want to highlight two things from the Wikipedia entry, the album “Bing With A Beat” that Bob Scobey did with Bing Crosby and the biography “He Rambled!” written by his widow, Jan Scobey. The full title of the book is “He Rambled! ‘Til Cancer Cut Him Down.” It’s a beautiful hardcover book with a full discography, of LPs only, and chock full of great facts and photos. I’m not sure if you can still purchase this book. Jan Scobey once ran a mail-order Jazz company and I would receive catalogues like the one below from 2000:
I lost track or rather stopped communicating with Jan in the early 2000s but, at that time, she was still selling copies of the book. I’ll talk more about that later.
It’s an interesting but backwards story of how I became interested in Bob Scobey. I’ve always been a Bing Crosby fan as well and when I attended Trent University in Peterborough, Ontario in the early 1980s, I purchased a Bing LP at a local store called “Bing Crosby A Legendary Performer.” Below is a picture of the cover and some details from the inner sleeve:
If you click on the inner sleeve image you will get more details of the track listing. In case you can’t make it out, here are the tracks from both sides:
Side A:
Ol’ Man River Recorded January 11, 1928
Three Little Words Recorded August 26, 1930
It Must Be True Recorded October 29, 1930
Wrap Your Troubles In Dreams Recorded March 2, 1931
Just A Gigolo Recorded March 2, 1931
I’m through With Love Recorded September 2, 1931
Just One More Chance Recorded September 2, 1931
Side B:
Some Sunny Day Recorded February 19, 1957 in San Francisco with Bob Scobey’s Frisco Jazz Band
I’m Gonna Sit Right Down Recorded February 19, 1957 And Write Myself A Letter in San Francisco with Bob Scobey’s Frisco Jazz Band
Mack The Knife Recorded February 20, 1957 in San Francisco with Bob Scobey’s Frisco Jazz Band
Dream A Little Dream Of Me Recorded February 19, 1957 in San Francisco with Bob Scobey’s Frisco Jazz Band
Whispering Recorded February 20, 1957 in San Francisco with Bob Scobey’s Frisco Jazz Band
Down Among The Recorded February 20, 1957 Sheltering Palms in San Francisco with Bob Scobey’s Frisco Jazz Band
Now, I do like Bing’s earlier material but after hearing these tracks from 1957 with Bob Scobey’s Frisco Jazz Band, I was hooked. I found myself not just listening to Bing’s vocals by straining to just hear the band. Who was this band? I had never heard of Bob Scobey. This was 1982 or 1983 and there was no Internet (maybe the military had the Internet but they didn’t share it with me) so I couldn’t look up the band. I knew a guy that ran a local music store so I had him keep an eye out for a Bing Crosby album with Bob Scobey. I don’t think I even knew the title. Eventually the store owner located a copy of Bing With A Beat:
What a fantastic collaboration. It’s easily my favorite Bing Crosby album and definitely up there as one of my favourite Bob Scobey albums. Just give a listen to Bing and Bob on “Mack The Knife”:
It’s so difficult to offer up other tracks from this great album and totally neglect others. The whole album is an experience and I’m not doing justice by not referencing all of the songs. I decided I’d link to a YouTube video of the song “Whispering” because there’s a great interaction between Bing Crosby and Bob Scobey where Bing talks to Bob about his trumpet playing. Here’s a hint, search YouTube for Bing Crosby and Bob Scobey and you’ll find links to all of the songs on the album.
The rest of my story as it relates to discovering Bob Scobey is very vague after that. I might have acquired some of his other albums through my local record store but the details are a little fuzzy to me. Age will do that. With the advent of the Internet and Ebay, I’ve been able to acquire all of his albums and then some. I do remember somehow finding out that there was this great book about Bob Scobey, the one I referenced written by Jan Scobey, but I tried to borrow it from my local library to no avail. I was trying to use an inter-library loan where another library that has it lends it out to our local library who lends it to me. I was told that it was a new book and couldn’t be used for inter-library loan. I found that odd because the book was published in 1976. My library did provide information about the publisher so I contacted them and they forwarded my request on to Jan Scobey. Eventually, I would buy the book from her but not before I sent her a letter about my interest in Bob Scobey and she sent me back the following postcard in September of 1995:
As I have mentioned, Jan Scobey’s book is a wonderful resource on the life of Bob Scobey with a full discography of albums. Here are some cover shots of all of the albums associated with Bob Scobey. Click on any of them for a larger view.
Some of these albums have been issued on CD. The Good Time Jazz issues such as Scobey & Clancy (L-12009), Bob Scobey & His Frisco Band With Clancy Hayes (L-12006),
Scobey Story, Vol. 1 and Vol. 2 (12032 & 12033), and Direct From San Francisco (12023) have each received a CD issue. The Yerba Buena Jazz Band records are also available on CD as is the Bunk & Lu album and the three Jansco issues of Scobey and His Frisco Band! and the two volumes of The Great Bob Scobey. Scobey & Clancy Raid the Juke Box and Bing with a Beat are available on CD as is the Claire Austin album “When Your Lover Has Gone.” None of the other RCA releases or the three Verve albums have been reissued on CD. Of course the Sesac release and the Kraft album, Jelly ‘N Jam and Jazz are still only vinyl releases and the early tracks of Bob Scobey as Alexander’s Jazz Band have only been compiled on LP.
So, where does this blahg go from here? I was thinking about that and thought I would concentrate on the rarities. The CD issues are excellent albums and worth tracking down or many can be found on YouTube. I’m going to put up some tracks from the rare to find albums and some comments of my own. Before I do that, I want to offer up a couple of scans from the 2000 issue of Jan Scobey’s Hot Jazz that I previewed earlier in this blahg. These two pages reference Jan Scobey’s great book but give some historical context and insight into the legend of Bob Scobey. Make sure you click on both images for larger readable scans.
Here’s a collage of the handmade CDs that I’m going to use for some samples
Some of the earliest recordings on which Bob Scobey performed were with the Yerba Buena Jazz Band. Here’s the very minor Wikipedia entry on the Yerba Buena Jazz Band:
Lu Watters & the Yerba Buena Jazz Band is the name of the Traditional Jazz revival band founded by Lu Watters. Notable members include singer and banjoist Clancy Hayes (from 1938 to 1940); clarinetist Bob Helm; trumpeter Bob Scobey; trombonist Turk Murphy; tubist/bassist Dick Lammi; and Watters himself.
I wanted to include some of the tracks from the homemade CDs but the volume on the Yerba Buena tracks is very low. Instead, I’ll post here a couple of YouTube videos of early Yerba Buena Jazz Band. First up is “High Society” that the group recorded on March 29, 1942. The ensemble consisted of Lu Watters – Coronet, Bob Scobey – Trumpet, Turk Murphy – Trombone, Ellis Horne – Clarinet, Wally Rose – Piano, Clancy Hayes and Russ Bennett on Banjos, Squire Girsback – Tuba, Bill Dart – Drums.
Here’s another Yerba Buena track with Bill Dart on drums, Bob Helm on Clarinet, Lu Watters and Bob Scobey on trumpets, Dick Lammi on Bass Guitar, Harry Mordecai on Banjo, Turk Murphy on Trombone and Wally Rose on Piano. This time it’s “Pastime Rag No. 5”:
For a while Bob Scobey appeared as a member of Turk Murphy’s Bay City Stompers with Turk Murphy on trombone, Bob Scobey on trumpet, Bob Helm on clarinet, Burt Bales on piano, and Harry Mordecai on banjo. In December 1947 the band recorded four songs that were issued on a pair of 78s on the Jazz Man label. Eventually Good Time Jazz put the four songs out on an EP (at left). The songs were “Shake That Thing”, “Brother Lowdown”, “Yellow Dog Blues”, and “Kansas City Man Blues”. From the December 1947 session, here are “Shake That Thing” and “Kansas City Man Blues”:
“Shake That Thing”:
“Kansas City Man Blues”:
Bob Scobey would play again with Turk Murphy’s Jazz Band in 1950 and all sides were issued on the Good Time Jazz label as Turk Murphy’s San Francisco Jazz. The entire album has also been released on CD. In addition to Turk Murphy, Bob Scobey, and Burt Bales, they were joined by Bill Napier on clarinet, Bill Newman on Banjo, Stan Ward on Drums and Squire Girsh on bass. Here’s a YouTube sample of the 1950 band on “Irish Black Bottom”:
I don’t really want to concentrate on the years Bob Scobey spent with the Yerba Buena Jazz Band or as a member of Turk Murphy’s Band because my fondness for his music comes from his fronting his own band. In 1948 Bob Scobey had a band called “Alexander’s Jazz Band” and he recorded a number of sides in 1947/1948 for the Trilon and Rag Time Records label. These have been compiled on a couple of LPs with the main one being the one below:
The line-up for the band consisted mainly of Bill Dart on drums, Bob Helm on Clarinet, Bob Scobey on trumpet, Squire Girsback on Bass, Harry Mordecai on Banjo, and Wally Rose on Piano. Here a couple of samples of the early Bob Scobey sound on “Alexander’s Ragtime Band” and “Doin’ The Grizzly Bear”:
“Alexander’s Ragtime Band” with vocal by Bob Scobey:
“Doin’ the Grizzly Bear”:
Now here are a couple of live tracks of “Alexanders’ Ragtime Band” when they appeared at the Oakland Public Library in 1947. These are from the handmade CDs and the sound quality is not perfect. The band consisted of Bob Scobey on trumpet, Jack Buck on trombone, Jack Crook on clarinet, Burt Bales on piano, and Pat Patton on bass and banjo. Here are “Blues My Naughty Sweetie Gives To Me” and “Tin Roof Blues”:
“Blues My Naughty Sweetie Gives To Me”
“Tin Roof Blues”
I really think that Bob Scobey started to have a great sound in the 1950s when he was recording for Good Time Jazz. Those are all officially licensed recordings and I want to steer clear of violating any copyrights so I’m going to post a few live tracks here from around that time as well as some alternate takes from released material that is not available on CD. Here’s one of the unissued tracks from a 1950 Good Time Jazz session. The band now consists of Bob Scobey on trumpet, Jack Buck on trombone, George Probert on clarinet, Wally Rose on piano, Dick Lammi on bass, Clancy Hayes on banjo, and Fred Higuera on drums. Here’s “Long Gone” with Clancy Hayes on vocal:
“Long Gone”:
Here’s a sample of the live ensemble in 1951 at Jenny Lind Hall in Oakland California. Bob Scobey, Jack Buck, Clancy Hayes, and Fred Higuera are still in the band but Darnell Howard is on clarinet, Burt Bales is on piano, and Squire Girsback is on the bass. Here’s “Panama” and “Clarinet Marmalade”:
“Panama”:
“Clarinet Marmalade”:
The sound quality on some of these old live recordings vary so I’m going to move onto some recorded material that is very rare and in much better shape. A real treat is up next. In October of 1953 Bob Scobey was fronting a band that appeared at the 1953 Dixieland Jubilee in Los Angeles. Bob Scobey was joined on stage by the late great Sidney Bechet. Four songs from that appearance have been issued on three different EPs from the United Kingdom, France, and Sweden.
I own the one on the top left. After I purchased it, I contacted Jan Scobey because it had not been included in her discography. I mailed her a scan of the cover. She later wrote back and said she had been aware of the session but had never seen the EP. The songs were “On The Sunny Side Of The Street”, “Muskrat Ramble”, “Saint Louis Blues”, and “Summer Time.” I could not find a lot of details on the members of Scobey’s band at the time other than Bob Scobey, Clancy Hayes was on banjo, Jack Buck on trombone, Bob Hotaling on drums, Burt Bales on piano, and Ellis Horne on clarinet. We are lucky that someone has created videos of the four songs from the Dixileand Jubilee using photos from that date.
“On The Sunny Side Of The Street”
“Muskrat Ramble”:
“Saint Louis Blues”:
“Summer Time”:
I hadn’t listened to the Scobey/Bechet tracks in a while but last night when I heard “Summertime” again, I said out loud “It Doesn’t Get Better Than That!”
In 1957 Bob Scobey started recording for Verve. The three albums he produced for Verve were “Bob Scobey’s Band”, “The San Francisco Jazz of Bob Scobey”, and “Bourbon Street.” The ensemble changed a bit from album to album.
—“Bourbon Street” was Bob Scobey, Ralph Sutton on piano, Clancy Hayes on guitar and banjo, Bob Short on bass and tuba, and Fred Higuerea on drums. Jack Buck on trombone on some tracks and Bill Napier on clarinet. Vocals by Lizzie Miles
—“The San Francisco Jazz of Bob Scobey” was Bob Scobey, Clancy Hayes, Jesse “Tiny” Crump on piano, Bill Napier on clarinet, Jack Buck on trombone, Fred Higuera on drums, and Hal McCormick on bass
—“Bob Scobey’s Band” was Jack Buck, Will Sudmeirer & Jack Sudmeier on trombones, Frank Snow & Bob Scobey on trumpets, Bill Napier & Leon Ratsliff on clarinet, Jess “Tiny Crump on piano, Fred Higuera on drums, and Hal McCormick on bass, Bob Short on tuba, and Clancy Hayes on banjo, guitar, and vocals.
None of these records, to my knowledge have had CD releases. From “Bourbon Street” here are “On Revival Day” and “Deep Henderson” (not named after me):
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“On Revival Day”:
“Deep Henderson”:
From “The San Francisco Jazz of Bob Scobey” here are “Copenhagen” and “Getting My Boots” with a great Clancy Hayes vocal.
“Copenhagen”:
“Getting My Boots”:
The last of the Verve albums to present here is “Bob Scobey’s Band.” I’m not sure of the order in which the three Verve albums were released but I think the sound of the band is phenomenal on the Verve albums and really needs to rediscovered with CD pressings. From the album “Bob Scobey’s Band” here are “Dardanella” and a fantastic version of “Stardust” featuring Bob Scobey’s horn. I’m also going to throw in “Stars Fell On Alabama” because of Clancy Hayes’ vocal.
“Dardanella”:
“Stardust”:
“Stars Fell On Alabama”:
In 1955 Bob Scobey backed the vocalist Claire Austin on her album “When Your Lover Has Gone. The band included modern jazzmen Barney Kessel on guitar and Shelly Manne on drums, as well as studio/Dixieland musicians Stan Wrightsman on piano and Morty Corb on bass. It’s hard to listen for Bob Scobey on this album because Claire Austin’s vocals are so lush and draw your attention. Bob does have a nice solo though on “I’ll Never Be The Same” and the title track “When Your Lover Has Gone”. Both are very haunting.
Moving on to the RCA albums, which I mentioned have never had CD releases except “Bing With A Beat”, it’s a shame that there have been no CD releases of the other five albums. The remaining RCA releases are “Beauty And The Beat”(1957), “Between 18th And 19th On Any Street” (1957), “College Classics” (1958), “Something’s Always Happening On The River” (1959), and “Rompin’ And Stompin'” (1960). I really like these albums and Bob Scobey and Clancy Hayes are sensational together. I’ll present some songs from all five albums but I encourage anyone to track down the original vinyl releases.
First up is “Beauty And The Beat.” The band on this album is Bob Scobey and Mannie Klein on trumpets, Clancy Hayes on banjo and vocals, Abe Lincoln, Warren Smith, Elmer Schneider, Jack Buck on trombones, Matty Matlock, Bill Napier, and Wayne Songer on clarinet, Ralph Sutton on piano, Phil Stephens on bass, Bob Short on tuba, and Freddie Higuera on drums. Here are “Miss Annabelle Lee” and “Lulu’s Back in Town”:
“Miss Annabelle Lee”:
“Lulu’s Back in Town”:
“Swingin’ On The Golden Gate” was the second album released by Bob Scobey on RCA in 1957 . The band here is Bob Scobey and Dick Cathcart on trumpets, Matty Matlock on clarinet, Abe Lincoln, Warren Smith, and Jack Buck on trombones, Ralph Sutton on piano, Red Callender on bass, Bob Short on tuba, Sammy Goldstein on drums, and Clancy Hayes on gutiar, banjo and vocals. Again, another great RCA album and here are “New Orleans” with that great Scobey trumpet and “Let’s Dance The Ragtime, Darlin'” with Clancy’s great vocal:
“New Orleans”:
“Let’s Dance The Ragtime, Darlin’ “:
Next is an album that has a bit of a mystery to it. The album is “Between 18th And 19th On Any Street” released in 1958. The first time I came across this album was an EP (4 song 45rpm) that I picked up in the late 90s or early 2000s at a record store in Toronto. Here’s what the cover to that EP looks like:
Note the 4 tracks listed on the front cover. When I finally tracked down a copy of the full album, the song “My Bucket’s Got A Hole In It” was not on the album. I eventually bought another copy and the song was missing from that copy as well. I wrote to Jan Scobey about it because in her book, the discography mentions the full album but does not list “My Bucket’s Got A Hole In It.” She replied to me saying that she was unaware that this extra song existed and all copies of the album that she had seen did not list the song. I eventually discovered that there were Stereo and Mono issues of the album and “My Bucket’s Got A Hole In It” is missing on all Stereo issues. I guess my EP was a mono release because the song is there but my two LP copies are both Stereo issues. So, the song “My Bucket’s Got A Hole In It” is a bit of a rarity so I’ll present it here along with “Bob’s Blues”. The band on this album is Bob Scobey on trumpet, Jack Buck and Doug Skinner on trombones, Pete Dovidio on clarinet, Clyde Pound on piano, Tom Beeson on bass, Dave Black on drums, and Clancy Hayes with banjo and vocals.
“My Bucket’s Got A Hole In It”:
“Bob’s Blues”:
The next 1958 release for Bob Scobey was “College Classics.” The album is reminiscent of 1920s college tunes at a tavern or sung by a college vocal group. The band consisted of the same musicians that appeared on “Between 18th And 19th On Any Street,” Bob Scobey on trumpet, Jack Buck and Doug Skinner on trombones, Pete Dovidio on clarinet, Clyde Pound on piano, Tom Beeson on bass, Dave Black on drums, and Clancy Hayes with banjo and vocals. Here are “I’ve Been Floating Down The Old Green River” and “Shine On Harvest Moon” with nice vocals by Clancy Hayes:
“I’ve Been Floating Down The Old Green River”:
“Shine On Harvest Moon”
The last 1958 album for Bob Scobey on RCA was “Something’s Always Happening On The River.” Bob Scobey is back of course on trumpet as well as Clancy Hayes on banjo and vocals. This time they’re joined by Rich Matteson on tuba and bass trumpet, George Duvivier on bass, Jim Beebe on trombone, Gene Schroeder on piano, Brian Shanely on clarinet, Dave Black on drums, and Toni Lee Scott along with Bob Scobey on other vocals. I really like the title track “Something’s Always Happening On The River” so I’m going to offer up that as well as “Alexander’s Ragtime Band” which features vocals by Clancy Hayes, Toni Lee Scott, and Bob Scobey.
