Today is January 27th, 2021 and for the second time, in a long time, in a single month, I’m going to put up another blahg. Twice in one month is a record I haven’t accomplished that often but if I’m going to make that 100 blahgs goal this year, then I’ll have to continue to double down.
As readers of this blahg know, I lost my Father, George Henderson, on January 19th, 2019. It’s not a date I choose to celebrate. My friend Bryan reminded me that we shouldn’t remember the death but rather the life. I agree with that but an odd thing happened on January 19th this year. I had gone over to visit my Mother on that date and she asked me if I remembered what was significant about the day? I initially replied that I didn’t know, thinking I had forgotten something I promised to do for her on that day. Then I caught myself and realized that two years previous, Dad had passed away. I felt embarrassed because I had forgotten.
I realized that after Dad died that there would come a time when his memory wouldn’t be something that filled my every day. The first year was busy enough mourning him and dealing with his estate. Last year there was less to do with his final taxes having to be filed and then having to meet with a lawyer and remove Dad’s name from the title of the house. That last deed, of removing Dad from the Deed, hadn’t even occurred to me in the first year. It wasn’t until we tried to renew my Mother’s small mortgage left on the house that we were informed by the bank that it couldn’t be done until the house was solely in her name. That was finally accomplished last fall and what with the Covid 19 pandemic, Christmas, and daily life, I didn’t realize that Dad’s memory was no longer in the forefront of my mind.
I won’t go on and on about the process of letting go of the memory of a loved one. It’s not a choice you make, it just happens. It doesn’t mean you forget that person but maybe it’s not a daily remembrance. There are days when you think about that person and then you wonder why you hadn’t thought about that person for a while. When I came home on January 19th, I reminded my wife that it had been two years since my Father had passed. She too was surprised that we hadn’t thought of it. It was no big deal. It wasn’t deliberate and, again, I didn’t want to celebrate the day we lost my Father. We went about our evening and we went to bed. I don’t even think we talked further about Dad that night.
Sometime that night, I guess it would have been early January 20th, I awoke with a start. I had been dreaming some unimportant dream and it didn’t even involve my Father. But suddenly, and clearly, I heard my Father call out my name. It was loud and clear and just the once. I sat up quickly in bed and then sat for a few minutes on the side of the bed. I was so startled. I have heard of these things happening to others and didn’t really believe in them. In my family, I have relatives who swear they have been visited by the spirits of departed loved ones. I thought it was bunk. Even one of my brothers maintains that he was visited by a vision of Dad. I dismissed his claim. But here was this event that shook me to my core. My wife woke up and asked me if I was okay. I told her I wasn’t. I told her what happened and I began to cry. I was ashamed that I had forgotten my Father. She held me and assured me that I hadn’t forgotten him or let him go. She was right, I hadn’t forgotten him but it was his voice that had left me.
When my Father died in 2019, it took me two weeks before I wrote a blahg about it, THE PASSING OF GEORGE ARTHUR HENDERSON. In that blahg I posted a handful of photos of my Father over the years. One of those photos was the one taken below of my parents at my wedding to Jeanette on May 30, 1987.
My Father had turned 50 on May 24th, 1987, just six days before my wedding. To be fair to my wife’s parents, here’s a photo from my wedding of Jeanette and I with hers and my parents:
I have lots of photos of my Father that I can cull from different sources. That isn’t the point of this blahg. Waking up in the middle of the night and hearing my Father call my name reminded me that one of the things that goes first is the sound of a person’s voice. It has been more than two years since I’ve heard my Father’s voice. The last memory of him speaking to me was in the hospital when I told him that the Doctor stated that there was no quality of life for him and that she recommend we let him go. I asked him if he was ready for that and he said “yes.” That is not the vocal memory I want to recall of my Dad.
I lay awake after hearing my Father call my name in the wee hours of January 20th of this year. I was trying to hold onto my Father’s voice. It got me thinking about what I had that might have recorded my Father. There were no videos of my wedding but I remembered that I had provided my brother Dan with a small tape recorder to record the service and the speeches at my wedding in 1987. That meant there was an audio cassette but I couldn’t remember when I last saw the tape. I searched for a couple of days for the tape before asking my wife about it. She pointed me to a drawer I had forgotten about that contained an odd assortment of burned Sinatra CDs that I had received from other collectors as well as a loose collection of cassettes. In that drawer was a loose cassette labelled “Our Wedding”. Here’s an image of that tape:
It’s not only a collector’s item for Our Wedding but we haven’t had a Kmart here in Canada in more than 20 years.
From that tape sprang to life my Father’s voice from more than 33 years ago. I want to present it here. It’s not easy to understand everything he said in his speech so I’m presenting a transcript below.
“I want to thank everyone for coming and Mr and Mrs Ploegman for making this all happen. Unfortunately Scott doesn’t realize it but I do know where he is tonight because the hotel call me to make sure he had his reservations all right.
When Scott was a school boy I thought I could teach him something. When he was six years old we had an awful battle when he went to school, he wouldn’t come home. He kept staying at school and I swore every noon hour I ran home and I thought after he got a good enough licking he wouldn’t stay at school again. But what’s he do? He wants to be a teacher and he’s marrying a teacher and he’s going to be in school all the way.
I really appreciate you Jeanette for coming to our family because we need another daughter. Boys, we’ve got five of them. So that’s about all I’ve got to say and thank you all very much for coming.”
Mr and Mrs Ploegman that my Father mentions in his speech are my in-laws Florence and Peter.
From over the years, my Father spoke to me again. It was a precious memory finding that cassette and being able to post it here. I started to think of what other medium might hold a recording of my Father’s voice. I’ve owned video cameras over the years but never remembered recording my Father. One memory I did recall was my Father’s voice on a video recording of my son Noah’s first Birthday. He was off camera but I remember him talking in the background. Here’s a clip of my son’s Birthday with my Father’s voice in the background:
My wife Jeanette is working the camera and my daughter Emily, then 4 years old, is seated next to him. Across the table are my niece Keri and my nephew Christopher. I had cats at home at the time, and for the record, I did not cook up one of the cats.
It was funny that when recalling this video I could remember exactly what my Father had said in the background about cooking up one of the cats. Again, another nice memory and another way for me to hear my Father’s voice. In that video were three generations of male Hendersons: Noah, myself (Scott) and my Father George. My son Noah will be 27 this year and he carries on the Henderson name passed from my Father to me to Noah.
I haven’t found any other videos or audio recordings but if I do I might just keep them to myself. This, after all, was to help me remember my Father’s voice. I heard him call my name about a week ago and I wanted him to know I heard him.
Today is January 16th, 2021 and this is my first official blahg for the year. I have actually filmed two videos this year and they are going to be the bulk of this blahg. I mention some Dvds and books, and records in the actual False Ducks Video Blahg #4 but I’m not going to detail that information here. I’m going to save all of that for another blahg. That way I get two blahgs out of the same information. Clever and frugal!
The first video I shot this year was actually shot by my wife. It’s of my daughter Abbie and I doing the Polar Dip at North Beach in Prince Edward County, Ontario, Canada on New Year’s Day, January 1st, this year 2021:
The next video I made was actually a remastering of the video I made to accompany the audio of “The Dead From The Neck Up 25th Anniversary, Covid 19, Quarantine Special.” I should have added the word “Christmas” somewhere in there because it was a Christmas comedy special. I wasn’t totally happy with the mix on our special and I fixed a couple of flubs I made and punched up the sound effects on one sketch and normalized the audio on others. I’ve left up the old version on Youtube which you can view in my last blahg, CHRISTMAS IS WHAT YOU MAKE IT. Here’s the remastered version:
Finally, we come to the official “THE FALSE DUCKS VIDEO BLAHG #4: OH, DIDN’T I RAMBLE”. I think it speaks for itself or I speak for myself…oh you know what I mean:
Now, one last thing I will add is a song to go along with the title of this blahg. There is a great jazz standard called “Oh, Didn’t He Ramble”. My title is a riff on that song title. Of course “riff” is also a music term of you’re in the know like hep cats like me. Give a listen to the Preservation Hall Jazz Band and their version of “Oh, Didn’t He Ramble”:
Well, it’s the day before Christmas and, as usual, I’m cutting it close to finish this Christmas blahg.Today is December 24th, 2020 and I haven’t written a new blahg since my last one, TRACING LINDA KEENE, PART 3: ONE MORE FOR THE ROAD, way back in September. Frankly, that blahg series tired me out and I’ve had other things to keep me busy. Living in the time of a world wide pandemic, Covid 19, hasn’t helped and it’s part of the theme of this blahg. Christmas is a little different this year and we’ll have to make the most of it; any way we can.
Last year’s Christmas blahg, MEATS AND CHEESES AND BABY JESUS, detailed how I had to change some of the plans I normally have for this time of year. I had to miss the live Nativity in Bloomfield last year and had to find a new place to cut down our real Christmas Tree. This year, we’ve had to adapt to doing things differently. Emmanuel Baptist Church in Bloomfield, Ontario still had their Nativity this year but it was a drive-through experience. We waited an hour to drive by all of the stations from the announcement from the angel to Mary about her impending birth, through Joseph’s visit from the angel, to the shepherds, on to the magi, and onward to Bethlehem. There were ten stations in all and at the beginning we were give a CD with 10 tracks to play; one at each station. We were also given a bag of cookies and either hot chocolate or hot cider. I’m glad I didn’t have to miss it and that Emmanuel Baptist found a way to make this season a little bit more enjoyable with us all keeping our social distance.
The hunt for this year’s Christmas tree was also very different. Carol’s Christmas Tree Farm in Napanee, where we cut our tree last year, was closed this season due to the pandemic. That left me no other options than to pursue a tree at a local nursery. My daughter Abbie came home from University on December 9th and I waited until she was home before turning to the tree issue. My wife had suggested Lockyer’s Country Gardens in Picton. I remember years ago, probably close to 20 years ago, I bought one there and paid $30 back then which I thought was pricey. Still, my options were limited so Abbie and I set out on Friday, December 11th and headed to Lockyer’s. We were surprised when we saw no trees outside and even more surprised when we found no trees inside. I asked a young guy who worked there where they kept their Christmas trees. He didn’t laugh but he apologized and said they were all sold out. He also said the local firemen who sold trees by the fire-hall were also sold out. I asked where we might find one in the County, being Prince Edward County where I live and where Picton is relatively in the center. He said he didn’t believe I could find one in the County but there might be a tree farm north of Belleville. I doubted any tree farm would be open during this pandemic and I certainly didn’t want to drive the hour it would take to find the farm he was suggesting.
Abbie and I were a little disappointed but were still determined. Lockyer’s was on the outskirts of Picton so we drove into Picton proper to scout around. The first place we passed was the Metro grocery store and there were about 10 trees stacked against the front door of various sizes. The price at Metro was $45. There were a couple that were over six feet and we thought they might be suitable. We decided to drive around to the other grocery store and by the fire-hall in case the fellow at Lockyer’s had been wrong about the firemen. There were no other trees to be found in Picton. Driving in from Lockyer’s we had passed the No Frills grocery store and Canadian Tire but we could see from the road that they had no trees for sale. As we drove into Picton, we saw some nice ones growing on people’s lawns that looked suitable but I didn’t have an axe nor the inclination to ruin the Christmas of someone else. We settled on a purchase from Metro. When we drove back to the store, we saw someone carting off one of the trees. Luckily, it was not one of the larger ones.
We were able to easily fit the tree inside our Hyundai Sana Fe with the back seats folded down. Carrying in the tree and setting it up was a breeze. It was only after we had it seated in the stand when I cut the twine that was bound around the tree. The tree did not unfold. It probably had been tied so long that it was going to hold its bound shape unless I did something. I searched the Internet about “how to relax a Christmas tree.” I thought about getting it drunk to see if it would relax but someone else suggested “just stick your arms in and push down on the branches. Go around the tree doing that and it should open up.” I still thought that getting it drunk would lessen the tree’s inhibitions. After all, it was more uptight that depressed. I did, however, like one person’s suggestion about trying to make the tree depressed. “If you tell the tree that it’s a very bad tree and it’s mother was a balsam fir so it will never amount to anything the tree will become depressed and it’s limbs will sag.” I opted for the method of massaging the tree. Someone also suggested adding ginger-ale to the tree’s water because their tree seemed to like it. Back to getting the tree drunk again but I don’t drink so the tree just had the ginger-ale water mix. Eventually after the massage and a night sitting in the ginger-ale solution, the tree looked much better. I think the image below speaks for itself:
Here are some pictures of some of our other decorations both outside and inside (click on the pictures for a larger image):
To add to your Christmas delight I’m going to post here something very special. I have mentioned before that from 1993 to 1995 my friend Stephen Dafoe and I, along with our producer and good friend Bryan Dawkins, had a radio show in the Belleville area called “Dead From The Neck Up.” The last show that aired was a Christmas show in 1995. You can check out the 1993, 1994, and 1995 Christmas specials here at http://www.falseducks.com/dead/readdead.html. We were all getting too busy back in 1995 and our lives took different directions. Stephen ended up moving to Alberta in the early 2000s and I wouldn’t reconnect with him until about five years ago. Bryan and I have remained in the Belleville region and keep in touch. So, I’ve been listening to some of our old shows to keep myself amused during this pandemic. A few weeks back I realized that it’s been exactly 25 years since our last show and I got to toying with the idea of a 25th anniversary reunion show. So, I emailed Stephen and he thought it would be fun. I wrote all of the sketches, had him record his parts and emailed them to me and then I contacted Bryan over the Internet and recorded his vocals over Facetime on my Ipad. The result is The Dead From The Neck Up 25th Anniversary Covid 19 Quarantine Special. Of course it’s a Christmas show and I just thought I would share this as it’s amazing with today’s technology what we were able to accomplish and now the Dead From The Neck Up cast is in their late 50s with a good laugh for this holiday season.
I also created Youtube video with some old images of Dafoe, Dawkins, and myself along with some of my Christmas light display.
One thing I should add is a sad note. My daughter Emily and her husband Charlie were set to come down for Christmas but because Charlie is battling a lingering cough, which is not Covid 19 related, they decided to stay in Toronto and not take any chances. This is the first time that Emily has not been home for Christmas. She is thirty now and we’ll just have to do a video chat. We picked up my son yesterday to have him home with Abbie and his mother and I and we went over to Emily and Charlie’s and met them in the parking lot of their building, socially distanced, and dropped off their gifts. They’ll still have to wait until Christmas morning to open them virtually with the rest of us. That’s how we’re making Christmas work for us.
It’s different times and we all have to roll with the punches. Christmas will come again next year and we’ll have a vaccine and hopefully we’ll gather again. Stay safe, stay home and hug those you can. Send virtual hugs to those you can’t and remember to listen to the “The Dead From The Neck Up 25th Anniversary Covid 19 Quarantine Christmas Special”.
Merry Christmas, and I’ll catch you back here in the New Year!
Well, here we go with the third and final in a series of blahgs where I try to trace musical star Linda Keene through the media. If you haven’t read the first two parts, TRACING LINDA KEENE, PART 1: THE FLORENCE SUTTLE YEARS or TRACING LINDA KEENE, PART 2: THE MOMENT IN MY LIFE then do yourself a favour and stop now and check out those two blahgs. If you’ve arrived here or returned here after reading the first two parts then you know I’m trying to trace the life of the great but forgotten singer Linda Keene through her notices, reviews, advertisements, and photos in the media. This post will have a great surprise at the end and if you want to skip ahead to check it out, I wouldn’t blame you but I’m hoping you stick it through from the beginning. This blahg will pick up where the last one left off but a quick word about the title. I can’t tell you that right now but when you get to the end, and the big reveal, you will understand the title. I think it’s a more respectful title to end this final blahg on tracing Linda Keene.
1946
When I last left off, Linda Keene was finishing up 1945 at the Village Vanguard in New York. In February of 1945 she had also recorded the last of her official recordings supervised by her good friend Leonard Feather with a group of musicians including Charlie Shavers on trumpet and Red Norvo on vibes. Linda had once toured with Norvo and was at Kelly’s Stable in 1944 with Charlie Shavers. The sum total of her official recordings were 21 songs starting with her first recording of “Blue and Disillusioned” with Bobby Hackett’s band in November of 1938 through recordings with Jack Teagarden in 1939, Lennie Hayton also in late 1939 and again in early 1940, a single with Tony Pastor in 1941, a 78rpm album containing six vocals from Linda with Henry Levine and his band in February of 1942, then two recordings with Joe Marsala in November 1944, followed by the last recordings in 1945 with Charlie Shavers, Red Norvo, and group. There were also three Soundies with Levine in 1942; which you will understand if you checked out part two of this blahg series. There were no further orchestra or band affiliations by the end of 1945 and all of Linda’s future appearances would be club dates.
I’m not sure when her engagement at the Village Vanguard came to an end. Billboard reviewed her there on December 19th, also see part two of my Linda Keene series, and mentioned she went into the Village Vanguard on the 18th. Variety failed to mention her in the Variety Bills section for the whole month of December. The last listing for the Village Vanguard in the December 26, 1945 issue of Variety looked liked this:
The January 2nd issue of Variety had the following billing for the Village Vanguard for the week of January 3rd:
Variety would carry the same billing well into February with only a slight change-up in their February 27th issue for the week of the 28th:
The last Village Vanguard billing listed in Variety that carried Linda Keene’s name was in the March 13th, 1946 issue for the week of March 14th:
It looked like a very long engagement for Linda Keene at the Village Vanguard from December 18th, 1945 to mid-March 1946.
The first newspaper notice for Linda Keene in 1946 appeared in the Daily News (New York, New York) on January 20, 1946:
This was a radio listing for an appearance for Linda Keene on a radio program called “Battle of Music.” Further research turned up an article in The Times Dispatch (Richmond, Virginia) also on January 20th:
That article from The Times Dispatch explains a little of the format of Classical vs. Pop tunes. We also learn that Linda Keene, misspelled here as Linda Keane, sang “My Guy’s Come Back” and “Blues in the Night” backed by Ken Delmar. A similar article would appear in the Indianapolis Star, Indianapolis, Indiana, on January 26th:
I checked the radio listings for January 26th in Indianapolis and the show aired from 6 to 6:30pm on WIRE 1430. This means that if the show aired six days after the initial airing on January 20th then there must have been a transcription recording of the program to air on the later dates. I have yet to find a transcription for the program. I have also found this program listed as the “RCA Show”, “RCA Victor Show”, and “RCA Victor Program”. Of the two songs sung by Linda Keene, “Blues In The Night” is the more famous of the two, having been written in 1942 with an excellent recording in the same year by Dinah Shore. “My Guy’s Come Back” was written in 1945 by Ray McKinley and Mel Powell with three recordings of the song made in the same year. Liza Morrow recorded it with Benny Goodman and his Orchestra, while another recording was of Helen Forrest with Mannie Klein’s Orchestra, and Dinah Shore also recorded this one with Russ Case and his Orchestra. You can view/hear all three recordings on YouTube:
“My Guy’s Come Back” is an interesting swing tune so I wonder what Linda Keene would have done with it. “Blues In The Night” certainly would have been more suited to her.
A very small but interesting article appeared in the New York Daily News on January 29th, 1946 shortly after Linda Keene’s appearance on “Battle of Music.” It seems that Linda Keene, who was credited at being at the Village Vanguard, was being considered for Dick Kollmar’s new musical, “Windy City.” Unfortunately, Linda was either busy or was not offered a part. The musical would play at the Shubert Theater in late April 1946 in Philadelphia and would be reviewed in the May 6th edition of Billboard:
It is probably a good thing that Linda Keene stayed on at the Village Vanguard. According to the website, http://operetta-research-center.org/world-premiere-recording-walter-jurmanns-windy-city/, “Windy City opened in New Haven on April 18, 1946, in Philadelphia on April 23, in Boston on April 30, and in Chicago on May 16. Per usual during this out-of-town tryout period, the book was tweaked and songs were added, subtracted, and shifted around. The 12-day gap between the May 4 closing in Boston and the Chicago opening was necessitated by a major overhaul of the script and the attendant extra rehearsal time.” Apparently the musical play was not well received and didn’t last long in Chicago. From the same website, the poster below is from the play’s run at the Shubert Theatre in New Haven, Connecticut on April 18, 1946. I guess there was more than one Shubert Theatre where this play ran.
If we assume that Linda Keene finished at the Village Vanguard sometime during the middle of March then the next big announcement for her came about a week later. The Hanover Evening Sun, Hanover, PA on March 23rd carried a small article about some upcoming changes due for Kelly’s Stable in New York. Kelly’s Stable had undergone some changes to expand seating and would reopen on April 4th, 1946 with Linda Keene in the lineup. A week later on March 30th, the Hanover Evening Sunaffirmed that the reopening with Linda Keene was still set for April 4th adding the names of Nan Blackstone, The Osmund Sisters, and Nellie Hill. Despite the two articles stating that Linda Keene would take part in the reopening of Kelly’s Stable, Variety did not list her among the first week performers.
Billboard published a review of the reopening in the April 13th edition but Linda Keene is not mentioned. Nan Blackstone gets a good nod and Nellie Hill, who wasn’t listed in the Variety roster for the first week of April also is reviewed. Variety did include Linda Keene’s name in their performer list for Kelly’s Stable for the week of April 11th.
Billboard also published another review of Kelly’s Stable in their April 27th edition and specifically singled out Linda Keene; even if they did misspell her last name as “Kean.”
Variety would continue to list Linda Keene among the performers at Kelly’s Stable in the May 1st, 8th, and 15th editions. Gone was Nan Blackstone but Rex Stewart’s Orchestra had been added. Linda Keene’s name was also appearing in ads for Kelly’s Stable published in the Princeton Daily Princetonian, Princeton, New Jersey on May 3rd and May 10th:
However, by the time of the May 22nd, 1946 edition of Variety, Linda Keene was not in their review of Kelly’s Stable and Rex Stewart’s Orchestra had moved on as well.
Neither Variety or Billboard would carry any club reviews or route information for Linda Keene for the rest of 1946. At some point, however, Linda was at the Little Casino in New York’s Greenwich Village in June of that year. Down Beat made a mention of it in their June 3rd edition.
Nothing is noted of Linda Keene after that until a small notice appears in The Miami Herald (Miami, Florida) on August 9th. Linda Keene opened at the Blackamoor Room in Miami for two weeks, closing on August 22nd. Linda had last made an appearance in Florida on April 27th, 1942 with Tony Pastor and His Orchestra. Linda would receive some good press throughout her engagement at the Blackamoor but the advertisement that ran in Miami newspapers would not mention her appearance.
Linda Keene’s run at the Blackamoor, as mentioned, generated some generally good press with at least one featuring her picture:
The Miami News (Miami, Florida), August 10, 1946
There were some good reviews as well of Linda at the Blackamoor. On August 14th, The Miami Herald praised her singing:
It’s interesting that the reviewer mentions Linda Keene’s recordings of “Unlucky Woman” and “Blow-Top Blues” both on the Victor label. This was wrong on two accounts. First, “Unlucky Woman” was recorded by Linda Keene with Joe Marsala and His Orchestra on November 29th, 1944 for the Black & White label. Second, Linda did not record “Blow-Top Blues.” It was a tune written by her friend Leonard Feather and Linda had been singing it for a while, including during her engagement at the Village Vanguard in New York in December of 1945 which was reviewed in Billboard and included in my last blahg TRACING LINDA KEENE, PART 2: THE MOMENT IN MY LIFE. I could add third, Linda had not recorded for the Victor label since February of 1942 with Henry Levine. Note that the Miami News article from August 10th, with Linda’s picture, also mentioned “she has new recordings set for the market.” I can find no other recordings for Linda that had been produced in 1946.
Other reviews of Linda at the Blackamoor also praised her singing and mentioned songs she was performing. The one on the left from the Miami News on August 16th mentions her singing “Somebody Loves Me” and “Someone To Watch Over Me” which were two of the six tunes she recorded with Henry Levine in February of 1942. I’m not sure what the song “Hold Me Close” refers to. It could be the song “La Vie En Rose” which was written in 1945 and was popular throughout 1946 and well associated with Édith Piaf. It contains the lyrics “Hold me close and hold me fast. The magic spell you cast This is la vie en rose.” I’m not familiar with the song “I Just Can’t Help Myself.” This too, could be a misquoted title where the lyrics contained the phrase “I Just Can’t Help Myself.” It’s odd that the Miami News gave a positive nod to Bernie Bennett’s accompaniment of Linda Keene but the August 21st Miami Herald didn’t care for Bennett’s Orchestra.
While performing at the Blackamoor, Linda Keene was also called upon to make a personal appearance with Bernie Bennett at a local hospital:That article appeared in the August 18th, Miami Herald. The last significant article mentioning Linda Keene appeared in The Miami News on August 21st. Billy Lowe was the male singer talent at the Blackamoor while Linda Keene was appearing there. The article mentions that “Billy Lowe met Linda Keene five years ago in Erie, Pa.,” where she had been singing at a local club and Lowe was appearing with Frankie Masters’ Orchestra. I tried to trace the exact time that Billy Lowe and Linda Keene might have appeared five years earlier at separate venues in Erie, Pennsylvania. Frankie Masters’ Orchestra was appearing at venues in Pennsylvania in July of 1941 but none of the advertisements or articles mentioned Billy Lowe. Most articles suggested that Lowe didn’t join up with Masters until the summer/fall of 1941. I did find an advertisement from the Pittsburgh Press (Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania) from October 30th, 1942 that put Masters and Lowe in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania at the end of October 1942:
Linda Keene was not in Pennsylvania at that time. Linda was in Cincinnati, Ohio at The Patio for two weeks opening on October 19th and closing on November 1st. Billy Lowe’s memory might have been faulty on the year or it might have been another city or a different month in 1942 or possibly 1943. Starting January 18th, 1943 Linda was featured at the Tropical Room of the Hotel Bolton in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, ending on January 24th. I could find no recordings of Lowe with Masters but Phyllis Myles who also appeared with Frankie Masters was married to Masters. Here’s a nice recording of Myles with Masters on their March 31st, 1947 version of “If This Isn’t Love”:
Linda Keene’s last notice in Floridas was from the August 23rd Miami Herald when it was announced that Marcia Carroll was replacing her that night at the Blackamoor.