“Something’s Always Happening On The River”:
“Alexander’s Ragtime Band”:
The last RCA album was released in 1960 and was Jan Scobey’s favorite of the RCA albums. The album is “Rompin’ And Stompin’ ” and here’s what Jan Scobey had to say about it in her book:
“It features a wide library of ‘Jelly Roll Morton’ tunes, all fine classics of Dixieland Jazz. There are tremendous intricacies in the solo playing; as well as an outstanding ensemble performance. RCA has discontinued issuing this album. Sometimes they are available through jazz societies or record collectors. Perhaps with enough requests RCA may find it lucrative to re-issue.”
Yeah, RCA, why don’t you reissue it or better yet put out a box set of CDs of all of Bob Scobey’s records? The final RCA band was Bob Scobey, Rich Matteson on tuba, Brian Shanely on clarinet, Jim Beebe on trombone, Art Hodes on piano, Dave Black on drums, and Clancy Hayes on banjo and vocals. Here are “Kansas City Stomp” and “Fidgety Feet”:
“Kansas City Stomp”:
“Fidgety Feet”:
Before I move on to some other rare material, it would be a shame not mention another 1958 release but on the California Records label. The album was “Scobey & Clancy Raid The Juke Box.” It was an attempt to have Bob Scobey record some more contemporary, for the time, songs. Not all of the songs worked for Scobey and Clancy but there are a couple that I really enjoy. Here are the track listings:
Bye Bye Love
Singing the Blues
Yellow Dog Blues
Tammy
Round and Round
All Shook Up
Love Letters in the Sand
Marianne
C. C. Rider
So Rare
Blueberry Hill
Don’t Forbid Me
The band has some familiar player other than Bob Scobey and Clancy Hayes. Pud Brown is on clarinet, Jack Buck and Doug Skinner on trombones, Stan Wrightsman on piano, Bob Short on string bass and tuba, and Dave Black on drums. My favorite instrumental on this album is “Tammy.” Many may be familiar with Debbie Reynolds’ version on record and from the film. This time it’s Bob Scobey’s horn and the rest of the band joining in on their version of “Tammy.” I’ll have to rely on a YouTube link because this album has been issued on CD.
As for Clancy Hayes’ vocals on this album, I don’t think the contemporary songs of that time suited him. There is of course one exception for me and that’s Clancy’s version of “Round and Round.” This was a hit for Perry Como but I think Clancy does an excellent job with the vocals and the band does well backing him.
Keeping with 1960, when Bob Scobey’s last RCA album “Rompin’ And Stompin’ ” was released, I’m going to move on to the two rare albums that were released that year and were not distributed to the public at large. The first of these albums contains recordings that Bob Scobey did for Sesac in 1960. The album is “Bob Scobey and His Frisco Jazz Band Featuring Clancy Hayes.” Here is what Jan Scobey had to say about the Sesac recordings in her book:
“At a new high-water mark in Bob’s career, Sesac recorded Scobey’s band. In the recording industry they provided piped-in music for shopping centers, office buildings, dental offices, and everywhere that continuous, canned ‘musak’ is needed
Scobey’s recordings for the Sesac Transcribed Library (about 12 were issued) are rare since these selections were never recorded on any other label available to the buying public. Fortunately, every so often, on a jet over Kansas, leaning back in a barber’s chair, or having your teeth drilled at the dentist’s, you will suddenly, out of the blue, hear the Happy Sounds of Scobey’s dixieland music–‘Memories of Bunk’ or ‘Sudan’!”
The band on the Sesac recordings consisted of Bob Scobey on trumpet, Doug Skinner & Ralph Hutchinson on trombones, Jack McConnell on clarinet, Floyd Bean on piano, Clancy Hayes banjo and vocal, Bob Short on tuba and bass, and Dave Black on drums. From the Sesac album here are the two songs that Jan Scobey mentioned, “Memories of Bunk” and “Sudan”:
“Memories of Bunk”:
“Sudan”:
After I had purchased the 12″ Sesac record I later discovered that Sesac had issued a couple of EPs:
The one above on the left is “Frisco Jazz in Hi-FI” and contains 4 songs from the full album, “Frisco Jazz Parade”, “Too Much Mustard”, “Bourbon Street”, and “Sudan”. The second EP, “Shades of Blue” only contains the song “Hobo Blues.” I bought them from an ex-disc-jockey. They had been sent to the radio station where he worked and were tossed out so he fished them out of the garbage. Imagine, throwing out Bob Scobey! There was even one more Sesac EP released, that I later purchased on Ebay, that contained the song “My Heart’s In Dixie” by Bob Scobey. The EP was “Did You Say Dixie.” The front and back covers are below, followed by the song “My Heart’s In Dixie”:
“My Heart’s In Dixie”:
Until recently, in fact as of the writing of this blahg, I thought the 12 songs on the 12 inch Sesac record were all there were from the Sesac sessions. I discovered today that Sesac also issued a transcription record that contained some of the recordings from the 12 inch record and four additional songs. Here are images of the transcription record:
The four additional songs are “Southern Comfort”, “Clarinet Capers”, “While You Were Far Away”, “Along The Wabash” and here they are:
“Southern Comfort”:
“Clarinet Capers”:
“While You Were Far Away”:
“Along The Wabash”:
Now, I’ll move on to one of the last extremely rare albums also recorded and released in 1960. This wasn’t a record you could hear in an elevator or at the Dentist. This was a promotional record for Kraft Foods. Jan Scobey included it in her discography but provided no other details other than listing the musicians and the songs. The album is “Jelly ‘N’ Jam And All That Jazz.’ On side one of the record, Kraft’s spokesmen Perry Como and Ed Herlihy talk about what’s in store for advertising and sales promotion for Kraft Jellies and Preserves for the coming year. The second side is all Bob Scobey with Dave Black on drums, Buddy Lee on banjo, Tommy Smoot on piano, Connie Milano on bass, Bill Hanck on trombone, and Bill Napier on clarinet. The songs are “When The Saints Go Marching In” “Under The Double Eagle”, “Maple Leaf Rag”, “Georgia Camp Meeting” and “Peshtigo Court Stomp.” Here’s a scan of the information on the back cover. Click on the image to read from a larger version.
It would be a shame not to offer up all five songs from this album so here they are:
“When The Saints Go Marching In”:
“Under The Double Eagle”:
“Maple Leaf Rag”:
“Georgia Camp Meeting”:
“Peshtigo Court Stomp”:
You may have noticed that by the time of the Kraft album, Clancy Hayes was no longer performing with Bob Scobey. This was a shame because the Bob Scobey and Clancy Hayes sound fit well together. To explain what happened, we have to back up a little in 1960 to before the Kraft LP. From Jan Scobey’s book she cites the following:
“Bob decided early in his career to handle his own bookings because of mishaps with agents, in the past. Bob sold his band to the Marlboro cigarette people for a television commercial. His band was featured and the commercial was televised all over the world.”
At the time of the Marlboro cigarette commercial both Clancy Hayes and Toni Lee Scott were still performing with Bob Scobey. I am not sure if Toni Lee Scott is still alive, I think she is, but she has a YouTube page at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC4ESSEnQhcpZF8BrP0mrbBg where she hosts some videos of her performing and in 2017 she posted the Marlboro advertisement with herself, Clancy Hayes, and Bob Scobey and his band:
So why did Toni Lee Scott and Clancy Hayes part company with Bob Scobey? According to Jan Scobey’s book, Bob Scobey received more money for doing the commercial than the other performers. Jan argued that there was nothing shady about the deal but because it was Bob’s band and he did all of the organization and booking and performed then he was entitled to a larger share. Other members of the band disagreed and would eventually leave the band. Unfortunately, that was the end of the band that once featured Clancy Hayes and Toni Lee Scott.
While I’m on the subject of Bob Scobey on film or video, there exists other footage of Bob Scobey and his Band. Bob Scobey appeared on the “Playboy Penthouse” program in 1959/1960 and there are a couple of wonderful photos of Bob, Clancy, and the band appearing on the program:
Apparently Bob Scobey and his Frisco Jazz Band played “The Colonel Bogey March” and “The Black Bottom Stomp” and Clancy Hayes joined them and sang “Travellin’ Shoes” and “Ace in the Hole.” Unfortunately the video is not available to view.
There exists other footage of Bob Scobey and his 1961 band that is available to view. Bob and the band can be viewed performing at a party scene in the film “Living Venus”. The description of the film is that “Man and his partner, a photographer, start up a men’s magazine called “Pagan.” The magazine becomes a success, he leaves his fiancee, marries his star model, and complications ensue.” The first song that the band performs is appropriately titled “Pagan Party”:
The second video from the film is the title song “Living Venus”:
I’m not sure of the other musicians who performed with Bob Scobey in “Living Venus.” It might have been the same crew that appeared on the Kraft album. It may be the same band members that appeared on his last album he ever recorded.
In 1960 there would be one more album from Bob Scobey and his band. The album was “Scobey And His Frisco Band!” The album was recorded in 1960 and was issued on the Ragtime Label. Jan Scobey purchased it outright from Bob Scobey’s estate and the label changed to Jansco Records. The full album has not had a CD release but all the tracks were bonuses split over the two CDs of “The Great Bob Scobey and His Frisco Band, Volume 1 and Volume 2. Jan Scobey rated this as her favorite album. “This album is an instrumental. The sounds cover a wide range of feeling; from Misty, a mood tune, to the rip-roaring excitement of Bourbon St. Parade! I believe it successfully captures the entire range of Bob Scobey’s musical skills and types of playing.” Turning back to YouTube, here are the two songs that Jan mentions, “Misty” and “Bourbon St. Parade.” This was the last recorded album of Bob Scobey, although I don’t know if it follows or precedes the Kraft album, and the band features Bob Scobey on trumpet, Richard Nelson on trombone, Bill Napier on clarinet, Tommy Smoot on piano, Buddy Lee on banjo, Dickie Phillips on electric bass, and Dave Black on drums.
“Misty”:
“Bourbon St. Parade”:
Unfortunately, all great things come to an end. Bob Scobey would survive the breakup of his band after the Marlboro commercial arguments and would go on to form a new band. We have seen videos of that new band in “Living Venus” and heard them on the Kraft album and the last recorded album “Scobey and His Frisco band!” What Bob Scobey could not survive was cancer. He was in Montreal to try a new experimental drug when his heart gave out in the wee small hours of June 12, 1963. From 1961 to 1963 he continued to perform and even toured Europe in 1962. I have another postcard in my collection which I keep inside my copy of Jan Scobey’s book. Before I display it, I want to explain that Bob Scobey opened a club in Chicago in 1961 called “Bourbon Street”. It was to be a base of operation when he was not out on the road. Other bands would perform there when Bob Scobey was touring. In fact, when he toured Europe in 1962, Kenny Ball and his band subbed for Scobey. When Bob Scobey returned from his European tour he sent out postcards to fans about his return to Bourbon Street. My postcard is one of those he sent out to a fan in Canada:
I believe that is Bob Scobey’s signature on this July 19th, 1962 postcard. It is sad to think that he would be dead less than a year later.
I don’t want to end this blahg on doom and gloom. For me, it’s all about the music. The Bob Scobey sound with Clancy Hayes is so special and even the later bands without Clancy had an awesome sound. For me, it started with that “B” side of that Bing Crosby album that would lead me to a pursuit of Bob Scobey. The first song I offered up in this blahg was the version of “Mack The Knife” that Bob Scobey did with Bing Crosby. I’m going to end this blahg with a different version of “Mack The Knife” with Clancy Hayes on vocal. Jan Scobey, on her Jansco label would also issue two volume LPs called “The Great Bob Scobey.” These were recorded in 1956 at The Jenny Lind Hall in Oakland, California. This was the earlier band of Bob Scobey and Clancy Hayes with Bill Napier on clarinet, Jack Buck on trombone, Jesse “Tiny” Crump and Ralph Sutton on piano, Bob Short on tuba, Hal McCormack on bass, Freddie Higuera on drums, and other vocals by Lizzie Miles. From Volume 2 here is “Mack The Knife”:
By the way, the correct answer to “What On Earth Is Scobeyfan” should always be “I AM!”
It’s been three weeks since that little poke in the arm laid me out flat. You can read more about all of that in my previous blahg ASTRAZENECA VACCINE — MY CAUTIONARY TALE. I don’t want to revisit that but now that they’ve halted AstraZeneca, I’m not sure what will be my second dose. Hopefully, whatever it is, it won’t make me ill. I’m moving on.
Recently, I was contacted by a fellow Canadian, currently in England, who had read my AstraZeneca blahg as well as a previous blahg that I wrote in October of 2011 about Frank Sinatra at the Canadian National Exhibition (CNE) in September of 1984. That previous blahg was SINATRA ALMOST GOT ME KILLED and you’ll really have to read that blahg in order to understand the title. The blahg was more about my experience with the concert and not Sinatra’s or Toronto’s experience. My Canadian colleague was doing some research on that concert and had emailed me about some articles from that time period. In responding, I realized there was really more of a back-story to the 1984 concert that had to be taken into consideration. So, I’ve decided that this blahg will be the chance to provide more insight into the 1984 concert and why Sinatra was behind the eight-ball before he even appeared on stage.
In the email, explaining about the back-story, I had only backed up to 1983 and explained some of the events leading up to the 1984 concert. To be fair, I need to back up as far as 1949 so I can provide true context. A quick note about 1940 and 1941 would provide even more insight. This is all about Sinatra in Toronto and his first appearance with the Tommy Dorsey Orchestra was at the CNE in September of 1940. The band would play from September 4th-7th, 1940. Sinatra would not receive credit in any of the news clippings during his appearance at the CNE. Here’s one of the ads that ran in the Toronto Star on September 5, 1940. You can click on the advertisement to view a larger image.
A rare 15 minute radio transcription of Sinatra and Dorsey’s performance from September 5th, 1940, the same day as the above advertisement, has recently surfaced. Give it a listen:
The Tommy Dorsey Orchestra with Sinatra would return to the CNE again in August of 1941. That year, it was only for two days on August 22nd and 23rd, 1941. Again, Sinatra’s name would not appear in local media advertisements. The following ad appeared in the Globe and Mail, Toronto, August 21st, 1941.
By September of 1942, September 3rd, 1942 being his last day, Sinatra had left Dorsey and the band did not play the CNE in Toronto that year. Dorsey and Sinatra would only make one Canadian stop in 1942 and that was on May 6th at the Forum in Montreal.
Are you still wondering about 1949? Wait no longer. The explanation is that Sinatra’s first appearance as solo vocalist in Toronto was at the Mutual Arena on August 7th and 8th, 1949. It had been eight years since his last visit to Toronto at the CNE in August of 1941. Finally, Sinatra would make a two evening performance in the city.
Reviews for Sinatra at the Mutual Arena were good.
One article even mentioned Sinatra’s previous Toronto appearance with Dorsey in 1941:
Sinatra even got his picture in the Globe and Mail newspaper on July 8th, 1949 noting how he flew in to a local airport and was met by fans and still how it had been eight years since he was last in Toronto.
And you’re probably still asking, “what’s the significance about 1949?” Well, I’ll tell you. After the 1949 concert, Sinatra would not return to Toronto until 1975. Yes, 26 years would pass before Sinatra would perform again in Toronto. During those 26 years Sinatra had appeared from February 6th to 15th, 1953 at the Chez Paree in Montreal and gave two concerts at the Vancouver Forum in Vancouver on June 8th, 1957. The 1957 Vancouver concert would be issued on CD on the Acrobat label in 2010, mistaking the venue as the Orpheum, and is a splendid example of the 1950s swinging Sinatra. Toronto missed out on the swinging 1950s Sinatra and the 1960s Summit Sinatra with pals Dean Martin, Sammy Davis Jr., Peter Lawford, and Joey Bishop. When Sinatra retired in 1971, it probably left Sinatra fans thinking they would never see the great singer perform in their city again. It would be a new generation or maybe the old generation waiting for him to come back.
Jump to 1975 and on January 28th, the Toronto Star runs a two part article announcing Sinatra’s return to Toronto on May 10th. The first part would mention Sinatra’s 25 year absence from Toronto. The second part of the article would talk about the absence and some animosity towards Sinatra.
The Toronto Star ran a full-page spread on Sinatra on May 5th, 1975 and provided some details about the previous 1949 appearance in Toronto. You could tell by the article that some excitement was building regarding his appearance and that it was in part due to his long absence from the city.
The stage was set for an exciting evening.
So what went wrong? It started with an editorial by Gary Lautens in the Toronto Star on February 25th, 1975; less than a month after it had been announced that Sinatra would appear at Maple Leaf Gardens in May.
Mr. Lautens wanted to dig up the whole issue Sinatra had had with the press in the past.
Then there was the issue with tickets. Before tickets went on sale, most of the top seats were already gone:
But that issue was quickly solved by Sinatra agreeing to add another show on May 10th.
Of course there was that “50-cent service charge” added to tickets that made some people angry. It was the issues of service charges and ticket scarcity that made some angry but the press wasn’t finished with Mr. Sinatra.
On the day of the concert, May 10, 1975, an incident of violence was reported in The Toronto Star:
This was the type of press Sinatra didn’t need. Gary Lautens had already taken on Sinatra about violence towards reporters and now it was being alleged that Sinatra’s bodyguards were attacking media persons. So what was Sinatra to do? Well, he gave his concert that people paid to see and hear but he also took the opportunity to call out the media and suggest that the punching incident never happened.
The Canadian Press wire service even picked up the thread and published a picture and article of Sinatra holding a copy of the Toronto Star before ripping it up to cheers from the audience.
Of course, the media took shots at Sinatra as well in their reviews of the two concerts. The Globe and Mail said Sinatra was a “vocal has-been” but acknowledged that he still held sway with his fans:
Two days later, on May 12th, 1975 the Globe and Mail acknowledged even more so that Sinatra was no “has-been” to his fans:
On May 12th, the Toronto Star also finally got around to covering Sinatra’s appearance by publishing a full page with three articles and photos. The articles covered everything from the fan adoration, the press thinking Sinatra’s performance was lacking, and that punch or no punch incident.
Frank Sinatra would return to Toronto later in 1975 to perform at the CNE on August 21st. Just a few months after the May concert and none of the articles make reference to any of the issues that occurred while Sinatra had appeared at Maple Leaf Gardens.
There was no mention of the earlier 1975 concerts or the problems associated with Sinatra’s appearance at Maple Leaf Gardens. This was the first time that Sinatra had appeared at the CNE since his 1941 performances with the Tommy Dorsey Orchestra. Even the reviews of Sinatra at the CNE in 1975 were better. The Toronto Star said this was the concert he should have performed at the Gardens earlier that year.
The Globe and Mail also praised Sinatra at the CNE:
Definitely, the CNE was a better venue for Sinatra in 1975.