Just over two weeks after Linda Keene finished at the Blackamoor in Miami, she headed north and crossed into Canada to Gatineau, Quebec. On Saturday, September 7th, the Ottawa Citizen, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, ran an advertisement for the Gatineau Club noting that Linda Keene would start on the Monday, September 9th. Gatineau is directly across the Ottawa River from Ottawa, Ontario about ten kilometres or six miles away. On September 10th, the Ottawa Citizen ran a nice picture and article of Linda Keene at the Gatineau Club:
I’m not sure where the Ottawa Citizen obtained the information that Linda Keene was primarily remembered as a vocalist with Artie Shaw. In my previous blahg I posted the article to the right as a wire service article from February of 1942 that stated that Linda Keene had turned down an offer from Artie Shaw. At least The Ottawa Citizen was correct about her appearance on the “Strictly From Dixie” program.
A similar advertisement with picture appeared in the Citizen on September 11th and 12th.
This certainly was a better ongoing advertisement than the one that appeared during her time at the Blackamoor. Linda’s initial run at the Gatineau Club was for a week but was extended. On September 19th the Ottawa Citizen noted in the new ad for the Gatineau Club that everyone had been held over. Her two week engagement likely ended on September 23rd, which coincidentally is my Birthday, as new shows generally started on Mondays and she would have closed on the Sunday the 23rd.
Before I move on to Linda Keene’s next appearance in 1946, I want to post a Soundies review from the September 9th, 1946 Billboard.
“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.”
Linda Keene made three Soundies with Henry Levine and his Jazz Band in the spring of 1942, “Ja-Da”, “Frankie and Johnny”, and “When My Sugar Walks Down The Street.” The Billboard review above gives us the program of Soundies that included “When My Sugar Walks Down The Street”. If you wanted to see that particular one, you had to watch all of the ones that preceded it in the program and the one that followed. I thought it would be interesting to recreate that Soundie program by posting each here for your viewing pleasure. Unfortunately I could not find the Soundie for “I Left My Heart In Texas” by Chuck Foster but I did find a video of a live remote (audio only) of that song by Foster:
Unfortunately, I could not find “Dinty McGinty” featuring Johnny Woods with the Bailey Axton Trio. If anyone can locate it, please let me know.
After “Dinty McGinty” of course was “When My Sugar Walks Down The Street” with Linda Keene and Henry Levine.
After Linda Keene came Dorothy Drew dancing to the accompaniment of Dardanelle and her Boys on “Happy Cat”. The version here appears to be abridged:
Following “Happy Cat” came Tommy Reynolds and His Orchestra” playing “Smiles” while Sunnie O’Dea danced:
Finally, if you got through all of those then you were treated to “We’re The Village Fire Brigade” by the Music Mixers. Alas, that Soundie is also not available for viewing. Program 1244 of Soundies was probably a repackaging because Linda Keene’s effort was from 1942 as was “I’d Love To Know You Beter” and “Smiles”, “I Left My Heart In Texas” was from 1945, while “Dingty McGinty”, “Happy Cat” and “The Village Fire Brigade” were relatively new for 1946. As always, “The Soundies Book” by Scott MacGillivray and Ted Okuda is a great resource. Clearly by 1946, Soundies were coming to an end and repackaging of the new with the old was a way to keep things going. According to MacGillivray and Okuda:
“Soundies’ flurry of activity in 1946 was not sufficient to keep the company solvent, and the Soundies Distributing Corporation discontinued operations. William Forest Crouch tried to keep the brand name going himself, doing business as Soundies Films, Inc. and applying for Soundies copyrights in 1947. His last few Soundies, released in March 1947 were cobbled together from cutting-room film clips.”
In October of 1946, Linda Keene’s name appeared in The Evening Sun (Baltimore, Maryland) on October 14th. The advertisement was a novelty advertisement for the Club Charles using all of the letters of that name to spell out reasons to attend performances at the Club. “B” was for Breath-taking Linda Keene sings. The highlight of the show was of course Billy Vine, comic, who featured prominently in the advertisement in The Evening Sun on October 15th when the show opened:
Billy Vine would be featured in other Club Charles advertisements until he closed on October 28th. Linda was not mentioned in any other advertisements but it’s possible she was only there for the two weeks. Linda had last appeared at the Club Charles in January of 1945 and before that in mid-June of 1943. Down Beat made note of her appearance in their October 21st issue and the fact that her hair color had changed. As for Billy Vine, he would die of a heart attack in 1958 at the age of 44.
Media references for Linda Keene were difficult to find over the next year. I could find nothing for her for the remainder of 1946 and it was well into 1947 before I could find her name in print again.
1947
By 1947, Linda Keene’s fame was on the decline. She may have been playing club dates but the media coverage of her appearances were difficult to locate. She had not made a recording since February of 1945 and her radio appearances had dwindled as well. The only radio appearances I could document prior to 1947 had been her appearance in January of 1946 on “Battle of Music” and before that her last guest spot had been on “Everything For The Girls” back in December of 1944. Her screen-test in 1944 had not produced a film career, Soundies were fading fast and she hadn’t made a new one of those since 1942, and her consideration for musicals such as “Windy City” failed to produce results. The remainder of Linda Keene’s career that produced any media coverage was her club work.
The next notice for Linda Keene was not until July of 1947. The only print that Linda Keene would receive from Billboard magazine in 1947 was the one from July 26th when they mentioned her as part of the program at the Susie Q club. What Billboard failed to mention was that the Susie Q was on Hollywood Boulevard in Los Angeles. Linda Keene was back on the west coast for the first time since early of 1944 where she was playing at the Little Club in Hollywood. The same day, July 26th, that Billboard had the notice for Linda at the Susie Q, an advertisement for her appearance ran in The Los Angeles Times. This same advertisement was published in the August 2nd edition of the Los Angeles Times suggesting another two week engagement.
Why was Linda Keene back on the West Coast in July of 1947? The major clue comes from Opal L. Nations’ article “Unlucky Woman – The Story of Linda Keene.”
“A later report in Down Beat announced that Keene had married Burleigh Smith in Shreveport, Louisiana on February 12th, 1947 and that they had both settled down in Los Angeles. Smith was a long-established radio announcer. They found a new manager named Stillman Pond who worked tirelessly on Keene’s behalf. The entertainment business was changing. A film short called “Bitter Street” and a feature film with Bob Crosby with the working title ‘Champagne for Everybody’ fizzled out at the last moment. Her second marriage lasted only a year.”
The article mentions a marriage to Burleigh Smith in Shreveport Louisiana on February 12th, 1947 but a search of the Shreveport newspapers from that time failed to produce any results. This was, of course, not her second marriage because her first had been to Spurgeon Suttle in September of 1931 and there was a second marriage that lasted four days in September of 1944. Opal Nations’ article does clarify that Linda and Burleigh had taken up residence in Los Angeles which explains why Linda Keene was appearing at the Susie Q. Down Beat would also post a photo and article of Linda Keene in their August 27th, 1947 edition, noting that Linda was out of the Suzie Q and waiting for her next engagement:
Down Beat would report in their September 10th issue on some problems at the Suzie Q and why Linda Keene was no longer there:
Opal Nations’ made reference to Linda’s new manager, Stillman Pond and a short film to star Linda called “Bitter Street”. On September 11th, 1947, the California Eagle (Los Angeles, California) published an article about a party recently held by Stillman Pond with Linda Keene as guest of honor. The article mentions “Bitter Street” and some other projects being considered for Linda Keene:
Of course, we already know that “Bitter Street” was never made but it’s interesting to note that Linda Keene was being considered for a feature entitled “My Old Flame” and another short called “Black Night and Fog”. Sam Coslow, who accompanied Linda Keene when she sang “My Old Flame” at the party, was co-author of the song with Arthur Johnston. The song was first recorded by Mae West in 1934 and was obviously still getting traction in 1947. Charlie Barnet, with whom Linda had been linked to in 1941, actually released a version in 1947 with Jean Louise doing the vocals:
“My Old Flame” was a great ballad and I think Linda Keene would have performed a great version of the standard. There was no film produced with the title of “My Old Flame” nor a short with a title “Black Night And Fog.” There was a song from around that time with the title “Black Night And Fog” attributed to Boyd Raeburn and his Orchestra. There exists a radio transcription of “Black Night And Fog” from 1946 by Boyd Raeburn and his Orchestra with vocal by David Allyn:
It is an interesting blues type ballad which might have suited Linda Keene but there is no evidence she ever sang it in any of her club appearances. It seems that the only thing that resulted from Stillman Pond’s party was the news article above and the following photo that appeared in the California Eagle (Los Angeles, California) on September 18th, 1947:
Down Beat would also cover the party in their September 24th, 1947 issue:
The notices for Linda Keene at the Susie Q were the last notices for 1947 that I could find for her with the exception of an article in the September 3rd edition of Variety. The article was primarily about vocalist Bob Davey and his upcoming radio program, “The Blues and Bob.” It was going to have a format similar to the “Chamber Music Society of Lower Basin Street” and would include Linda Keene on the program. I searched extensively but could find no reference to Bob Davey and certainly listings for “The Blues and Bob” on old time radio sites failed to turn up anything. Another potential project for Linda Keene that failed to materialize.
1948
Again, the notices for Linda Keene were sparser and sparser. She may have been working but she certainly wasn’t getting the coverage she would get in previous years. Her first media coverage in 1948 was probably one she really didn’t want. On March 6th, 1948, wire services were carrying notices that Linda Keene was divorcing Burleigh Smith. Down Beat from April 21st, 1948 made reference in two articles to the divorce and that Linda had travelled to New York. Following that announcement, Linda Keene is located the following month back on the East Coast playing at Bob Feldman’s Jazz Club in the Hotel Diplomat in New York. The advertisement to the right is from the Daily News (New York, New York) April 9th, 1948. Down Beat also ran an article about Linda’s appearance at the Diplomat in their April 21st, 1948 edition. The article to the left mentioned Linda as headliner on the previous Friday. It was probably referencing the Friday before that being April 9th which is when the advertisement above noted she was there. The following flyer card of her appearance at the Hotel Diplomat confirms the opening as April 9th, 1948:
The April 21st, 1948 edition of Down Beat also noted in their Band Routes section that Linda was also at the Club James at some point in April 1948:
Referring back to Opal Nations’ article he had this to say about Linda Keene after her marriage to Burleigh Smith came to an end:
“A final trip was made to New York. Work for Keene’s type of act was close to non-existent. She found one gig in Akron, Ohio after which she returned home to Los Angeles.”
The “gig in Akron” was at Senior’s Yankee Inn where she opened on June 14th, 1948. The article to the left and the advertisement for the opening night both come from the Akron Beacon Journal on June 14th. The advertisement prominently featured her name and stated that she had just come from the Blue Angel in New York.
I checked the New York papers as well as Billboard and Variety for the first six months of 1948 and Linda Keene was not listed in any of the advertisements or talent rosters for the Blue Angel. Other advertisements for Linda Keene at the Yankee Inn appeared in the Akron Beacon Journal on June 18th
and on June 23rd:
On June 25th the advertisement for the Yankee Inn had a new performer starting on the Monday, June 27th.
This was another two week engagement for Linda. She had played Akron before, both times at the Summit Beach Park. In September of 1935 she had appeared there with George Duffy and his Orchestra under her married name Florence Suttle and returned as Linda Keene in June of 1941 with Muggsy Spanier’s Orchestra. Both had been single night performances. It was no doubt better for her to have a two week run in Akron than having to pack up and change venues in different cities every night.
1949
It would be over a year after her Akron engagement at the Yankee Inn before I could trace Linda Keene again in the media. By July of 1949, she was back on the West Coast, in Los Angeles, and she was settling in for a two month stay at Larry Potter’s Supper Club. The advertisement below from the July 2nd, 1949 Los Angeles Times notes Linda Keene as a special added attraction opening July 5th .Linda Keene’s engagement at Larry Potter’s received notices from the July 5th opening to her September 5th closing. Below are some of the other advertisements that appeared during those two months:
The Los Angeles Times, August 20, 1949
The Los Angeles Times, August 27, 1949
The Los Angeles Times, September 3rd, 1949
On July 9th, 1949 Linda Keene made an appearance on KECA, a radio station in Los Angeles. The article on the right is from the Los Angeles Evening Citizen News (Hollywood, California) on July 9th and mentions her appearance along with Sidney Miller. When I checked the radio listings for KECA at 9pm on July 9th, the listing indicated the program was called “Buzz Adlam’s Playroom”. I could find no other information about her appearance or what songs she might have performed. Down Beat mentioned the Playroom appearance in their August 12th edition but also stated she had made a TV appearance as well with Don Otis. The article to the left is for the Don Otis appearance on June 21st, 1949 and appeared in that day’s Los Angeles Evening Citizen News.
On July 9th, the same day as Linda appeared on “Buzz Adlam’s Playroom”, Larry Potter’s ran the following advertisement in the Mirror News (Los Angeles, California):
The Mirror News (Los Angeles, California) also printed the following article to highlight Linda’s appearance at Larry Potter’s Supper Club:
Linda was still getting traction from her appearance with Glenn Miller more than a decade before. Of course her career had not started with Glenn Miller but Miller’s name was big enough that associating Linda Keene’s name with him was probably good for business.
During the latter half of her engagement at Larry Potter’s Supper Club, and sometimes after the engagement had concluded, a small wire service article would mention Linda Keene. I found this article appearing as late as September 18th in the Asheville Citizen-Times (Asheville, North Carolina), almost two weeks after Linda had left Larry Potter’s. I have tried to find some information on the song “Ingrid Couldn’t Help It” or a song that included those words in the lyrics but could find nothing. It’s interesting that Linda Keene was getting such odd press for her appearance at Larry Potter’s in Los Angeles in papers as far away as North Carolina. Was the significance the song or the singer?
It’s interesting to note that Linda Keene was mentioned in advertisements for Larry Potter’s in Los Angeles from July 5th to September 5th 1949 yet she was also advertised as appearing in Las Vegas in July at the Club Bingo. The following advertisement from the Las Vegas Review Journal, July 22nd, 1949, indicated that Linda Keene opened at the Club Bingo on July 22nd:
On July 25th, the Las Vegas Review Journal published a positive review for Linda Keene at the Club Bingo:
The only other reference for Linda at the Club Bingo was in the August 26th, 1949 issue of Down Beat and they once again focus on her hair color.
Another oddity, I will also throw in here was another wire service article making the rounds in mid-October. Arnold Ross was a jazz pianist living in California in the late 1940s. From 1944 to 1947 he worked with Harry James; around the same time he played with Harry Edison, Charlie Ventura, and Charlie Parker. He moved to California in 1947, working with Lena Horne, Dizzy Gillespie, Bob Crosby, and Billy Eckstine, in addition to leading his own small group. I could find nothing else about the relationship between Linda Keene and Arnold Ross and whether the relationship was professional or personal.
On November 25, 1949, the Greensburg Daily News (Greensburg, Indiana), published a small article that Linda Keene was opening at The Blue Angel in San Francisco on December 1st. It seems that the Blue Angel used to be the Club Cortez. Down Beat, in the January 13, 1950 issue would explain that the Blue Angel opening was actually delayed by three weeks with Linda opening on December 23rd. Down Beat also mentioned her closing at the Blue Angel, ending her run on January 5th of 1950, with a small article in the February 10, 1950 issue. The reference to Reno is curious because I could find nothing else to suggest another marriage at that time.
1950
A new decade and Linda Keene was still out there trying. She was 38 years old by the end of 1949 and in a couple of years she would be 40. By 1950 she was on her own again without a husband, a movie career, new recordings, or a radio program. Television was in its infancy and offered lots of opportunity with variety show programming but there is no information that suggests Linda even tried television. Speaking of radio, her next media notice, and the first that I could find for 1950, was an odd article from the Broken Hill Barrier Miner, Broken Hill, New South Wales, Australia on February 10, 1950. It was a notice for a radio program called “Ladies First” on which Linda Keene, Gracie Fields, and Vera Lynn would be heard. I could find no other information about the program and whether these were live performances or a disc-jockey spinning records by these three great ladies.
The same day that the Broken Hill Barrier Miner notice appeared on February 10, 1950, the Los Angeles Times reported that Linda Keene was back at Larry Potter’s Supper Club:
Linda had been at Larry Potter’s the previous year for a two month engagement from July 5th to September 5th, 1949. This time, she was only at at Larry Potter’s for two weeks from February 10th to 23rd. Linda would receive a good review from the Valley Times (North Hollywood, California), on the right, in their February 17th edition. As before, when she had performed at Larry Potter’s in 1949, small notices appeared again about a new song she was singing.Again, I have no idea what the song “Billy! Let Me Go!” refers to. As in 1949, this wire service notice ran during her engagement and into March, like the above notice from the Stephens Star, Stephens, Arkansas that appeared March 1st, 1950.
In April of 1950 Linda Keene was back in the newspaper again but not for any appearances. Linda Keene’s picture appeared in the The Los Angeles Times on April 29th along with her friend, comedienne Mable Todd. Linda was a witness who provided testimony in the divorce proceedings of Mable Todd against her husband Matthew Santino. Jumping ahead a bit, Mabel Todd and Linda Keene were linked again in a wire service article that ran in newspapers the week of June 10th. The article mentions a four week tour of hospital shows in Montana starring Keene and Todd. It’s odd that this article appeared in June but notes that Todd’s divorce wouldn’t be final until April. Was that the April that just passed or was she referring to April of 1951? Even odder is that Linda Keene was performing in Montana but it was in May of 1950 before this article appeared; suggesting the June article should have appeared in March or April of 1950.
Linda’s appearance in Montana was at the Legion Club in Great Falls, Montana.
Linda’s engagement at the Legion Club began on May 16th, as referenced in the advertisement above from the Great Falls Tribune (Great Falls, Montana) on that date. It’s interesting to note from the advertisement that she had appeared at “Cafe Society Uptown, Village Barn in New York, the Paddock Club and Bar of Music in Miami.” We know of course about her appearance at the Cafe Society Uptown in July of 1941 but nothing of the other venues. Perhaps the Village Barn is a reference to the Village Vanguard where she appeared in December of 1945. The advertisement also notes that she “comes directly from the Blue Angel in San Francisco” but that might have referred to her December 1949 engagement there. It’s also interesting that the advertisement makes reference to her USO work and that she received the Legion of Merit from the President. I can find no reference to her Legion of Merit but it’s possible. Linda’s appearance at the Legion Club was likely only for a week as there were no other advertisements after this one that appeared in the Great Falls Tribune on May 20th:
Linda and Mabel Todd did appear in Montana later in 1950 over the Labor Day Weekend. The following article appeared in The Western News from Libby, Montana, on September 7, 1950.
I had to cobble the article together from an article that was spread across three pages. Linda’s appearance in the stage show at the High School auditorium was summed up as “Linda Keene in the second spot earned some wolf calls as a sophisticated blues singer.” I could find no other information about the event or of any other appearance of Mabel Todd and Linda Keene in 1950.
1951
The next notice for Linda Keene wasn’t until well into 1951. In August of 1951 she was out in Colorado. The Greeley Daily Tribune out of Greeley, Colorado ran an advertisement on August 31st for the Rosedale Inn where Linda Keene’s name was spotted among the talent. The Greeley Daily Tribune would offer up this advertisement the next day on September 1st: Linda only appeared at the Rosedale Inn for a week from August 31st to September 6th. The Greeley Daily Tribune ran this advertisement on September 7th: For the record, the advertisement on September 8th, 1951 clarified that the “talented new artist” appearing on the bill with Paul Motley was Lou Lockwell, ‘spectacular performer on roller skates.’
The only other notice for 1951 appeared in the October 19th, 1951 issue of Down Beat. Apparently Linda was in Chicago and looking for club work. I could find no references to her club work in Chicago in the fall of 1951.
1953
After the October 1951 notice in Down Beat, I could find no other media notices for Linda Keene until the summer of 1953. I have searched through the back catalogue of available newspapers as well as issues of Billboard, Variety, and Down Beat for this period but found nothing for Linda Keene. At this point, her career was waning and she was relegated to club work where she was not the headliner in some cases. Sometimes she appeared in Canada, like the time she appeared at the Gatineau Club in Quebec. Just because I could find no notices for her from fall of 1951 to summer of 1953 doesn’t mean she wasn’t working. Her name just might not have been prominent but she was still receiving some notices. Referring back to Professor Eves Raja’s article, “Linda Keene, Her Elusive Fame”, he had this to say about this time period in her life:
Her manager Stillman Pond could not get her a break with the Hollywood studio establishment. Linda’s final entry in Down Beat came on Oct. 19, 1951…”Linda, after several years on the West Coast blew into Chicago and plans to stick around doing club work….Despite the positive reviews form her many admirers Linda’s career petered out in the early 1950s.”
Opal Nations’ article, ” ‘Unlucky Woman’ – The Story of Linda Keene”, concurred with Professor Raja regarding Linda’s 1950s work:
“…Down Beat Magazine reported the odd engagement Keene played in San Francisco and Las Vegas…Keene had moved to Chicago and was looking for work. She wound up living in Hollywood.”
By July of 1953, Linda Keene was once more on the East Coast, appearing this time at the Musi-Club in Troy, New York: I believe the opening date for Linda’s engagement at the Musi-Club was Friday, July 3rd, 1953 and the engagement ran well into August. By August 7th the line-up of talent had changed but Linda Keene was still in the mix: The same advertisement as the one above from the Troy Times Record, Troy, New York, would run up to Saturday, August 15th. It is likely that the engagement concluded on Thursday, August 27th.
The following month, September, Linda was still on the East Coast, appearing at the Hollywood Restaurant in Pittsfield, Massachusetts. The advertisement below appeared in the The Berkshire Eagle (Pittsfield, Massachusetts) on September 21st.According to the advertisement, Linda opened on Monday, September 21st and appeared through Saturday, September 26th. All other advertisements for the Hollywood Restaurant for that week were the same as the one above. On September 28th, the Hollywood Restaurant advertisement still featured Jack Rossello but the vocalist spot had been replaced by Marsha Carrol.
In October of 1953 Linda was up in Providence, Rhode Island at the Hi-Way Casino. The following advertisement appeared in the Providence Journal on October 24th, 1953: Notice that Linda Keene was now being billed as Decca’s Great Blues Star. There is no evidence that Linda Keene ever recorded for the Decca label. I checked through all of the editions of the Providence Journal for the week preceding and the week following the above advertisement from October 24th but found no other advertisements for the Hi-Way Casino. Assuming that “Coming Monday”, which would have been Monday, October 26th, from the above advertisement suggests that the program changed on Mondays. From that, it is safe to assume that Linda Keene likely appeared at the Hi-Way Casino from October 19th to October 25th. By the way, Jack Soo, who started on the 26th, would go on to play the very funny character of Detective Sergeant Nick Yemana from 1975 to 1982 on the hilarious “Barney Miller” television show.
An an interesting article appeared in the The Oneonta Star (Oneonta, New York), on December 12th, 1953. Before commenting on Linda Keene at the Windsor, I want to highlight the statement “Linda is just back from the Copa in Montreal.” Given that the engagement at the Hi-Way Casino in Providence, Rhode Island ended on October 26th, I searched through English and French language newspapers in Montreal for any notices of Linda Keene’s appearance at the Copa. I could find nothing from the end of October through the first week of December. She might have been in Montreal but her run at the Copa failed to generate any noticeable press. I also checked all of the advertisements for Linda Keene at the Windsor Hotel in Oneonta, New York for the month of December but her name is not mentioned. Linda Keene’s name does appear in advertisements for the Windsor Hotel but not until January of 1954.
1954
The first advertisement for Linda Keene at the Windsor Hotel appeared in The Oneonta Star on January 2nd, 1954.
Other advertisements for the New Windsor Hotel noted that the program usually changed on a Friday. The Friday before the January 2nd, 1954 advertisement appeared was New Year’s Eve, December 31st, 1953. Here is the advertisement that appeared in the Oneonta Star on December 31st:
Note that Linda Keene’s name does not appear. The following day, Saturday, January 1st, 1954 was a holiday and the New Windsor Hotel was probably closed; making January 2nd, 1954, Linda Keene’s debut at the Hotel. Other advertisements that were published during Linda’s engagement at the New Windsor Hotel would prominently feature her name and picture:
Linda Keene appeared at the New Windsor Hotel from January 2nd to January 14th, with her last press appearing in the Troy Times Record, Troy, New York on January 11th. Despite a promise to revisit the issue of Blues music in a subsequent issue, I could find nothing for the remainder of January where the Troy Times Record revisited the subject.
After her January appearance at the New Windsor Hotel in Oneonta, New York, Linda Keene’s name is absent from any media I could find until late May of 1954. The Newburgh News on May 28, 1954 had her appearing at the Crystal Lake Restaurant in Newburgh, New York:
Linda had last played Newburgh for a one night only appearance at the Ritz Theatre on February 24th, 1942. The Crystal Lake Restaurant appearance likely began on May 28th, 1954 because it was a Friday evening. The Newburgh News was still advertising Linda at the Crystal Lake Restaurant as late as June 11th, 1954, suggesting a 2 or possible 3 week run in Newburgh:
The next news of Linda Keene was until August of 1954. On August 6th, the New York Daily News reported that Linda Keene was opening at the Blue Angel in New York. Linda Keene was supposedly last at the Blue Angel in May or June of 1948 but I could not find any media for that engagement. Linda’s return to the Blue Angel, and indeed New York, was so significant that the New York Daily News played it up in their August 14th edition and also included her picture:It might have been significant to the New York Daily News that Linda Keene was back in New York at the Blue Angel but neither Billboard or Variety would make any reference to her. Variety’s list of performers at the Blue Angel for August failed to mention Linda Keene at all. Linda’s engagement at the Blue Angel was likely for two weeks, ending on August 19th.
Linda continued working on the East Coast in the last half of 1954. She returned to Pittsfield, Massachusetts in November of 1954 at Frankie and Johnnie’s. The Berkshire Eagle (Pittsfield, Massachusetts) ran the advertisement below on November 1st, 1954:
When Linda performed in September of 1953 in Pittsfield, she was at the Hollywood Restaurant. In November of 1954 she was at Frankie and Johnnie’s which ironically was the name of one of the Soundies she filmed in 1942. This was a one week engagement ending on November 7th, 1954. On November 8th, the vocalist Lisa Mansfield would open at Frankie and Johnnie’s.
The night after closing at Frankie and Johnnie’s in Pittsfield, Massachusetts, Linda was over in Utica, New York on November 8th opening at The Silver Rail.
The Utica Observer Dispatch made use of the New York Daily News August 14th edition that highlighted Linda Keene’s appearance at the Blue Angel. The same advertisement would appear in the Utica Observer Dispatch for Linda’s one week engagement that closed on November 14th, 1954.
1955
After Utica, New York in November of 1954, Linda was still performing in New York State in January of 1955. On January 24th, 1955 the Syracuse Herald Journal published an advertisement for Andre’s Tic-Toc Club in Syracuse, New York. Linda had last performed in Syracuse twenty years earlier in 1935, under her married name Florence Suttle, with George Duffy and his Orchestra at the Hotel Syracuse. Her engagement at Andre’s Tic-Toc Club would be for a week from January 24th to January 30th. Linda Keene would return again to the Tic-Toc Club but it wouldn’t be for another three years.
1958
Linda Keene’s career was most definitely slowing down. After the Tic-Toc Club appearance in Syracuse in January of 1955, I could not track her again until three years later when she was back on the West Coast. She was back at Larry Potter’s Supper Club in Los Angeles. It had been eight years since the last advertisement featuring Linda Keene at Larry Potter’s in 1950. Opening on March 7th, 1958, Linda Keene would appear through to March 27th. The above advertisement would appear every Friday from March 7th to March 21st in the Valley Times (North Hollywood, California). This would be Linda’s last advertisement that I could find on the West Coast.
Finally, Linda Keene returned to Andre’s Tic-Toc Club in Syracuse, New York. Three years had passed since her January 1955 appearance at the Tic-Toc Club. Her return engagement was for a week opening on April 28th, 1958.
This was not only Linda Keene’s last appearance on the East Coast that I could track, it was the last known advertisement or notice for Linda Keene anywhere. Essentially, after the 1958 Tic-Toc Club appearance, she disappeared from the media altogether.
It was inevitable that the the last media notice for Linda Keene would be her obituary. The November 7th, 1981 issue of Billboard mentioned her passing on October 23rd of that year. It is sad that it was so brief and also contained inaccuracies. Linda Keene was born Florence McCrory on December 1st, 1911 in Hattiesburg, Mississippi. This would have made her 69 years old at the time of her passing. Of course, according to Professor Raja, ““When Linda Keene arrived in Boston in the fall of 1937, she had convinced all those in the entertainment circles that she was 19 when her true age was actually 25.” Those five or six years that she shaved off her real age apparently never caught up to her even when she died. The other obvious error in the obituary was the misspelling of Bobby Hackett’s name as “Jackett.”
When I looked at that obituary there wasn’t a sense of completion that I had finally reached the end of my three part blahg series. What I felt was a sense of sadness. I thought I could write a better obituary than that. In fact, with this blahg series, I have. I traced Florence McCrory from her first notice regarding her High School graduation in 1929 through her marriage to Frank Suttle in September of 1931 and on to the beginnings of her career in Jackson, Mississippi in 1933. I followed her up to Detroit in 1934 and through 1935 and 1936 as she appeared throughout Ohio with her husband and bands lead by such people as Danny Rousseau, Bob Chester, George Duffy, Pinkey Hunter, Johnny Joyce, and Sam Jack Kaufman. I traced her back down to Birmingham, Alabama in May of 1936 where she appeared for two months at the Rex with Coleman Sachs and his Orchestra and then over to Atlanta, Georgia for an engagement at the Casa Loma with Buddy Fisher and his Swing Orchestra that was cut short after two weeks when the club was raided and shut down. At the end of 1936 Florence was in Philadephia at the 20th Century Club with Barney Zeeman and his Orchestra. Florence Suttle disappeared after that, only to reappear as Linda Keene with Nye Mayhew and his Orchestra at the Hotel Statler in the fall of 1937.
Tracing Linda Keene became much easier. Her career was on the rise with connections to such greats as Glenn Miller and Bobby Hackett in 1938. Linda even waxed her first recording with Hackett in November of 1938 on “Blue and Disillusioned.” This would be the first of 21 recordings from 1938 to 1945 with big names such as Jack Teagarden, Lennie Hayton, Tony Pastor, Henry Levine, Joe Marsala, and Charlie Shavers. She toured extensively with most of those bands and spent time as well fronting for orchestras and bands led by Scott Fisher, Red Nichols, Willie Farmer, Red Norvo, Muggsy Spanier, and supposedly Charlie Barnet. She took time out as well to appear in USO shows and had a successful nightclub career in the mid-1940s through the late 1950s on both the East and West Coasts of the USA and points in-between and up into Canada as well. Add to that, her three Soundies appearances with Henry Levine and radio appearances on “Strictly From Dixie” and “Club Matinee” then the sum or her career was more than could be noted in any obituary. As I said, these three blahgs are the best obituary I could write for Linda Keene.
I didn’t want to end this blahg on a sad note. Yes, it’s sad that Linda Keene didn’t have the fame she deserved but for a time, she was famous and continued to work and earn respect. I wish that I could find some of the radio programs she appeared on or any of the live remotes she did while touring with most of the bands I listed. I’ll keep looking. Both Professor Raja and Opal Nations alluded to some recordings that Linda Keene made in 1942 that were never released. Opal Nations states that “shortly before Petrillo’s AFM recording ban on July 31st, 1942, Keene managed to cut four sides with her Backroom Boys for Bob Thiele’s Signature label. This would have been at the very onset of the label’s existence. However, financial problems cancelled out the project that included a blues rendering of the Koehler-Moll-Barris song Wrap Your Troubles in Dreams.” Professor Raja also reported on the recordings but maintained it was in 1943. “In 1943 she waxed Wrap Your Troubles In Dreams and three blues for Bob Thiele’s Signature Records. Masters were apparently made but they never made it to the factory floor.” The August 1st, 1943 issue of Down Beat confirms it was 1943 stating the release would be around September 1st of that year. I wonder if any of these could be located?
Failing to locate any of her radio appearances or remotes or the lost 1942/43 recordings for Signature Records, I still have something else that is phenomenal with which to end this blahg. In a previous blahg, DOWN A RABBIT HOLE WITH LINDA KEENE, I wrote about a listing on Ebay of an “Audition 78” of Linda Keene singing “Muddy Waters”. This was the picture published with the item description:
The listing description stated the following: “Linda Keene Audition Vinyl “Muddy Waters” on Gold Star 78RPM 10″ Single Sided ” I had no idea what to expect. Was this “the” Linda Keene? What was this an audition for? What was the song “Muddy Waters?” I took a chance and negotiated a price with the seller. The seller was in California and all he could tell me was that he bought it at a yard sale or flea market but no other details. Finally the record arrived and I was able to play it. Here’s what I heard:
I have not made any attempt to clean it up as I thought it would take away from the recording. If there are others more adept at cleaning audio files then I invite you to try. Needless to say, I was more than pleased and surprised to hear that this was indeed Linda Keene. It still left the mystery as to the recording but more on that in a bit. The song Muddy Water was written by Peter DeRose, Harry Richman, and Jo Trent in 1926. Here’s the sheet music for it that was published in 1926:
Bessie Smith record it in 1927 as did a young Bing Crosby with Paul Whiteman’s Orchestra in 1927. Bing would re-record the song with the Buddy Cole Trio in 1954. Part of the lyrics contain the following:
Dixie moonlight, Swanee shore Headin’ homebound just once more To my Mississippi delta home
Here was Linda Keene, Mississippi born, singing about her home state in what I believed was a 1950s recording.
I did not know anything about the Gold Star recording label or studio. I did some research and found a Facebook group dedicated to the Gold Star recording studio. I explained about the 78 audition record and they replied with the following:
“There was a Gold Star Recording Studio in Texas. Without seeing the label of your disc, it’s possible that it may have been cut there. Ms. Keene was a big band vocalist in the 1940’s so if she did anything at Gold Star Recording Studios in Hollywood, it would have been after 1950 when the studio opened its doors.”
I explained that Linda was living in Hollywood in the 1950s so I suspect it was done there. I also sent them a scan of the label. Here was their reply:
“That is indeed a Gold Star Recording Studios (Hollywood) disc. That was an early 1950s label design.”
The group also sent me a link regarding the three acetate label designs utilized at Gold Star during it’s thirty-three years of operation between 1950 and 1983. Gold Star Studios was a major independent recording studio located in Los Angeles, California. For more than thirty years, from 1950 to 1984, Gold Star was one of the most influential and successful commercial recording studios in the world. Founded by David S. Gold and Stan Ross and opened in October 1950, Gold Star Recording Studios was located at 6252 Santa Monica Boulevard near the corner of Vine Street in Hollywood, the studio name was a combination of the names of the two owners — (Dave) GOLD and STA(n) R(oss). The studio was renowned for its unique custom-designed recording equipment and many big bands and orchestras recorded on Gold Star. The particular label of this Linda Keene audition 78 was used up to the mid-1950s. That doesn’t narrow down the recording date but we can assume it may have been recorded when Linda Keene was on the West Coast between 1950 and 1953. I can find no other information about the recording and who performed with Linda Keene on that date.
Finding a lost or unknown Linda Keene recording is significant enough but what comes next is truly amazing. After playing the recording I was showing off the 78 to my daughter when I noticed that the flip-side of the record had what looked like residual glue marks where another label might have been. We both also noted that the flip-side appeared to have grooves. I own some one-sided 78 records and usually the unrecorded side is flat and smooth. I had to take a chance and see if the second side was playable. It was. Here’s what I heard:
Again, I haven’t cleaned up the track. What an amazing surprise! Here was a mature Linda Keene singing the ultimate saloon blues song. The song doesn’t need an explanation. “One For My Baby” was written in 1943 and was recorded by many artists but became associated with Frank Sinatra who would record the song a few times and would sing it as a standard in his concert performances. But for Linda Keene fans, this is an outstanding swan song for her career. I swear that discovering this track as an unknown track on a supposed one-sided 78 is the truth. I knew after hearing it, that it would be the closer for my last blahg entry on Linda Keene and the title of the blahg itself. It’s so fantastic a story that I couldn’t possibly make this up.
That’s it. I don’t think there’s much else to say. I don’t know if there are any other copies of this recording in existence. I also don’t know if Linda Keene recorded any other songs that day at the Gold Star studios. It was lost until it ended up in the hands of the Ebay seller from California and then was shipped out to me here in Canada. Did this once belong in Linda Keene’s own collection? She was living in California, too, at the time of her death. Did she handle this with her own two hands? We will never know. Two lost tracks that summed up her career. “Muddy Water” was a look back to her Mississippi beginnings and “One For My Baby” is a swan song of an artist who was waiting to be rediscovered and one more recording to be found…One More For The Road.
Welcome to the second in a series of blahgs where I try to trace musical star Linda Keene through the media. If you haven’t read my two previous blahgs about Linda then you really should because it will give you context. In my first blahg, Down A Rabbit Hole With Linda Keene, I talk about how I became fascinated with Linda Keene. After that blahg, I noted that I couldn’t get Linda Keene off my mind and I wanted to find out more. I decided that other than the two articles, one by Prof. Eves Raja and the other by Opal Nations, I needed to see if I could trace her through old newspapers and magazines and find out what happened in her life. In the last blahg, TRACING LINDA KEENE, PART 1: THE FLORENCE SUTTLE YEARS I traced Linda from her first newspaper appearance under her original name as Florence McCroy through her years under her married name of Florence Suttle. At the end of that blahg, she had made the transformation to Linda Keene.
Although my last blahg was detailed in some aspects, I believe it was lacking in others. It is very difficult now 80 years later to try and trace Linda’s movements. There are some good resources online and a number of websites where you can search through old periodicals. The difficulty comes if some newspapers do not have searchable text. Also, that says nothing of newspapers that are not available to review at all. I’ve tried to expand my scope to include magazines of the time like Variety and Billboard but these do not always have searchable text options therefore I’m bound to miss something and have to resort to scanning page after page trying to catch her name. In this Part 2, I am now going to try and piece together her movements from late 1937 through 1945.
It is not without design that I chose to focus on these particular years. In 1937, Florence Suttle made the change to Linda Keene; naming herself after Ginger Rogers’ character in 1937’s “Shall We Dance”. By 1945 she had made the last of her officially released recordings. Her star appeared to be on the rise and she was seeking fame and recognition. There is a line in her recording of “You’re The Moment In My Life” that goes “You’re the moment in my life that comes and goes, but then again, I don’t suppose, you were ever meant to stay.” She might have been singing about fame in those lyrics. That’s why I chose it as part of the title of this blahg. 1937 to 1945 was the moment in her life. Clever? I have my moments too.
In my two previous blahgs dedicated to Linda Keene, I reprinted articles about her by Opal Nations and Prof. Eves Raja. Prof. Raja also produced the wonderful CD “Linda Keene – Recordings and Soundies.” I finally located a copy of this excellent CD and found that the booklet included in the CD was another source of information produced by Prof. Raja. Here are reprints of the booklet which I will refer to throughout this blahg.
I won’t revisit the early years when she was appearing around the USA as Florence Suttle but will draw on this booklet and the other article by Prof. Raja and the one by Opal Nations, along with my own research, to try and chronicle Linda Keene’s movements beginning with 1937.
1937
When I last left off my previous blahg, Florence Suttle had made her transformation to Linda Keene and was appearing with Nye Mayhew’s band in Boston, as evidenced in the article from Birmingham News on December 4th, 1937. To be accurate however, Linda Keene had been appearing with Nye Mayhew since September 30th. 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. Linda received her first media mention, that I could find, under her new name with the compliment that she was a “charming girl from New Orleans, who combines a soft, mellow contralto voice with an ability to hit a falsetto range.” She was in reality from Mississippi but maybe this was part of her reinvention.
On the first page of the CD Booklet, Prof. Raja provided the following information:
“When Linda Keene arrived in Boston in the fall of 1937, she had convinced all those in the entertainment circles that she was 19 when her true age was actually 25. She was determined to succeed in the highly competitive world of professional singers despite the constant flow of new young talent.”
Was changing her age along with her name, another part of her transformation? I find it unlikely that she would not try to build on the reputation she had made while singing as Florence Suttle with George Duffy’s orchestra in 1935 or her appearances at the Mayfair Room in Detroit in 1936, and subsequent appearances with Coleman Sachs in Birmingham for six weeks at Club Rex and her stint in Atlanta at the ill-fated Casa Loma. Okay, maybe she might have left the Casa Loma off her résumé but you’ll have to read my previous blahg for details on that. Suffice it to say, she had a good history and lying about her age would have eroded that history…unless Nye Mayhew believed she was performing with George Duffy when she was 16 or 17 in order to keep up with the change in her age.
It has been difficult to determine how long Linda stayed with Nye Mayhew in Boston. Prof. Raja’s booklet states “a very promising seven week stand at the Statler in Boston and her first job as a band singer with Nye Mayhew moved her up to the next level.” Seven weeks would have put her stay with Mayhew around the end of November. The notice below from Billboard Magazine November 27, 1937 traces acts and notes where they are appearing. According to this, Linda was still at The Statler with Mayhew as of the time of this notice:
Ads like the one to the right from the Boston Globe, October 14, 1937, ran throughout October and November but none mentioned Linda Keene. In fact Mayhew’s band was still playing at the Statler up to April 29, 1938. There was a small mention of Mayhew and his orchestra in the Boston College Heights newsletter from May 6, 1938 stating Mayhew had finished up at the Statler the previous Friday, being April 29.
I can find nothing that mentions when Linda took her departure as vocalist with Mayhew’s band. I can also find no other mention in print for Linda Keene in 1937.
1938
1938 was a significant year for Linda. After the last notice regarding Linda in the Birmingham News in December of 1937, I found nothing in print for her until the end of October 1938 (more on that later). It wasn’t until I expanded my search that I actually came across an article that mentioned what we long heard and suspected of Linda Keene in 1938. In The Times Record (Troy, New York) from February 25, 1954 there was an article about ‘local boy’ Al Masten who had performed with Glenn Miller’s Orchestra from 1938 to 1941. The article, besides carrying a picture of Masten, also highlighted the picture below of the band at Hamid’s Million Dollar Steel Pier in Atlantic City:
Linda Keene is mentioned as Linda “Keane” but it’s a wonderful photo, which you can click on to get a larger image, that proves that Linda Keene was with Miller’s Orchestra in 1938. A very similar picture to the one above is to be found in the book “Chattanooga Choo Choo: The Life and Times of the World Famous Glenn Miller” by Richard Grudens:
The photo also includes signatures of everyone in the photo, including Linda’s, but furthermore narrows down the date of the Steel Pier engagement to August 1938.
There are other books and articles that talk about Glenn Miller and the summer of 1938. From John Flower’s book, “Moonlight Serenade A bio-discography of the Glenn Miller Civilian Band”, Flower discusses 1938 and we learn the following:
During the summer the female vocalist position had a turnover: Virginia Vonne replaced Gail Reese and Linda Keene replaced Virginia Vonne.
September 1938: Sometime during this month Glenn signed a recording contract with RCA Victor…also during this month Marion Hutton joined the band replacing Linda Keane as vocalist.
Flower mentions Linda once as “Keene” and then as “Keane”. Keane was how she was represented in the 1954 article in The Times Record (Troy, New York). Flower’s work also includes an itinerary of dates from 1938 including recording sessions and concert appearances. Unfortunately none of the concert appearances note the date that Linda Keene joined with Miller. There exists a few radio transcriptions of Glenn Miller’s Orchestra from 1938 and the one from June 27th, 1938 still has Gail Reese singing with the band. So, Linda Keene would have had to become the female vocalist after that but before the appearance in August at Hamid’s Million Dollar Pier. The advertisement on the left is from The Morning Post (Camden, New Jersey) August 19, 1938. If Glenn Miller was appearing for a week, ending August 26, then it is likely the appearances at the Pier began on August 19th. There would be other advertisements similar to this one but Linda Keene’s name is not mentioned.
I have tried to follow the itinerary in John Flower’s book by checking periodicals starting with Glenn Miller’s appearance at Beach Point Club, Mamaroneck, Long Island on August 13th, through the band’s appearance at Hamid’s Million Dollar Pier, and on into September ending with the band at the Memorial Auditorium, in Raleigh, North Carolina September 9th and 10th, 1938. I have found one advertisement and two articles for some of those dates:
August 15, 1938, Lakewood Park, Mahanoy City, Pennsylvania
August 17 – September 2nd, 1938, Guy Hunt’s Ocean Pier, Wildwood, New Jersey
September 9/10, 1938 Memorial Auditorium, Raleigh, North Carolina
None of these articles or advertisements mention Linda Keene. We can only assume that Marion Hutton replaced Linda Keene in late August or early September. Glenn Miller was looking for a sound and Marion Hutton would be his female vocalist on and off from 1938 until 1942. With any other singer, you could say singing with Glenn Miller’s Orchestra was the height of fame. With Linda Keene, she came and went too quickly with the band. She was still getting credit as late as November of 1938 for the time she served with Miller. The article to the upper left and advertisement to the right are from the The Journal (Meriden, Connecticut), November 25th, 1938 and Linda Keene was still being associated with Miller’s name. Miller’s Orchestra wouldn’t really make it big until 1939 and become the Glenn Miller Orchestra we know today.
Update (May 10, 2023): I found a new reference to Linda Keene still performing with Glenn Miller as of September 14, 1938. The article on the right, from the Winston-Salem Journal, North Carolina, September 14, 1938 details that Glenn Miller’s orchestra was performing for the Downtown and Country Club members and that Linda Keene was the girl vocalist with the band. If Linda Keene was indeed performing with Miller on September 14th, 1938 then her departure from Miller had to be around the middle of September or later in the month.
Although 1938 appeared to be short on mentioning Linda Keene in the media, the year was still a success. She had a short run with the Glenn Miller Orchestra and by the end of the year had made her first recording. She may have left Miller in September but by the end of October she had hooked up with Bobby Hackett and was appearing with him at Nick’s in New York. The article to the right was a wire service article that ran in several papers on October 30th, 1938. On November 4th, 1938 Linda Keene entered the studio for the first time with Bobby Hackett for her recording “Blue and Disillusioned”, first issued on the Vocalion label:
Then issued on the cheaper OKEH label:
I have not been able to find any information about how Linda ended up performing with and recording with Bobby Hackett and his Orchestra. It is possible her reputation had grown through her appearances with Nye Mayhew and then with Glenn Miller.
The song, “Blue and Disillusioned” is a solid blues effort from Linda. Back when she was appearing under her married name, Florence Suttle, the Clarion-Ledger ran ads on July 2nd and July 3, 1933 for her appearance in the Midnite Frolic at the Majestic Theatre in Jackson, Mississippi and dubbed her “Blues Singer.” Five years later, with Bobby Hackett, she made it official. The label categorizes the song as a Fox Trot and Linda’s first attempt is soulful and full of her southern intonations. I could find only three reviews of “Blue and Disillusioned.” The first one appeared in the New York Columbia Spectator, New York, New York from December 15, 1938. “Hampered by a long vocal by Linda Keene” was all it said about Linda but that had to be damaging to read that. The second was from the Barnard Bulletin (New York, New York) on January 10, 1939 where the vocal is reviewed as “competently done by Linda Keene. The third was from the Virginia-Pilot from Norfolk, Virginia where the article from January 29, 1939 failed to mention Linda’s vocal at all.
Linda must have taken the poor review in stride or maybe there were better reviews by the end of 1938 because she was still working by the end of 1938. Jumping ahead a bit, a very strange little picture and article ran in many newspapers in January of 1939. The one below, exactly like all the others, ran in the The Cushing Daily Citizen (Cushing, Oklahoma) on January 25th, 1939: The notoriety of this picture and caption was really more for Lefty Gomez, the star pitcher with the New York Yankees. It mentions that Linda Keene is a soloist with an orchestra at a Hamilton hotel. I was able to access the archives for The Royal Gazette and Colonist Daily, Hamilton, Bermuda and found this article from the December 20th, 1938 issue:
Linda was now appearing with Scott Fisher and his Orchestra starting on December 19, 1938. Fisher and his Orchestra had also recorded for Vocalion in the 1930s. I wonder if there was any connection? The following favorable article about Linda’s appearance appeared in The Royal Gazette and Colonist Daily on Christmas Eve, 1938:
This review was a better way to finish out 1938 than the poor review of her first recording.
1939
What a great way to start off 1939, working in Bermuda. Ads such as the two below began appearing in The Royal Gazette and Colonist Daily as early as January 3, 1939 and continued until nearly the end April:
The last advertisement mentioning “Songs by Linda Keene”, exactly like the one above appeared Wednesday, April 26, 1939. On April 27th, Linda’s name was noticeably absent:
Even the Arthur Murray Dancers seemed to be gone. Scott Fisher would close out the season at The Bermudian on May 10th as noted in the final advertisement from The Royal Gazette and Colonist Daily on May 8th, 1939:
We next pick up Linda Keene’s trail on May 5, 1939 when she’s in New York and records the “B” side of a 78 with Jack Teagarden’s “Octoroon” on the “A” side. This time it’s Linda’s second recording and she’s the “girl” with Jack Teagarden and his Orchestra “Featuring 16 men and a girl” and her vocal on “White Sails”
WHITE SAILS –LINDA KEENE with JACK TEAGARDEN AND HIS ORCHESTRA
Just a week prior to this recording, on April 28th, 1939 Teagarden had been in the studio recording with Jean Arnold. We know that Linda Keene last performed in Bermuda on April 26th. Was she called up by Teagarden? By 1939, both Brunswick and Vocalion were owned by Columbia Records. Again, was this the connection? Reviews were favorable but of the handful of reviews that I found, none mention Linda Keene’s vocals:
Teagarden was fronting a new band and he had a new girl singer. Linda’s vocal on “White Sails” is a wispy perfect song for dancing. It’s not the blues like her first recording and it doesn’t hamper the band’s music. It’s a nice compliment and she seems confident.
On June 4, 1939, there was a small notice that ran in newspapers announcing that Jackson Teagarden’s band would be the guests on the “Fitch Summer Bandwagon” that day. There’s no mention of Linda Keene in the notice but the program survives as a radio transcription and from it, three vocals by Linda Keene who was now well established with the band.