Sinatra came back again to Maple Leaf Gardens on May 1st of 1976 with very little fanfare.
Reviews were mixed again for his 1976 engagement at Maple Leaf Gardens.
Notice that The Star felt Sinatra had given a better performance at the CNE the previous year. The CNE Grandstand was an open-air venue where the Gardens had been closed in. Was that the secret of his success? The Globe and Mail gave a similar review:
So now we get to what went wrong with the 1984 CNE concert. Sinatra had performed well and the reviews were good for his August 1975 concert at the CNE compared to the ones he performed at Maple Leaf Gardens. But 1984 is a considerable time after 1975 and 1976. Again, people were starting to wonder if Sinatra was ever coming back to Toronto. The rumour of his return started again in 1983 and concluded with a scheduled date in 1983. On June 3rd, 1983, Peter Goddard with the Toronto Star reported on rumours of Sinatra appearing at the CNE in 1983 although Sinatra’s office denied any plans of Sinatra returning to the CNE that year:
By June 30th, 1983, both the Toronto Star and the Globe and Mail reported that Sinatra was indeed appearing at the CNE in 1983 and the date had been set for August 27th:
On August 5th, however, it was announced that Sinatra had to cancel, or postpone, his performance at the CNE that year.
To be fair, Sinatra did not have another gig on August 27th of 1983. Sinatra’s last summer performance was at the Universal Amphitheatre on June 19, 1983 and he would not perform again until September 20th at the Waldorf Astoria in New York. There was one exception and that was August 5th at the Sporting Club in Monte-Carlo, Monaco which was a benefit for the Red Cross and he performed with his pal, Sammy Davis Jr.
I have yet to find any other reason for Sinatra’s cancellation of the 1983 CNE appearance but his cancellation started to raise a furor in Toronto.
The first suggestion of any backlash over the cancellation of the 1983 concert started with an article in the Toronto Star on August 11th, 1983.
Bob Yuill the North York Controller was the one spouting off. Remember the name Bob Yuill because his voice will be heard again in 1984 when Sinatra returned again to the CNE. It should be noted that not everyone associated with the CNE was as angry as Bob Yuill. David Garrick, with the CNE Entertainment Committee, and the person who was responsible for booking Sinatra at the CNE in 1975, wrote a letter to the Toronto Star disagreeing with Bob Yuill’s position.
Garrick’s rebuttal of Yuill seemed to quiet things down because there was no further mention of Sinatra or even a Sinatra ban during the rest of 1983.
In April of 1984 the first rumour started that the CNE was looking to have Sinatra back in 1984. On April 11th, 1984 Sinatra’s name appeared briefly in a Toronto Star article reporting on possible acts for the 1984 CNE:
On July 18, 1984, the Toronto Star announced Sinatra’s appearance at the CNE that year to be official. The date was set for a September 2nd concert by Sinatra but the Toronto Star still had to drag out some of the press issues Sinatra had prior to the 1975 concert at Maple Leaf Gardens:
Ticket prices were much higher for Sinatra in 1984 with the top seats going for $75 compared to the top price of $25 when he last appeared in Toronto at Maple Leaf Gardens in 1976. Notice as well that Bob Yuill’s name popped again with Yuill doubting that Sinatra would follow through with his September concert. He was even waging money that Sinatra would not appear. The Toronto Star followed up with another article on July 19th dedicated to Yuill’s skepticism toward Sinatra’s concert at the CNE:
The wagering of money offered by Yuill was taken up by someone two days later as noted in an article in the Toronto Star on July 20th, 1984
This time, Frank Sinatra’s defender was Bill Ballard who was head of the Concert Productions International who had booked Sinatra into the CNE for 1984. Bill Ballard was also the son of Harold Ballard who was instrumental in booking Sinatra into Maple Leaf Gardens in 1975. Even fans came to Sinatra’s defence and asked that things be left to the past. The following letter to the Editor of the Toronto Star appeared on July 27th, 1984:
Tickets finally went on sale on on July 30th, 1984:
In my previous blahg about the 1984 concert, SINATRA ALMOST GOT ME KILLED, I detailed my ordeal to secure tickets to this concert. It’s a fun read and since I’ve mentioned that blahg and linked to it twice in this blahg, then you really should check it out. Despite my own issue with trying to obtain a ticket to the concert, the issues that plagued fans at previous concerts didn’t seem to occur in 1984. One fan was happy he only had to wait 4.5 hours to get his ticket. This article comes from the August 3rd, 1984 edition of the Toronto Star:
The remaining articles leading up to Sinatra’s appearance were relegated to advertisements and nothing critical from Bob Yuill nor anything more about his possible wager with Bill Ballard.
I don’t think I’ll detail much more than I’ve said about the actual concert. If you haven’t checked out my previous blahg, SINATRA ALMOST GOT ME KILLED, now plugging it for a third time, then I’ll re-post what I said then about the concert:
The concert was great despite what you can read in the reviews. Here was Sinatra, in the pouring rain, no protection, with lightning flashing all around, and him just singing as if this was all commonplace to him. I kept thinking “my god, he’s standing in a puddle, it’s pissing down rain, and he’s holding a metal stand, he’s going to get electrocuted.” If there’s anything to the old adage that the show must go on, Sinatra lived by it. It was as if nothing phased him. He sang some of the songs from his new album, “L.A. Is My Lady” and thrilled the audience with some great standards. I think the greatest thrills were when he sang songs that mentioned the rain. When he sang “Come Rain or Come Shine” and “Pennies From Heaven” with the opening line, ‘Every time it rains, it rains, pennies from heaven’, more cheers went up from the crowd than when he belted out “New York, New York.” The only thing that would have made it perfect was if he had performed “September in the Rain” or “Stormy Weather.”
The whole concert only lasted 46 minutes. Sinatra left the stage and within a minute, you could see his limo, followed by a police car, driving off to drier parts unknown. Many people were upset about the shortness of the concert but not me. I had almost died and I had gotten soaked by rain but those were the only downsides. In the plus column, I had lived, I had made it to the concert, I had sat beside a beautiful girl, and I had seen and heard Sinatra live in concert. I had no complaints.
I still don’t think I could have summed it up better than that. I mentioned that opening line of “Pennies From Heaven” and this is what it sounded like almost 37 years ago. This is actually Sinatra singing “Pennies From Heaven” at the CNE on September 2nd, 1984:
If you thought the storm on the night of the concert was bad enough, the storm of bad press that followed the concert took everything to the next level. The review from the Toronto Star on September 3rd, 1984 tried to be kind but hinted at the anger towards Sinatra:
The Toronto Star also devoted their front page of the September 3rd edition to the problems associated with the shortened concert and how fans felt:
The Globe & Mail’s coverage was very much like the Toronto Star’s leaning on the disappointment of the fans:
Notice that in the Globe & Mail article from September 3rd, that the North York Controller is mentioned but this time it’s Esther Shiner. Was there more than one North York Controller? The Globe & Mail at least published a defence of Sinatra by the CNE in the September 4th edition:
Risking his life in a thunderstorm by holding a microphone? Didn’t I say that? Of course the Globe & Mail had to add their two cents worth about that issue in the September 5th issue:
The United Press article from September 8th, 1984 was even less kind:
The Toronto Star, meanwhile, published an article on September 4th that highlighted the blame game of who was not taking responsibility for the problems with the concert, putting some of the blame on Sinatra, and even invoked Bob Yuill’s name again:
And what of Bob Yuill? He obviously lost his bet that Sinatra would not appear. In the same September 4th edition of the Toronto Star, Bob Yuill is heard from again and this time he’s proposing another ban on Sinatra:
Of course Bob Yuill did not get his ban. Personally, I can understand the anger of some fans but Bob Yuill had complimentary tickets so what did he have to complain about? Me? I was one fan who was happy. But what did other fans think of the concert? Here are some the letters to the Editor of the Toronto Star:
For the record, I think Roger Wyatt is mostly correct. In 1975 Sinatra was heralded for his appearance at the CNE but it didn’t rain then. If Sinatra had appeared indoors, maybe not Maple Leaf Gardens, then the story would have been quite different. Other fans continued to support Sinatra:
The question about whether Sinatra would be invited back or if Bob Yuill would have his way was finally answered in a Globe & Mail article on November 22, 1984:
There was one more article that dealt with some disgruntled fans who had organized a rally to try and get refunds. The following article from the Globe & Mail on September 24th sums up how that fizzled out:
So what have we learned from all of this? Toronto had a love/hate relationship with Sinatra. Certainly the press never made it easy for him. His long absence from Toronto between 1949 and 1975 was one strike against him. The attacks from the media because of Sinatra’s own love/hate relationship with the press was another strike. You’d think issues with ticket sales and venues would have been the third or more strikes against him. But this is Sinatra. He might have received three strikes but he never struck out. Would you have called out on Sinatra? The die-hard fans never did and to most he put on great shows. And he kept coming back.
Sinatra would return to Toronto again in 1989 with Liza Minnelli at the then Sky Dome and again in 1991 with Steve and Eydie at Maple Leaf Gardens. I’ve detailed about those in another blahg SINATRA:TORONTO, ROUND 2 or “DO YOU WANT FRIES WITH THAT?” so you can check that out and read also about his last Canadian concert in Hamilton in 1993. I’m lucky to have seen Sinatra three times in Toronto in 1984, 1989, and 1991. I also attended that Hamilton concert in 1993 and have copies of fan recorded versions of those concerts so I can relive the memories.
I started out once to detail information about all of Sinatra’s appearances in Canada and even finished part one. The first part provides information, clippings, and reviews starting with his very first appearance as part of “The Hoboken Four” with the Major Bowes touring group at the Capitol Theatre, Victoria, B.C., November 6th and 7th, 1935 and concluding with the famous June 8th, 1957 concert at the Vancouver Coliseum. The file also includes artwork for posters for concerts that were cancelled as well as extensive information on Sinatra’s USO tour with Phil Silvers when they spent ten days touring military bases throughout Newfoundland in May and June of 1945. I’m going to post the link here for the PDF of part one but in doing so, I noticed that I must have included some material for what would have been part two. The current file actually starts with the Victoria 1935 appearances and ends with his appearance at The Forum, Montreal, Quebec, May 9th, 1975. The link to read or download is http://falseducks.com/theblahg/images/SinatraInCanada(2021).pdf. Maybe I’ll get motivated and eventually finish part two which includes not only the Montreal Forum concert in 1975 and all of the Toronto concerts I’ve mentioned in this blahg but also other concerts in Montreal as well as Vancouver, Calgary, Hamilton, and a cancelled concert in Edmonton from 1991.
I hope you enjoyed the story behind the 1984 ill-fated CNE concert. Me, I think it was fine. I paid for my ticket and had nothing to complain about. I think Sinatra showed great class in going on that night. I wonder if Bob Yuill would have been happier if Sinatra had cancelled or if Mr Yuill would have been outraged by the cancellation. I don’t think Sinatra could have won either way. The real fans support his memory and I’ve said it before, “It’s Sinatra’s World, We Just Live In It.”
Here it is mid-may and I have a tale for you. I haven’t spoken much about Covid 19 and the vaccines but I finally have something to say. First let me say that I am pro-vaccine and I certainly encourage everyone to get whatever vaccine they can get. I’m not anti-mask or anti-vaccine and I believe we should all follow all of the safety precautions and do our social distancing and not gather when it’s not safe to do so. This isn’t rocket science folks. Do the right thing! Moving on.
I have been trying to get a vaccine for more than a month now. I live in a rural area but I’m very close to a populated city, Belleville, Ontario and I even work in Belleville. I’m 58 and I’ve been on numerous wait-lists and have signed up through our Health Unit and on a local pharmacy’s website. I was casting my lines but getting no nibbles. On April 27th, I happened to stop into one of the Shopper’s Drug Mart on my way to work to purchase stamps when I thought to stop by the pharmacy section to ask about the vaccine. It was just before 10am and they hadn’t started giving out their daily doses so they asked me if I wanted one then and there. Of course I jumped at it and even convinced them to schedule my wife for later that date. I was just in the right place at the right time.
I was informed that it was the AstraZeneca vaccine but I didn’t care. I know there’s been some people who have died of rare blood clots but the smart people were saying that was extremely rare and to get the first vaccine that is offered. We have to get that herd immunity. Like I said, I didn’t care. I was given the information about the vaccine and agreed to it and got the jab in my left arm. I even texted my wife and children and my employer stating that I was no longer a vaccine virgin. I was happy that I did it.
Jump to later in the day and my left arm is very sorry and I have a slight headache. That evening the headache got worse and I started to feel unwell. I knew this was a possibility and I didn’t worry. I went to bed feeling ill and woke up in the middle of the night with the chills and shaking vigorously. My wife had to share her body heat to keep me warm and to stop the shivering. It wasn’t foreplay. Luckily she only had a slight headache from her vaccine. I eventually got back to sleep and then awoke later in the morning just soaked from sweat. I had to lie in my underwear on top of the blankets to try and cool down. I know, that’s an image you’ll never get out of your head.
I had received my vaccine on a Tuesday and I didn’t have to work the next day. Good thing, too, because I felt like I had been hit by a truck and not the nice kind with an ice-cream cache inside. I still had the headaches but I generally felt like I had the flu. That night, the buzzing in my ears started. The next day I felt a little better and by Friday I was running at about 90% of my old self but still with the ear buzzing and a slight headache. Friday afternoon, on my way home from work, my nose started running strenuously for about 30 minutes then stopped. Then the headache increased with dizziness, blurred vision, and chills and sweats again. The next day, Saturday, I was run over again by the same truck.
In the afternoon on Saturday I thought maybe I should get a Covid test because it was possible I had been infected before my vaccination and the current symptoms were from that. I managed to get into a drive-through Covid testing site and the results were back the next day and they were negative. I was still not feeling well on the Monday, May 2nd so I called the pharmacy that gave me the vaccine and they said to call my Doctor. I called my Doctor and told them I had been sick since getting the vaccine but I also had a Covid test but it was negative. The receptionist at my Doctor’s office said I wasn’t supposed to call her but to call “them.” I said, “who’s them?” She said, “the Covid testing center.” I explained again that I didn’t have Covid but everything had happened since getting the AstraZeneca vaccine. She took a moment to consult with my Doctor and said my Doctor would call me on Thursday afternoon, May 6th.
Meanwhile, I felt awful. I had the never-ending headache, buzzing in the ears, I had no energy and I was tired all the time. There was no fever and no cough. By the time my Doctor called me on Thursday, there had been no improvement. The pharmacy had recommended either Tylenol or Ibuprofen but neither did anything for me. My Doctor listened to me explain my symptoms over the phone and then basically said it was a side-effect of the vaccine and that I would have to tough it out. Five minutes later she called me back and asked for more details about when certain symptoms had started and intensity. She said she would call me back. Five minutes later, her receptionist called me and said the Doctor wanted to see me in her office right away.
I live 30 minutes away from my Doctor’s office so the drive was a little stressful. In fact, I was already dizzy and probably shouldn’t have driven myself. My wife was at work and I texted her but when the Doctor tells you to come to her office when she’s not seeing anyone in person then you don’t delay. By the time I got to her office, my heart was pounding and I was exhausted. I had to sit in an exam room for 10 minutes and I fell asleep.
When my Doctor finally came in she could see I wasn’t well but she asked me why I had come in. Duh, you told me to. She then asked why I had waited until today to report my symptoms. I explained that I had actually called her office on Monday and was told she would call me back Thursday. She was surprised by that and said they had some things to learn in her office…yeah, at my expense. I’ve had this Doctor for almost thirty years. She should know that I don’t usually come in unless I’m really ill. The Doctor then took my blood pressure, temperature, and then had me do some hand-eye coordination tests. She also had me try to walk a straight line with heel to toe but I kept stumbling because I was dizzy. She then told me to sit down because she was going to call the hospital because she wanted me to get to the Emergency department and get blood work and an MRI or Cat Scan if possible. If I wasn’t feeling ill before, that news sent me into a spin.
After five minutes, the Doctor came back and said the Hospital didn’t want to see me. She said they felt it was probably a reaction to the vaccine and that I would have to tough it out. Wasn’t that what she had said on Monday? Why all the tests and causing my anxiety to max out? Apparently the hospital was sure I hadn’t had a stroke and didn’t have a blood clot. This was after no blood work or xrays or even seeing me and they could diagnose me second-hand through my Doctor. I wasn’t impressed. I was drained and the ride home wasn’t much better than the drive in. I was exhausted when I got home and went and lay down for two hours. Sheesh!
The next day, Friday May 7th was no better and I was even worse on the Saturday and had to spend a lot of time in bed. Sunday was Mother’s Day and the sun shone and our son came to visit. I felt better but tired. Monday I had a dentist appointment and rallied enough to attend that. The dizziness and headache were still there. Today is Tuesday and I still have the headache and ear-ringing but I’m toughing it out and came to work. I’m off now until Friday. I’d love to wake up without the headache and ear-ringing but hopefully that will fade too. Yesterday, my local pharmacy notified me that I could come get my AstraZeneca vaccine. I phoned and told them I had it already. I didn’t tell them what they could do with the one they were holding for me.
Nothing is ever simple with me. I kept telling people I was glad I got the vaccine but if I knew I’d have this kind of reaction, I’d have waited for Pfizer or Moderna. It’s been a tough two weeks. I think my Doctor has learned something or I hope she has. Still, there’s talk about discontinuing AstraZeneca in Ontario so I’m wondering what that means for my second shot. There’s also talk about mixing and matching. I didn’t think you’re supposed to do that with medicine. I know you’re not supposed to mix your drinks. Honestly, this is like the magician asking you to pick a card and you hope he guesses right. Again, I’m encouraging everyone to get a vaccine but maybe read my precautionary tale and then put yourself on every list and get the one that you feel the most comfortable receiving. When the magician asks you to take a card and put it back, hide an extra one up your sleeve and screw up the whole trick. Stay home. Stay safe. And get a vaccine…I’m just not going to say which one.
Well it’s the last part of April 2021 and it’s a snow day. That shouldn’t happen. Oh well, it will all melt in a few days. And to think I assembled a porch swing the other day and the next day cut my grass. You have to love Canada weather! If you have read my two previous blahgs, 12 MONTHS – 12 RECORDS – 12 SONGS & 12 MONTHS – 12 MORE RECORDS – 12 MORE SONGS, you would know that I’ve been having fun posting about some of the vinyl LPs I’ve purchased over the past year. I had a lot of fun assembling those two blahgs but I was busy at the same time looking ahead to this blahg.