FITCH SUMMER BANDWAGON JUNE 4, 1939 WITH JACK TEAGARDEN AND LINDA KEEN
The significant track here is of course “Tears From My Inkwell,” as the other two only have brief lines sung by Linda. I want to give a shout out to Greg Poppleton out in Australia, which is as far away from Canada as you can get unless you loop over the top. Greg, among other things, hosts a podcast called “Phantom Dancer” https://2ser.com/phantom-dancer/. Back on June 23, 2015 Greg’s podcast included the live track of “Tears From My Inkwell” from the Fitch Bandwagon program. Unfortunately I could not find an archive of Greg’s 2015 podcast so I could hear the song but when I reached out to him through Facebook he got my request. Exactly five years later, on his recent June 23, 2020 podcast, Greg included the track again and I was able to hear it for the first time. The entire June 4, 1939 Fitch Summer Bandwagon program was issued on the LP “Birth Of A Band” in 1985 on the Giants of Jazz Records label. If you want to find out more about Greg Poppleton you can also check out his website: https://gregpoppleton.wordpress.com/.
The other takeaway from the the Fitch Summer Bandwagon program was hearing that Teagarden and band including Linda Keene were appearing at the Blackhawk Restaurant in Chicago. At some point, prior to entering the Blackhawk, Teagarden’s Orchestra with Linda Keene were appearing at the Roseland Ballroom in New York. In George T Simon’s 1971 book, “Simon Says : The Sights and Sounds of the Swing Era, 1935-1955” he republishes a June 1939 review of Teagarden and Keene at the Roseland:
There is no telling when Linda Keene joined up with Teagarden but in Simon’s article he states that Teagarden was at the Roseland for almost two months before appearing at the Blackhawk. Teagarden with his “16 Men and A Girl” started at the Blackhawk on May 18th, 1939 as can be noted from the ad from the Chicago Tribune (Chicago, Illinois) on May 14, 1939. Linda Keene left Bermuda in late April while Teagarden was still at the Roseland so it is likely she got her start there and then moved into the studio for the May 5th session. Appearing at the Blackhawk, however, Linda Keene is officially recognized as the girl in in the “16 Men and a Girl” in the June 2nd advertisement.
It wasn’t difficult to track Jack Teagarden and his orchestra in the week leading up to his premiere at the Blackhawk. The band played several one-nighters throughout Pennsylvania, probably after leaving the Roseland in New York, but none of the advertisements that I came across mentioned Linda Keene or the tag line of “16 Men and a Girl.” Linda was probably travelling with the band as they made their way from New York to Chicago. Linda is only mentioned with Teagarden during their run at the Blackhawk with some very good notices especially this one from the Chicago Tribune on June 25, 1939:
Build up for Teagarden started on May 14th, 1939.
There was some other good press throughout their run at the Blackhawk:
Chicago Daily Times, May 21, 1939
Chicago Daily Times, June 4, 1939
The most significant thing to happen to Jack Teagarden and his “16 Men and a Girl” was that they went into the Brunswick recording studio in Chicago and recorded four songs on June 23, 1939. Two of the recordings, contained vocals by Linda Keene, “Especially For You” and “You’re The Moment In My Life”:
ESPECIALLY FOR YOU –LINDA KEENE with JACK TEAGARDEN AND HIS ORCHESTRA
———————————-
YOU’RE THE MOMENT IN MY LIFE –LINDA KEENE with JACK TEAGARDEN AND HIS ORCHESTRA
A couple of articles suggest that both tunes were popular:
Both of these reviews ran in mid-August of 1939 but by then Linda Keene was no longer the girl singer with Jack Teagarden’s Orchestra. The last article that would appear for Linda Keene with Teagarden ran in the Chicago Daily Times on July 1st, 1939:
It is difficult to speculate why Linda Keene parted ways with Jack Teagarden. She had recorded three songs with Teagarden, totaling four when including “Blue and Disillusioned” with Bobby Hackett back in November of 1938. Maybe Linda was ready to move on to other prospects. Some research suggests that Teagarden’s band was having some financial difficulties in 1939 and Teagarden’s problems with alcohol were also an issue. Did these contribute to Linda leaving the band? The day after the July 1st, 1939 Chicago Daily Times post with Linda and Teagarden’s pictures, a small notice ran in the Chicago Tribune on July 2nd:
I can find nothing that proves the date that Linda Keene left Teagarden. Obviously it was near the end of June or the beginning of July 1939. One anomaly is that the following article appeared in the Green Bay Press-Gazette (Green Bay, Wisconsin) on August 8th:
I have checked ads for the engagement at the Bay Beach but none of them mention Linda Keene. A review of the appearance ran in the August 7th, Green Bay Press-Gazette but there is no mention of Linda but rather Avis Kent who sang. More than likely, some advance notice included Linda while she was still with the Teagarden’s Orchestra and was not corrected in time.
So where was Linda? As I said, I cannot pinpoint an exact date or reason why she left Teagarden but by the time of his Bay Beach performance in Wisconsin, Linda Keene was already back in New York. An article from the Brooklyn Daily Eagle (Brooklyn, New York) on August 11, 1939 reports that Linda Keene is appearing with Willie Farmer and his Orchestra at the Park Central Cocoanut Grove. I could not determine a start date for Linda with Willie Farmer but a search of New York newspapers revealed in The Brooklyn Daily Eagle from Friday July 28th, 1939 that Willie Farmer started at the Park Central on Wednesday, July 26, 1939.
The same edition of The Brooklyn Daily Eagle from Friday July 28th, 1939 also carried the following photo of Linda Keene:
This clearly establishes Linda Keene with Willie Farmer’s orchestra; suggesting she opened with Farmer on July 26th. Linda’s name would begin appearing in the August 26th and September 2, 1939 issues of Billboard for Route information for singers and acts:
It is possible that information was not submitted for Linda Keene when she started with Farmer when they opened together on July 26th. Down Beat would acknowledge Linda’s move to Willie Farmer’s outfit in their October 15th, 1939 issue. They noted she had been with Teagarden for six weeks. There was also a Billboard review of Willie Farmer and his orchestra in the September 9th, 1939 issue. The review was not kind to Farmer but Linda received a good notice:
Another oddity is that the Billboard route information for Linda Keene on August 26th had her at the Park Central in New York but the next night, August 27th, she was advertised as being at the Roton Point Park in Stamford, Connecticut with Willie Farmer. The Daily Advocate out of Stamford, Connecticut ran a good sized advertisement on August 25th announcing the Sunday, August 27th appearance of Linda and Willie Farmer:
Willie Farmer and his Orchestra had been around for a few years and had released a number of sides on the Bluebird Label in 1937 and 1938. Linda Keene would not record with Farmer.
Willie Farmer and his Orchestra were not listed in the Billboard route information for Orchestras in the September 16, 1939 issue. It is possible that after their bad review in Billboard on September 9th that their run at the Park Central came to a quick end. I found no trace of Willie Farmer and his Orchestra with Linda Keene until I stumbled upon an old advertisement posted by the Albany Group Archive on Flickr:
There was no indication when this advertisement appeared or in what newspaper. I only assumed it would be Albany, New York because Farmer and his Orchestra were in New York City in September when they finished at the Park Central. I was eventually able to access the Times Union newspaper from Albany and the October 12th, 1939 edition confirmed the opening night at the Goblet was October 12th. The Albany Times Union on October 14th also reviewed Farmer’s opening at the Goblet on October 12th but only mentioned Linda Keene’s name briefly. The Times Union on October 21st, 1939 wrote again about Farmer and his Orchestra at the Goblet and this time noted “Linda Keene, charming song stylist.” The article also detailed Farmer’s previous engagements at the Coconut Grove and prior to that having been at the Promenade Cafe. I have found no evidence if Linda Keene joined Farmer at the Promenade Cafe or if she was still with Jack Teagarden. The last advertisement for the Goblet that I have found having any further mention of Farmer and Linda Keene also appeared in the October 21st, 1939 edition of the Albany Times Union:
The Billboard Route information for Orchestras had listings for Willie Farmer and his Orchestra at the Goblet in Albany in all of the Billboard issues from November 4th, 1939 up to and including December 30th, 1939. None of those issues mentioned Linda Keene in the Route information for singers. It is not clear if Linda Keene was in Albany or perhaps started out in Albany but did not finish the run with Willie Farmer and his Orchestra. One thing is clear, by the end of 1939, Linda Keene was not appearing with Willie Farmer.
As with her appearances with Jack Teagarden, there is another anomaly for Linda Keene in the fall of 1939. Apparently, according to The Herald-News (Passaic, New Jersey), Linda Keene appeared as part of the “Vaudeville Night of Stars” at the New Deal Long Bar in Passaic on November 7, 1939:
Notice that the advertisement calls attention to the fact that Linda was “formerly with Jack Teagarden Orchestra” and does not mention any connection to Willie Farmer and his Orchestra. I scrolled through other editions from The Herald-News but Linda Keene’s name does not appear in any subsequent ads for the New Deal Long Bar after November 7th. This mystery doesn’t help in proving how long Linda Keene stayed with Willie Farmer and his Orchestra at The Goblet in Albany.
LENNIE HAYTON
We do know for sure that Linda Keene was not with Farmer and his Orchestra by late November 1939. At some point, 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. Linda Keene is not listed in the advertisements that ran in New York papers but according to Billboard magazine she was with Hayton during his engagement at Loew’s State. Billboard reviewed Hayton on November 24th and ran their review in the December 2, 1939 issue. This time, unlike with Billboard’s review of Willie Farmer, the band is good but “Linda Keene is just fair.” Hayton and his Orchestra would finish at Loew’s State on November 29th.
On November 30th, according to Billboard, Hayton and his Orchestra were booked into Leon and Eddie’s for 4 weeks.
Even the Evening Sun (Hanover, Pennsylvania) made note of it in their December 2, 1939 issue. Billboard also made mention of Hayton and his Orchestra at Leon and Eddie’s in their Route information for Orchestras in their December 2, 9, 16, and 23rd issues. Again, Linda Keene is not mentioned.
Linda Keene must have been with Hayton while he was at Leon and Eddie’s because a week after they started there the Orchestra was in the Varsity Records studio on December 7, 1939 with Linda Keene. Varsity was one of two labels that comprised the United States Record Company; Royale Records was the other. Eli Oberstein created the USRC in the summer of 1939, shortly after he left an executive position at RCA Victor. Varsity was considered a “budget” label, specializing in popular music and selling records for 35 cents each. Lennie Hayton and his Orchestra would record four songs on December 7, 1939, “Peg O’ My Heart” backed with “As Long As I Live”, both instrumentals, and two sides with Linda Keene doing vocals on “At The Balalaika” and “The Starlit Hour”.
AT THE BALALAIKA –LINDA KEENE with LENNIE HAYTON AND HIS ORCHESTRA
———————————-
THE STARLIT HOUR –LINDA KEENE with LENNIE HAYTON AND HIS ORCHESTRA
There wasn’t much in the way of reviews for these two Linda Keene tracks with Hayton. The only one I came across was this one from The Akron Beacon Journal (Akron, Ohio) January 13, 1940:
The Lennie Hayton recordings are considered rare. Varsity Records was a small label and did limited runs of their 78 records. According to Professor Raja’s article, ‘Linda Keene – Her Elusive Fame’, “All shoe-string recording companies had to wait their turn regarding record manufacture and had a limited number of pressings. On Linda’s two records, apparently, there was very little shellac left over from a Glenn Miller hit. As a result, very few copies of these two records are known to exist.” Many of Linda Keene’s other recordings with large Orchestras like Bobby Hackett’s and Jack Teagarden’s have been included on CD compilations of the early years of those orchestras but her recordings with Lennie Hayton remain limited to the obscure 78 records and of course Prof Raja’s CD “Linda Keene – Recordings and Soundies.”
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.
One of Hayton’s extended stay locations was of course Leon & Eddie’s in December of 1939. Perhaps Linda was singing the two songs during the engagement at Leon & Eddie’s. After that engagement ended during the last week of December, Lennie Hayton hit the road for the rest of December and into 1940. We catch up to Lennie Hayton and Linda Keene from an article in the Irvington Gazette, Irvington, New York on December 21st, 1939. Hayton is booked for New Year’s Eve at the County Center in White Plains, New York:
Apparently Hayton and his Orchestra were part of a tour that headlined Gene Krupa and his Orchestra. Another article announcing the appearance of the two Orchestras in White Plains ran in the Brewster Standard, Brewster, New York on December 28, 1939:
Linda Keene’s name does not appear in the advertisement below but the review of the New Year’s Eve concert is very favorable to Linda.
In all aspects, it appeared Linda Keene had a great year with 1939. She had started 1939 during her engagement with Scott Fisher’s Orchestra in Bermuda and then was picked up by Jack Teagarden. Three recordings resulted with Teagarden and an appearance with his Orchestra on the national Fitch Summer Bandwagon program as well as appearances with Teagarden at the Roseland in New York and a five week run with Teagarden at the Blackhawk in Chicago. She never stopped working and moved on to a hitch with Willie Farmer’s Orchestra for August through November before starting with Lennie Hayton and eventually recording two more songs with his Orchestra and then ending the year on tour with Lennie Hayton and Gene Krupa. What would 1940 bring? A hint came in small article in the December 27th, 1940 issue of Variety stating that Linda Keene had left Lennie Hayton’s Orchestra for Tony Pastor’s band. Obviously incorrect as she was still with Hayton as of New Year’s Eve 1939 but a prediction of things to come?
1940
LENNIE HAYTON contd…
Lennie Hayton and Linda Keene continued to tour in 1940. Sometimes it was difficult to locate a listing for Lennie Hayton. Sometimes his touring information was included in Billboard’s Orchestra Route information or other times it required scanning pages of Billboard or other periodicals that were not searchable. Piecing together bit and pieces I was able to find some tour information for Lennie Hayton and his Orchestra in January of 1940. On January 5, 1940 it is noted that Hayton will follow Krupa into the Roseland the following day. This was the same Roseland where George Simon saw Linda Keene perform with Jack Teagarden in the spring of 1939
Variety from January 3, 1940 also makes mention of Hayton moving into the Roseland after Georgie Auld. The engagement at the Roseland may have lasted from two to three weeks. Billboard, from January 20, 1940 mentions that “Mal Hallett is the follow-upper to Lennie Hayton at Roseland Ballroom in another couple of weeks.” This suggest a possible end date of the last week of January. The January 20, 1940 Billboard article also puts down speculation that Linda Keene has moved over to the Tony Pastor orchestra. Again the rumors were flying that Linda was considering a move to the Tony Pastor Orchestra. Down Beat would post in the January 1st, 1940 issue that Linda Keene had been auditioning for Pastor. Another article about Linda Keene joining up with Pastor would appear in in a New Orleans newspaper on January 21st, 1940. Pastor would factor into Linda Keene’s future but in January 1940 her commitment was still with Hayton.
A small Billboard article from the February 3, 1940 issue noted
that Lennie Hayton was due at the Raymor Ballroom in Boston on January 27th through February 10th. This must have been immediately following the stay at the Roseland in New York. I could not find any advertisements in Boston papers for this engagement. Directly after ending at the Raymor in Boston on February 10, Hayton and his Orchestra were booked into the New Yorker Hotel in New York
for a week starting February 11th. Although Hayton’s tour was being well documented, Linda Keene’s information seemed to be lagging behind. Her route information in Billboard for February 17th, February 24th, and March 2nd had her listed as still at the Raymor Ballroom; albeit with the listing misspelling her last name as “Keane”.
It was while Hayton was at the New Yorker Hotel that Billboard ran an interesting article in their February 17th issue on the success of “At the Balalaika” and “Starlit Hour”:
It is interesting that both songs were recorded by Hayton with Linda Keene doing vocals but neither artist is mentioned in the article. There are other recordings of “At The Balalaika” from 1939 as well as a few for “The Starlit Hour” so the article might have been referring to the popularity of the songs and not specifically Hayton and Keene’s recordings. Still, the fact that their record was out there in late 1939 and early 1940 might have bolstered sales by riding the wave of popularity of the two songs.
There is a slight gap in the route information for Lennie Hayton and his Orchestra after the engagement at the New Yorker Hotel ended on February 17th. Linda’s own route information, as noted above, still had her at the Raymor in Boston but that must have been incorrect. Billboard next notes that Lennie Hayton and his Orchestra were booked into the Flatbush in Brooklyn for February 22nd through the 28th. The article below from The Brooklyn Daily Eagle (Brooklyn, New York) February 21, 1940 notes the appearance and Linda Keene is also mentioned:
The gap between the end of their appearance at the New Yorker Hotel on the 17th and the beginning of their two day showing at the Flatbush on February 22nd might have been due to Hayton and Keene preparing to return to the recording studio. On February 20, 1940, Hayton and his Orchestra laid down four tracks at the Vocalion recording studio in New York: “AC-DC Current”, “Times Square Scuttle”, “I Love You Too Much”, and “One Cigarette For Two”. The last two songs contained vocals by Linda Keene.
I LOVE YOU TOO MUCH –LINDA KEENE with LENNIE HAYTON AND HIS ORCHESTRA
———————————-ONE CIGARETTE FOR TWO –LINDA KEENE with LENNIE HAYTON AND HIS ORCHESTRA
Reviews for the two tracks with Linda Keene were generally good:
The Times (Munster, Indiana) April 14, 1940
Madison Capital Times, Madison, Wisconsin, April 21, 1940
Billboard Review June 20, 1940
The Lennie Hayton and Linda Keene pairings on Vocalion and earlier on Varsity are, as one review puts it “not good, not bad.” Certainly Linda’s voice is excellent but the songs are not memorable and certainly don’t seem to fit with Linda Keene with the exception of “I Love You Much Too Much”. That song is haunting and the music and vocals are a perfect blend. The recordings the previous year with Jack Teagarden were, as I’ve said, a compliment of the band and the vocalist. There is a lushness in the Hayton recordings, perhaps better suited for dancing, but Linda had made and would make better recordings. These were the last recordings by Lennie Hayton and his Orchestra. Hayton and his Orchestra recorded 25 songs between April 1937 and February 1940. A complete list can be found at
Appearing at the Flatbush following the recording session, the advertisement for Lennie Hayton’s appearance from The Brooklyn Daily Eagle (Brooklyn, New York), February 22, 1940 does not mention Linda Keene but the review from the same newspaper on February 23rd mentions her in passing:
A scan of the movie listings in The Brooklyn Daily Eagle revealed a small ad each day ending with one from February 28th: Flatbush, Church and Flatbush Aves…ON STAGE: Lenny Hayton & Orch.: Cass Daley, The Debonaires. Extra! Henry Armett. Again, Linda Keene’s name is not mentioned.
March of 1940 presented a problem when tracking Linda Keene. Down Beat published a photo of Linda in the March 15th issue and stated she and and Hayton were “playing theaters in the east.” However, on the same day that the notice appeared in Down Beat, March 15th, Hayton is at the Fiesta Danceteria in New York. On Wednesday, March 13th, the Daily News (New York, New York) announced “Lenny Hayton” starting on the Friday, March 15th. Of course Hayton’s first name is misspelled.
The engagement must have been for a week because an advertisement for the Fiesta ran on March 22nd without Hayton’s name. The last advertisement with Hayton’s name, still misspelled, appeared in the Daily News on March 21st:
Again, Hayton is mentioned and Linda Keene is not. After the Fiesta I could find nothing for the rest of March for Hayton and certainly nothing for Linda Keene at all. The next mention of Lennie Hayton in the media was not favorable. From the general news feed on April 9th, 1940, we find that Hayton is in a Morristown, New Jersey hospital. Apparently Hayton recovered because the next article has Hayton and his Orchestra appearing on a national program on April 21st:
There was no mention of Linda Keene in this small notice that appeared in most papers on April 20th. Linda’s name appeared in none of the national magazines like Billboard nor in any of the newspapers in the New York area, assuming that Hayton and Keene were still performing in the area. Billboard had no route information for both Lennie Hayton’s Orchestra and Linda Keene after the notice for the Fiesta in mid-March. Linda Keene’s name last appeared in the review for the Flatbush in February. Her route information in Billboard last had her listed at the Raymor in Boston in the March 2nd issue when we know in fact she was still with Hayton in February. I have scanned through numerous periodicals, carefully line by line, and ad by ad, but Linda Keene’s name does not appear again until the summer of 1940. As for Lennie Hayton, his prospects were brighter. By mid-June wire services ran the following one line around June 26, 1940:
In fact, Hayton was arranging for Jimmy Dorsey and then was in Hollywood in the summer of 1940 arranging for Artie Shaw. He moved on from that in 1940 and became a musical director for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer until his retirement from the post in 1953. As, I could find nothing more linking Linda Keene with Hayton I will drop that line and move on to the next phase of Linda’s career in 1940.
RED NORVO
From Prof. Raja’s article we learned that in the summer of 1940 Linda Keene “teamed up with Red Norvo’s band just as they were about to depart on a grueling six-month Mid-West and Southern States tour.” This is in keeping with my research because Linda Keene’s trail was not documented, or not well documented, in the media for the spring of 1940 and nothing definitive suggests when she left Hayton or was still with Hayton when his orchestra disbanded in June of that year.
I want to provide some context regarding Red Norvo’s band in 1940. There is probably a great deal of information to be found online regarding Norvo and his history but as it relates to Linda Keene, I want to back up to March of 1940. A small notice was making the wire service news in most papers on March 23rd. The one on the right is a sample from the Mason City Globe Gazette, Mason, Iowa. Note, that the Red Norvo band is one of five swing bands that had folded around that time. The truth, however, was something different. The article below from Billboard a week later explains what Norvo was really doing:
I chose not to include the second half of the article because it does not include information about Norvo. More details on the restructuring of Norvo’s band appeared in the May 1940 issue of Metronome:
My apologies for the image being cut off as that occurred at the source. This is what I believe is the full text:
-Norvo Brings Back Soft Subtle Swing Group for Hotels
Young Outfit Makes Yelling and Snoring Quite Unnecessary
Red Norvo has returned to his best bet: a small, soft, subtle swing outfit. It consists of only nine men and musically and commercially it is a potent piece of merchandise.
The band is ideally suited for hotel work, especially for rooms that cater to the younger trade. Both the size and the style of the group result in its playing soft music, and yet it maintains a moving swing that the kids call for.
The instrumentation is a slight augmentation of the famous Norvo septet of several years ago. It consists of a full, three-way sax section one trumpet, one trombone, the usual four rhythm of piano, guitar, bass, and drums, and, of course Norvo. He has switched from Xylophone to marimba, the latter instrument being similar to the former except that it has greater range. The change will give Norvo more opportunities on the ballads especially.
The style of the band is definitely swing, but it is the classic proof of the theory that swing can be solid and can be good that way, too There is no blaring; instead the swing is achieved via the arrangements, by the delicate rhythm figures, and of course by Norvo’s exciting hammerings. There’s little danger of this group causing any yelling or snoring on the part of patrons at dinner sessions.
Future plans of the organization are indefinite. It is being booked by MCA, and will shortly wax disks for one of the major recording companies.
So the stage was set for Norvo’s next band and a tour that MCA would arrange; a tour that would include Linda Keene as vocalist with the band.
I began to search through posts for Red Norvo in 1940, going back to April and May to see if I could locate any reference to Linda Keene becoming Norvo’s new singer. Back on May 22, 1940 the Brooklyn Daily Eagle (Brooklyn, New York) ran a small article about Red Norvo’s Orchestra appearing at the Luna Park Ballroom but it was clear that Judy Abbott was the vocalist at that time. I eventually found what I believe was the first concert where Linda Keene began with Norvo. The list below is what I have been able to cobble together as the itinerary during Norvo’s six month tour. It is probably by no means complete but all of these are documented. There may have been other smaller towns or College or University campus appearances that are missing from this list:
Roton Park, Amusement Park, Stamford, Connecticut, June 30
Potomac Cruise, Washington DC, July 3-9
Steel Pier, Atlantic City, New Jersey, –July 10-12
Moonlite Gardens Dance Pavilion of Coney Island, Cincinnati, Ohio, July 19 – 25
Crystal Beach Park, Vermilion, Ohio, July 28
Terrace Grill, Hotel Muehlebach, Kansas City, Missouri, August 2-22
Robinson Memorial Auditorium, Little Rock, Arkansas, August 23
Shreveport Country Club, Shreveport, Louisiana, August 24
Piatt County Fair, Cerro Gordo, Illinois, September 2, 1940 (cancelled)
Plantation, Dallas Texas, August 25-September 7
Eta Kappa Chapter of Kappa Alpha Pi, Lake Worth Casino, Fort Worth, Texas, September 9
Turnpike Casino, Lincoln, Nebraska September 14
Terp Ballroom, Austin, Minnesota, September 25
Surf Ballroom, Mason City, Iowa, September 26
Palais Ballroom, South Bend, Indiana, September 28
The Rink Ballroom, Waukegan, Illinois, September 29
New Moon Theatre, Vincennes, Indiana, October 6
Tune Town Ballroom, St. Louis, Missouri, October 15 – 20
Crystal Palace, Paw Paw Lake, Coloma, Michigan, October 26
Wisconsin Roof Ballroom, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, October 27
Turkey’s Nest Club, Uniontown, Pennsylvania, October 30
Valley Dale, Columbus Ohio, November 2
The Cathedral, New Castle, Pennsylvania, November 5-6
The Graystone Ballroom, Detroit, Michigan, November 7-12
Trianon Ballroom, Cleveland, Ohio, November 11 (Cancelled?)
The Grotto Ballroom, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, November 13
Kenyon Dance, Kenyon College, Gambier, Ohio, November 15
Castle Farm, Cincinnati, Ohio, November 16
Trianon Ballroom, Cleveland, Ohio, November 21
Annual Homecoming Dance, Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio, November 22
Union Theatre, New Philadelphia, Ohio, November 24
University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan, November 29-30
Apollo Theater, Oberlin, Ohio, December 4
Roseville Pottery 50th Anniversary Party, Hotel Rogge, Zanesville, OH, December 7
Liberty Theater, Zanesville, OH, December 11
All College Christmas Formal, Oberlin College, Oberlin, Ohio, December 14
Meyers Lake, Canton Ohio, December 29
For the sake of brevity I will detail the dates on the tour that include only those advertisements or articles that are significant or include Linda Keene.