I’ll mention three other blahgs I wrote last year that helped to inspire this current blahg. My three part Linda Keene series, TRACING LINDA KEENE, PART 1: THE FLORENCE SUTTLE YEARS, TRACING LINDA KEENE, PART 2: THE MOMENT IN MY LIFE,TRACING LINDA KEENE, PART 3: ONE MORE FOR THE ROAD, was very labour intensive. I spent a great deal of time researching Linda Keene and perusing through old newspaper articles to assemble a narrative of Linda Keene’s career. One thing I learned, outside of all of the things I learned about Linda Keene, was that there were many big bands and orchestras in the mid and late 1930s and through the 1940s that we no longer remember. So, I thought I would look at some of those forgotten bands that specifically were associated in some way with Linda Keene. I’ll try to provide some information of these orchestras and some recordings where I can. This blahg will be an assemblage of information and recordings and images from various sources. I’ve done the research and now you get to enjoy reading it.
In part one of my Linda Keene series I detailed how she was born Florence McCrory in December of 1911 and later married Sturgeon Suttle in September of 1931. She performed under her married name of Florence Suttle in the early 1930s and toured with her husband who billed himself as “Frank Suttle.” The first reference I found for the couple performing with any orchestra was from the August 3, 1934 Detroit Times, below, where they were performing at the Oriole Terrace as part of a floor show including Bob Chester and His Music. It is not clear if Florence Suttle performed with Bob Chester and His Orchestra but for the purposes of this blahg, Bob Chester’s band will be the first forgotten band we’ll look at.
With some of the bands I’ve tracked, there is very little information about the orchestra or what might have happened to them. Not so with Bob Chester. There is even a Wikipedia entry for Bob Chester although there isn’t more than really a page of information”
Bob Chester (March 20, 1908 – June 14, 1977) was an American jazz and pop music bandleader and tenor saxophonist.
Chester’s stepfather ran General Motors’s Fisher Body Works. He began his career as a sideman under Irving Aaronson, Ben Bernie, and Ben Pollack. He formed his own group in Detroit in 1939, with a Glenn Miller-influenced sound. This band was unsuccessful in local engagements and quickly dissolved. He then put together a new band on the East Coast under the direction of Tommy Dorsey and with arrangements by David Rose. This ensemble fared much better, recording for Bluebird Records.
Chester’s group, billed “The New Sensation of the Nation,” had its own radio show on CBS briefly in the fall of 1939. The twenty-five-minute program aired from the Hotel Van Cleve in Dayton, Ohio late on Thursday nights (actually 12:30 am Friday morning, Eastern Time); the September 21, 1939 edition can be heard on the famous One Day In Radio tapes, archived by Washington D.C. station WJSV.
Chester’s Bluebird records have proved excellent sellers, both for retail dealers and coin phonograph operators such as “From Maine to California”; “Wait Till the Sun Shines, Nellie”; “Madelaine”; and two songs from “Banjo Eyes” – “Not a Care in the World” and “A Nickel to My Name”. His only national hit was “With the Wind and the Rain in Your Hair” (b/w “I Walk With Music”; Bluebird 10614), which featured Dolores O’Neill on vocals and went to #18 on the charts in April 1940.
Chester’s orchestra included trumpeters Alec Fila, Nick Travis, Lou Mucci, and Conrad Gozzo, saxophonists Herbie Steward and Peanuts Hucko, drummer Irv Kluger, and trombonist Bill Harris. His female singers included Dolores O’Neill, Kathleen Lane, and Betty Bradley; among his male singers were Gene Howard, Bill Darnell, Joe Harris, Stu Brayton, Hall Stewart, Peter Marshall, Bob Haymes, and Al Stuart.
The orchestra disbanded in the mid-1940s, due in part to the shrinking market for big band sound. After a stint as a disc jockey at WKMH radio, Chester assembled another band for a short time in the early 1950s, but after it failed he retired from music and returned to Detroit to work for the rest of his life in auto manufacturing.
Looking at this output from 1939-1942, Bob Chester recorded more than 110 songs onto 78 rpm records. Many of these have not been reissued on CD. Below is a discography, of sorts, of the recordings Bob Chester and his Orchestra made between 1939 and 1942. If you click on any of the images then you will be able to view a larger image of the listings.
This is a fairly significant output for an orchestra that we barely know. For my money, this was a fantastic orchestra with some great recorded songs. Luckily some collectors of original 78rpm records have compiled and posted many of Bob Chester’s early recordings. You can see the list and listen to the recordings here: https://archive.org/search.php?query=creator%3A%22Bob+Chester+and+his+Orchestra%22. Choosing from the extensive selection is difficult so I’m going to offer up a few different recordings. Here’s their first recording, “Just For A Thrill”:
Next up is their only national hit, “With the Wind and the Rain in Your Hair.” This time someone has posted the recording on Youtube:
Now for one from their middle years, “The Moon Won’t Talk:”
Here are two tracks from their last listed session of June 30, 1942, “By The Light Of The Silvery Moon” and “He’s My Guy.” Note that “He’s My Guy” is listed in the discography as “Yes My Guy” but “He’s My Guy” was the flip-side of “By The Light Of The Silvery Moon” from the same session.
The discography that I posted above stops at 1942 but from the Wikipedia article we know that “The orchestra disbanded in the mid-1940s…Chester assembled another band for a short time in the early 1950s.” We are lucky that some of the 1950 recordings were also posted on Archive.org. Here’s “Frenzy” and the flip side of that 78, “Mad About Love.” Both songs were recorded in March of 1950.
Before I finish with Bob Chester, I want to post some other exciting material by this band. In one of my Linda Keene blahgs, I wrote about the Soundies she did with Henry Levine and his band. In case you haven’t read that yet, here’s my explanation about Soundies:
“Soundies are three-minute American musical films, produced between 1940 and 1947, each containing a song, dance, and/or band or orchestral number. Produced professionally on 35mm black-and-white film, like theatrical motion pictures, they were printed in the more portable and economical 16mm gauge.
The films were shown in a coin-operated “movie jukebox” called the Panoram, manufactured by the Mills Novelty Company of Chicago. Each Panoram housed a 16mm RCA film projector, with eight Soundies films threaded in an endless-loop arrangement. A system of mirrors flashed the image from the lower half of the cabinet onto a front-facing screen in the top half. Each film cost 10 cents to play, and there was no choice of song; the patron saw whatever film was next in the queue. Panorams could be found in public amusement centers, nightclubs, taverns, restaurants, and factory lounges, and the films were changed weekly. The completed Soundies were generally made available within a few weeks of their filming, by the Soundies Distributing Corporation of America.”
We are lucky that Bob Chester and His Orchestra filmed some Soundies. We are also lucky that someone has posted these on Youtube. The first is Bob Chester and the band performing “B-I-BI” which they recorded for Bluebird on September 10, 1941:
The second is a compilation of songs by Bob Chester and his Orchestra, “Octave Jump”, “On The Sunny Side of the Street”, “Deep River”, and “Chesterwoogie.” The orchestra recorded “Octave Jump” on March 4, 1940 but I don’t know if they recorded the other three songs.
Finally, I want to jump back to something else that was referenced in the Wikipedia article:
Chester’s group, billed “The New Sensation of the Nation,” had its own radio show on CBS briefly in the fall of 1939. The twenty-five-minute program aired from the Hotel Van Cleve in Dayton, Ohio late on Thursday nights (actually 12:30 am Friday morning, Eastern Time); the September 21, 1939 edition can be heard on the famous One Day In Radio tapes, archived by Washington D.C. station WJSV.
The reference here is to the “One Day In Radio” which was broadcast by the WJSV radio station. Here’s another Wikipedia explanation:
On September 21, 1939 radio station WJSV in Washington, D.C. made an audio recording of its entire 19-hour broadcast day. This undertaking was a collaboration between the station and the National Archives,
Bob Chester and his Orchestra were part of the schedule and a twenty-five minute program of their music was included in the “One Day In Radio” recordings. The entire 19 hours is also available on Archive.org at https://archive.org/details/001WakeUpMusic. Here’s the entire Bob Chester program as broadcast on September 21, 1939:
Moving on, the next major outfit that was associated with Florence Suttle was George Duffy and His Orchestra. Florence Suttle would tour with Duffy from April to December of 1935. Duffy and his band seemed to be a big deal in Ohio in the mid-1930s. Look at this article below from The Cincinnati Enquirer (Cincinnati, Ohio), June 21, 1935 announcing the opening that evening of the George Duffy Orchestra at the Gibson Roof Garden:
It was a a fairly significant advertisement announcing George Duffy and His Orchestra. But what happened to George Duffy? It should be noted that there was also an Irish Show Band, the George Duffy Orchestra in the 1940s but it’s not the same organization. I could find very little about the American Duffy and his Orchestra. There is a website/blog dedicated to Duffy at http://georgeduffyandhisorchestra.blogspot.com/ with some wonderful photos but no real information. Here’s one of the photos of George Duffy and his Orchestra:
Unfortunately there are no other details about the photo or even a date for the image. I could not find a discography for George Duffy and His Orchestra but did find some sheet music images of songs that had been attributed to Duffy:
I could find nothing to suggest that George Duffy even recorded these songs. I scanned through old newspapers and found that Duffy continued to front an orchestra and was busy making public appearances from the mid-1930s to as late as the early 1960s. In fact, Duffy was still performing as late as 1962 as can be attested by this advertisement from the Cleveland Plain Dealer, August 3, 1962:
George Duffy passed away on March 29th, 1963:
As I have said, I cannot find a discography for George Duffy and His Orchestra but it is possible that the band made at least one recording. I have found images for a 78 rpm record on the Quaker label for George Duffy and His Orchestra. The record features the songs “Love Is Just Around The Corner” backed with “The Ice Cream Song”
Unfortunately I could not find any music files to offer of George Duffy and His Orchestra. I know they also performed a number of live radio remotes but I haven’t come across any of these either. George Duffy and His Orchestra did perform at the Cleveland Auto Show in November of 1935. The Cleveland Automobile Show ran for a week from November 23rd to November 30, 1935 and one of the big attractions was the appearance of George Burns and Gracie Allen in a stage show. Burns and Allen did broadcast from the Cleveland Automobile Show but I haven’t found a radio transcription of the show so I do not know if Duffy made an appearance on the Burns and Allen show.
The next band I wanted to explore was an Orchestra that Florence Suttle appeared with in January of 1936. The following advertisement is from the Cleveland Plain Dealer on January 25, 1936:
The name of the Orchestra is referred to as Pinkey Hunter and his Orchestra. This is another Orchestra that seemed to have roots in Ohio but again very little is known about them. In searching for a discography for Pinkey Hunter and his Orchestra, I could only find reference to Pinkey Hunter as a member of Emerson Gill and His Castle of Paris Orchestra. The following discography section notes Pinkey Hunter as a member of Gill’s Orchestra and that Hunter performed vocals on some of the recordings.
The last credited song for Pinkey Hunter with Gill’s Orchestra was “Ready For The River” from March 27th, 1928. This song is also available on Archive.org.
From the same March 27, 1928 session that produced “Ready For The River”, we have Emerson Gill & His Bamboo Garden Orchestra with “That’s What I Call Keen” with Pinkey Hunter doing vocal:
Someone has posted on Youtube the first Emerson Gill track that credits Pinkey Hunter on vocal. It’s “That’s My Girl ” from the February 17th, 1925 session.
Youtube also brings us two tracks from Emerson Gill’s March 1st, 1926 session that also have Pinkey Hunter vocals. They are “My Bundle of Love” and “The Roses Brought Me You”:
I could find no recordings for Pinkey Hunter and his Orchestra or any information that suggests that Pinkey Hunter recorded with his own Orchestra. One of the last news articles that I could find about Pinkey Hunter was from the Cleveland Plain Dealer, March 13, 1949 that shows an elderly Hunter:
In 1949 Pinkey Hunter was the program director at WHK in Cleveland, Ohio. I could not find an obituary for him.
Skipping ahead to 1936, we find the next reference to Florence Suttle was that she was appearing at the Mayfair Room of the Book-Cadillac Hotel in Detroit beginning on April 17th, 1936. This time she was with the Sam Jack Kaufman Orchestra. I’ll work backwards in that I found Sam Jack Kaufman’s obituary from the February 11th, 1990 Washington Post:
MUSICIAN S.J. KAUFMAN DIES AT 88
Sam Jack Kaufman, 88, president of the D.C. Federation of Musicians Local 161-710 from 1955 until he retired in 1985, died of cancer Feb. 7 at his home at Leisure World in Silver Spring.
Mr. Kaufman was born in Rochester, N.Y. He was a musician and bandleader in New York, Chicago, Detroit and elsewhere before moving to the Washington area in 1940.
He was the conductor and then the music director at Loew’s Capitol Theater from the time he came here until 1954, when the Capitol discontinued its vaudeville programs. Mr. Kaufman became head of the musicians union the next year.
His wife, Helen Kaufman, died in 1985.
Survivors include two children, Carol Chappelear of Landover and Noel Kaufman of Burke; two grandchildren; and three great-grandchildren.
So, what we know of Sam Jack Kaufman was that he was a bandleader up to 1940. Here’s a picture of him:
His obituary contains the most detailed information I could find on Sam Jack Kaufman. I could find no discography for the Sam Jack Kaufman Orchestra but Archive.org did offer up a 78 rpm of “Washington” sung by Jimmie Dodd and backed by Sam Jack Kauman and his Capitol Theater Orchestra.
Seeing as the band is billed as “Sam Jack Kaufman and his Capitol Theater Orchestra,” this recording would have to been made after 1940 when Kaufman relocated to Washington. Of course we should also take note of the fact that the song is the “Motorola Song for Washington Contest 1st Prize Winner.” There may be some earlier recordings of Sam Jack Kaufman because I did find the following 78 of “My Confession” backed with “My Love For You”:
I could not find any other information about these recordings nor when they were issued.
The last forgotten band that I want to look at associated with Florence Suttle is Coleman Sachs and his Orchestra. After Florence finished with Sam Jack Kaufman in the Mayfair Room in Detroit, she was next spotted in Birmingham, Alabama on May 22, 1936 at the Club Rex on the same bill with “Coleman Sachs and his 14-Star Band.”
Like Pinkey Hunter, most of the recordings I could find of Coleman Sachs were with another orchestra. In this case it was the Jack Linx Orchestra. There is a website of sorts, https://www.angelfire.com/ga/benningcobbrussel/coleman_sachs_orchestra.html, dedicated to the Coleman Sachs Orchestra but, like the one dedicated to George Duffy, it consists mainly of photos and old articles. This is another case of working backwards. Two of the articles were from later in life when he was retired from the music business. If the images are not very clear then click on them to open a larger and clearer image. The first apparently comes from 1956 because it has a handwritten notation of that year:
So, the big thing we learn is that the orchestra disbanded in 1944 and may not have got around to making any recordings. The second article doesn’t have a date but it references Coleman Sachs as being 74 years old. He died in 1985 at the age of 79 so this next article was either 1979 or 1980:
The only way we get to hear Coleman Sachs play is by listening to early recordings of Jack Linx and his Society Serenaders. This was the band that Sachs took over in 1930 and by 1932 he had hung up his trumpet to concentrate on leading the band. Before I get to the Jack Linx recordings, I want to post some pictures of Coleman Sachs and his Ochestra and one of the Jack Linx orchestra. These come from the website I mentioned earlier dedicated to Coleman Sachs. First, here’s Sachs and his band:
There is no date for that picture but it’s probably early 1930s. Here’s Jack Linx and his Society Serenaders (again no date):
I’ve been able to put together a small discography of Jack Linx recordings. I do not know if this is complete:
The very first recording listed is “How Come You Do Me Like You Do?” from August 28th, 1924 and we are lucky that is available to hear:
Someone has posted on YouTube, the other two tracks from that first session, “It Ain’t Gonna Rain No Mo” & “Doodle Doo Doo””:
A year later in August of 1925, Jack Linx recorded “She’s My Sheba, I’m Her Sheik”:
And finally two songs from the March 13th, 1926 session, “Tie Me To Your Apron Strings” and “Fallen Arches” :
Somewhere in these almost 100 year old tracks is the long gone trumpet of Coleman Sachs. I may not have found any recordings for Coleman Sachs and His Orchestra but the Jack Linx Society Serenaders is essentially the same group of musicians but with Coleman Sachs on trumpet and Jack Linx conducting.
Our story as it relates to bands associated with Florence Suttle ends and then begins anew with a very small notice in the Birmingham News on December 4th, 1937. The article relates to Frank Suttle, her then husband, but there is a mention that his wife “Flo, is singing with Nye Mayhew’s Band in Boston under the name of Linda Keene.” Florence Suttle had finally made the transition to Linda Keene. The next few forgotten bands all came to my attention because of Linda Keene. To be accurate, Linda Keene had been appearing with Nye Mayhew since September 30th of 1937. The article to the left from The Boston Globe (Boston, Massachusetts), September 25th, 1937 states “Nye Mayhew and his orchestra will open at the Hotel Statler, Thursday evening,” which would make the opening on September 30th, 1937.
I wish someone had created a website dedicated to Nye Mayhew. The little that I could find in the way of a biography comes from old newspaper articles and from this excerpt from “”American Big Bands” by William F. Lee:
I know the excerpt is short on details but I found an interview that Mayhew gave in 1956 about his early career and association with Bix Beiderbecke. The article comes from the January 5th, 1956 edition of the Dallas Morning News.
We can piece together from this article and the excerpt from “American Big Bands” that Nye Mayhew started out with Paul Whiteman. In fact I found references of Nye Mayhew recording with the following bands:
–Hale Byers and His Orchestra February 25, 1926
–Paul Whiteman 1927
–Hoagy Carmichael and His Pals October 28, 1927
–Fred Rich and His Hotel Astor Orchestra, May 4, 1928
–The Dorsey Brothers’ Concert Orchestra July 16, 1928
–Carolina Club Orchestra March 27, 1929
Nye Mayhew’s Orchestra has a discography that starts on July 27th, 1933 as Nye Mayhew and his Westchester Biltmore Orchestra:
Note that the September 7th, 1933 session that produced “Thanks” and “The Day You Came Along” were issued under Will Osbourne and His Orchestra but supposedly Osbourne was only the vocalist with the accompaniment actually being Nye Mayhew’s Orchestra. Also, the January 19th, 1934 session produced recordings by Mayhew being issued under another Orchestra’s name.
For this blahg, I’m not going to offer recordings that Mayhew did with earlier orchestras. I want to stick to the above discography because quite a number of his recordings are available on Archive.org and YouTube. Someone has posted to Archive.org thirteen selections of Mayhew’s 78rpm output, https://archive.org/details/NyeMayhewOrchestra78rpmCollection. Mayhew had a nice sound in the 1930s. From the first listed session, July 27, 1933, here are “Blue Roses” and “It Isn’t Fair”:
Blue Roses:
It Isn’t Fair:
From the September 7, 1933 session here are the two recordings that were actually Nye Mayhew and His Orchestra issued as Will Osborne and His Orchestra. Here are “Thanks” and “The Day You Came Along”:
And finally, from the last session on April 9, 1934 here are “This Is Our Last Night Together” with a vocal by Douglas Newman and “Baby, Take A Bow!” which has a Russ Morgan vocal:
Nye Mayhew was still fronting an Orchestra under his name into the late 1950s. I do not know if Mayhew made any other recordings after his April 9th, 1934 session. There were some radio remotes of his Orchestra over the years which might have included Linda Keene as well but I have not come across any remotes by Mayhew. I could not find an obituary for Mayhew but I found references to him leading an orchestra well into the late 1950s.
I’m skipping ahead a little bit with Linda Keene’s association with big bands. In 1938 she had a short stint with Glenn Miller’s Orchestra and then Bobby Hackett’s Dixieland Orchestra. Seeing as these are relatively known bands, I want to stick to the forgotten orchestras that had some association with Linda Keene. Just before Christmas in 1938 Linda Keene landed in Bermuda for a stint at the Silver Grill, in the Hotel Bermudiana. The band she was appearing with was Scott Fisher and His Orchestra.
Here’s another band for which there is very little information. I had to really search for any information on Scott Fisher and His Orchestra. The following information comes from the website https://jazzagemusic.blogspot.com/2020_06_15_archive.html:
1905
‘Bud’ Fisher, Leader
aka: “Scott Fisher and his Orch.”
b. New York, NY, USA
York, NY, USA.
d. August 2, 1972, Flemington, NJ, USA
Winfield Scott (“Bud”) Fisher was born in the Bronx, New York on June 16, 1905. He moved to Bogota, Bergen County, New Jersey at age 13. He and younger brother William Hardy “Billy” Fisher, known in 1923 as “The Musical Fishers,” made one of their earliest appearances at “The Sphinx Club” in New York’s Waldorf Astoria Hotel on the same bill with the legendary Will Rogers. Scott was only 17, while Billy was just 9.
Using a foundation of himself on piano and kid brother Billy on sax and clarinet (and later handling orchestrations), Scott organized his first band as a teenager. Eventually, they became known in the New York/New Jersey area as “Bud Fisher & His Commodores.”
Into the early 1930s, Scott’s orchestra became known throughout New York and New Jersey, playing numerous dates on area radio stations like WABC, WEAF, WAAT, WJZ, and WADA. Scott, Billy, and company also performed at New Jersey’s legendary “Rustic Cabin” for two years, among their numerous other club appearances. “Bud Fisher & His Commodores” were regulars on Cunard Line cruise ships, performing on runs to Cuba and Bermuda, and were winter mainstays at Bermuda’s “Bermudiana Hotel.” The band also recorded several commercial pressings, and performed at the famous Coconut Grove Room at New York’s Park Central Hotel.
Around 1935, the band went on several two-month tours, only to return to the New York area without a gig. As a result, the orchestra split up. Had they been able to survive that period, the Fisher band may well have become one of the top names in the business as the movement of individual band members shortly after the breakup illustrates:
Harold Mooney, the piano player, went on to arrange for Hal Kemp; Gordon Griffin found a place for his horn with Benny Goodman; “Toots” Camarata became Jimmy Dorsey’s arranger; the third trumpet player (name unknown) joined up with Casa Loma; while Billy Fisher became sax/clarinet man and arranger for Russ Morgan. (Billy later filled a similar role for Al Donahue, before becoming Ray Bloch’s “right-hand man” for roughly 35 years, the bandleader for whom he arranged the music of “The Ed Sullivan Show” for all 24 seasons.)
Scott Fisher later became Head Copiest for Ray Bloch. He also worked in this capacity for numerous Broadway shows including “How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying,” “Golden Boy,” “The Apple Tree,” “My Fair Lady,” and “The Music Man,” mostly under the direction of Elliot Lawrence. He died on August 2, 1972 in Flemington, New Jersey at age 67. Billy Fisher died in Greenwich, Connecticut on April 24, 1972.
I was able to find a small discography for the 1935 Scott Fisher and His Orchestra:
I apologize for the image above but it was presented that way at the source although I was able to enhance the January 10, 1935 session. A handful of the Scott Fisher and His Orchestra recordings are available on Archive.org at https://archive.org/search.php?query=creator%3A%22Scott+Fisher+and+his+Orchestra%22. What is noteworthy about the Archive.org available recordings is that some are from the 1935 sessions and there are later ones from 1949. I cannot find a discography for Scott Fisher in 1949 but we can assume this is the same Scott Fisher from 1935 but probably fronting a new orchestra.
Now, I’ll offer the remaining tracks from the January 10, 1935 session. Here we have “In A Blue And Pensive Mood”, “Just A Fair-Weather Friend”, and “Haunting Me”. The vocals on the three songs are all performed by Lee Johnson. These tracks also come from the Soundcloud.com source.
The 1949 tracks of Scott Fisher and His Orchestra are also available on Archive.org. Of course, by 1949 the sound of the Scott Fisher Orchestra is quite different.
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Again, I have no proof that the 1949 Scott Fisher and His Orchestra is the same as the 1935 band. Here’s another mystery to add to the Scott Fisher Orchestra from the later years. Betty Clooney, sister of Rosemary Clooney, apparently recorded the song “In the Cool, Cool, Cool of the Evening” with Scott Fisher and His Orchestra, also for the Hi-Tone label in 1953
Unfortunately I was not able to find a source from which to download or listen to this track.
Here is Scott Fisher’s obituary from August 2nd, 1972:
After leaving Scott Fisher and His Orchestra in Bermuda, Linda Keene returned to America to do some recordings and touring with Jack Teagarden and His Orchestra. Teagarden and his band are famous enough that I don’t need to include them here. Linda Keene was with Teagarden from May to July 1939 but by August she had moved on to touring with Willie Farmer and His Orchestra.
Like some of the other bands detailed in this blahg, I had never heard of Willie Farmer and His Orchestra until I started researching Linda Keene. I will again start with the obituary to try and provide some information about Willie Farmer. This is from the April 7th, 1990 edition of The Morning Call out of Lehigh Valley and Allentown, Pennsylvania
WILLIAM FARMER, 84; HAD 65-YEAR MUSICAL CAREER THE MORNING CALL
William “Willie” Farmer, 84, formerly of 1622 Liberty St., Allentown, a musician for more than 65 years, died Thursday at the Leader Nursing and Rehabilitation Center, Bethlehem. He was the husband of Hilda (Solomon) Farmer. They observed their 60th wedding anniversary last October.
Farmer began his career at the age of 13 as a drummer with the Carl Fenton Orchestra. He later played with many of the big bands, including Glen Gray and the Casa Luma Band, Red Nichols and Tommy Dorsey. In 1932 he took over the Larry Siry Band at the Simplon Club, New York City, and the band was known thereafter as Willie Farmer and the Farmer-in-the-Dell Orchestra.
Born in New York City, he was a son of the late Abraham and Celia (Dorsky) Farberman.
During the 1930s, Farmer’s orchestra toured throughout the East and Midwest and made more than 30 recordings, mainly for the Bluebird/Victor label. The band was well-known in New York night spots, including The El Murrocco, Tavern-on-the Green and Rainbow Room at Rockefeller Center.
They also played locally at the former Castle Gardens at Dorney Park, the former Mealey’s Auditorium, Allentown, and Flagstaff, Jim Thorpe. The band also performed for many early radio broadcasts of the era.
Farmer moved to Florida in 1975 and continued to work as a musician until retiring in 1985.
He was a past board member of Associated Musicians Local 802.
Survivors: Wife; son, Dr. H. Stephen of Princeton, N.J.; daughter Judith, wife of Morton Miller of Allentown, five grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.
Graveside services: 2 p.m. Sunday, Beth Israel Cemetery, U.S. 1, Woodbridge, N.J. Arrangements, David J. Boyko Funeral Home, Macungie.
The takeaway information from the obituary is that Farmer’s orchestra “made more than 30 recordings” and that “the band also performed for many early radio broadcasts of the era.” Unfortunately I cannot find any live remotes for Willie Farmer and His Orchestra but from two different sources I was able to assemble the following discography:
I apologize again for some of the images for the 1937 and 1938 discography as they were cropped at the source. Note that in 1933 the Orchestra was known as Willie Farmer and His Simplon Club Orchestra. We are indebted again to people who have posted some of the 78 rpm records of Willie Farmer to Archive.org. You can listen to many of them through this link: https://archive.org/search.php?query=creator%3A%22Willie+Farmer+and+his+Orchestra%22. Willie Farmer and His Orchestra also had a nice sound on their recordings. None of the 1933 tracks are available on Archive.org so we will have to rely on YouTube. Here are two songs from that first session, “Love Is Love, Anywhere” and “Let’s Fall In Love”
Love Is Love, Anywhere
Let’s Fall In Love
From the Archive.org postings are two tracks from the June 11, 1937 session, “Stop! You’re Breaking My Heart” and “Scattin’ At The Kit-Kat”:
The following selections are simply because I like the titles. From September 9, 1937 comes “Midnight In The Madhouse” followed by “Tarzan” from July 15, 1938.
I’ll finish off with this band’s 1930s output by offering two tracks from their last session on September 1st, 1938. Here are “A Pretty Girl Milking Her Cow” and “Yes Ma’am I’m The Guy”:
As with some other artists, like Scott Fisher, Willie Farmer appeared to have fronted another Orchestra in the 1940s. I have found listings for at least three songs that Willie Farmer and His Orchestra released on Jubilee in 1947, “I Found Gold”, “Louisa Learned The Roomba From Her Goomba”, and “Why Do They Fall In Fallsburg”. All three songs had vocals by Lee Tully. Luckily, someone has posted the last two songs on Archive.org:
In 2016 a digital album of Willie Farmer and His Orchestra, “Perfect Jazz For Dancing” was released to digital platforms. None of the tracks match the 1930s discography so we have to assume these might have been from the late 1940s or later or quite possibly this is some other Willie Farmer and His Orchestra.
At last, we come to the final Forgotten Band for this blahg. After Willie Farmer and his Orchestra, Linda Keene was next spotted with Lennie Hayton and His Orchestra. At some point in November 1939, Linda took up with Lennie Hayton and his Orchestra and was appearing with him at Loew’s State theatre in New York starting November 24th. Billboard magazine reviewed Hayton at Loew’s State on November 24th and ran their review in the December 2, 1939 issue.
Now, I know some might say that Lennie Hayton is a very recognizable name. That is true. He has a good entry on Wikipedia at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lennie_Hayton. He started out with Paul Whiteman and His Orchestra and then joined the Charles Previn Orchestra for a time. Hayton in his history as a band leader recorded two numbers as a leader in 1928 and then led a big band that recorded from 1937-40. When the band broke up in 1940, Hayton settled in Hollywood, where he worked for MGM as an arranger, conductor and musical director. He married the singer Lena Horne in 1947 and thereafter served as her pianist, arranger and musical director. Between 1937 and 1940, the Hayton band, booked by Mills Artists Incorporated, toured coast-to-coast, playing one-nighters and extended stay locations with a lineup that ranged from 12 to as many as 20 musicians.
As mentioned, Lennie Hayton’s Orchestra recorded 24 tracks between 1937 and 1940. None of these tracks have been reissued on CD to my knowledge. It is that forgotten band that I want to focus on here. Here is the discography for the 1937-1940 Lennie Hayton and His Orchestra:
Carelessly (Chas. & Nick Kenny ‑ Norman Ellis). Vocal by Paul Barry. Decca 1248‑A (62144‑A). NY, 4/22/1937. E. Sid Stoneburn, clarinet solo. 3:10
It Looks Like Rain In Cherry Blossom Lane (Edgar Leslie‑Joe Burke). Vocal by Paul Barry. Decca 1248‑B (62145‑A). NY, 4/22/1937. E. 3:13
The Lady Who Couldn’t Be Kissed (from the Warner Bros. production “The Singing Marine”) (Harry Warren‑Al Dubin). Vocal by Paul Barry. Decca 1268‑B (62146‑A). NY, 4/22/1937.(Seems as if Hayton recorded practically the entire score of “The Singing Marine”, a musical that starred Kenny Baker. I’ve seen it on TCM). E+ 3:05
Night Over Shanghai (from the Warner Bros. production “The Singing Marine”) (Harry Warren‑Johnny Mercer). Vocal by Paul Barry. Decca 1268‑A (62147‑A). NY, 4/22/1937. E+. 3:19
I Know Now (from the Warner Bros. production “The Singing Marine”) (Harry Warren‑Al Dubin). Vocal by Paul Barry. Decca 1267‑A (62148‑A). NY, 4/22/1937. E+. 3:12
You Can’t Run Away From Love Tonight (from the Warner Bros. Production “The Singing Marine”) (Harry Warren‑Al Dubin). Vocal by Paul Barry. Decca 1267‑B (62149‑A). NY, 4/22/1937. E. 3:03
Gone With the Wind (Allie Wrubel‑Herb Magidson). Vocal by Paul Barry. Decca 1341‑A (62320‑A). NY, 7/1/1937. E. 3:05
What A Beautiful Beginning (from the 20th Century‑Fox production “Sing And Be Happy”) (Harry Akst‑Sidney Clare). Vocal by Paul Barry. Decca 1341‑B (62321‑A). NY, 7/1/1937. Looks rough, plays E (especially after restoration). 2:38
Can I Forget You (from the Paramount picture “High, Wide And Handsome”) (Jerome Kern- Oscar Hammerstein II). Vocal by Paul Barry. Decca 1348‑A (62324‑A). NY, 7/1/1937. N‑. 3:13
The Folks Who Live On the Hill (from the Paramount picture “High, Wide And Handsome”) (Jerome Kern‑Oscar Hammerstein II). Vocal by Paul Barry. Decca 1348‑B (62325‑B). NY, 7/1/1937. E+ to N‑. 3:05
That Old Feeling (from the Walter Wanger production “Vogues of 1938”) (Lew Brown‑Sammy Fain). Vocal by Paul Barry. Decca 1354‑A (62326‑A). NY, 7/1/1937. Superb side; solos from Sid Stoneburn‑clarinet, and either Ralph Muzzilo or Red Hymie‑trumpet. E to E+. 2:54
Lovely One (from the Walter Wanger production “Vogues of 1938”) (Manning Sherwin‑Frank Loesser). Vocal by Paul Barry. Decca 1354‑B (62327‑A). NY, 7/1/1937. E+ 3:06
Once In A While (Michael Edwards‑Bud Green). Vocal by Paul Barry. (American) Decca 1443‑A (62582‑A). NY, 9/8/1937. E. 3:00
Once In A While (Edwards‑Green). Vocal by Paul Barry. (Canadian) Decca 1443‑A (62582‑B). NY, 9/8/1937. This record looks E‑ to E, but has rim chip 2 grooves in (ends before music starts) and 1 1/2″ hairline crack. It has excellent quality shellac, so all defects are unnoticeable after restoration. E . 3:02
15. The Morning After (Dorsey‑Jaffe‑Boland). Vocal by Paul Barry. (American) Decca 1443‑B (62583‑B; an”X” has been stamped through take “A”, with the “B” take stamped next to it !!). NY, 9/8/1937. E. 3:01
So Many Memories (Harry Woods). Vocal by Paul Barry. Decca 1437‑B (62584‑A). NY, 9/8/1937. E+. Sid Stoneburn‑clarinet; ? Ralph Muzzilo‑trumpet. 3:07
Make A Wish (from the Principal Production “Make A Wish”) (Straus‑Alter‑Webster). Vocal by Paul Barry. Decca 1437‑A (62585‑A). NY, 9/8/1937. E+. 2:45
At the Balalaika (from “Balalaika”). Vocal by Linda Keene. Varsity 8125 (US‑1130‑1) NY, c. 12/7/1939. E. 3:15
The Starlit Hour (Parish‑DeRose). Vocal by Linda Keene. Varsity 8125 (US‑1131‑1; as above). NY, c. 12/7/1939. E (slight scuff removed by restoration). 2:53
Peg O’ My Heart (Bryan‑Fisher). Varsity 8134 (US‑1132‑2). NY, c. 12/7/1939. Slats Long ‑ clarinet. N-. 3:00
As Long As I Live (Koehler‑Arlen). Varsity 8134 (US‑1133‑2). NY, c. 12/7/1939. N‑. 3:20
I Love You Much Too Much (Olshey‑Raye‑Towber). Vocal by Linda Keene. Vocalion 5421 (W‑26541‑A). NY, 2/20/1940. E. 3:00
Times Square Scuttle (Hayton). Vocalion 5471 (W‑26542‑A). NY, 2/20/1940. That trumpet sounds like Yank Lawson to me, but wasn’t he still with Crosby at this time??? or not??? N‑. 2:32
One Cigarette For Two (Metzger‑Dougherty‑Ryan). Vocal by Linda Keene. Vocalion 5421 (W‑26543‑A). NY, 2/20/1940. E. 2:56
Note that 13 and 14 are the same song but it appears that number 14, a Canadian issue of “Once In A While” appears to be an alternate take. Not all of the 24 songs are available on Archive.org. Certainly, the Canadian issue of “One In A While” is not there and remains a rarity but the American release is available. The four tracks that had vocals by Linda Keene from late 1939 and early 1940 are also not there. Those I have included in a previous blahg, TRACING LINDA KEENE, PART 2: THE MOMENT IN MY LIFE. Of the remaining tracks, I was unable to find a listening source for “Peg O’ My Heart” and “As Long As I Live”. One of his last recordings, “Times Square Scuttle” will be presented as a YouTube post.
From the April 27th, 1937 session, here are “Carelessly” and “You Can’t Run Away From Love Tonight” with vocals by Paul Barry:
From July 1st, 1937 are two songs that I’ve particularly enjoyed by other artists as well, “The Folks Who Live On The Hill” and “That Old Feeling” with Paul Barry again providing the vocals:
Here are two tracks from the September 8, 1937 session, the aforementioned American release of “Once In A While” and “Make A Wish” with Paul Barry vocals:
I won’t present anything from the December 7th, 1939 session because “Peg O’ My Heart” and “As Long As I Live”are not available and I have already posted “At The Balalaika” and “The Starlit Hour” in my previous blahg, TRACING LINDA KEENE, PART 2: THE MOMENT IN MY LIFE so you can head over there to listen to those two songs. I am going to present three tracks from the last session on February 20th, 1940. Linda Keene also did vocals at that session and I will repost one of those tracks because I think it’s one of the most haunting vocals that she performed with Hayton. Here are “AC-DC Current”, which the Angelfire website claimed was a Magnificent side, probably Hayton’s best! Following that is Linda Keene doing the vocal on “I Love You Much Too Much” and a Youtube post of “Times Square Scuttle.”
That’s it. I hope you’ve enjoyed these Forgotten Bands. There’s some good music here and I hope you take some time to follow the links and listen to some of the other recordings by these bands that are almost lost to time.