Roton Amusement Park, Stamford, Connecticut, June 30
Roton Park in Connecticut was the first reference that I found for Linda Keene appearing with Red Norvo. As far as I can tell, this was a single night appearance. I am not sure if this was the official kick-off to the six month tour but I have found no other documented appearances earlier in June. Linda had last played Roton Park in August of 1939 with Willie Farmer.
Potomac Cruise, Washington DC, July 3-9
Linda Keene is not mentioned in any of the ads or the article that ran in the Evening Star, Washington, D.C., on July 4th, 1940 but I thought it was interesting to mention this week long engagement. Imagine, Norvo and the band, along with Linda Keene, cruising up and down the Potomac River in Washington, D.C. every night supplying music for dancers under the stars. I hope it didn’t rain.
Steel Pier, Atlantic City, New Jersey, –July 10-12
It took a while to confirm this date. The first mention that I came across for this engagment was in Variety when it noted in their July 17th issue that Raymond Scott’s orchestra was alternating with Alex Bartha’s orchestra at the Steel Pier and that Red Norvo had ended his engagement there on Friday July 12th. The advertisement to the left is the one that ran for the Steel Pier in the Press of Atlantic City, July 10, 1940. The article mentions that Red Norvo and his Band is in for three days on July 10, 11, 12. There is no mention of Linda Keene in any of the ads that ran through July 12th. The advertisement to the right is for the last night that Norvo was at the Steel Pier but it failed to mention Linda. The Steel Pier performances were significant for Linda Keene because it was her second engagement in Atlantic City with the first being with Glenn Miller two years earlier at Hamid’s Million Dollar Steel Pier in August of 1938. There remains a gap in the itinerary between the end of the Steel Pier engagement on July 12th and the beginning of the next engagement on July 19th.
Moonlite Gardens Dance Pavilion of Coney Island, Cincinnati, Ohio, July 19 – 25, 1940
On July 21, 1940 the Cincinnati Enquirer (Cincinnati, Ohio) ran an article where it mentioned that Norvo and his band opened at the Moonlite Gardens Dance Pavilion of Coney Island in Cincinnati on July 19th and his new singer Linda Keene was introduced. We know that this was not the first appearance of Keene with Norvo’s band but maybe he made it official during this engagement. None of the advertisements that ran that week included the name of Linda Keene but there was an advance article that ran in the Cincinnati Enquirer on July 18th and included Linda in the details.
The reviews for Norvo at Coney Island were good and Linda’s name was mentioned in both articles that appeared on July 22nd and 23rd in the Cincinnati Enquirer.
The August 1, 1940 issue of Downbeat magazine also mentioned Norvo and Keene’s appearance at the Coney Island Park in Cinncinnatti and would reference a previous engagement at the Steel Pier in Atlantic City and a future gig at the Hotel Muehlebach in Kansas City:
Crystal Beach Park, Vermilion, Ohio, July 28, 1940
The first announcement that Norvo was coming to the Crystal Beach Park in Vermilion appeared in the Sandusky Register (Sandusky, Ohio) on July 20th while the band was still appearing at Coney Island in Cincinnati. Linda gets a nod as a “charming ballad singer.” The last time Linda Keene played Crystal Beach, Vermillion, was five years earlier in 1935 when she appeared for one-nighters in June and September under her married name Florence Suttle. Oddly, her appearances in 1935 both times at Crystal Beach were with the George Duffy Orchestra who would follow Linda and Norvo in August at the same venue.
There was a great review of Norvo’s Vermilion concert that ran in syndicated papers on July 31st of 1940 even though it failed to mention Linda Keene:
Terrace Grill, Hotel Muehlebach, Kansas City, Missouri, August 2-22, 1940
Norvo’s appearance in Kansas city started with a small announcement in the The Kansas City Star on July 28th; the same day he and Linda were playing Crystal Beach in Vermilion, Ohio. Almost 800 miles west of Vermilion, Ohio, Red Norvo, Linda Keene and the band settled in for a three week stay beginning August 2, 1940. Even Billboard ran a small notice about the “tri-weeker”. Linda Keene’s name had been in the small announcement on the 28th and the advertisements that appeared during the three week run. I believe, at this point, this was the furthest west that Linda Keene had appeared either under her new name or her married name of Florence Suttle.
Other smaller notices also appeared in the Kansas City Star and Linda Keene’s name was still being mentioned. Most of the praise was for Norvo and the band but the appearance of Linda’s name even in small articles meant she was being noticed. Near the beginning of the run, on August 4th, the Kansas City Star put Linda Keene front and center by including her picture:
Down Beat would reuse their photo from the March 15th, 1940 issue but with a new caption in the August 15th issue regarding her current tour with Norvo and the stop in Kansas City.
Variety would offer up a good review of Norvo in Kansas City in the August 7, 1940 edition:
In addition to the appearances at the Terrace Grill, there were several radio remotes of Norvo from the Hotel Muehlebach. I do not know if any of these remotes survived as radio transcriptions. These would be the only way for us to hear how Linda Keene performed with the newly structured Norvo band.
Robinson Memorial Auditorium, Little Rock, Arkansas, August 23
This performance was for a dance for the Delta Phi Omega Fraternity. None of the ads or articles mentioned Linda Keene.
Shreveport Country Club, Shreveport, Louisiana, August 24, 1940
About 550 miles due south of Kansas City, Missouri lies Shreveport, Louisiana. On August 24, 1940 Red Norvo and his band along with Linda Keene performed at a dance for the Emanon Club at the Shreveport Country Club.
This was a private affair so there were no advertisements or reviews.
Piatt County Fair, Cerro Gordo, Illinois, September 2, 1940 (Cancelled?)
On August 8th the Farmer City Journal, Farmer City, Illinois, announced Red Norvo as part of the lineup for the Piatt County Fair in September. Norvo and his band were to play on the Tuesday night, September 3rd, the night after Raymond Scott and his Quintet played there. Two weeks later on August 22nd, the Gibson City Courier, Gibson City, Illinois, announced that Ben Pollack and his group would instead appear on September 3rd. For the record, Red Norvo and Linda Keene were playing at the Plantation in Dallas, Texas on September 3rd.
The Plantation, Dallas Texas, August 25-September 7
I’ll be honest, I almost missed this one. Even though the articles by Opal Nations and Prof. Raja mention that Down Beat interviewed and photographed Norvo and Keene, I was thinking October when the issue of Down Beat with their coverage would hit the newsstands. Probably because The Plantation was not mentioned, it did not occur to me that the Dallas engagement was in late August/early September and furthermore that it ran for two weeks. While researching the performance for the Emanon Club at the Shreveport Country Club, I first found the reference to the Plantation in the August 20th, Shreveport Journal. A couple days before the Shreveport Journal article, another article ran in the Dallas Morning News on August 18th. The same picture used to promote Linda Keene in Kansas City was paired with one of Red Norvo:
The advertisement that would run in the Dallas Morning News announcing the opening on the evening of August 25th wasn’t as flattering. It was in fact one of the plainest advertisements for any of their stops on the six month tour and it did not mention Linda Keene. Even the review below, appearing a couple days later on August 27th in the Dallas Morning News, was a mixed bag:
At least the article referenced Linda Keene’s short time with Glenn Miller even though it noted she was “somewhat lacking on the showmanship or personality side. Perhaps things were better for her as things went on over the two weeks. The Dallas Morning Star at least gave her praise and published a picture of her with Norvo in their August 28th edition:
As I said earlier, the Down Beat review of Linda Keene and Red Norvo in Dallas appeared in the October 15th edition of that magazine with both of them sharing the cover: The same Down Beat issue would carry a nice article about Red Norvo and his new band:
In addition to being on the cover, Linda would also get her photo by the pool in the same issue of Down Beat:
Eta Kappa Chapter of Kappa Alpha Pi, Lake Worth Casino, Fort Worth, Texas, September 9
The article to the right from the September 6th Fort Worth Star points out that even college dances were part of Norvo’s itinerary in September of 1940.
Turnpike Casino, Lincoln, Nebraska, September 14
The Turnpike Casino appearance was also one of Norvo’s performances that received favorable reviews. Billboard actually posted two articles in their September 28, 1940 issue. The first was to note that Norvo grossed $750 for his appearance that night. Apparently he was competing against four other dances in Lincoln that night; one of which was free. The second article in the Billboard issue was a review which also had kind words for Linda Keene.
Terp Ballroom, Austin, Minnesota, September 25
There is a gap in the itinerary between the the Turnpike Casino on September 14, 1940 and the Terp Ballroom in Austin, Minnesota on September 25th. I have found nothing that fills that gap but it is possible that Norvo was playing one-nighters in small towns or college dances and these events were not covered by some of the local newspapers. I thought the Turnpike Casino engagement might have been an extended stay performance rather than one night but I could find no evidence of that. I did find that Herbie Kay and his Orchestra opened there on September 20th. There were no reviews for the Terp Ballroom performance.
Surf Ballroom, Mason City, Iowa, September 26
Two notices for the Surf Ballroom, both with mentions of Linda Keene, but no reviews.
Palais Ballroom, South Bend, Indiana, September 28
There was no mention of Linda Keene at the Palais.
The Rink Ballroom, Waukegan, Illinois, September 29
Two advertisements with Linda Keene’s name included. No reviews.
New Moon Theatre, Vincennes, Indiana, October 6
Here’s another one I almost missed. The small article to the right appeared in the Evansville Press (Evansville, Indiana) on October 4th, 1940. The focus was mostly on the Ossenberg Brothers who also appeared at the New Moon Theatre so I almost didn’t notice that Red Norvo was mentioned. At least the advertisement from the Vincennes Sun-Commercial on October 6th mentioned both Norvo and Linda Keene.
Tune Town Ballroom, St. Louis, Missouri, October 15 – 20
The concerts in St. Louis follow another gap from October 6th in Vincennes, Indiana to the Tune Town Ballroom on October 15th. The six day run at the Tune Town also included broadcasts over the KXOK radio station. Down Beat would publish a picture of Red Norvo and Linda Keene at Tune Town when they ran a retrospective on Red Norvo in the August 11th, 1950 issue; nearly ten years after the Tune Town engagement.
I have not found any radio transcriptions of these performances.
Crystal Palace, Paw Paw Lake, Coloma, Michigan, October 26
Another small gap from October 20th to October 26th, 1940.
Wisconsin Roof Ballroom, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, October 27
Skipping over to Wisconsin, Red Norvo and Linda Keene are on the roof…the Wisconsin Roof Ballroom in Milwaukee.
Turkey’s Nest Club, Uniontown, Pennsylvania, October 30
In Uniontown, Pennsylvania, Red Norvo opened the Turkey’s Nest Club on October 30th, 1940 and Linda Keene received a mention in an article and an advertisement from the Monessen Daily Independent, Monessen, Pennsylvania.
Valley Dale, Columbus Ohio, November 2
Another College dance appearance for Norvo and the band. This time it’s for the Ohio vs. Indiana Football party but there’s no mention of Linda Keene.
The Cathedral, New Castle, Pennsylvania, November 5-6
Now in Pennsylvania, Linda gets her picture back in the paper for the two day, three shows an evening, run at The Cathedral in New Castle.
The Graystone Ballroom, Detroit, Michigan, November 6-12
Norvo played the Graystone in Detroit for a week starting November 7th. Big city. Small ad. No mention of Linda Keene.
Trianon Ballroom, Cleveland, Ohio, November 11 (Cancelled?)
This is an oddity. The Plain Dealer from Cleveland, Ohio November 10th, 1940 ran the article to the left in which Norvo is mentioned for an appearance at the Trianon Ballroom the next night, the 11th. I checked the Plain Dealer on the 11th and there was no advertisement for Norvo at the Trianon but there was mention of a dance at the Trianon sponsored by the American Legion County Council as part of Armistice Celebrations. In fact, Norvo and the band were scheduled for the week at the Graystone in Detroit.
The Grotto Ballroom, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, November 13
On October 25th, the Pittsburgh Press announced that Red Norvo would be in Pittsburgh at The Grotto Ballroom on November 13th for a special benefit sponsored by the Yugoslav Dapper Dan Club. Linda Keene’s picture was used as part of the announcement. Another announcement would appear in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette on November 4th and Linda’s name would also be mentioned. The articles gave a significant build up to the event but the actual advertisement that appeared in Pittsburgh papers was rather small.
Kenyon Dance, Kenyon College, Gambier, OH, November 15
Not all of Norvo’s appearances on college campuses received small coverage. His appearance at Kenyon College in Gambier, Ohio on November 15th received a nice build up in the Gambier Kenyon Collegian:
Castle Farm, Cincinnati, OH, November 16
The first announcement for Red Norvo’s Band at Castle Farm was the last line in an article, from the Cincinnati Enquirer on October 30th, about other acts appearing ‘down on the farm’. Norvo had looped back to Cincinnati on his tour almost four months since he had opened at the Moonlite Gardens Dance Pavilion of Coney Island on July 19th. Although Linda Keene was mentioned in articles related to the Moonlite Gardens appearances, there would be no reference to her in November.
Trianon Ballroom, Cleveland, Ohio, November 21
Norvo didn’t get to Cleveland earlier in his tour but made up for it by being part of a jitterbug’s double bill dream. Norvo would appear November 21st at the Trianon Ballroom with Charlie Barnet’s orchestra. With two giant bands like that, it’s no wonder that Linda Keene’s name wasn’t mentioned. Both advertisement and article came from the Plain Dealer, in Cleveland, Ohio.
Another oddity related to Linda Keene’s appearance a the Trianon appeared in the 1993 autobiography of Frankie Laine titled “That Lucky Old Sun.” Laine mentions Linda Keene appearing with Red Norvo at the Trianon in Cleveland but that she left him to get married:
Back in Cleveland, I started picking up a few things by listening to June Hart. I may have been fired, but the College Inn was a public place and they couldn’t keep me out of the joint. I used to go hear her every night, and I was especially taken with one ” oldie” in her repertoire. It was an obscure little 1931 ballad entitled That’s My Desire. I thought it was very pretty, and the melody spent a long time running through my head before it burst out in spectacular fashion a few years later. After her show, June would pick up the tab for our food and beer. I was still as broke as could be. Meanwhile, a friend of mine named Bill Furman had fallen in love with a girl singer named Linda Keene who was working with bandleader Red Norvo at the Trianon Ballroom. They decided to elope, and Norvo was going crazy with no girl singer. I went down to see him and introduced myself. ” I’ve been working at the College Inn with a girl named June Hart,” I told him, ” and I don’t know if I’m saying a good or a bad thing here, but she sings just like Mildred Bailey.” Mildred and Red had been married and used to work together, but she stopped singing with him after they were divorced. Red said he’d like to hear her, so we went down after hours to listen to June at another place called the Cabin Club. He thought she was great and decided to take her with him to New York. This marked the beginning of what has been a long and dear friendship between Red and me, but at the time it also meant the end of my meal ticket. I had no idea where to turn next.
I cannot confirm that Linda Keene left Norvo after the Trianon but she is noted as appearing with him through the rest of his tour. I can find no evidence that she also married anyone named Bill Furman. June Hart did join Norvo in early 1941 but that was after the tour had ended.
Annual Homecoming Dance, Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio, November 22
Still in Ohio, Norvo played another University dance in Columbus, Ohio. This time it was the Annual Homecoming Dance at Ohio State University. The article above from the Columbus Dispatch focused more on the chaperones for the dance than the entertainment that would be present. At least the “Sundial”, the student newspaper of Ohio State University ran an advertisement that ran over two pages:
Union Theatre, New Philadelphia, Ohio, November 24
Red Norvo and the Band with Linda Keene next played the Union Theatre in New Philadelphia, Ohio on November 24th for four shows. The feature film also playing was “Girls Under 21” with Bruce Cabot and Rochelle Hudson. What do they expect from life, these Girls Under 21?
University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan, November 29-30
Skipping over to Michigan, Norvo played for another University. At the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, Norvo and band played November 29th and 30th. The following articles come from The Daily Michigan, the student newspaper of the University of Michigan:
This time there would be no review of the concert by The Daily Michigan but rather Red Norvo gave a review of the dancers who attended and the contract disputes with ASCAP and BMI:
Apollo Theater, Oberlin, Ohio, December 4
This would be the first of two appearances that Norvo would make in Oberlin Ohio in December of 1940. The second would be for the All College Formal at Oberlin College on December 14th. The Oberlin College social committee was not happy about the appearance at the Apollo because they thought it would cut down on revenues for his appearance at the College on the 14th. Despite the objection, the Oberlin Review, the student newspaper of Oberlin College, in which the ad and article above appeared, did offer up a fairly decent review of the Apollo concert.
Roseville Pottery 50th Anniversary Party, Hotel Rogge, Zanesville, OH, December 7
More than three months after Red Norvo and his Band played for the Emanon Club on August 24th, 1940 in Shreveport, he performed another private party. The Roseville Pottery Company was celebrating their 50th anniversary in 1940 so they booked in Red Norvo for the affair. Linda Keene is mentioned as “nationally known songstress.”
Liberty Theater, Zanesville, Ohio, December 11
For those who could not attend the Roseville Pottery Company 50th anniversary party where Norvo appeared on December 7th in Zanesville, they didn’t have to wait long for another chance to see him in concert. Only a few days later, on December 11th, Red Norvo and his band appeared at the Liberty Theater. This time Linda Keene is billed as “one of the finest girl vocalists with any orchestra.”
All College Christmas Formal, Oberlin College, Oberlin, Ohio, December 14
This was Red Norvo’s second appearance in Oberlin, Ohio, after playing the Apollo Theater on December 4th. The Oberlin College social committee were worried that the earlier appearance at the Apollo would impact attendance at the All College Christmas Formal. An interview with Red Norvo appeared in the Oberlin Review on December 10th and it highlighted the hectic schedule Norvo and the band had been keeping. Norvo is quoted as saying “we really were stepping lively a couple of days last week.” His reference to Cleveland doesn’t make sense if it was the day before Kenyon College. They played Kenyon College on November 15th but there is no record of Norvo in Cleveland on November 14th. I have checked the Cleveland Plain Dealer for November 13th and 14th but there were no articles or advertisements for Norvo playing in Cleveland. We do know that Red Norvo was at The Grotto on November 13th in Pittsburgh. It’s possible he played a College or University dance in Cleveland or another private party on November 14th but I could find no record of that either.
As for a review of the dance, the Oberlin Review had this to offer:
Meyers Lake, Canton Ohio, December 29
A small article appeared in the Canton Repository, Canton, Ohio, on December 29th, 1940. It mentioned a live broadcast from Meyers Lake and that Red Norvo would be the band for the initial broadcast. This was the last reference that I could find for Red Norvo in 1940 and a full two weeks afer the All College Christmas Formal at Oberlin College. I could find nothing else for the two week gap. I checked the listings for Meyers Lake and Red Norvo only appeared December 29th. There was no mention of Linda Keene.
The appearance at Meyers Lake marked the last engagement, I believe, of the six month tour started in June. I checked into early 1941 and found that Norvo, by the end of the first week of January, was playing the Hotel Brunswick in Boston without any mention of Linda Keene. It is highly unlikely that Linda Keene was still appearing with Norvo when he was in Boston. With the end of 1940 it is more likely that the tour with Linda ended. According to Professor Raja “when the band returned to the Big Apple to record, Red’s wife Mildred Bailey was waiting, thus denying Linda of an earned recording session.”
An interesting article appeared along the wire service in September of 1940 around the time that Linda Keene and Red Norvo were appearing at the Turnpike Casino in Lincoln Nebraska. The article concerned Mildred Bailey, Red Norvo’s wife, and why she wasn’t touring with Norvo. His answer was simple that Mildred Bailey could make more on her own, sometimes up to $3,000 a week, and that was more than he could pay a girl singer. It was clear that Mildred Bailey was still in Red Norvo’s life and by the end of the tour, Linda Keene was on to her next adventure. She wasn’t, however, completely finished with Red Norvo.
1941
TONY PASTOR
It isn’t clear where Linda Keene was in January of 1941. The previous year had been a busy one continuing with Lennie Hayton’s Orchestra and recording two songs in February of 1940. More dates followed with Hayton in February and early March but by June she had hooked up with Red Norvo for the six month tour. Oh, and there were those rumors that Linda Keene had left Hayton’s Orchestra in January of 1940 for Tony Pastor and his Orchestra. Finally, in 1941 those rumors came true.
I could not find an exact start date for Linda Keene with Tony Pastor’s Orchestra. She certainly was appearing with him in February of 1941 and was in the studio with his Orchestra the same month. It would take newspapers and magazines a few months to catch up with the change. Down Beat was the first to mention it in their February 15th issue. It wasn’t until March 2nd that the Pittsburgh Press reported that Linda Keene was now with Pastor. It would take until the April 19th issue of Movie-Radio Guide before they made note of the change. In their “Vocalistings” article, they made note of Tony Pastor acquiring Linda Keene and made reference to her history with Red Norvo and Jack Teagarden.
Despite not knowing the official start date for Linda Keene with Tony Pastor, it certainly became official with their one and only recording together. On February 18, 1941, almost a year after her last studio session, Linda Keene recorded “Number Ten Lullaby Lane” with Tony Pastor and his Orchestra. It would be her only recording with Tony Pastor. Dorsey Anderson and Tony Pastor were also heard on the recording.
NUMBER TEN LULLABY LANE –LINDA KEENE with TONY PASTOR AND HIS ORCHESTRA
Personally, I like the song and Linda’s singing on it. It’s more of a gimmick song and not a solo Linda Keene effort, which is too bad because her vocal is very charming. Dinah Shore would also record it as a solo effort as did Eddie Duchin’s Orchestra, Martha Tilton, and Harry James’ Orchestra. Here’s an interesting article about the composer of “Number Ten Lullaby Lane”:
According to the article, Bob Carlton who composed the song also wrote “Jada” which would also factor into Linda Keene’s career later on. With all of the different versions of “Number Ten Lullaby Lane” out there, it was difficult to find any reviews specifically mentioning the version by Tony Pastor. I found one that mentioned Linda Keene from the Syracuse Herald American, Syracuse, New York, on May 25th, 1941
It’s sad that neither of the reviews mentioned Linda’s splendid singing. The article to the left from the Houston Chronicle on March 16th at least gave credit to the vocalists.
After the recording session on February 18th, I was able to begin tracking Linda Keene again in her appearances with Tony Pastor. On February 24th, 1941 they played one night at the Ritz Theater in Newburgh, New York. A couple days after that, on February 26th, according to the January 1941 edition of Variety, Pastor and his Orchestra started a three week engagement at the Paramount Theatre in New York City. What I find most odd is that a few articles mention a seven month stay for Pastor at Hotel Lincoln in New York. I have found some ads for Tony Pastor and his Orchestra at the Hotel Lincoln in the fall of 1940 and some continuing into the spring of 1941. Here is the advertisement that ran in The Daily Princetonian, Princeton, New Jersey on February 28th, 1941:
There is no mention of Linda Keene although she appeared with Pastor on February 24th at the Ritz Newburgh. Also strange, is that this advertisement bills Pastor at the Hotel Lincoln on February 28th but he was supposed to be on a three week engagement at the Paramount Theatre in New York as of February 26th. Here is the advertisement that ran in the New York Daily News on February 26th:
There is no mention of Linda Keene in the ad or the small notice that also ran mentioning that Ella Logan was the vocalist.
It is possible that Linda Keene was part of group that was with Tony Pastor and she wasn’t mentioned in the ads. The show at the Paramount was reviewed in the March 8th, 1941 Billboard but again, there was no mention of Linda Keene. My apologies for the poor scan which comes from the source. This is essentially the review of Tony Pastor’s Orchestra:
The Preston Sturges pic, “The Lady Eve” (Paramount), plus a fairly stage bill with Tony Pastor’s ork, Ella Longa, Ben Blue, and Toy and Wing, should give the house plenty of magnetism for weeks. The Pastor aggregation makes lots of noise and knocks off some passable arrangements, but didn’t draw too many hands. Band features the drum beating of Johnny Morris and vocalizing of Johnny McAfee, both lads being very capable at each. Pastor himself sings and tootles his tenor sax. Toy and Wing open up with a neat and effortless soft-shoe number, then heat it up with a little jitterbugging. Got a nice hand and closed with Miss Toy’s fast toe number and some good novelty acro turns by both. Ella Logan struck home with her original song work and had to beg off after four numbers. Gal’s mugging and strong voice stamp her song selling with a distinction which is refreshing. She stays away from pops, doing arrangements like “On the Sunny Side of the Street and The Curse of an Aching Heart.”
The rest of the article is about Ben Blue and his comedy antics. It appears that the run at the Paramount, which was to have lasted three weeks, had been extended to five weeks.
It is interesting to note that Down Beat would publish and article in their March 15th, 1941 issue and state that Red Norvo had reorganized his band again and that Linda Keene was back with him:
Down Beat also mentioned the Norvo and Keene reunion as a caption of a photo of Linda.
The photo is of course Linda performing with Tony Pastor’s Orchestra when they played the Lincoln Hotel earlier in 1941. I checked the Cleveland newspapers for this period but found no listings for Red Norvo nor Linda Keene. The only article about Red Norvo appeared in the Cleveland Plain Dealer on March 5th, 1941 stating that June Hart was going to be the female singer with Norvo. This would not be the first or last time that Linda Keene was rumored to be back with Red Norvo in 1941.
The article to the left ran in the Altoona Mirror, Altoona, Pennsylvania, on April 5th, 1941 and pretty much explains everything. It talks about Pastor’s appearance at the Sunset Park, Carrolltown, Pennsylvania on Easter Monday which would have been April 14th, 1941. The article also mentions the extension of the Paramount engagement by two additional weeks. This too, is strange, because five weeks from the opening on February 26th would make closing around April 2nd. That last advertisement for Tony Pastor and his Orchestra at the Paramount was March 17th because Tommy Dorsey and His Orchestra moved in the next day with a premiere for the film “Las Vegas Nights” (which was the first on screen appearance of Frank Sinatra) followed by Charlie Barnet’s Orchestra with Dinah Shore.
The Sunset article also addressed the issue of the appearances at the Hotel Lincoln where Pastor was broadcasting from several times a week. He might have been pulling double duty at the Paramount and at the Hotel Lincoln. Linda Keene is mentioned in the article for the Sunset appearance so it is natural to assume that she was with Pastor at the Paramount and perhaps at the Hotel Lincoln. According to the New York Daily News on April 8, 1941, Tony Pastor’s orchestra was leaving the Hotel Lincoln to tour theatres in the Brandt Theatre chain starting April 17th. This would only be a few days after the Sunset Park appearance.
Billboard Magazine, during the month of April 1941 would publish Tony Pastor’s route itinerary in each issue. Here is what most of April looked like:
Manhattan Center, New York City, April 12
Arena, New Haven, Connecticut, April 13
Sunset Park, Carrolltown, Pennsylvania, April 14
Warner Theater, Morgantown, West Virginia, April 15
West Side Park, Berwick, Pennsylvania April 16
Flatbush, Brooklyn, April 17-22
Windsor, Bronx April 24-30
I have checked all of these dates throughout numerous newspapers and found that some of the dates were incorrect. For example, Louis Armstrong was playing at the Manhattan Center on April 12th and I found an ad that places Tony Pastor at the New Bradford Theatre in Bradford, Pennsylvania on April 28th when he was to be at the Windsor in the Bronx at that time. With the exception of the Sunset Park appearance, the only other article I could find that mentioned Linda Keene with Pastor in April was for the April 13th appearance at the Arena in New Haven, Connecticut. The following article and advertisement both appeared in The Journal (Meriden, Connecticut) on April 8th, 1941:
When I checked other publications for the month of April I also found interesting information from two articles in the April 23, 1941 issue of Variety. The first reported that Linda Keene had taken the vocalist spot with Charlie Barnet. The other article reported that Linda Keene had been replaced as the vocalist with the Red Nichols band who were playing at the Raymor Ballroom in Boston. The Raymor was the same venue that Linda had played with Lennie Hayton in early 1940. Down Beat would mention the Nichols and Keene collaboration in their April 15th, 1941 issue and would note the previous back forth Linda played with Norvo and Pastor:
I could not find any advertisements of Charlie Barnet appearances that included Linda Keene nor could I find any articles or advertisements for Nichols at the Raymor that mentioned her. I did find something in the April 1969, Record Research magazine, “The Red Nichols Memorial Issue”, that confirmed the appearance at the Raymor but suggested something different for Linda’s departure from Nichols. Their contention was that Linda Keene left Red Nichols to join Muggsy Spanier’s Orchestra. If Linda was with Nichols in Boston in mid-April, it’s unclear if she was back with Tony Pastor at Sunset Park in Carrolltown, PA, on April 14th despite the article announcing her appearance there with Pastor’s band.
Another oddity is an announcement that Linda Keene was appearing with Red Nichols at the Junior Prom in the New Hampshire Hall of the University of New Hampshire in Durham, New Hampshire on May 2nd, 1941. Articles in both the April 25th, and April 29th, 1941 The New Hampshire student newspaper hyped up the appearance of Nichols and Keene:
Unfortunately Linda Keene must have departed from Nichols by May 2nd as a review from The New Hampshire on May 6th fails to mention her. Instead, Jenny Banks, who probably was Penny Banks, was given credit as vocalist. It is interesting to note that that this was the second billed appearance for Linda Keene in 1941 at the University of New Hampshire where she did not appear. In the January 10, 1941 issue of The New Hampshire, it was noted that Linda Keene and Red Norvo would appear at the Carnival Ball on February 14, 1941:
Unfortunately neither Linda nor Red Norvo would make an appearance. The February 14th, 1941 issue of The New Hampshire would explain that Newt Perry’s Orchestra would take “the place of Red Norvo, who recently joined Benny Goodman’s band.”
A quick note about Muggsy Spanier. Spanier’s Orchestra was fairly new, having only been established in the first couple of months of 1941. According to Variety’s February 8th, 1941 issue, this was Spanier’s “second attempt at fronting a band of his own.” There was no mention in the article about any singer having been signed at that time for the band.
Moving into May, 1941, Linda Keene’s trail becomes a little more obvious if not still confusing. According to Billboard, Tony Pastor was booked to play the Runnybrook Ballroom in Pottsdown, Pennsylvania on May 3rd, 1941. Linda Keene was also in Pennsylvania on that date but she was appearing with Muggsy Spanier’s Orchestra at the Venetian Gardens in Altoona, Pennsylvania according to the article on the right from the May 3rd, 1941 Altoona Tribune. If appearing with Spanier’s Orchestra, instead of Pastor’s Orchestra, wasn’t odd enough, Linda Keene was mentioned as appearing with Red Norvo’s Orchestra the next night, May 4th at Eastwood Park, Detroit Michigan according to the article below from the May 4th, 1941 Detroit Free Press.
I came across a beautiful photo that credits Linda Keene with Muggsy Spanier:
It appeared that Linda Keene, if she had been down with laryngitis, was making up for lost time by appearing with Muggsy Spanier and Red Norvo and Tony Pastor throughout the month of May, 1941. On May 10th, supposedly Linda Keene was with Tony Pastor when he opened at the Hershey Park Ballroom in Pennsylvania on May 10th. Both of the articles on the right appeared in the Harrisburg Telegraph (Harrisburg, Pennsylvania).
An article from the Altoona Tribune on May 12, 1941 mentioned that Linda Keene was back in Altoona with Muggsy Spanier’s Orchestra on May 17th at Gable’s Department Store. The previous article from the May 3rd Altoona Tribune mentioned that Spanier’s stay at the Venenetian Gardens in Altoona was indefinite. While researching the May 17th appearance at Gable’s Department Store, I noticed an advertisement for Muggsy Spanier still at the Venetian Gardens. This same advertisement would appear in the Altoona Tribune up to and including May 30th. By the end of May, it appeared Muggsy Spanier was finished at the Venetian Gardens.
Linda Keene was by no means finished with Tony Pastor’s Orchestra. Two days after appearing with Muggsy Spanier at Gable’s Department Store in Altoona on May 17th, Linda’s name is advertised for an appearance at the Library Theatre in Cumberland Maryland.There were in fact four shows at the Library with a fourth show added at 1:50PM according to the advertisement that ran the day of Pastor’s appearance.
There is of course no way to verify that Linda Keene was doing all of this travelling with and between bands. Most of the advertisements and articles had no follow-up reviews but there was one exception. The Altoona Mirror ran an article in their May 13th edition, commenting on an event at the Venetian Gardens the night before, May 12th, and Linda Keene is mentioned as being one of the entertainers.Obviously Linda Keene was in Altoona on May 12th with Muggsy Spanier. I have found no reviews of her appearances in May with Tony Pastor or Red Norvo. Speaking of Norvo, Linda Keene was advertised as being with Norvo again in late May. On May 28th, 1941 Red Norvo and Linda Keene were appearing at Enna Jettick Park in Auburn, New York. When I checked other issues of the Ithaca Journal, Ithaca, New York, where the May 28th advertisement appeared, I found that Norvo was booked to play Enna Jettick Park from May 24th to June 1st, 1941. In fact Linda Keene’s name was still being included in advertisements that ran June 1st:
The problem with all of this, and the most confusing, is that Linda was supposedly with Muggsy Spanier and Tony Pastor on overlapping dates. The Youngstown Vindicator, Youngstown, Ohio had her starting with Spanier at The Mansion in Youngstown on May 29th, 1941. There was the advertisement on the left and even a photo and write-up, below, regarding Linda’s appearance with Spanier. The Youngstown Vindicator was still advertising both Spanier and Linda Keene as late as June 12, 1941 suggesting at least a two week run at The Mansion:
The June 1st, 1941 issue of Down Beat mentioned Linda Keene and Spanier’s appearance at The Mansion:
All of this conflicts with reports that at the end of May 1941, Linda was with Tony Pastor out in Atlanta. According to the May 31st, 1941 Atlanta Constitution, Tony Pastor with Linda Keene were playing for the Georgia Military Academy Dance on the evening of May 31st in Atlanta, Georgia.
Again, I can find no reviews to substantiate Linda’s appearance in Atlanta.
June 1941 would also hold some very interesting events for Linda Keene. The most significant was that on June 10th, she was granted a divorce from her husband Spurgeon Suttle. If you haven’t read my previous blahg “TRACING LINDA KEENE, PART 1: THE FLORENCE SUTTLE YEARS“, then I’ll explain this quickly. Linda Keene was born Florence McCrory in December of 1911 and married Spurgeon Suttle on September 16, 1931. They toured both separately and together as Frank Suttle and Florence Suttle from the beginning of their marriage until 1937 when Florence made a break and changed her name to Linda Keene. Apparently her husband could not reconcile himself with the fact that she was making more money than him. He had a small career for a time after they separated but it didn’t amount to much. For more on Spurgeon Suttle you’ll just have to check out my previous blahg. Both of the articles about the divorce come from Chicago papers so we can assume that Linda Keene was in that city around June 10th, 1941.
The next article in June of 1941 to mention Linda Keene was published in the Akron Beacon Journal from Akron, Ohio on June 15th.
Linda is back with Muggsy Spanier’s band at the Summit Beach Park in Akron. Linda had last appeared at the Summit Beach park in 1935 with George Duffy’s Orchestra under her married name Florence Suttle. The divorce five days before this new appearance at Summit Beach made it her first official appearance there as the newly single Linda Keene. Muggsy Spanier’s appearance was such a big deal that it received a coast to coast broadcast over the entire mutual network.
I can find no mention of Linda Keene with Spanier for the rest of June. I do know that Muggsy Spanier moved into the Roseland Ballroom in Claremont, New Hampshire on June 19th but Linda’s name does not appear in the advertisement. Spanier was also at the Lake Spofford Hotel in Brattleboro, Vermont on June 25th but again there is no mention of Linda Keene. Following that, Spanier was at Wagenbach’s Lawrence Hofbrau in Lowell, Massachusetts for one night on June 29th. I’m trying to establish a pattern that Muggsy Spanier and his Orchestra were playing venues in New England states at the end of June and early July because the next article I could find related to Linda Keene with Spanier’s Orchestra was a review of Muggsy and Linda at the Roseland State Ballroom in Boston from the July 12th edition of Billboard. They don’t mention the date of the performance that was reviewed but it’s possibly early July because late June had him performing at other venues in Massachusetts, Vermont, and New Hampshire and before that he was in Akron, Ohio in mid-June. It’s interesting what the Billboard review had to say about Linda as well as proof that Linda was still with Spanier in early July. They complimented her voice but felt she was out of place with Spanier and “would be better with a sweet band or in a cocktail lounge than with this jump crew.” Interesting indeed because Linda’s next move was along the lines of their suggestion. Down Beat reported in their July 15th, 1941 issue that Linda had left Spanier and was going solo.
I have checked listings for Muggsy Spanier and Red Norvo but found nothing that mentions Linda Keene for the rest of June. Tony Pastor was in Raleigh, North Carolina in the middle of June at the Carolina Cotillion Club but nothing suggests Linda Keene was there. Red Norvo was making a swing through Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Ohio but none of his advertisements included Linda Keene’s name. An engagment for Linda Keene with Tony Pastor did pop up that brought her back to Atlantic City for a week at Hamid’s Million Dollar Pier at the end of June and into July of 1941. Hamid’s Million Dollar Pier is the same location at which Linda Keene appeared with Glenn Miller in August of 1938. The Hamid’s advertisement above and to the left appeared in the Press of Atlantic City on June 28th, 1941 announcing Tony Pastor’s appearance there from June 30th to July 6th. Linda Keene’s name also appears in the ad. Subsequent advertisements like the one to upper-right from the Press of Atlantic City on July 30th and the one on the left for July 12th, failed to mention Linda’s name with Pastor. The only other advertisement with Linda’s name was a Hamid’s listing for July 3rd similar to the one that appeared in the Press of Atlantic City on June 28th.
Other than the July 12th, Billboard article and the July 15th Down Beat notice, the next listing I could find for Linda Keene was a confusing little notice that ran in the July 2, 1941 issue of Variety stating she was starting a single turn at the Uptown Cafe Society in New York City. The article to the right from the New York Age, July 19th, stated that Linda was appearing as part of a program that included “boogie-woogie piano duets.” Variety also posted smaller notices in their July 9th, 16th, and 23rd issues listing the performers at the Cafe Society Midtown, which appears to also have been called the Cafe Society Uptown, and Linda Keene’s name was published in each notice. The photo to the left is of Linda Keene at the Cafe Society Uptown and appeared in the August 1941 issue of Metronome Magazine. The small notice mentioned from the July 2nd Variety stated that Linda Keene was a “vocalist last with Muggsy Spanier’s new band.” That is odd, suggesting she was no longer with Spanier, and stranger still that Variety had her throughout the month of July in New York at the Cafe Society Midtown, and yet she was supposedly with Pastor at Hamid’s Million Dollar Pier in Atlantic City during the first week of July and further than on July 22nd, Linda was billed as being back with Muggsy Spanier at the Tune Town Ballroom in St. Louis, Missouri. The engagement at the Tune Town Ballroom would last until July 28th. It’s interesting to note that the article from the St. Louis Globe-Democrat (St. Louis, Missouri) on July 20th, 1941 that Linda Keene “formerly appeared with Red Norvo and Tony Pastor.” Was it being implied that she was no longer connected with those two bands?
I want to jump ahead just a bit to the end of December 1941. I had been looking for more listings for Linda Keene with either Spanier, Pastor, or Norvo and after the Tune Town listing there was nothing except one small notice in the December 6th, 1941 issue of Billboard. This would have put Linda Keene and Red Norvo back together again at the Blue Gardens in Armonk, New York from December 5th until mid-January 1942. I am of the opinion that this last reunion of Red Norvo and Linda Keene did not happen. At that time, Eddie Bert was playing trombone with Red Norvo and I came across an article on the Jazz Wax website, https://www.jazzwax.com/2007/12/eddie-bert-part.html, from 2007 where Eddie Bert talks about the engagement:
We went into the Blue Gardens in Armonk, N.Y., on December 6, 1941. The next day, of course, was Pearl Harbor. I thought, man, I finally get a gig and a day later there’s a war. We were at the Blue Gardens for a month and half after that. During that time, Benny Goodman came in to hear us, and we broadcast live.
I was already married by then—my wife’s name is Molly—and I taught her how to use the Wilcox-Gay recorder. Molly recorded me off the radio with Red at the Blue Gardens in January 1942. These recordings were released on CD in the early 1990s.
I was able to track down some information about the CD he references, “Red Norvo Orchestra Live From The Blue Gardens”. Here’s the artwork from the back of the CD:
Notice that vocals are attributed to Helen Ward, Kay Allen, Fran Snyder, and Eddie Bert. There is no mention of Linda Keene in Eddie Bert’s interview or on the back of the CD. I will mention more about Linda Keene’s whereabouts in December 1941/January 1942 later but I just wanted to highlight not just what might have been but also that I could find no other reference to Linda Keene with Red Norvo after the week at Enna Jettick Park in Auburn, New York in late May/early June of 1941. It’s too bad that she wasn’t at the Blue Gardens in December 1941/January 1942 because the CD would have been a great opportunity to hear the combination of Red Norvo and Linda Keene. Here’s a track from the CD of Helen Ward singing “This Time The Dream’s On Me.” One wonders what Linda Keene could have done with the song if she had appeared with Norvo at the Blue Gardens.
THIS TIME THE DREAM’S ON ME –HELEN WARD WITH RED NORVO FROM THE BLUE GARDENS
Jumping back to the July 1941 timeline, the last media for Linda Keene was about the Tune Town appearance in St. Louis with Muggsy Spanier’s Orchestra from July 22nd to 28th. Linda was also supposed to be finishing another week at the Cafe Society Uptown/Midtown in New York. I cannot confirm that Linda finished out the month at the Cafe Society or was even at Tune Town. I did find one review for the Cafe Society Uptown from the July 12, 1941 issue of Billboard and although the review is short, it is telling that at the time of the review, Linda Keene was not there. The previous listings by Variety for this show included everyone mentioned in this article, James Copp, Hazel Scott, Ammon and Johnson, and the bands of Teddy Wilson and Eddie South. What is missing are the names of Linda Keene and the comic, Jack Gilford. The last line that the “entire show Negro except for Copp,” is clear that neither Jack Gilford or Linda Keene were in the show when it was reviewed. Remember, the July 12, 1941 issue of Billboard is the same edition that reviewed Muggsy Spanier up in Boston at the Roseland State Ballroom with Linda Keene. Variety might have had it wrong about Linda’s start date at the Cafe Society Uptown or it’s possible that Linda simply didn’t join the show at all. I was able to track Jack Gilford and he was performing at the Orpheum in Minneapolis, Minnesota starting July 11th, 1941 but a syndicated column of Jack Gaven “Up and Down Broadway” dated July 12 mentions that Jack Gilford was at the Cafe Society Uptown in New York. This review might have been from the previous week but, like the Billboard review of the Cafe Society Uptown, it too fails to note Linda Keene as being there.
In George T Simon’s 1971 book, “Simon Says : The Sights and Sounds of the Swing Era, 1935-1955” he provides a daily diary of one week in August 1941 where he mentions seeing Linda Keene at the Cafe Society Uptown:
So, it might have been possible that Linda Keene was still at the Uptown in August of 1941. By the beginning of August, and probably well into December of 1941, it appears that Linda Keene had no affiliation with any orchestra. The next listing for Linda is in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania for the week running August 12th to the 18th. She was appearing at the Bolton Tropical Room for two shows nightly with two dancers and some Swiss-Bell-Ringers. The only review of the show was from the Harrisburg Telegraph from August 13th and it just repeated what appeared in the advertisement.Billboard had no route information for Linda during the month of August and Variety had no notices of her movements.
After the week in Harrisburg, the next notice was for an engagement in New York at the Famous Door in September of 1941. The big draw was Andy Kirk and his “Clouds of Joy” Orchestra. I found nothing further to be mentioned about their appearance at the Famous Door and nothing for reviews of Linda Keene. The advertisement to the upper right is from the The Brooklyn Daily Eagle, Brooklyn, New York, on September 19th. Route information for Linda Keene (misspelled as Keen) from the September 6th, 1941 issue of Billboard has her at the Famous Door. My research revealed that Andy Kirk had started his engagement at the Famous Door on September 5th with Linda Keene added on September 11th. Unfortunately, although Billboard does mention Andy Kirk at the Famous Door in their Orchestra Route information for the entire month of September, Linda Keene’s route information was just the one from the September 6th issue. As we saw, she was included in the advertisements up to the 19th so it’s possible she was there for two weeks. Variety had no information of Linda Keene for the month of September. Down Beat, however would publish a photo of Linda in the October 1st issue and would mention she was back stage watching Andy Kirk perform.
In October, neither Variety or Billboard had notices for Linda Keene. Linda was working though because she was spotted in a revue in Newport, Kentucky at the Primrose Country Club. Newport is just across the Ohio River from Cincinnati, Ohio so many of the advertisements for the show appeared in the Cincinnati Enquirer like the one on the left from October 8th. The show began on October 6th and ran until October 19th with ads like the one on the right also appearing in the Kentucky Post as late as October 18th. A review of sorts ran in the Cincinnati Enquirer on October 8th and mentioned Linda’s past affiliations with Red Norvo and Tony Pastor. Unfortunately that time, it’s her first name that is misspelled.
Down Beat would catch up to Linda Keene again in November of 1941 when they noted, in the December 1st, 1941 issue, that Linda Keene was back appearing again with Red Norvo. The article was primarily about the, yet again, restructured Red Norvo combo, but it did mention that Linda had joined Red Norvo again for an appearance in New Haven probably around mid-November 1941. I cannot find any other reference to that appearance.
November 1941 saw no notices in Billboard or Variety or other periodicals for Linda Keene. It wasn’t until the December 3rd issue of Variety that a new notice for Linda Keene appears. This time she’s at Kelly’s Stable in New York. This same notice would appear in the December 17th issue of Variety. I could find no advertisements for Kelly’s Stable in December of 1941.
HENRY LEVINE & STRICTLY FROM DIXIE
Other than appearing at Kelly’s Stable, December 1941 saw one of the most significant events in Linda Keene’s career. The same day, December 3rd, that Variety published a notice about Linda at Kelly’s Stable, the Jersey Journal, Jersey City, New Jersey ran this article:
The following day the San Antonio Express, San Antonio, Texas made the same announcement. Linda Keene had apparently replaced Ella Fitzgerald to be the new vocalist on Henry Levine’s weekly show “Strictly From Dixie.” Similar write-ups appeared in other newspapers in December:
The one on the left is from The Central New Jersey Home News (New Brunswick, New Jersey) and the one on the right is
from The Evening News (Harrisburg, Pennsylvania). Down Beat would also make an announcement about Linda Keene joining “Strictly From Dixie” in the December 1st, 1941 issue.
Henry Levine had previously been with NBC but his new radio show “STRICTLY FROM DIXIE” was the result of him switching from NBC’s “Chamber Music Society of Lower Basin Street”, to ABC’s “Strictly From Dixie” show. It was on this new show that he introduced his new vocalist Linda Keene. On his previous show at NBC, he introduced at different times, singers Dinah Shore and Lena Horne. Now it was Linda’s turn and after a year full of touring and a connection, at times, to Tony Pastor, Red Nichols, Red Norvo, Muggsy Spanier, and supposedly Charlie Barnet, it must have been exciting for her to now be connected to a weekly radio show.
One other item of significance began appearing in the The Pittsburgh Courier (Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania) December 13th, 1941. It was the result of fan voting for favorite band and favorite male and female vocalists. Here were the standings on December 13th:
Note that Linda Keene was 16th in the female vocalist standings with 340 votes; ahead of some great singers like Mildred Bailey, Helen O’Connell, Ella Logan, and Dinah Shore. By comparison, Frank Sinatra was only 24th in the male vocalist standings with only 290 votes. Near the end of the voting, on December 27th, the standings looked like this:
Frank Sinatra had sunk to 26th with only 300 votes, a gain of only 10 votes in two weeks, and Linda Keene had dropped lower on the list to 21st but had gained 250 votes for a total of 590. It was not a bad showing to end out 1941.
1942
According to Variety, Linda Keene continued her association with Kelly’s Stable in January 1942. The line-up posted for the weeks of January 16th and 30th, 1942 were very similar to those posted for December. A variation of the notice appeared in Variety up to the week of February 6. So, Linda Keene was pulling double duty by performing at Kelly’s Stable and performing on the weekly radio show “Strictly From Dixie”. I could find no advertisements for Kelly’s Stable in January or February 1942.
HENRY LEVINE contd…
I do not know the exact date that Linda Keene joined up with Henry Levine on “Strictly From Dixie” or when she stopped appearing on the show. All media point to a December 1941 start and she was still appearing on that program into February of 1942. According to a wire service article appearing February 1st, she even turned down an offer to join up with Artie Shaw so she could stay on the “Strictly From Dixie” radio show. It’s a good thing, too, because as a result of her appearance on that program, she went back into the studio the first week of February to record six songs for a 78 rpm album that would also bear the title of “Strictly From Dixie.”
The album, “Strictly From Dixie”, which culturally sports an inappropriate cover image, was the first and only album that Linda Keene would record. Three of Linda’s tracks, “Mound Bayou”, “Embraceable You”, and “Somebody Loves Me” were recorded on February 2nd, 1942 and the remaining three of her vocals, “Georgia On My Mind”, “Someone To Watch Over Me”, and “Way Down Yonder In New Orleans” were recorded on February 4th. The pairing of Linda Keene with Henry Levine and his band was the best fit that Linda had up to that time. The songs are dixie and with her famous southern voice, the vocals and the music click, in my opinion, like none of her other band associations since Jack Teagarden.
MOUND BAYOU –LINDA KEENE with HENRY LEVINE AND HIS STRICTLY FROM DIXIE JAZZ BAND
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EMBRACEABLE YOU –LINDA KEENE with HENRY LEVINE AND HIS STRICTLY FROM DIXIE JAZZ BAND
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SOMEBODY LOVES ME –LINDA KEENE with HENRY LEVINE AND HIS STRICTLY FROM DIXIE JAZZ BAND
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GEORGIA ON MY MIND –LINDA KEENE with HENRY LEVINE AND HIS STRICTLY FROM DIXIE JAZZ BAND
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SOMEONE TO WATCH OVER ME –LINDA KEENE with HENRY LEVINE AND HIS STRICTLY FROM DIXIE JAZZ BAND
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WAY DOWN YONDER IN NEW ORLEANS –LINDA KEENE with HENRY LEVINE AND HIS STRICTLY FROM DIXIE JAZZ BAND
The other two tracks in the album were instrumentals of “Shine” and “Strictly From Dixie” by Henry Levine and his Strictly From Dixie Jazz Band. None of the tracks from this 78 rpm album would be released on any other format until the Harlequin label put out a CD in 1995 entitled “NBC’s Chamber Music Society of Lower Basin Street”. If you look at the image to the right you will see that Linda Keene is included on the CD and there’s even a picture on the bottom right of her. Linda’s only two tracks on the CD are “Somebody Loves Me” and “Georgia On My Mind”. All six of Linda’s songs with Henry Levine would also be issued on “The Velvet Voice Of The Forgotten Linda Keene” compiled by Professor Eves Raja.