Well it’s April and we’re in another lockdown/stay at home situation here in Ontario. I’m not complaining. Covid-19 cases are on the rise again and we need to do this to bring the case numbers down. What a perfect time to enjoy some more music that I’ve collected over the past year. In my previous blahg, 12 MONTHS – 12 RECORDS – 12 SONGS, I offered up samples from some albums I had purchased over the past 12 months either at local thrift stores or purchased over the Internet. I’m talking about LPs. Vinyl! The good stuff! I have another batch of 12 albums that I purchased over the past month so I’m basically doing a part two with these new to me albums. Sit back and enjoy some good music
As I’ve said before, many of these records have not had CD releases so they’re a bit on the rare side. I’ve done another good job of scanning the covers so if you click on the rear covers then you get full images with all of the great jacket notes. I’ve tried to clean the audio and remove any clicks and crackle sounds. I think you might just find something interesting this time around. Wait, I didn’t mean the last batch of 12 records were not any good but I’m just saying I’m continuing with the vinyl and there’s bound to be something here that’s enjoyable. There was only one album in the batch that wasn’t as good as the rest. You’ll have to read on to find out more.
The first up is an album called “Vic Lewis Featuring Tubby Hayes – In Concert.” This was released in 1978 on the Hep Records label.
There’s an interesting documentary about Tubby Hayes from 2015. I haven’t seen it yet but here’s the official trailer:
From the album “Vic Lewis Featuring Tubby Hayes – In Concert, here’s “Moonlight In Vermont”:
Next up is another album by The Kenny Clarke-Francy Boland Big Band. In my last blahg, I featured a track from the 1965 album “Now Hear Our Meanin’ ” by the same group. This time the album is “Live At Ronnie’s, Album 2, Rue Chaptal” by The Kenny Clarke-Francy Boland Big Band on the Polydor label from 1969. This is a gate-fold album so the middle two pictures are what you see when you open up the album jacket.
The interesting track here is “The Girl & The Turk”:
The next album is probably my most recent purchase before stores shut down again this spring due to the pandemic. I had never heard of Bernadine Read but the first track that caught my eye was “Rhode Island Is Famous For You.” I knew this song from the late great Blossom Dearie but did not know anyone else had recorded a version. The album is “Bernadine” on the Epic label from 1958
Here’s Bernadine Read’s version of “Rhode Island Is Famous For You”:
I think the following album was another thrift store find from earlier this year. It’s the great Lionel Hampton and “Hamp’s Big Band.” This is on the Audio Fidelity label from 1959
This album really swings and it was tough to choose just one track. Some of the tracks are quite lengthy so I chose one of the shorter ones coming in at 3:37. It’s Hamp and the band with “Red Top”
The selections up to now in this blahg were thrift store purchases but I confess that the next album was ordered after I downloaded and listened to the second album by this group. I read online somewhere about a jazz album with a very interesting cover, “Music To Lure Pigeons By” by the Night Pastor And Seven Friends. Luckily someone had posted the whole album on Youtube:
I think I came across it because I was researching Dave Remmington. In my previous blahg I had offered a selection from “Dixie On The Rocks” by Dave Remington and The Dixie Six. Dave Remmington was also a member of the Night Pastor’s Seven Friends. After hearing “Music To Lure Pigeons By”, I had to order the first album which is “The Night Pastor And Seven Friends Play Chicago Jazz.”
The track I have selected here is the first track on side one because the Night Pastor does a spoken intro and explains a little about himself and a little about the album. The song is “Beale St. Blues.”
The next album was just another whim purchase from a thrift store. The album is “TV Action Jazz!” by Mundell Lowe and His All Stars. It’s on the RCA Camden label from 1959.
My selection from this album is one of the most iconic instrumental theme songs to any TV show. It’s Mundell Lowe and His All Stars with their interpretation of “Peter Gunn”:
I think this next album might have been another thrift store purchase as well. When you see a compilation album with the title “Jazz Hall Of Fame, Volume II” then you know you’re getting something good. Of course, it’s a sampler album and you get tracks by bands led by Charlie Shavers, Jack Teagarden, Charles Mingus, Al Haig, Osie Johnson, Josh White, Ralph Burns, Django Reinhardt, and Big Bill Broonzy. This is on the Design label from 1959.
The track I have selected is “Osie’s Oasis” by Osie Johnson And His Orchestra.
Now we get back to another vocal performance. This is another female vocalist (I swear I also listen to males) with the same initials as Bernadine Read. This time it’s Betty Reilly and her “The Explosive Betty Reilly” album on the Golden Tone label from 1960. Neither the front cover nor the rear cover are very exciting…unless the cannon goes off.
I had mixed emotions about this album. The first track was “The Saga Of Elvis Presley” which almost turned me off to the album. I think Betty Reilly performs best when she sticks to the standards, so I’ve chosen an old chestnut, “When The World Was Young”
Returning to Dixieland Jazz, it’s Phil Napoleon’s Emperors of Jazz with their Emarcy label 1955 album “Dixieland Classics Volume 1”
Give a listen to a great version of “Never Be The Same.”
It’s time for another Dixieland sampler. This time it’s “Jubilee Dixieland Sampler” on the Jubilee label. I couldn’t find a release year but the album features such great bands as the Salt City Five, Conrad Janis And His Tailgate Jazz Band, Stan Rubin And His Tigertown Five, David Bee, The Spring Street Stompers, and the College All Stars.
There were lots of great artists and tracks to choose from but I think I purchased this album because I’m a huge fan of the Salt City Five. The band later became the Salt City Six. There’s a great website dedicated to the group where you can listen to some of their material and live performances: http://www.saltcity56.com/. I decided to offer up “Baby, Won’t You Come Home” by the Salt City Five.
The next album intrigued me because I’m a fan of the musical “My Fair Lady.” The late great Nat King Cole put out an album with his take on the songs from the musical so I thought this next album would be another delight. I wasn’t disappointed. The album is “Modern Jazz Performances Of Songs From My Fair Lady ” by Shelly Manne & His Friends. To be clear, the friends consist of Andre Previn on piano, Leroy Vinnegar on bass, and of course Shelly Manne on drums. Shelly Manne and friends also put out albums of music from “L’il Abner” and “The Bells Are Ringing”
Here’s Shelly Manne & His Friends with their version of “Get Me To The Church On Time”:
Would you believe I have another Jazz Sampler to offer up? Believe it! This time it’s a live album featuring Billy Butterfield and his band. I bought “College Jazz Sampler” at a local DVD store that also sells used records. It contains live performances from the colleges listed on the cover. On the REO label from 1956, this album turned me on to Billy Butterfield and I’ve been listening to a lot of his music over the past year.
To close out the last of the 12 albums I selected “Willow Weep For Me”. Listen to that Butterfield horn!
Before I close this blahg, I want to offer up a bonus. To prove that I don’t always buy Jazz or Vocal albums, I recently picked up the following at a thrift store:
This album has the original voice talent from the cartoon. I really like Quick Draw McGraw and have the funko pop figures of Quick Draw and Baba Looey and the Vnyl two pack figures. They look like this:
I also have the Funko release of Quick Draw’s secret identity El Kabong:
I have a couple of plush Quick Draw figures as well but I won’t post those here. I don’t want to come across as a fanatic. I was going to post the audio here but I found that someone had posted it to Youtube. Here it is:
That’s it for this time. I hope you have enjoyed some of these selections. I have a few more but I’ll save those for another time. Stay safe and stay home and listen to the music.
This is the blahg that I intended to publish last time. I got a little side-tracked with my mental health and trying to be upbeat. Mental health is a big thing and for me, music is very important. I don’t play any instruments but listening to good music is a great tonic. Over the past 12 months we’ve have a couple of different lock-downs with this pandemic and I’ve spent a great deal of time working from home. When stores were open I usually hit up local thrift shops and scanned through the record section. This blahg is devoted to some of my acquisitions over the past year. Most of these came from thrift stores with the odd one ordered online or picked up at a local DVD store that also sells some used records.
Many of the albums mentioned in this blahg have not had CD releases so many will be new to you as they were to me. Album covers usually attract my attention first and I thought it would be important to include those covers here. More important, is the back covers because you can usually find out more information about the artists by reading the liner notes. I’ve included good sized photos of the back covers where you can make out full details of the information on the rear covers. Click on each photo to view larger sized images.
The first up is an album called “Clarinet Gumbo” by Barney Bigard And His Orchestra. This was released in 1976 on the RCA label
Here’s the title track, “Clarinet Gumbo”:
Next up is the album “Dixie On The Rocks” by Dave Remington and The Dixie Six. This album came out on the Vee Jay label in 1960. The group looked like they were having a lot of fun so I decided to purchase the album
The fun track here is “Take Me Out To The Ballgame”:
The previous two albums were thrift store finds and here’s another one from one of the same stores. It’s The Kenny Clarke Francy Boland Big Band with their 1965 album “Now Hear Our Meanin’ ” released in North America on the Columbia Label.
This track is a real swinger. It’s “Johnny One Note”:
I think I acquired most of these records at the same time as I remember the following record was purchased at the same time and location as the above albums. This album is a 1962 reissue on the Trip Jazz label of the 1959 original release of “Buddy Johnson Wails”. The original issue had been on the Mercury label.
The track I chose from this album is “Please Mr. Johnson”. From the album jacket, “His sister, Ella, another unaffected singer, was always a major attraction, and she was responsible for several of the band’s biggest hits, among them “Please Mr. Johnson”, which she recorded for the first time at the age of fourteen while still in high school…”Please Mr. Johnson” is recreated here, with sister Ella on hand to sing it.”
Here’s a real oddity. This is the 1977 album “The Pucker And Valve Society Band”. This album is like listening to the best of or strange songs by a marching band. It’s fun nonetheless.
The track I have selected here is “I Was Kaiser Bill’s Bat Man”.
In a previous blahg, THE RAMBLE UNPACKED, I wrote about an album I picked up before Christmas by Jonah Jones, with the title “and now in person Jonah Jones.” That was a live album but many months before purchasing that album, I picked up “Jumpin’ With Jonah” by the same artist.
The song I have selected from this album is the first track on side one of the album. The song is “No Moon At All” which is a song I’ve enjoyed by singers such as Doris Day and Mel Torme.
I cannot for the life of me remember what inspired me to purchase the following album. I know I had to order it from a reseller on the www.discogs.com website but it’s enjoyable. This album, “Fireworks” was released by the Weatherbird Jazzband in 1982.
The track I have selected is the title track “Fireworks.”
Now we get back to a vocal performance. This is from an artist I did not know but when I saw the album I thought I would give the album a chance. The artist is Betty Roché and the album is “Singin’ & Swingin’ ” from 1961.
There are quite a few standards on this album so the selection to offer here was a tough choice. I decided to go with a song that I have enjoyed by Frank Sinatra from his “L.A. Is My Lady” album. The song is “Until The Real Thing Comes Along” but it’s all Betty Roché.
The next group is a Canadian band. In fact this album was recorded live, November 14, 1975 at Olivet United Church, in Hamilton, Ontario. The band is The Washingtons and the album is “50 Years Together”.
The album had quite a few scuffs and skipped in a couple of places but I was able to clean it and get a nice recording from it. Again, here’s another title track with The Washingtons performing “Fifty Years Together”.
It’s time for another vocal selection. Here we have the great and talented Pat Suzuki. The album is “Pat Suzuki’s Broadway ’59”
Again, the selection was tough. Pat Suzuki performs song great tunes from such great Broadway shows as Flower Drum Song, West Side Story, My Fair Lady, Bells Are Ringing, and The Music Man. I decided to go with a song from a Broadway show with which I wasn’t familiar. The Broadway show is “First Impressions” and the song is “I Feel Sorry For The Boy”
It’s back to the jazz again with another thrift store purchase. I didn’t know this artist either but I seem to have good luck taking a chance on these purchases. The album is “The Don Elliott Quintet” by The Don Elliott Quintet from 1954. I know the album title isn’t very original.
There were some nice tracks to choose from but I selected the second track this time from the first side. Here’s the The Don Elliott Quintet with “Five O’Clock Whistle”:
The last album is one I really enjoy. It’s got a nice swing to it and the artist was again unknown to me. The artist is Harold Betters and the album is “Out Of Sight & Sound”
I chose the song “Sweetheart” from this album because right from the get-go it grabbed me. Another great thrift store find.
That’s the twelve records for this time. Do yourself a favour and seek out some of these artists or take a chance on some unknown artists when you find their records in a thrift store bin. You might just be surprised! Stay tuned. I have another batch of records from the past year featuring some more great artists. Lucky you. Lucky me.
This blahg is not the blahg I intended to publish this week. I had another blahg all mapped out in my mind with lots of audio recordings. I won’t spoil it by giving anything away. That blahg will be coming in the next month. Part of the problem in the delay was that I lost my motivation and began to suffer some depression last week. When you’re feeling low, everything you want to accomplish either gets pushed aside or seems unaccomplishable. That’s a real word. Look it up!
A few things happened this week to take me out of my funk and inspired this blahg. I haven’t talked much lately about my mental health or even wanted to talk about mental health in general. I’ve been hearing and reading all the news about mental health and the current pandemic and I just didn’t want to tackle that topic. I wasn’t planning on avoiding it but I like my blahgs to be uplifting, inspiring, or at least entertaining. Depression to me was like something from the Seniors’ menu at a restaurant where you skip over it because it doesn’t apply to you. Me, I like to order from the kids’ menu and get that hotdog that they won’t let us adults order. Why are restaurants hiding the hotdogs? Cut it out!
My recent bout of depression was brought on by some detractors who don’t want me to fill in on a job contract for a colleague who is expecting a baby in June. I haven’t done anything wrong but sometimes the peanut gallery gets it in their mind that they think they know something or heard something and never thought to check to see if any of it is true. That’s enough of that. I should know better than to listen to the voices of the detractors but I’m human and you just want to yell “DAMN IT, I’M LIKEABLE”. I didn’t do that and so it was hard to get out of my own head and stop flailing myself with the “POOR ME.”
Last week I had an encounter with my colleague who is expecting. She had been in a virtual meeting which I had not attended but where my name was being put forth as a replacement for her while she is away on maternity leave. I was trying to feel her out on how that went without directly asking what people thought of me as her replacement. She didn’t really elaborate but I got a sense she was trying to protect me from some of the negativity. I had it confirmed later from another colleague but I began to feel guilty later that I had put my female colleague on the spot. No, it really wasn’t guilt about that as much as it was that I didn’t even ask her how she was feeling or how the pregnancy was going. Later, I went back and apologized to her and said I shouldn’t have tried to pry information from her and that I was even more sorry that I didn’t ask her how she was doing. She seemed to appreciate that and I was determined that in future encounters I was going to make sure I focused more on her.
So, this is where this blahg begins. A few days ago I saw my colleague again and made it a point of asking her how she was doing. We chatted briefly about the pregnancy and I asked casually if she had any cravings. Her answer was surprising. She said she hadn’t had any cravings but everything she ate recently seemed to her to be the best of that particular things she had ever had. She gave this example of snacking on M&M candies in the evening. She said she’s always had a bowl that she snacks on in the evening but eating them recently made her feel that these M&Ms were the best M&Ms she’s ever tasted. I commented that wouldn’t it be great if you could keep that feeling all the time and that no matter what you were eating or viewing or hearing or experiencing at any given moment was the best. It would be the ultimate ‘living in the moment’ experience you could ever have. After that, I didn’t give that notion much thought.
On my way home that afternoon after discovering this new philosophy, I stopped to gas up my vehicle and I bought a PLINKO instant scratch ticket. This ticket had instant prizes but if one of your lucky numbers matched one of the scratched and uncovered numbers with the corresponding word “CHIP” then you could take it into your local retailer to reveal your prize. I learned that a video would play at the retailer and I could win up to $10,000 instantly or a “PLINKO” chip that I could play on the real board for a minimum of $100,000 up to a maximum of $500,000. The big board is of course at the Ontario Lottery offices in Toronto and is similar to the PLINKO game we’ve all seen on the game show “The Price Is Right.” I was excited. It took me two days before I got back to the retailer and I had convinced myself that I was going to get that “PLINKO” chip for the big board. I knew the odds were against me and ultimately they were with me only winning $10 which doubled my money from the $5 I had paid for the scratch ticket. It was a disappointment but for those two days I lived that fantasy and dreamed big.
This morning, while shaving, something else happened that reminded me of that “best of something ever had” idea. I don’t know what it is but I always get great ideas while I’m shaving. Some of my short story ideas occurred while I was shaving and so did ideas for my blahgs. I probably should concentrate more on what I’m doing if I don’t want to cut myself. Usually when I’m shaving I have my I-pod playing my music on shuffle. I have such a wide range of music on there that I never know what I’m going to hear. This morning I heard “When I Am King” by Great Big Sea. The lyrics really struck me. Here they are:
Wake up
Without a care
Your head’s not heavy, your conscience clear
Sins are all forgiven here
Yours and mine
Fear is gone without a trace
It’s the perfect time in the perfect place
Nothing’s hurting, nothing’s sore
No one suffers anymore
The doctor found a simple cure
Just in time
All these things if I were king
Would all appear around me
The world will sing when I am king
The world will sing when I am king
Oh, she walks right in
She don’t even knock
It’s the girl you lost to the high school jock
She shuts the door, turns the lock
And she takes your hand
She says she always felt a fool
For picking the captain over you
She wonders if you missed her
Said she always told her sister
Oh, that you’re the best damn kisser
That she’s ever had
All these things if I were king
Would appear around me
The world will sing when I am king
The world will sing when I am king
Daylight waits to shine until the moment you awaken
So you never miss the dawn
No question now, you know which road you’re taking
Lights all green, the radio plays just the perfect song
Well, the war’s been won
All the fights are fought
You find yourself in just the spot
It’s a place where everybody’s got a song to sing
Just like the final movie scene
The prince will find his perfect queen
The hero always saves the world
The villains get what they deserve
The boy will always get the girl
When I am king
By the way, Great Big Sea was an awesome Canadian band. Below is a video of them singing “When I Am King.” It turns out the video is from a concert that was held at the Empire Theatre in Belleville, Ontario in 2006. I live south of Belleville but I work there. I’ve been to concerts at the Empire but sadly I missed this one.
As I said, the lyrics struck me. They’re about everything being great but unfortunately they depend up the singer becoming king. Immediately the lyrics struck me as the best of everything and reminded me of the conversation I had had a few days earlier with my colleague. It also reminded me of that PLINKO fantasy I had lived in for two days.
Shortly after hearing this song, I was getting ready to go into Belleville to work and I couldn’t shake the “best of everything” thought. I asked my Google speaker to play “When I Am King” again. It was at that moment that all of these puzzle fragments of thought slammed together into a clearer picture for this blahg. I was going to ask Google to play me another song in particular by Great Big Sea but then the speaker launched into “Consequence Free” by the band. Here’s another song with poignant lyrics:
Na na na, na na na na na!
Na na na, na na na na na!
Wouldn’t it be great,
If no one ever got offended?
Wouldn’t it be great,
To say what’s really on your mind?
I’ve always said,
All the rules are made for bending.
And if I let my hair down,
Would that be such a crime?
I wanna be consequence free!
I wanna be where nothing needs to matter.
I wanna be consequence free!
Just say: Na na na, na na na na na!
Oh! Na na na, na na na na na!
I could really use,
To lose my Catholic conscience.
Cause I’m getting sick,
Of feeling guilty all the time.
I won’t abuse it,
Yeah I’ve got the best intentions.
For a little bit of anarchy,
But not the hurting kind.
I wanna be consequence free!
I wanna be where nothing needs to matter.
I wanna be consequence free!
Just say: Na na na, na na na na na!
Oh! Na na na, na na na na na!
Oh! I couldn’t sleep at all last night,
Cause I had so much on my mind.
I’d like to leave it all behind,
But you know it’s not that easy.
Oh! But for just one night,
Wouldn’t it be great,
If the band just never ended?
We could stay out late,
And we would never hear last call.
Wouldn’t need to worry about approval or permission.
We could slip off the edge,
And never worry about the fall.
I wanna be consequence free!
I wanna be where nothing means to matter.
I wanna be consequence free!
Just say: Na na na, na na na na na!
Oh! Na na na, na na na na na!
Oh! Na na na, na na na na na!
There’s a theme here of “wouldn’t it be great” and of course, living “consequence free.” Here’s the video for that song:
It was coming together. Great Big Sea was selling me on writing this blahg. I drove to work humming the songs I had heard. I also started to write part of this blahg over lunch. As if that wasn’t enough, on my way home, CBC radio played excerpts from a March of 2009 concert that Great Big Sea played at the Mile One Centre in St. John’s, Newfoundland. They of course played “Consequence Free” but they also played the song that I hadn’t had a chance to ask my Google speaker to play earlier in the day. The song is “Ordinary Day”:
I’ve got a smile on my face and I’ve got four walls around me
I’ve got the sun in the sky, all the water surround me
Oh you know, yeah I win now and sometimes I lose
I’ve been battered, but I never bruise
It’s not so bad
And I say way-hey-hey, it’s just an ordinary day
And it’s all your state of mind
At the end of the day
You’ve just got to say it’s all right
Gina sings on the corner, what keeps her from dying
Let them say what they want, she won’t stop trying
Oh, you know
She might stumble, they push her ’round
She might fall, but she’ll never lie down
It’s not so bad
And I say way-hey-hey, it’s just an ordinary day
And it’s all your state of mind
At the end of the day
You’ve just got to say it’s all right
It’s all right, it’s all right
It’s all right
In this beautiful life there’s always some sorrow
And It’s a double-edged knife, but there’s always tomorrow
Oh, you know
It’s up to you now if you sink or swim
Just keep the faith that your ship will come in
It’s not so bad
And I say way-hey-hey, it’s just an ordinary day
And it’s all your state of mind
At the end of the day
You’ve just got to say
I say way-hey-hey, it’s just an ordinary day
And it’s all your state of mind
At the end of the day
You’ve just got to say it’s all right
It’s all right, it’s all right
‘Cause I’ve got a smile on my face, and I’ve got four walls around me
Here’s the video for that song:
Finally, the theme was clear. It’s all a state of mind and it’s just an ordinary day and it’s all right.
The point I want to hammer home is also that it can be more than just all right. Okay is just okay but what if moments could be the best of whatever it is we are experiencing? That’s what it’s all about. Find a moment or take a moment and say this moment is the best. It might not be the best that’s ever been or will ever be but it’s the best right now and that’s all right. I’m no philosopher and I struggle to even call myself a poet but experiencing the moment like my colleague does, sounds pretty good to me.
I had started off 2021 on a good note. There was that Ramble video from my blahg, THE FALSE DUCKS VIDEO BLAHG #4: OH, DIDN’T I RAMBLE and the subsequent explanation of that video in the follow-up blahg THE RAMBLE UNPACKED that explained what I wanted to accomplish this year. So far, I have fixed the cuckoo clock, listened to all of the records, started reading “Roses Are Difficult Here” by W.O. Mitchell, and averaged two blahgs a month with the goal of reaching 100 blahgs over the past ten years. The motivation was with me and I was living the moments by enjoying what I was doing. I even re-edited the “The Dead From The Neck Up 25th Anniversary Covid 19 Quarantine Special” that I posted last December. By the way, if you haven’t listened to the “The Dead From The Neck Up 25th Anniversary Covid 19 Quarantine Special” then check out this video below containing the remastered version of our special. It’s just the audio from our program set to images of my Christmas display this past Christmas.
When we recorded the special last December and when I was editing it in December and remastering it in January, I felt this was the best work we had ever done. Of course it probably isn’t but I enjoyed it so much that I continue to listen to it at least 2 to 3 times a week while I’m driving to work. It makes me feel happy and each time I hear it, I think “that’s the best we’ve ever done.” I’ll hold onto that thought for a while. We hope to record a new special later this year and it’ll probably be the best…at least in my mind.
When thinking about the theme for this blahg and ultimately the title, “The Best of Everything”, I was reminded of another blahg I had written in late January MY FATHER’S VOICE where I talked about needing to find a cassette that contained my late Father’s voice. It was a tape of speeches from my wedding in 1987. What I didn’t detail in that blahg was that my double cassette deck was found to be non-functioning so I decided to purchase another one off Ebay. I received that tape deck last month and immediately began to locate all of the cassettes I used to enjoy over the years. I remember that I practically wore out three of my favourite tapes once upon a time. The first was “Graceland” by Paul Simon. The second was “Cloud Nine” by George Harrison. And the last was the 1984 release of “L.A. Is My Lady” by Frank Sinatra. The Sinatra cassette was the first of the three that I had purchased and I still think it’s a great album. It seems like I might have gone off topic but really it all connects. One of the great songs on “L.A. Is M Lady” is “The Best of Everything”. I know, I’m brilliant. Still, if you want to understand everything, read some of the lyrics:
The best of everything – that’s (that is) what I wish you all
The best of everything – a Rembrandt (hanging) on your (the) wall
A yacht that wins you cups
Skateboards with style and speed
Show dogs or loving pups
The pride of the pound or the pedigreed
I hope you win that prize – pass that blue ribbon test
I hope your good keeps getting better – ’til your better’s best
The best of everything – that’s (that is) what I wish you all
The best of everything – a Rembrandt (hanging) on your (the) wall
A yacht that wins you cups
Skateboards with style and speed
Show dogs or loving pups
The pride of the pound or the pedigreed
I hope you win that prize – pass that blue ribbon test
I hope your good keeps getting better – ’til your better’s best
If you haven’t heard the song then do yourself a favour and check out this audio/video:
See? It all came together. This is the song that wishes us “The Best Of Everything”. The truth really is, though, that we already have the best of everything…we just have to realize it in the moment. I think that’s the best mental health advice I can offer in this moment.
This blahg will probably not make any sense unless you have seen/read my previous blahgTHE FALSE DUCKS VIDEO BLAHG #4: OH, DIDN’T I RAMBLE. In that blahg, I rambled about a number of things that I wanted to talk about this year. This blahg will unpack some of those topics and will show how I’m doing this year with some of my projects. There will be images, videos, and music, so I’d stick around if I were you. That wasn’t meant to be a threat but hey, what are you going to do about it? No, not you, I’m talking to the person standing behind you. Made you look!
In case you skipped reading the aforementioned blahg, here’s the video so you can see what I’m talking about:
At one point in that video I show the cuckoo clock that my mother gave me about five or six years ago which means it’s probably closer to 7 years ago. It has been in a box by my desk since then and I decided to finally tackle the project of restoring the clock. Here’s a front image of the clock before I began working on it:
Notice that the door is missing at the top, the wooden balcony is missing below the dancers, and the Fraulein on the right at the bottom is also missing. I had all of those parts but they still needed to be attached. Here’s a shot of the inside of the clock:
The picture of the inside was taken after I had removed the inside mechanism and cleaned it up and then replaced everything. I had not removed the bellows but you can see that the top parts of the bellows are missing. Below are some pictures of one of the bellows removed, the clockworks after it had been removed, as well as a shot of the clock housing when the mechanism was removed:
These were the only photos I took of the restoration. Luckily, I did video document the repairs and you can see in the video below the complete restoration.
In the video, I mention two companies where I purchased parts for the clock. If you want to purchase parts in Canada, try: https://perrinwatchparts.com and in the United States try https://www.clockworks.com/. There are some very good videos about cuckoo clock repair and one in particular that I found helpful was the one below:
Moving on…In my ramble I also mentioned some books that I want to read. I detailed how I had ordered a book called “How To Be Topp.” Let me back up a bit and detail something else that I explained in the video. Every Christmas I read from a book called “Happy Christmas.” It is a book compiled by William Kean Seymour and John Smith. From the dust-jacket: “The contents have been drawn from English prose and poetry, from Elizabethan times to the present day.” The “present day” being 1968 when it was first printed or 1978 when it was reprinted. I would check out this book every year from the Picton library until one year my wife found it in the school library where she was working. Either they were getting rid of it or she liberated it. Regardless, I’m glad to own it.
There are several stories and poems that I enjoy reading from the collection and some are excerpts from books that I’ve never read or never known existed. One of the entries that always intrigued me was “Ding-Dong Farely Merily For Xmas” from Geoffrey Willans’ “How to be Topp.” The excerpt on the right, which will enlarge if you click on it, is the first page of the teaser. The teaser being that the short excerpt is only three pages. I’ve always wondered what the entire book would be like. This year, I decided to steam full ahead and ordered a paperback copy of “How to be Topp.” Both the hardcover and paperback are out of print but the a used copy of the book was a lot less than the hardcover and easier to obtain. The images below are of the front cover and explanations on the inside from the editor and the author:
I haven’t got around to reading it yet but it’s on my list to read after the current book I am reading which was also mentioned in my ramble.
Back in 1990 I started reading a short story published in either Canadian Author and Bookman or Canadian Forum. I don’t know if I ever finished reading the story but because it was a library copy, and I couldn’t check it out, they allowed me to photocopy the pages. I have kept those pages and over the years thought often about trying to find the novel from which the story was an excerpt. Somewhere along the way, I lost one of the pages of the story and this past Christmas I decided to pull out what I had in an effort to track down the original novel. Below are images of the two pages I photocopied back in December of 1990. Again, click on each for a larger image.
I finally ordered a hardcover copy of the book “Roses Are Difficult Here” by W.O. Mitchell.
It’s the story of a small prairie town in Canada through the eyes of the editor of the local paper. I’m about 100 pages in, without having encountered the excerpts from above, and I’m thoroughly enjoying the book. It’s well written with small town humour and quirky characters. I highly recommend it even though I haven’t finished it yet.
Next up I want to go back to some of the albums I mentioned in my ramble video. Over this past year it has been a treat to get out to thrift shops when they’ve been open. I find myself always pouring through their used records and I’ve picked up quite a few jazz albums over the past year. I’ll have to create another blahg just to talk about some of those acquisitions but right now I’m just going to address those featured in the ramble.
“Lance (Easton) Harrison, saxophonist, clarinetist, banjoist, singer, entertainer (born 23 June 1915 in Vancouver, BC; died 26 November 2000 in Langley, BC).
Lance (Easton) Harrison, saxophonist, clarinetist, banjoist, singer, entertainer (born 23 June 1915 in Vancouver, BC; died 26 November 2000 in Langley, BC). At first a banjoist and guitarist, Harrison switched to saxophone in his teens and played in the Vancouver dance bands of Trevor Page, Sandy DeSantis, and Dal Richards. After service during World War II in RCAF dance and show bands, he was a sideman for over 20 years in Vancouver pit, dance, and hotel orchestras.
In 1950 he also began leading his own dixieland band, which was heard on the CBC, both in variety series – eg, ‘Hotel Downbeat’ (radio), ‘The Twenties Roar’ (radio), ‘Some of Those Days’ (TV, summers 1961-6) – and on jazz programs. It also performed in Vancouver clubs (eg, Pillar and Post), on the Vancouver Island ferries, and, during the 1980s, at Troller’s Pub, Horseshoe Bay. Members of the band included the trumpeters Stew Barnett or Don Clark, the trombonist Jack Fulton, the pianist Bud Henderson, and the bassist Stan Johnson. It made several CBC broadcast recordings, including The Lance Harrison Dixieland Band (1965, RCI 263), as well as two commercial LPs, The Vancouver Scene (1965, RCA PCS-1043) and Happy Jazz (1972, Water St 1636).
Harrison was a convincing exponent of the dixieland and swing styles; his tenor saxophone style reflected the particular influence of Eddie Miller. Although Harrison rarely performed outside the Vancouver area, he was featured in the CBC TV special ‘A Visit to New Orleans,’ filmed during a trip to the birthplace of jazz in 1971, and he appeared with the US cornetist ‘Wild Bill’ Davison during club engagements made in Toronto and Ottawa in 1983. His band performed occasionally during the 1990s, and Harrison in 1994 joined the ensemble Red Beans and Rice, with Rice Honeywell, with whom he recorded the CD Runnin’ Wild in 1996. Harrison was a member of the BC Entertainment Hall of Fame.”
Here’s a partial scan of the back cover:
If you click on the image you will get a much larger scan of the cover and can read the cover notes and the track listings. I don’t mind posting a couple of tracks here because this album is not on CD and this gives you a chance to sample the LP in case you’re thinking about tracking it down. First up is “Ya Gotta Know How To Love”:
I believe that’s Lance Harrison on vocals on “Ya Gotta Know How To Love”. Regarding the song, Lance Harrison mentions in the jacket notes that he first heard that song performed by the Denza Dance Band and that he still owns the Gene Austin 78rpm record of that song. For the record, sorry about that pun, here’s a Youtube video/audio of Gene Austin’s version from 1926
The second track I’ll present from “The Vancouver Scene” is a swinging version of “At The Jazz Band Ball”:
If anyone is interested in hearing more tracks from this fabulous album then let me know and I’ll post some tracks.
The second album that I mention in my ramble video is “and now in person Jonah Jones.” This album is from 1966 and was “Recorded Live at the Crescendo On Hollywood’s Fabulous Sunset Strip” This is another LP that I don’t believe has had a CD release. Jonah Jones and his Quartet swing some great songs on this album with Jonah doing some vocals. Here’s a scan of the back cover. Remember to click on the image to see a larger scan.
The first track I have chosen from the album is “From This Moment On”. The band is really swinging on this one.
I really like Jonah Jones and his quartet. I have a couple of their other albums that I’ll have to dig out. Finishing, up with this album, I’ve chosen another track from the first side of the album. This time it’s the old chestnut “I Can’t Get Started.”
The third album that I mention in the video is “Nathaniel Rateliff & The Night Sweats – B Sides and Bonus Songs”. Here are shots of the front and back covers:
I haven’t listened to this album yet but I wouldn’t post tracks here because this is a new album and I don’t want to violate any copyrights. I did get to see Nathaniel Rateliff in concert in Toronto last year with my son and NR was great. He appeared this past weekend, February 13th as the musical guest on Saturday Night Live so I’ll link to two videos of his performances. The first is the song “Redemption” which is a new song featured in the film “Palmer”:
The second is “A Little Honey” and it’s Nathaniel Rateliff & The Night Sweats:
“A Little Honey” is off the 2018 album “Tearing At The Seams”. Check out everything you can by Nathaniel Rateliff. He’s a talented artist and his solo album from 2020 “And It’s Still Alright” is a gem I particularly enjoy the song “Rush On” from that album. Here’s the video for “Rush On”:
Stepping back to jazz, I’m going to talk about an album that I didn’t mention in my ramble. This album was either one I had ordered and was expecting in the mail or was ordered after I recorded my ramble video. I’m a fan of another jazz trumpeter, Billy Butterfield. Back in December of 1978 Billy Butterfield appeared at the Manassas Jazz Festival in Manassas, Virginia. The label, Fat Cat’s Jazz, released an album called “Swinging At The Elks’, Billy Butterfield and his World Class Jazz Band”. I received the album a couple of weeks ago and was very excited to listen to it. Here’s a scan of the back cover:
Researching a little further, I found that there was another Youtube video from the Manassas Jazz Festival on December 3rd, 1978 featuring the songs SOMEDAY SWEETHEART / STARDUST / COTTON TAIL / & SINGIN’ THE BLUES. Here’s that video:
So where did that leave me with the album “Swinging At The Elks'”? Well, if you read the back cover, there is one song on the album from December 2nd, 1978 with the following musicians: Billy Butterfield, Mason Thomas (clt), Spencer Clark (bass sax), Bill Allred (tbn), Larry Eanet (piano), Paul Langosch (str. bass), Cliff Leeman (drs). That song is “Carolina In The Morning”:
I don’t know if Billy Butterfield played any other songs on December 2nd, 1978 at the Manassas Jazz Festival but with the two videos above and the one track from the album, we are treated to 11 songs from Billy Butterfield at the Festival. I guess the album purchase was worth it for that one song from December 2nd, 1978.
Before I conclude this blahg, I want to comment on one of the Blu-Rays featured in the ramble and one that was not. I won’t comment on “Fedora” directed by Billy Wilder. I haven’t watched it yet but friend Bryan has and he really enjoyed it. I want to, however, comment on two ClassicFlix releases. The one featured in my ramble video was the Blu-Ray release of “Africa Screams” with Abbott and Costello. This film has never looked so good and the extras include some sketches from their appearances on the Colgate Comedy Hour as well a radio show from May 5, 1948 with Bela Lugosi, and an Abbott and Costello 3-D comic (on screen) and a pair of 3D glasses. There are other nice extras but you’ll have to purchase it to find out more.
ClassicFlix also released another film on DVD and Blu-Ray that I did not mention in my ramble. For a long time I have had a gap in my Laurel and Hardy collection and my Harry Langdon collection. That one film is Zenobia from 1939. For what it’s worth, here’s the information from Wikipedia:
Zenobia is one of the few films after the teaming of Laurel and Hardy that features Hardy without Stan Laurel, the result of a contract dispute between Laurel and producer Hal Roach, who maintained separate contracts for each performer, rather than a team contract, which would have offered them more control over their careers. Zenobia was Roach’s attempt to create a new comedic pair without Laurel, and a series of films with Hardy and Langdon was planned. The dispute was short-lived, however, and Laurel and Hardy were reunited shortly thereafter.
The film was issued in 1997 by Video Treasures on VHS as part of the Laurel & Hardy Classic Collection. I owned all of the Laurel & Hardy VHS issues in that series and gradually disposed of them one by one as they became released on DVD. The exception was, of course, Zenobia, which I held onto until ClassicFlix released the film on DVD & Blu-Ray in November of last year. I had ordered it and forgot about it until it arrived after my ramble video. The only extras on the film are a Restoration Comparison and some other ClassicFlix trailers. The film itself is the gem here. I have never seen it look so good and it’s a cute little film with both stars. I highly recommend it.