The reviews for the “Strictly From Dixie” album were generally very good.
Evening Star, Washington DC, May 3, 1942
The Atlanta Constitution (Atlanta, Georgia), May 3, 1942
Jackson Advocate, Jackson, Mississippi, May 23, 1942
Arizona Daily Star (Tucson, Arizona), November 28, 1943
Down Beat would publish an article in the May 15, 1942 edition stating that Linda did not like her own vocals on her Strictly From Dixie recordings:
Down Beat would follow up that article with a photo and caption in the June 1st, 1942 issue still maintaining that Linda didn’t enjoy her vocals on the album:
Another review suggested that RCA was so pleased with sales of the “Strictly From Dixie” album that a second volume was in the works:
The Record (Hackensack, New Jersey), March 6, 1942
There would not be another volume of “Strictly From Dixie” but, other than the 78 album and the radio program, there would be more of Henry Levine and Linda Keene to come…but in a different format.
The January 31st, 1942 issue of Billboard published the following advertisement:
Minoco Productions was responsible for producing “Soundies”. If you haven’t read my first blahg about Linda Keene, Down A Rabbit Hole With Linda Keene, then I’ll reprint from there, 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.”
There’s a great resource book titled “The Soundies Book” by Scott MacGillivray and Ted Okuda. The book is a reference of all things Soundies and has compiled information on all these “Music Videos of the 1940s.” Linda Keene and Henry Levine and his band would film three Soundies: “Ja-Da”, “Frankie and Johnny”, and “When My Sugar Walks Down The Street.” We are lucky that these all survive and even luckier that each is available for viewing on Youtube:
Ja-Da
Frankie and Johnny
When My Sugar Walks Down The Street
According to ‘The Soundies Book’, “Minoco Productions was owned and operated by the Panoram manufacturer (Minoco stood for MIlls NOvelty COmpany)…The Minoco films were made at the former Thomas Edison studio, on Decatur Avenue in the Bronx section of New York City.” ‘The Soundies Book’ also provided copyright dates for Linda Keene’s three Soundies. “Ja-Da” was copyright March 2, 1942, “Frankie and Johnny” March 30, 1942, and “When My Sugar Walks Down The Street” on May 18, 1942. “Ja-Da” and “Frankie and Johnny” would have been filmed at the Bronx location but “When My Sugar Walks Down The Street” would have been filmed in Chicago. ‘The Soundies Book’ clarifies that Minoco was having some financial issues due to the war and in April 1942 Mills Novelty, “needing to downsize and adjust to the company’s new economics, closed its New York and Hollywood production units and sought local facilities in the company’s home base of Chicago, Illinois.” Linda Keene would only film the three Soundies but before “Ja-Da”, Henry Levine and his band, without Linda, had filmed the Soundie “Bugle Call Rag” which had a copyright date of February 9th, 1942:
MacGillivray and Okuda had favorable things to say about Linda’s last Soundie “When My Sugar Walks Down The Street. “One of our favorite Soundies, with vocalist Linda Keene (who gets top billing). The visuals are a little cheesier than usual, with under-rehearsed showgirls and a cardboard backdrop, but the music is tops. This tune was part of Henry’s radio repertoire, so the band had this one down cold.”
TONY PASTOR contd…
Just like she did in 1941, Linda Keene appeared to keep more than one band connection in the spring of 1942. At the same time that she was appearing with Levine on the radio program “Strictly From Dixie” but apparently between the filming of the “Ja-Da” and “Frankie and Johnny” Soundies, she connected again with Tony Pastor and his Orchestra and went on tour. On March 17th, 1942, she was billed as appearing with Tony Pastor and His Orchestra at the Mishler Theatre in Altoona, Pennsylvania, as noted in the advertisement above from the Altoona, Mirror. The following month, Linda Keene is noted to appear again with Tony Pastor at the La Plaza Theater in St. Petersburgh, Florida.
This time, I was able to verify Linda’s appearance in Florida with Tony Pastor. Like the two advertisements above that appeared in the Tampa Bay Times on April 27th, the following review appeared in the same paper on April 28th:
Linda’s notice was very brief “Pretty Linda Keene also was well liked” but it was enough to verify that Linda Keene was indeed touring again with Tony Pastor almost a year after her last appearance with his Orchestra. Linda Keene continued her tour with Pastor in May with an appearance at the Carolina Theatre in Greenville, South Carolina for one night only on May 6, 1942. After that, I could find no other listings for Linda Keene appearing with Tony Pastor. One wonders why she was back with Pastor again in 1942.
Linda must have left Pastor again sometime in May after the the Greenville appearance. Her next listing is from the Asbury Park Press (Asbury Park, New Jersey) where Linda is appearing at the Rainbow Room atop the Albion Hotel in Asbury Park on May 23rd and 24th.
The New Rainbow Room was on top of the Albion Hotel, billed as entirely fireproof, finished in 1942 with all modernistic furnishings. The Rainbow Room with dancing every night proved to be Jersey Shore’s most popular rendezvous.
The question about whether Linda Keene ever toured with Henry Levine was considered in an article that appeared in the Red Bank Register, Red Bank, New Jersey on June 4th. In a column about “Goings On About the U.S.O Club” it was noted that Henry Levine would perform at the club on June 11th and Linda Keene would be the vocalist. Unfortunately, a review of the event in the following week’s Red Bank Register, failed to not that either Henry Levine or Linda Keene were there.
The reason why Linda Keene didn’t appear in Red Bank was that she was benefitting from her radio appearances. On June 11th, when she would have been in Red Bank, she was opening again at Kelly’s Stable in New York. The notice made reference to her radio work. Her previous appearances at Kelly’s Stable failed to mention her name in New York papers other than the personnel notices in Variety. The New York Daily News made note of her opening, however, in their June 11, 1942 edition and even carried her name in a Kelly’s Stable ad on June 18th. Variety noted that she was still appearing at Kelly’s Stable through the week of July 10th. Down Beat would also mention her appearance at Kelly’s Stable in the July 1st issue of that magazine.
In July, probably after finishing up at Kelly’s Stable, Linda Keene was out on the road again. On July 9th, the Detroit Times ran an advertisement for Club San Diego,
in Detroit, Michigan, in which Linda Keene’s name was prominently featured. The same edition also carried a picture of Linda Keene in a notice on the same page as the advertisement for the Club San Diego. The program, that also featured John Kirby and his Orchestra began on July 6th and ran until the 19th. It is likely that Linda was also there for the full two weeks. Her picture with a notice of her appearance at the club also appeared in the Detroit Times on July 12th as well as an interesting article that appeared on July 16th about a psychiatrist who fell in love with Linda Keene:
Following the Club San Diego engagement in Detroit, another significant event happened in Linda Keene’s life. She was asked to substitute on the daily radio program, “Club Matinee” for two weeks beginning July 20th.” Club Matinee was an American old-time radio variety show. It was broadcast on the NBC Blue Network from 1937 to 1943 and on ABC from 1945 to 1946. Club Matinee featured comedy and music, with the two sometimes combined in the form of comedic arrangements of musical classics, played slightly out of tune. The format was probably familiar to Linda because it was very similar to that of “NBC’s Chamber Music Society Of Lower Basin Street” as well as “Strictly From Dixie.” Linda would appear daily for two weeks. Unfortunately, like the “Strictly From Dixie” programs on which Linda appeared, I could find no radio transcriptions of any of her “Club Matinee” performances. Down Beat would also mention in their August 1st, 1941 edition Linda’s appearance on Club Matinee: Linda Keene’s appearance on “Club Matinee”, substituting for the vacationing Nancy Martin was so well received that she was welcomed back in August. Linda was asked to appear for another three weeks, this time for the vacationing Marion Mann beginning August 17th. The second appearance on “Club Matinee” with a three week run would have ended around September 4th, 1942. All of the notices regarding her appearance on “Club Matinee” were generally favorable.
A couple of other interesting things happened for Linda Keene in 1942 that might have been the result of her radio appearances on “Strictly From Dixie” and “Club Matinee.” Some time in 1942 Linda Keene appeared on the cover of the sheet music issued for the Johnny Mercer and Hoagy Carmichael tune “Skylark”. We know that she didn’t record this tune but it is possible she sang it on one of her radio programs. What a missed opportunity it would have been to have had Linda Keene record an album of Hoagy Carmichael tunes. Her voice had already proved itself on Carmichael’s “Georgia On My Mind” and, personally, I think other Carmichael songs like “Stardust”, “Baltimore Oriole”, Memphis In June”, “Heart and Soul” or the “Nearness of You” would have been well suited for Linda’s voice. Also in 1942, Linda Keene appeared on the sheet music for “If Anything Happened To You.” I could not find an image for this file but this was a tune written by Jimmy Van Heusen and was recorded by Ella Fitzgerald in 1939. Linda must have been singing it as well on the radio in 1942. In case you’ve never heard Ella’s version of “If Anything Happened To You” give it a listen. I’m sure you’ll agree it would have been a song well suited to Linda’s singing style. Maybe a radio transcription will surface one day of Linda singing the song and perhaps I’ll also find a copy of the sheet music with Linda Keene on the cover.
“If Anything Happened To You” – Ella Fitzgerald, 1939
After her second stint on “Cafe Matinee”, Linda Keene is advertised as performing at The Plantation in Moline, Illinois. The ad in the Moline Daily Dispatch made reference to her appearance on “Club Matinee” and that she came direct to Moline after her three weeks on that program. The engagement in Moline ran from September 11th to 24th. Linda even found time to make an appearance at a War Bond show on September 14th. Linda’s name might have been front and center in the advertisement for The Plantation but the one for the War Bond show focused more on the appearance of Griff Williams. We know that Linda was at this War Bond show because the review for the program mentions her appearance.
Linda Keene followed up her two weeks in Moline by moving over to the Club 509 in Detroit, Michigan for a week starting October 5th. After the Club 509, Linda was in Cincinnati at The Patio for two weeks opening on October 19th and closing on November 1st.
Linda was well received at The Patio over her two weeks.
The remainder of Linda Keene’s schedule in 1942 was very quiet. One answer might have been due to there being a War on. This didn’t stop Linda because Billboard noted she was joining the war effort by signing up with the USO to perform throughout the Winter season at various camps beginning the end of November. This would see Linda into 1943.
1943
In addition to her radio and USO work, Linda Keene continued her club work in January of 1943. Starting January 18th, she was featured at the Tropical Room of the Hotel Bolton in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, ending on January 24th. Once again, she is billed as a Blues singer. Linda’s work in 1943 would be mostly club work with no connection to any Orchestra. Most of the advertisements or reviews of her work over the next few years would fail to mention what musicians might have been backing her at the various venues.
In February, starting with the February 13th issue, Billboard would carry route information for Linda at the Famous Door in New York. The Famous Door was a jazz club on New York’s 52nd Street. It opened in 1935 and among the club’s initial backers were Lennie Hayton and Glenn Miller. Linda had since performed with Orchestra’s led by these two giants. Billboard published the same route information for Linda at the Famous Door in their February 13th, 20th, 27th, and March 6th issue. Variety also listed Linda Keene at the Famous Door for the week of March 5th, 1943. This would not be the last time that Linda Keene would play at the Famous Door in 1943 but I could find no advertisements for Linda’s engagement in February/March 1943. Coincidentally, Red Norvo, according to the New York Daily News advertisement for the Famous Door on February 1st, preceded Linda at the Famous Door. According to the February 15th, 1943 issue of Down Beat, Linda Keen may have stayed on at the Famous Door to appear with Red Norvo for his two week stay:
Down Beat would also carry a photo in the March 1st, 1943 issue of Red and Linda back together again at the Famous Door:
After Linda’s February/March 1943 engagement at the Famous Door, neither Variety nor Billboard carried any route information for Linda for the next few months. There was no information either regarding when she might have left the “Strictly From Dixie” radio program. She might have been busy with her USO work or smaller club work through March and April. The next listing for Linda Keene wasn’t until the May 7th edition of The Brooklyn Daily Eagle (Brooklyn, New York) where they noted she was back again at the Famous Door. Another article, more than three weeks later, in The Philadelphia Inquirer (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania) on May 30th noted she was still at the Famous Door but also clarified that she no longer had any radio program affiliation. It was suggested in the article that she was being pursued for a possible radio program of her own over the Blue Network. Someone was very optimistic that they could bill her to be the female Frank Sinatra and “America’s Greatest Blues Singer.” I can find no other references to this possible radio program deal nor could I find the length of her stay this second time at the Famous Door. Between the two articles it is suggested a run from at least May 7th through May 30th and possibly into June of 1943.
In mid-June Down Beat would report that Linda Keene was headed to the Club Charles in Baltimore. She would open on June 14th, 1943 and would appear for two weeks.
In the month of July 1943, Linda Keene had moved over to the Glass Hat in the Hotel Belmont in New York. The program was being billed as a Summer Revue and ads like the one on the left began appearing on July 7th and ran throughout the month. Billboard listed Linda Keene at the Belmont Plaza, the location of the Glass Hat, in their artist route section of their July 24th edition. This route information would also be repeated in Billboard’s July 31st, August 7th, and August 14th editions. Linda also received notices out in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, in the Harrisburg Telegraph on July 28th: Apparently, catching Linda Keene’s performance at the Glass Hat was the thing to do when you went into New York. Linda was still getting notices in the Brooklyn Daily Eagle for her Glass Hat appearance as late as July 30th, 1943.
The New York Herald Tribune published a significant review of Linda Keene at the Glass Hat in the July 27th, 1943 edition. The review started off with that statement that “We are told that Duke Ellington once remarked that there are only two singers in the world–Bing Crosby and Linda Keene.”
It is not clear when Ellington might have made the comment about Linda Keene but it was significant that he put Linda in the same class as Bing Crosby. From the review we learn that she is still performing “Unlucky Woman” and “Embraceable You.” She was also singing “Jenny” from the Broadway musical “Lady In The Dark”.
There was no further media coverage, that I could locate, for Linda Keene after the Billboard route information for her at the Glass Hat in the August 14th edition. In fact neither Variety or Billboard would carry route or notice information for her until well into November of 1943. The next newspaper coverage wouldn’t appear until October 6th in the Boston Herald noting that Linda Keene was now part of the program at the Roof and Star Bar of the Hotel Bradford.
The notice did not specify that the new program was beginning on the 6th and it wasn’t until a notice in the Boston Globe on October 8th that we learn the opening was the night before on October 7th. It was a good notice that “more than 300 were turned away from the opening”, even if they did misspell Linda’s first name as “Linday”. Notice, too, that the venue is now listed as the Roof and Sky Garden. Notices were still being published as of October 15th, suggesting a possible two week run. The October 22nd, Boston Globe noted a new program began on October 21st with Rose Marie.
In November of 1943, Linda Keene was back in Newport, Kentucky at the Glenn Rendezvous. Linda had last been in Newport in October of 1941 when she played the Primrose Country Club. On October 10th, the Cincinnati Enquirer carried an article about Linda being the headliner for the show opening on Friday, October 12th. She was also prominently featured in the advertisement that appeared on October 11th, in the Cincinnati Enquirer, the day before the opening.
Linda was now “The Mistress of Blues”. A subsequent advertisement on October 13th in the Cincinnati Enquirer had her name prominently featured but not her image:
Note the billing as “Year’s Singing Star” and “that gal from N’ Or’luns.” The same day the second advertisement appeared in the Cincinnati Enquirer, October 13th, they also published a small write-up about the show. Here, we learn that Linda has added the song “Jenny” from the Broadway musical “Lady In The Dark” to her repertoire. The song was written in 1941 and was made popular by Gertrude Lawrence. Linda Keene also received a nice notice on October 14th in the Cincinnati Enquirer. This would not be the last notice about Linda Keene at the Glenn Rendezvous because the Cincinnati Enquirer noted her singing on another song in their November 21st edition. This time their review was for her singing the song “Born On A Friday” which is actually correctly titled “Unlucky Woman” which Linda Keene would eventually record…but more about that later. The Cincinnati Times-Star gave Linda a good review in their November 13, 1943 edition. The article mentioned she was singing “I Don’t Stand A Ghost of A Chance” and “Wrap Your Troubles in Dreams” as well as “Jenny”. The reviewer expressly highlighted how Linda sang in a “slow, drawling violet-toned voice with crystal-clear diction.” The final advertisement that mentioned Linda Keene was the one that appeared for her last night at the Glenn Rendezvous on November 25th. Betty Reilly would follow her into the Glenn Rendezvous.
In late November 1943, Linda Keene was back in Cleveland, Ohio. The last time she had played in Cleveland was two years earlier on November 21, 1940 at the Trianon Ballroom with Red Norvo. This time she was performing in the Vogue Room of the Hotel Hollenden for two weeks from November 29th to December 12th. Below is the advertisement that appeared in the Cleveland Plain Dealer on November 28th:
A similar advertisement would appear on December 5th but in the bottom left corner, Roy Davis has been replaced by the Silver Cyclones, a roller-skating act.
In both advertisements, Linda Keene is compared to the 1800s Swedish opera singer Jenny Lind by parodying her name as “Jenny Linda.” The advertisements for the show might have been kind but the review that also ran in the December 5th issue of the Cleveland Plain Dealer was not. This must have been devastating for Linda. The only good takeaway we have from this review is that it notes two of the songs she was singing, “Basin Street Blues” and “You Let Me Down”. The latter song, “You Let Me Down” was written in 1935 by Harry Warren and Al Dubin and was popularized by Billie Holiday’s recording in 1936. Give a listen to that version:
“You Let Me Down” – Billie Holiday
It is probably likely that Linda Keene’s version was inspired by Billie Holiday’s version. I just want to make note of another beautiful version of that song recorded in 1960 by Sylvia Syms for her excellent album, “Torch Song.” If you have never heard it, by all means, treat yourself:
“You Let Me Down” – Sylvia Syms
I could find no other references to Linda Keene for the rest of December of 1943. Hopefully audiences received her better at the Vogue Room than the reviewer. Still, the review was not a great way to end out 1943.
1944
An interesting notice appeared in the January 1st, 1944 edition of Billboard. It was an announcement that Paula Victor and Linda Keene had been set for the new Lee Mortimer show scheduled for that month. On further research I discovered that the Lee Mortimer show was a program called “Around The Town” at the Folies Bergere in New York. Billboard reviewed the show in their January 8th edition:
There is no notice of Linda Keene in the review and it appears singing by a female vocalist was left up to Bea Saxon. Any other articles that I found regarding the show failed to mention Linda Keene or Paula Victor but did note the singing by Bea Saxon. It would have been an interesting start to 1944 for Linda Keene but I doubt it happened.
After an absence in postings for the first two months of 1944, Linda Keene’s name was mentioned in the February 26th Billboard issue noting she was now in Hollywood going into the Little Club. This puts Linda Keene solidly on the West Coast after working out of New York and the Ohio region. Despite intense research, I could not locate anything regarding Linda’s engagement at the Little Club.
It isn’t until late March that we learn what Linda Keene has been doing on the West Coast. The article on the left from the Circleville Herald, Circleville, Ohio, from March 25th makes note of Linda’s upcoming appearance on the Bob Crosby show on April 2nd. In the article, it states that Linda is 24 years old. In fact, by this time, she was 32. Recall that in the booklet to Professor Raja’s cd he noted that “when Linda Keene arrived in Boston in the fall of 1937, she had convinced all those in the entertainment circles that she was 19.” If this was true then seven years later in 1944 she would have been 26 and not 24 by that estimate. Her age was reversing even more by that rate. More importantly, the Circleville article references that she had been in Hollywood to make a screen test. It also references her previous engagements at “The Famous Door” and “Cafe Society”. By the way, I could find no radio transcription for her performance on the Bob Crosby program.
There would be no further Variety notices for Linda Keene for the remainder of 1944 and nothing new in Billboard until September of that year. A little over a week after her April 2nd appearance on the Bob Crosby radio program, she is, however, listed in local media as appearing in Las Vegas. This was the early days of Las Vegas and not the glitz and glamor of today with huge hotels and casinos. Linda’s appearance was at the Nevada Biltmore Hotel which was more like a motel with a number of bungalows:
It is likely that Linda Keene opened on April 10th and performed through April 23rd. Below is the advertisement than ran in the Las Vegas Review Journal on April 11th, 1944:
If you click on the above advertisement to make it larger, you will notice that Linda Keene is billed as “Famous Singer Direct From Bob Crosby’s CBS Show!” Below that, the tag reads “Has made over 1,000 Victor Recordings!” What an amazing statement to make. Linda had only recorded six songs for RCA Victor and those were the tracks included in the “Strictly From Dixie” 78rpm album. If she had made over 1,000 Victor recordings then her fame would have been phenomenal and there would be no need for this blahg.
Other advertisements for Linda’s engagement at the Nevada Biltmore Hotel included this one on August 18th:
and this final one on August 22nd:
Again, by clicking on both of the advertisements from above, you will notice the tag line appears in each, stating “has made over 1,000 Victor records.” I only wish that were true.
I could find no further notices for Linda Keene until September of 1944. She may have been performing on the west coast but nothing popped up when searching for her name during the months April through August. It wasn’t until a notice in the September 15th New York Daily News that we discover she is back on the east coast and performing again at Kelly’s Stable.
By all accounts, this was Linda Keene’s third time at Kelly’s Stable in New York. The notices that I have uncovered had her first appearing there in December of 1941 and then for a second time in most of June of 1942. More than two years later, she was back at the same club. Note that Charlie Shavers was also appearing at Kelly’s Stable with Linda Keene. In less than a year, Linda would be in the studio with Shavers laying down the last of her official recordings.
Billboard would include Linda Keene in their route information, for her appearances at Kelly’s Stable, in their September 23rd, September 30th, and October 7th editions. This would have been another good run for Linda at Kelly’s Stable, opening on September 15th and closing sometime during the first week of October. Down Beat would also take note of the reopening of Kelly’s Stable and the fact that Linda was there. In the October 1st, 1944 issue of Down Beat they noted that Linda had already been there for two weeks. Down Beat would also publish a favorable review of Linda Keene at Kelly’s in the October 15th issue:
Another odd thing happened while Linda Keene was appearing at Kelly’s Stable. By the end of September, wire services were all running the same article:
This article appeared in several papers on September 28th, 1944 and variations of the article were appearing as late as the first week of November:
I could not find anything about Harrison Bryon White III. I suspect that Linda married him when she was on the West Coast and separation from him might have been another reason for her return to the East Coast. The late October/early November notice was deliberately set to coincide with Linda returning again in late October to Kelly’s Stable.
The October 1st, 1944 issue of Downbeat featured a snippet regarding Linda with no further information. The small notice just mentioned that “Linda Keene, blues singer, is back on the Blue Network again, on the Dixieland House Party show.” I found radio listings for this program in 1944 but no other information about the show and whether Linda’s appearance was a guest shot or ongoing appearances. Beyond 1944, the show virtually disappeared.
Although Billboard listed route information for Linda Keene at Kelly’s Stable in their October 7th issue, it certainly wasn’t correct or may have been for the week previous. An advertisement in the October 2nd, New York Daily News showed that Linda Keene was now appearing again at The Glass Hat:
Linda was part of an “All Star Fall Revue”. Her last appearance at The Glass Hat was in July 1943 when she appeared in a Summer Revue. Linda received a favorable mention in an article following Miss America of 1943 and 1944 who had attended the performances at that club. The highlight was that Linda was still singing “Unlucky Woman” when she appeared at The Glass Hat.
It is likely that Linda’s engagement at The Glass Hat was for two weeks because by October 14th, the New York Daily News was advertising Linda back at Kelly’s Stable again. Once more, Linda was appearing on the same bill with Charlie Shavers. Similar advertisements would appear over the next two weeks with the last one appearing in the New York Daily News on October 27th. If Linda Keene remained in New York in November of 1944, there were no advertisements for her appearances after The Glass Hat.
The only news we have of Linda Keene from November of 1944 was that she returned to the recording studio on November 29th to record two tracks with the Joe Marsala Band. After singing “Unlucky Woman” for over a year in various clubs, she recorded that song, along with “Blues In The Storm.”
UNLUCKY WOMAN–LINDA KEENE with JOE MARSALA AND HIS ORCHESTRA
BLUES IN THE STORM–LINDA KEENE with JOE MARSALA AND HIS ORCHESTRA
It had been more than two years since her last studio session with Henry Levine’s band in February of 1944 but her club work had indeed strengthened her voice. “Unlucky Woman” became the tag name for Linda Keene in Opal Nations’ article ‘Unlucky Woman-The Story of Linda Keene.’ It was this recording which would later be included on the compilation LP “Shades of Blue”, that made Opal Nations sit up and take notice of Linda Keene for the first time:
Just a while ago I managed to snag a copy of the album ‘Shades of Blue’ on the Al-Fi label. In among the distaff delights…was an exquisite reading of Carl and Leonard Feather’s torchy Unlucky Woman, originally waxed on Paul Reiner’s Black & White label on November 29th, 1944. “Who in the world is this extraordinary gal!?” I exclaimed,. “And how come I have passed on this sensuous diva, full of soulful feeling and exquisite understanding for the low-down, dark-corner blues?”
Both “Unlucky Woman” and “Blues In The Storm” were written by Leonard Feather whom both Opal Nations and Professor Raja maintain was a good friend and influence for Linda Keene. Leonard Feather also played piano on both tracks.