Finally, I want to give another shout out to the people who restored “Africa Screams.” I mention in my ramble video that they’re working on restoring “Jack and the Beanstalk” with Abbott and Costello. I’ve already donated to it but if you really want to support a worthwhile project, check out their Kickstarter: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/3dfilmarchive/help-restore-abbott-and-costellos-jack-and-the-beanstalk. They’ve already reached their goal but with extra money they can always include extra content. “Jack and the Beanstalk” has been in public domain with so many bad image DVD releases. This is the chance to see this film restored to how those two great comics would have wanted us to see it.
So there’s the ramble unpacked. I’ve addressed most of everything I mentioned in the video as well as a few other things. I think I’ve also rambled enough for this blahg. Until next time…Scott out.
Here it is February 3, 2021 and I’m posting a new blahg. This isn’t going to be a long blahg but I accomplished something today that I want to share with everyone. Blahgs don’t have to be long and this will count towards that 100 blahgs mark I want to reach this year.
I usually write a short Christmas story every year and end up posting it in one of my blahgs. Most of them are fictional but 2019’s entry “MEATS AND CHEESES AND BABY JESUS” was a Christmas Entertainment based on real events. In 2020, I was so busy writing and recording for the “The Dead From The Neck Up 25th Anniversary Covid 19 Quarantine Special” that I didn’t get around to writing a new story. I guess writing the fictional Christmas themed comedy sketches counts but it isn’t exactly the same.
By the way, if you haven’t listened to the “The Dead From The Neck Up 25th Anniversary Covid 19 Quarantine Special” then check out this video below containing the remastered version of our special. It’s just the audio from our program set to images of my Christmas display this past Christmas.
After Christmas, I got thinking about the idea of someone having a Christmas by stealing everything they needed for the holiday. It was inspired by all of the news stories of stealing parcels off people’s porches over the holiday season. This of course, has inspired the term “Porch Pirates.” I’m not condoning the practise but the thought did spark the germ of an idea for a short story. The result is the story below “A Stolen Christmas.”
It took me more than a month to complete the story. Procrastination was my best friend and motivation was my enemy. I usually write from start to finish and then edit. I think this is the only story where I wrote a snip of a beginning, part of the middle, and part of the end. Today I went back and finished the ending, went back and fleshed out the beginning, and then completed the connecting pieces in the middle. Am I happy with it? I think I am. Writing a story is like getting a gift. Until you’re finished it, you never know what you’re going to end up with. So here’s a late for 2020 or early for 2021 Christmas story. I hope you enjoy it.
The Stolen Christmas
by
Scott Henderson
It was nearing the end of November before Brad realized it was almost Christmas again.
“Do you realize it’s almost Christmas again?” he hollered out to Carla.
Carla was in the bedroom that also doubled as her home office. Brad’s home office was in the spare bedroom. He and Carla both were able to work from home during the pandemic. She was part of a team who developed online advertising and Brad did coding for video games. It sometimes made for tight quarters but if staying home and staying safe were necessary then they would make it work.
“It seems to steal up on us earlier every year,” she shouted back.
“What’s that?” Brad inquired, leaning into their bedroom.
“You asked me if I realized it’s almost Christmas again and I replied it seems to steal up on us earlier every year. Say, aren’t you supposed to be working.”
“I’m on a break,” he replied. “It’s one of the perks of working from home.”
“I could use a break, too,” she offered in return.
“Coffee run?” Brad asked as he stretched in the doorway.
“Hot Licks it is,” she replied.
Hot Licks, was the neighbourhood ice-cream and coffee shop. It was one of the few businesses offering curbside pickup. Brad and Carla could have just as easily made coffee at home but one of the perks of working from home certainly was not seeing the same walls day in and day out. Both made it a point to go out for a walk at least once a day to get exercise and a change of scenery.
It had been challenging this past year working from home. Oh, having home work stations was easily accomplished and their Internet was fast enough to handle their needs. It was the social aspect that was the most difficult. In the past few weeks, it had just been the two of them and not getting on each other’s nerves was a conscious effort for both of them. They took walks together, yes, but they also took walks alone or made excuses to run errands without the other. Carla enjoyed going to the grocery store alone and Brad had taken to early evening coffee runs on his own.
“What was that you said about stealing Christmas,” he asked of Carla when they were down on the street.
“I didn’t say anything about stealing Christmas, silly. I said Christmas seems to steal up on us earlier every year.”
“Oh,” Brad replied. “Still…”, he said trailing off and looking at some of the houses on their way to Hot Licks. “Still,” he began again. “I wonder if it could be done?”
“If what could be done?” Carla inquired. He was making no sense.
Brad stopped and pointed to the porch of a bungalow. “Look at that package sitting there. Obviously some courier left it when he realized no one was home. Anyone could just walk up and steal it.” Brad seemed overly excited about the notion.
“What are you going on about? “ Carla asked. “You’re not thinking about stealing that package?” She tugged at his arm to try to remove him from the temptation.
“No,” Brad said, resisting her efforts to pull him along. “I’m thinking bigger. I was wondering if it were possible to steal Christmas.”
Carla stared at him. What was he saying?
“What are you saying?” Carla asked, speaking her thoughts aloud.
“Well,” Brad began. “Every year we have a pretty good Christmas and I have no complaints but there’s no challenge in it. We spend what we spend and we get each other what we get each other. Maybe it’s the whole pandemic but I want things to be different.”
“Things are different. There’s a pandemic and we’re in a lockdown,” Carla said, stating the obvious.
“I know,” Brad began again. “But what if we stole our Christmas? Nothing store bought or ordered. Everything has to be stolen. No ordering online either. It can be done. Just look at that package on that porch, for example. It would be so easy and every gift is a surprise box.”
Carla couldn’t believe what he was saying. Was he really serious about this?
“I’m serious about this,” Brad continued. “Let’s do it. I’ll take care of the tree and decorations and you take care of the Christmas dinner menu.”
“We can’t,” Carla answered in reply. Still, she didn’t have a rational reason why they couldn’t. A moral reason yes but Brad seemed so intent on the idea. Could she really go along with this? The idea was insane but Brad was right, it was a challenge and they had so few of those other than those imposed by the pandemic and the lockdown.
“Just say you’ll think about it,” Brad implored. He was squeezing her hand now.
“You won’t get a PlayStation 5 for Christmas, then,” was all she could think to say.
“Neither will you, unless one of the mystery porch presents contains one. I know you want a PS5 just as badly as I do.”
“What about that coffee?” she asked pulling at his arm again. “I have work to do and so do you.” She hoped that removing him from the sight of the porch parcel would eventually aid in him forgetting about his stealing Christmas idea.
They eventually made it to Hot Licks and back home again. Nothing more was said that day about the crazy idea.
————
Nothing more had been said about the Christmas stealing for almost a week until one evening Brad came in with a Christmas Tree. It had obviously been a struggle to get it in the elevator let alone the building. It was fully lighted and decorated with ornaments.
“How do you like that!” Brad declared.
Carla was taken aback. There was Brad standing there with a seven foot artificial Christmas Tree and a grin almost as big. It wasn’t the fact that he was standing there with this tree but that she recognized it. The tree was the one outside of Hot Licks. It still had some of the coffee themed ornaments adorning its limbs. She recognized the star on top and even the red metal stand. Brad had thought of everything.
“Don’t tell me you don’t like it?” Brad began. “Do you know what it took to get it up here? The stares alone were enough to stop me in my tracks but I was committed. Someone once said ‘don’t steal anything small’.”
“Oh yeah who was that?” Carla decided it would be best to play along.
“I don’t know, but somebody did,” Brad replied.
“Hey Google,” Carla shouted out to their Google Nest Hub. “Who said, Never Steal Anything Small?” It not only controlled lights and electrical devices in their home, but through its connection to the Internet, it was a wealth of information.
“James Cagney,” Google replied. “Never steal anything small marked the last time James Cagney sang and danced on screen.”
“There you go,” Brad remarked triumphantly. “Never steal anything small. Do you want to me sing and dance?
“No thanks,” Carla replied, “I’ve seen you sing and dance. I’d rather watch the tree.”
Brad took that as his cue. He went to the kitchen and rifled through a drawer and came up with an extension cord. He plugged it into a spare outlet and then connected the tree. Immediately the apartment was ablaze with the glow of the coloured lights.
“Hey Google, turn off all of the apartment lights,” Brad shouted.
The result was stunning. The glow from the tree was breathtaking.
“Will you look at that,” Brad exclaimed.
Carla was. She was looking at the tree…a tree that should have been outside Hot Licks. He was right, though, it was a sight to behold…certainly better than watching Brad dance. Of course, Brad had set up the tree in the middle of their living area but she could adjust that later. Right now, she would let him have this moment.
That night, Carla lay in bed thinking about the tree. This stealing business was now a thing and it was getting serious. The tree outside of Hot Licks was a source of pride in the neighbourhood. What would people say when they noticed it gone? Should Carla say something to Brad? How could she? Brad had been so proud of himself. Did this mean she was now committed to the stealing Christmas scheme? Could she really do it? Brad had made the first move. Now it was up to her.
The next day during her lunch break, Carla made an excuse about having to get some air. She made sure that on her walk, she passed by Hot Licks. She was right, the tree was gone. On the door there was a sign that read: ‘Merry Christmas everyone, closed until further notice.’
Carla was taken aback. What did this mean? The store had been open yesterday. She had bought coffee there for her and Brad. Did this single act of theft bring about the closure of the store? Had the owners taken it that hard? Maybe it was a sense of betrayal to them.
Carla felt sick. She stepped into an alley and threw up.
When she returned to the apartment she was very pale. Brad was still working. Carla went back to work. She was still feeling nauseous. Later, it passed. She said nothing to Brad.
————
The gifts began to appear beneath the tree. There were small things at first and then Brad had placed a larger gift under the tree. It was a square box shape and had some heft to it. Carla couldn’t help herself. She stopped short of shaking it or tearing off a small piece of the wrapping to get an idea of what might be inside.
Was this one of those porch parcels? She didn’t know when Brad had acquired it. It just showed up beneath the tree one day. Did this make Brad a Porch Pirate? The phrase was all over the media. When she thought about it, she really didn’t want to know. The uneasiness was back in her stomach again.
A few days later, there was a large Christmas gift for Brad underneath the tree. He too, had tested the weight of the present. It was heavy enough and it set his mind wondering what it was. He also wondered where Carla had picked it up. Had she picked it up…off someone’s porch maybe? Brad didn’t want to think about it. Christmas was going to be very interesting this year.
————
Brad began to notice a change in Carla. It had started after he had brought home the Christmas Tree. It was subtle things. She was quieter. She didn’t like to take as many walks as she once did. Maybe it was Christmas. Maybe it was the pandemic. Brad didn’t push her on it.
If it was Christmas, Carla didn’t say anything about it. The whole idea of stealing Christmas was an insane idea but Carla seemed to be taking it in stride.
It started with the canned goods. One day after one of her infrequent walks, the kitchen counter displayed cans of pumpkin, cranberry sauce, water chestnuts, and mushrooms.
“I understand the cranberry sauce and the pumpkin but what’s with the chestnuts and mushrooms?” Brad asked. It was safer asking her these types of questions. It was clear she didn’t want to talk about personal issues.
“It’s a new stuffing recipe I want to try,” was all that Carla would say.
“Don’t you need a turkey for that?” Brad asked.
“Just you wait,” Carla answered.
Brad didn’t have to wait long. A few days later, there was a frozen turkey in the refrigerator.
“How…” Brad couldn’t finish the question. He wasn’t sure he wanted to know. But he did know. She had gone out in sweats and then there was the turkey.
“No one questions a pregnant lady at the grocery store,” Carla casually replied.
Brad conjured up the image. Shoplifting was becoming an art with her. Should he be concerned? He had started all of this. A stolen Christmas. Wasn’t that his suggestion after all?
Brad looked at her. He leaned in and gave her a kiss. He’d have to let this thing play out.
————
Christmas day came with many revelations.
It started with the gifts.
“Go ahead, open it,” Brad said after placing the large gift at Carla’s feet. There was that big grin like the one he had sported after he had brought home the Christmas Tree.
“I can’t imagine what it is. I suppose it will be something totally useless,” Carla began as she tore into the wrapping. “Porch presents never are all that good. People always order the stupidest of things that they don’t really…” Her voice trailed off. Her removal of the wrapping revealed a PlayStation 5.
“Surprised, hunh?” Brad asked.
He wasn’t wrong. She was surprised. She couldn’t believe it. This was too much. The Christmas Tree was one thing but stealing a PlayStation 5 was too much. This was a Christmas present meant for someone else and not for her. There was no way this came from somebody’s porch. There was no way that Brad could have known that someone had ordered a PS5. But where else could he have gotten it?
Carla had so many questions but she felt if she asked them then it would ruin everything for Brad. Instead, she gently set aside the PS5 and quietly grabbed up the large bag and handed it to Brad.
“Oh boy, I just love Christmas. I know I’m just a big kid but…” Brad’s voice had trailed off too after he had opened his gift. Inside was another PlayStation 5. The grin from Brad’s face faded and was replaced by a look of confusion.
“Merry Christmas,” Carla offered up in a quiet crackling voice. The time had come for the truth.
“I don’t understand,” Brad began before being interrupted by Carla.
“Okay, okay. I bought it.” Carla watched Brad’s face. Was he unhappy with her for not stealing it? She couldn’t tell. The look of confusion on his face grew more intent.
“There’s no way. It was sold out everywhere.” If Brad was disappointed that it wasn’t stolen, he didn’t show it.
“Remember last month when I went to visit my sister?” Carla asked?
“Yeah, you told me she was going through something and you went as moral support.”
“The truth is I was in line at Gamer Station. They’re one of my clients. They tweeted out that they had received some stock. I was the second in line. I had to wait all night.“ Carla was still expecting that look of disappointment from Brad. “I’m sorry I just couldn’t do it. I just couldn’t steal Christmas.”
Brad’s face brightened and the grin returned. “Neither could I.”
“I don’t understand.” The look of confusion was now on Carla’s face.
“Compare your PS5 to the one you gave me,” Brad replied.
Carla set both gifts side by side and then she saw it. Brad’s gift to her was a PS5 bundled with “Grim Reaper Redux.”
“It’s your game! I mean it’s that game you used to play. But that game was more than ten years ago.” Carla was even more confused.
“That’s what I was working on earlier this year,“ Brad offered. “It’s the old game remastered with better graphics and more levels. Sony decided to do a special bundle of the game with the release of the PS5. I received a free console for my work.”
“So you didn’t steal yours either then?” Carla pointed out.
“Like you, I couldn’t steal Christmas either.”
“But what about the tree?” Carla queried.
“Oh, Nico gave me that.” Nico was the owner of Hot Licks. “Or rather he sold it to me for a dollar.”
Carla was relieved. But why did Hot Licks close? “But why did Hot Licks close?” she shot back.
“Nico thought it was safer to close over the holidays. He didn’t want to put any of his staff or customers at risk. I saw him putting up the notice one evening and we got to chatting. I asked him what he was going to do with the tree. He told me to take it and hoped it would make my Christmas brighter. I told him I couldn’t just take the tree for nothing so I offered him a dollar. That way I could claim it was a real steal.” Brad seemed very pleased with himself.
“And the other gifts under the tree?” Carla inquired.
“Ordered online. It turns out I’m no thief.”
“Same here,” Carla responded.
The rest of the presents weren’t as extravagant as the PlayStations. There were clothes and the requisite socks and underwear, as well as books and DVDs and other items ordered online and not stolen. Carla laughed to herself thinking about someone possibly stealing someone else’s underwear.
The day was perfect. They had found out what type of people they really were and amazed themselves at the same quality in their partner.
“No one questions a pregnant lady at the grocery store,” Brad said with a laugh later that day over Christmas dinner. “Here I was imagining you with a turkey stuffed in your clothing.
“Oh, that part’s true,” Carla casually replied.
“What!?” Brad exclaimed. “I thought you said you didn’t steal anything?”
“I didn’t. I said the part about no one questioning a pregnant lady at the grocery store was true.”
“I don’t get it,” Brad replied. It took him a few seconds but Carla’s smile explained everything.
“You mean..?” Brad uttered awkwardly.
“Merry Christmas Daddy,” Carla said through her huge smile.
Carla had known for a few weeks but she waited until Christmas to give Brad the news. She had suspected the pregnancy after that day she had vomited in the alley near Hot Licks. The morning sickness had continued after that and a home pregnancy kit had confirmed it. Blood work requested by her Doctor revealed the same. The most difficult thing had not been the morning sickness but keeping the secret from Brad.
Brad was quiet for a moment with the thought of it all. It was a perfect Christmas and nothing had been stolen. Brad decided that the appropriate reply to Carla’s revelation was to reach over to her and steal a kiss. He didn’t think she would mind that he’d stolen something after all.
. The day before Christmas in 2012 I wrote a blahg with the title WHAT IS WRONG WITH THE WORLD? and thought I would not need to revisit the theme. Little did I know that almost 9 years later I would be thinking about those words again…or rather uttering them out loud. I thought it was time to ask the question again and to see if my solutions have held up or if I have better ones to offer.
the problems in the world and war and death and Covid 19 but I think everyone is tired of hearing about it. I’d rather focus on the solutions. 
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We have to get that herd immunity. Like I said, I didn’t care. I was given the information about the vaccine and agreed to it and got the jab in my left arm. I even texted my wife and children and my employer stating that I was no longer a vaccine virgin. I was happy that I did it. 
Good thing, too, because I felt like I had been hit by a truck 
In fact, I was already dizzy and probably shouldn’t have driven myself. My wife was at work and I texted her but when the Doctor tells you to come to her office when she’s not seeing anyone in person then you don’t delay. By the time I got to her office, my heart was pounding and I was exhausted. I had to sit in an exam room for 10 minutes and I fell asleep. 
I didn’t think you’re supposed to do that with medicine. I know you’re not supposed to mix your drinks. Honestly, this is like the magician asking you to pick a card and you hope he guesses right. Again, I’m encouraging everyone to get a vaccine but maybe read my precautionary tale and then put yourself on every list and get the one that you feel the most comfortable receiving. When the magician asks you to take a card and put it back, hide an extra one up your sleeve and screw up the whole trick. Stay home. Stay safe. And get a vaccine…I’m just not going to say which one.
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which I held onto until ClassicFlix released the film on DVD & Blu-Ray in November of last year. I had ordered it and forgot about it until it arrived after my ramble video. The only extras on the film are a Restoration Comparison and some other ClassicFlix trailers. The film itself is the gem here. I have never seen it look so good and it’s a cute little film with both stars. I highly recommend it.