The main problem with “Unlucky Woman” and “Blues In The Storm” was that they were issued on a 12 inch 78rpm record. This limited hearing the track to home gramophones because commercial units in bars and restaurants could only play the normal 10 inch 78rpm record. Here’s what Billboard had to say about the record in their February 10, 1945 issue:
It’s too bad that despite the glowing review, Billboard felt it necessary to add the disclaimer that “unfortunately, this is a 12-incher and cannot be fitted for the music machines.” As late as August 13, 1945, positive reviews were still being published like the one on the right from the San Francisco Chronicle on that date:
The recording session with Joe Marsala was not Linda’s last hurrah for 1944. By the middle of December, Linda Keene was appearing on the radio and in a nightclub in Boston.
The radio appearance was on a “weekly New England WAC Show” called “Everything For The Girls!” that aired on December 16, 1944. Sorry, I could not find a radio transcription for this one either. Further searches through Boston newspapers revealed that Linda Keene was also appearing at the Fox and Hounds Club in Boston as noted in the article to the left from the Boston Globe on December 20th, 1944. An article about New Year’s Eve programs in various clubs in Boston, from the Boston Globe on December 27th, revealed that Linda Keene woud be part of the program at the Fox and Hounds.
1945
It is likely that after Linda Keene’s New Year’s Eve appearance at the Fox and Hounds Club in Boston, she finished her engagement there. New shows primarily began on a Monday and New Year’s Eve 1944 was on a Sunday evening. There were no further mentions of Linda Keene, at least, in Boston in January of 1945. The next notice for Linda Keene to start off 1945 came as a notice in The Evening Sun, Baltimore, Maryland, on January 25, 1945.
Linda Keene was scheduled to appear as part of the entertainment for the President’s Birthday Ball at the Armory in Baltimore on January 29th, 1945. She was chosen with other performers from Baltimore night clubs. Down Beat reported in their February 1st, 1945 issue that she was appearing at Club Charles again. She had last appeared at the Club Charles in June of 1943. I could find no other references to a possible radio show starring Linda Keene and Paul Baron. Another article about the President’s Birthday Ball appeared two days later in The Evening Sun, Baltimore on January 27th:
On January 29th, The Evening Sun published a thank you advertisement in which Linda Keene was mentioned:
What is interesting to note from the above notice was that other artists were listed and the club at which they were performing. Nothing was noted for Linda Keene except “Singer of Songs”. The subsequent reviews of the event noted that then President Franklin Roosevelt was not in attendance but the event was attended by Senator George L. Radcliffe as the Governor and Mayor were also not available.
In February of 1945, Linda Keene returned to the recording studio again to produce four more tracks on the Black and White label. This was the same label she recorded for with Joe Marsala in November of 1944 but this time she would be recording with Charlie Shavers who had been on the bill with her at Kelly’s Stable in the fall of 1944. The session on February 16, 1945 would also be supervised by her good friend Leonard Feather and Red Norvo would play vibes. Obviously this was a contingent of friends and playmates supporting Linda on what would turn out to be her last official recording session.
I DON’T STAND A GHOST OF A CHANCE WITH YOU–LINDA KEENE WITH CHARLIE SHAVERS & RED NORVO
I MUST HAVE THAT MAN–LINDA KEENE WITH CHARLIE SHAVERS & RED NORVO
I do not have images for the 78rpm record of the next two recordings. The image would be similar to those above listing the same personnel but having a different song title on each side. For the record, pardon the pun, “Gee Baby, Ain’t I Good to You” and “Blues On My Weary Mind” were 19A and 19B on the Black & White Label.
GEE BABY, AIN’T I GOOD TO YOU–LINDA KEENE WITH CHARLIE SHAVERS & RED NORVO
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BLUES ON MY WEARY MIND–LINDA KEENE WITH CHARLIE SHAVERS & RED NORVO
A review of sorts was published on the website, https://www.allmusic.com by Arwulf Arwulf upon the release of the CD set “The Chronological Charlie Shavers: 1944-1945” in 1997. Arwulf wrote, “The mood shifts down to first gear for Linda Keene’s session for Black and White Records. Shavers is able to relax and provide easygoing support for this pleasant vocalist.”
The four tracks with Shavers are, in my opinion, a good example of a more mature singer. Linda Keene was 33 when she recorded these songs. She had been the girl singer with big bands and orchestras, appeared in Soundies, performed a number of times on radio but by 1945 she was relegated to nightclub work. There was still a war on but of the orchestras that were still performing in the United States, few had female singers. It was the dawn of the singer as solo vocalist. Take Frank Sinatra, for example, he had left Dorsey in September of 1942. He’d been performing to sold-out shows, had his own radio show, and was now making a name for himself in motion-pictures. Linda, had none of this. Despite her nightclub work, she had no regular radio show and her screen test in Hollywood failed to produce any results. The moment in her life was fading.
I didn’t want to end off this blahg with just a note on her final recordings in 1945. I believe a natural break would be to follow her career, at this point, to the end of 1945. After her recording session with Charlie Shavers and company, she had no idea that she wouldn’t continue to make good. She kept on working. The spring of 1945 might have been sparse, however, because I could not find any further media notices for Linda until June of 1945. Variety carried nothing for Linda Keene for all of 1945 and Billboard wouldn’t report next on Linda until December of that year. It appears that by June of 1945 Linda Keene was performing again with the USO. The Victoria Advocate, out of Victoria, Texas made note in their June 22, 1945 issue that a new USO stage show was set for July 3rd at the Aloe Army Airfield. Linda Keene was part of the new “Right About Rhythm” USO show. The June 29th Victoria Advocate highlighted Linda Keene for the USO Show. The July 6th edition of the Victoria Advocate noted there was a packed house for the performance.
The “Right About Rhythm” show probably played a number of military bases not covered by local media. The next regular media notice was in the July 7th Barksdale’s Bark (Barksdale Field, Louisiana) for an appearance of the USO show at the Barksdale Air Force Base. Linda received another good billing with a nod to her previous connection with the Chamber Music Society of Lower Basin Street. The July 7th Barksdale’s Bark also featured a small advertisement for the USO show carrying Linda Keene’s name.
Later in July, there was another media notice for the show coming to the Smyrna Army Air Field in Nashville, Tennessee. The Tennessean (Nashville, Tennessee) from July 23rd provided a nice notice for the show on July 26th with Linda Keene’s name getting prominence. Linda was also mentioned in a subsequent article advertising the show in the July 25th Tennessean. There was one more performance of the show in July on the 30th at Camp Breckinridge in Morganfield, Kentucky. The Evansville Courier and Press, Evansville, Indiana, ran a notice about the show in their July 22nd, 1945 edition. There may have been other shows throughout the summer of 1945 but only Camp newspapers or military newspapers would have published notice of these shows.
The “Right About Rhythm” show continued into August with an appearance at the Camp Gruber military base in Oklahoma. The camp newspaper, The Gruber Guidon, on August 10th, 1945, carried a two-part article about the show that would be performed on the base on August 15th and 16th.
This was the last appearance for the “Right About Rhythm” USO that I could find that mentioned Linda Keene’s name. I have found some notices for the show in the early months of 1945 but none of the articles mentioned Linda Keene among the performers. The first article was the one on June 22nd in the Victoria Advocate and that last being the article above for the Camp Gruber appearances in August.
Linda Keene’s notices were quiet for the rest of the summer and into the fall of 1945. In fact, the next notice about Linda Keene wasn’t until the December 29th issue of Billboard where a small article mentioned that Linda Keene had started at the Village Vanguard in New York on December 18th. The same issue of Billboard also carried a review of Linda Keene’s performance at the Village Vanguard on December 19th:
Linda Keene was back in New York at the end of 1945, performing in a nightclub again. This was her strength at that time although the article wasn’t flattering on her gestures and manners, the reviewer had nice things to say about her voice and delivery. Notable in the article was the mention of two songs she performed. “Frim-Fram” was of course “Frim-Fram Sauce” made famous by Nat King Cole’s October 1945 recording. The other song was another Leonard Feather composition, “Blow Top Blues” that Etta Jones with Barney Bigard and His Orchestra had recorded on December 29th, 1944 for the Black & White label with Leonard Feather playing piano. This was the same label that Linda Keene had recorded for in February of 1945 under the supervision of Leonard Feather. Here’s Etta Jones’ recording of “Blow Top Blues”:
BLOW TOP BLUES–ETTA JONES with BARNEY BIGARD AND HIS ORCHESTRA
It would have been interesting to hear Linda Keene take a turn on the song at the Village Vanguard. No doubt, her friend Leonard Feather probably had his hand in her performing the song at that time.
Linda Keene’s engagement at the Village Vanguard probably closed out 1945 for her. It also closes out this blahg. This blahg has been extensive in the amount of work I have chosen to put into it. Linda Keene was in her prime in the late 1930s and into the mid 1940s. I wanted to include as much information as I could to cover this prime period that included all of her official recordings. Part three, I hope will be just as detailed following Linda Keene into the twilight of her career. It will be interesting, to say the least, and will include an amazing surprise. Stay tuned.
Well, it’s the 2nd of July and I’ve just completed this second blahg on Linda Keene. If you haven’t read my blahg from last month Down A Rabbit Hole With Linda Keene, then you should take the time to do it now. This blahg is a continuation of sorts. I couldn’t get Linda Keene off my mind. I’ve been working hard to track down the four tracks with Lennie Hayton that she recorded in December of 1939 and February of 1940. These were included on the CD ‘The Velvet Voice of the Forgotten Linda Keene’ produced by Prov. Eves I. Raja for Hunter Music in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada. I finally found a copy of the CD to purchase and it’s on its way. The next blahg in this series should include samples of the Hayton/Keene collaboration.
My research into Linda Keene for my last blahg was very sparse but I referenced a reprint of an article from “Doctor Jazz Magazine” out of Holland by Opal L. Nations titled “Unlucky Woman – The Story of Linda Keene.” At the time, that was the only article I had encountered but it did reference the CD put out by Prov. Eves I. Raja. I was curious as to what there was still to learn about Linda Keene and my further research found another article about Linda Keene that predated the one published in Doctor Jazz Magazine. This first article was authored by none other than Prof. Eves I. Raja. It was published in the IAJRC (International Association Of Jazz Record Collectors) journal in August of 2007. Below is the original article, “Linda Keene, Her Elusive Fame”. Give it a read and don’t forget to click on each page to get a larger image:
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If you’re like me, this article left me with more questions than answers. I compared this article written by Prof. Eves I. Raja with the one written by Opal Nations in the Dr. Jazz Magazine. The one by Opal Nations gave her name at birth as Florence McCrary born December 1st, 1911 in Hattiesburg, Mississippi. Prof Raja’s article has the correct name of Florence McCrory but notes she was born in Taylorsville, 35 miles north of Hattiesburg. But I’m getting ahead of myself. What I wanted to know was if there were more errors in the two articles and if I could trace Linda Keene from Florence McCrory to Florence Suttle to Linda Keene.
The main problem with my research is I’m a nobody in Canada and most of the the people who knew Florence/Linda have long since passed. I also don’t believe, outside of these two articles, there were any other scholarly articles or books about Linda Keene. That left me with newspapers or magazines published years ago that gave reference to Florence/Linda. I decided that was where I would start my research and see if I could trace Florence McCrory over the years into Florence Suttle and on to Linda Keene. This is part one in a series and the focus here will be on Florence and a commentary on what I found as it relates to the two articles. In fact, the picture at the top, not being me this time around, is a young married Florence Suttle in 1936. What follows is my research of Florence McCrory but mostly her married and performing life as Florence Suttle.
The earliest article I can find that even mentions Florence McCrory comes from the Hattiesburg American, Hattiesburg, Mississippi, on April 19, 1929. She is part of the Honor Roll where she seemed to excel in English with an “85”. This places her at the Forrest County Agricultural High School in Brooklyn, Mississippi in April of 1929. In Professor Raja’s article he states that “the McCrory’s were living in Shreveport, Louisiana…Florence at the age of 16 left her father, younger brothers and her half sister never to return.” If she left at the age of 16 from Shreveport, which would have been 1927/28 then why was she still in the Hattiesburg, Mississippi region in 1929? Brooklyn is in fact only 20 miles outside of Hattiesburg. Subsequent articles related to her marriage also place her in Mississippi in the early 1930’s.
Next up is Florence’s wedding notice from the Clarion-Ledger (Jackson, Mississippi) Wednesday, September 16, 1931. The article alludes that the ceremony was held on the previous Saturday, September 12, 1931. It is clear however that Florence is still in Mississippi and it mentions that her parents “Mr. and Mrs. Lee McCrory are still in Hattiesburg. The article also mentions that both Florence and her husband attended Forrest County Agricultural High School.
I’m going to side-step here a minute to offer what I’ve found on “Spurgeon Suttle.” I found a mention of him in the graduating class of Forrest County Agricultural High School in 1930. The article to the right comes from the Hattiesburg American, Hattiesburg, Mississippi, May 10, 1930. This suggests that Spurgeon graduated a year later than Florence. Further research revealed a birth date for Spurgeon Suttle on May 13th, 1912; making him six months younger than Florence. He was also now living in Lucedale, Mississippi.
It’s interesting to try and add some context for Spurgeon Suttle. Here’s what else I could find out. Spurgeon was an athelete. In fact he is mentioned not only in the Hattiesburg American on May 13, 1930 but also in the Clarion Ledger from Jackson, Mississippi on May 19, 1930. So was it Spurgeon’s athletic prowess that Florence fell in love with or did they share something else in common?
Just about a year before Florence and Spurgeon were to marry, Spurgeon is referenced in an article from the Clarion-Ledger (Jackson, Mississippi), September 7, 1930 about his father Reverend G. H. Suttle. “The song services and special musical programs during the meeting will be under the direction of Mr. Spurgeon Suttle, son of the conductor. His voice has been heard in the past by many Jacksonians and as a musician he is said to possess those qualities so essential to the success of a revival meeting.” Was music and singing what drew Florence to Spurgeon? In the spring of 1931, Spurgeon is again mentioned as a performer in the Clarion-Ledger on June 7, 1931. This time it’s “popular numbers by Robert McRainey and Spurgeon Suttle.” Robert McRainey’s name will factor in again later on.
Not much is known about the early married life of Florence and Spurgeon Suttle. I could find nothing to suggest what either was doing for a living. I did find though that they both were talented singers and performed together. Barely two weeks after they were married, the Hattiesburg American from September 25, 1931 publishes an article about the Hattiesburg Lions Club and in the last line mentions “the club had for a program today musical numbers presented by Robert McRainey, pianist, and Mr. and Mrs Spurgeon Suttle, who sang.”
We don’t hear about the young Suttle couple again for about 18 months when they are mentioned in the March 15, 1933 Clarion-Ledger (Jackson, Mississippi) marriage notice for Spurgeon’s sister. In the notice Spurgeon is referenced as the bride’s youngest brother and that his full name is Virgil Spurgeon Suttle and that he and his wife are “wonderfully gifted and sing out of Memphis. Mrs. Suttle being known as Florence Suttle. I can find no reference to either Spurgeon or Florence in Memphis around that time.
Three months later on June 18, 1933 the Clarion-Ledger offers up an odd reference to an extra attraction at the Majestic Theatre in Jackson. We notice that they are presenting Robert McCrainey in an organ interlude and that he will be “assisted by “Strut” Suttle who will sing some of the latest and peppiest songs. “Strut Suttle” has to be Spurgeon because his partner “Robert McRainey” is also featured. A larger ad, below, gives a larger notice of the appearance of McRainey and Suttle. We get another reference to “Strut” Suttle in a review in the Clarion-Ledger on June 21st, 1933. Apparently “Strut” Suttle has won fame as an interpreter of popular songs.
There has been no reference in any of these articles to Florence Suttle. But finally on July 2, 1933 the Clarion- Ledger does mention Florence and this time she’s billed as a “Blues Singer.” Was this a label she gave herself or was it something the Clarion-Ledger tagged her? She would be labelled as a “Blues Singer” throughout her career but here is the first reference. The Clarion-Ledger would run a similar article on July 3, 1933 referencing “Florence Suttle, Blues Singer” but the only difference in the articles is that they also mention the film playing at the Majestic which was “Cocktail Hour” with Bebe Daniels and Randolph Scott. Oh, and the performance would be on the eve of July 4th, the “Glorious Fourth.”
1933 finally concludes for Florence again at the Majestic in Jackson, Mississippi. The Clarion-Ledger on December 24th, 1933 ran an ad for their current film “The Sweetheart of Sigma Chi” with an on stage performance of the “Follies of ’34”. This was a “Musical Revue, Featuring”, among others, Florence and Strut Suttle. This time it’s the eve of another holiday, Christmas. For a year and half “Strut” Suttle and now Florence have been in or around Jackson and connected with stage shows at the Majestic. Would the “Follies of ’34” herald good things for them to come in 1934?
1934 was a slow news year for either of the Suttles. By the end of 1933, Florence was 22 years old and Spurgeon was only 21. They were still young. Was there a break ahead for them? We know that Florence would go on to be Linda Keene but what happened after the “Follies of ’34”? The first article for this year I could find about Florence and her husband was from the Clarion-Ledger from January 28, 1934. Again, Florence is performing with “Strut” Suttle and this time it’s at the Jackson Ball.
At this point, I want to jump out of chronological order to offer a section from an interview that Florence Suttle gave to the Birmingham News, (Birmingham, Alabama) in June of 1936. I will reprint the entire article later in this blahg but the essential part is the following:
“They were married the day they graduated from Forest County High School, down in Brooklyn, Miss., after a courtship which began when they were in the first grade, and went to Jackson, Miss, on their honeymoon to obtain a job singing over the Capital City radio station. Engagements following in Memphis, Dallas, New Orleans and Shreveport. But the real “break” for the young couple came when Jan Garber heard them in New Orleans and took them along with him to Chicago where Florence sang with Garber’s orchestra.”
If their break came in New Orleans that might have been in 1934. Florence also references in the article possible work with Danny Rouseau, Ted Weems, Guy Lombardo, and other orchestras. The first reference I found for the couple 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. From advertisements running that week, the Suttles began on August 3rd and ran through the 9th.
Florence Suttle’s claim that she appeared with Danny Rousseau, which should be Danny Russo, were probably correct. The article on the left is from the Chicago Daily News on October 30, 1934. It is possible that Florence was in the show or joined later but clearly her husband Frank is listed as being with Russo. This is the last reference for 1934 that I could find for either Frank or Florence.
So let’s move on to April of 1935 and catch up with Florence and her husband, now in Cleveland. On April 16, 1935, the Plain Dealer out of Cleveland ran the article to the right. It is an announcement that not only are Florence and Frank Suttle appearing at Freddie’s Cafe in Cleveland but more importantly that George Duffy has “engaged them to sing with his orchestra when it leaves the Mayfair.” Duffy left the Mayfair on or around April 24th because he performed at the Summit Beach Park in Akron Ohio on April 25th, 1935. None of the articles or the ad announcing his appearance at Summit Beach Park mentioned Florence or Frank Suttle. This was Duffy’s first appearance after ending his engagement at the Mayfair but it may not have been the first one in which Florence and Frank were included.
The ad to the right ran in The Cincinnati Enquirer (Cincinnati, Ohio), June 21, 1935 announcing the opening that evening of the George Duffy Orchestra at the Gibson Roof Garden. In itself it means nothing other than it begins a three month appearance of the George Duffy Orchestra in Cincinnati. It isn’t until almost a week later in the June 27th, 1935 Cincinnati Enquirer that we can connect the dots to Florence Suttle. Florence is listed as “Florence Suttler” but in other articles over the next three months her name would be corrected to Florence Suttle. When I factored in that her name might have been misspelled my search discovered an earlier appearance with George Duffy at the Crystal Beach Ballroom in Vermilion, Ohio on June 9, 1935. This is from the June 7th, 1935, Sandusky Star Journal, Sandusky, Ohio and Florence is called Frances in this article. Below is the ad that ran in the June 8th, 1935 Sandusky Star Journal. Florence is still Frances and again she is appearing with her brother Frank. But who is this brother, Frank?
Throughout that three month run at the Gibson Roof Garden in summer of 1935 there would be several references to the brother and sister team of Florence and Frank Suttle. The article to the right from the Cincinnati Enquirer on June 30th of 1935 states that the two Suttles are “brother and sister”. Other articles would follow claiming Florence and Frank as siblings. It wasn’t until the interview that Florence gave to the Birmingham News, (Birmingham, Alabama) in June of 1936 before the mystery would be solved:
“Yes, her husband! Frank and Florence are not “brother and sister”, as Danny Rouseau, Ted Weems, George Duffey, Jan Garber, Guy Lombardo and other orchestras have billed them.”
First he’s Spurgeon then we learn his first name is Virgil and then he appears as “Strut” Suttle and now he’s just plain Frank.
Other articles like this one from the July 1st, 1935 Cincinnati Enquirer reference the two Suttles but do not mention their relationship to one another. A week later on July 7th, the Enquirer highlights the duo as brother and sister and even publishes a picture of the two. This is the earliest photo I can find of either Florence or Frank/Spurgeon and the photo of Florence is of course the one I feature at the top of this blahg. Similar articles to this one from the July 7th, 1935 Cincinnati Enquirer appear in that same paper on July 11th and July 18, 1935. By the time the August 1st, 1935 edition of the Enquirer is published, Florence is the only Suttle getting the notices and the Roof Garden is now being referred to as the “Japanese Roof Garden”. Florence is billed as vocalist in the August 8th, August 12th, and August 19th, 1935 Enquirer editions with no reference to Frank. George Duffy and his Orchestra would conclude their run at the Rooftop Garden on Thursday, September 19th, 1935 as mentioned in the Enquirer on September 15, 1935 but there would be no mention of Florence.
Just because there was no mention of Florence during that last week at the Gibson Rooftop doesn’t mean she wasn’t working. In these articles on the left from the Dayton Daily News (Dayton, Ohio), September 8, 1935 and the one below on the right from September 13, 1935, we find Florence is still singing with George Duffy but this time they’re performing at the Lakeside Amusement Park in Dayton Ohio. This would place Florence Suttle with Duffy’s Orchestra opening at the Lakeside on September 14th. This means the Orchestra was playing at both the Lakeside in Dayton and the Rooftop Garden at the same time because they did not close at the Rooftop Garden until September 19th. The Saturday September 14th appearance at the Lakeside might have been a one night only appearance. The only other ad or article related to their appearance was published in the Dayton Daily News (Dayton, Ohio), the day of the performance, September 14, 1935. One can assume if Florence was appearing with Duffy and his band at the Lakeside then she surely finished out the run with the band at the Rooftop Gardens. In fact, Florence wasn’t finished yet with George Duffy and his Orchestra.
Throughout Duffy’s three month run at the Rooftop Gardens in Cincinnati in 1935, I have found several radio listings for Ohio radio stations carrying remotes of George Duffy and His Orchestra. Perhaps some of these have survived and contain vocals with Florence Suttle. I have not been able to locate any. Duffy and his Orchestra with Florence Suttle stayed on in Ohio and next appeared at Perry’s Summit Beach Ballroom in Akron, Ohio. The advertisement below is from the The Akron Beacon Journal (Akron, Ohio) on September 26, 1935.
Duffy and his Orchestra kept busy at the end of September and were found at the formal opening of the Columbia Club in Indianapolis, Indiana. The article to the left from the September 18, 1935 Indianapolis Star (Indianapolis, Indiana) announces the programs for the opening and at the bottom of the article we learn that “Florence Suttle and a harmony trio croon the tunes and provide distinctive entertainment.” Another smaller article was found in the September 23, 1935 Indianapolis Star highlighting the appearance of George Duffy and once again Florence is mentioned.
The next night, September 29, 1935, after Indianapolis, Duffy and his Orchestra with Florence Suttle are back again in Ohio. This time they’re back at the Crystal Beach Ballroom in Vermilion, Ohio as referenced in this article from
the Sandusky Star Journal, Sandusky, Ohio, on September 13, 1935 and the article from September 26.
Already, Florence Suttle’s series of appearances with George Duffy and His Orchestra in 1935 contradict the article in Doctor Jazz Magazine that stated that her first “advertised singing engagement under her married name – Florence Suttle – came about on May 9, 1936 at the Booker Cadillac Hotel in Detroit.” Both Opal Nation’s and Professor Raja’s articles have her separated from her husband. I could find no continued reference of Frank Suttle with George Duffy and his Orchestra in the later summer and fall of 1935 and a small article from the Cleveland Plain Dealer on September 8th, notes that he has left Duffy. This wasn’t the end of Frank Suttle with Florence because his name would soon appear in press again with Florence in 1936.
Let’s first finish with George Duffy. The first appearance I could find of Florence Suttle with Duffy’s orchestra was the one listed earlier in this blahg at the Crystal Beach Ballroom in Vermilion, Ohio on June 9, 1935 where Florence was listed as “Frances.” Then the three month run began at the Rooftop Garden in Cincinnati on June 21, 1935. Were there earlier appearances for Florence with George Duffy before June 9th or after the Crystal Beach Ballroom but before the Rooftop Garden? I haven’t found any. I did however find an article from the The Michigan Daily of the University of Michigan from April 26, 1935 mentioning an appearance on campus in Ann Arbor that evening featuring Marjorie Black as the the soloist with Duffy. So, sometime between April 26, 1935 and June 9th Florence and Frank were in and Marjorie Black was out. Obviously the Suttles were not with Duffy when he played Summit Beach Park in Akron Ohio on April 25th as speculated earlier. Marjorie Black probably appeared with Duffy in Akron because she was still with him in Ann Arbor the next night on the 26th.
The next stop for Florence Suttle after the September 29th 1935 Crystal Beach Ballroom that I could find wasn’t until December of 1935. Before I reference that article, I want to quote again from Florence’s interview in the Birmingham News, (Birmingham, Alabama) from June of 1936:
“Frank came down to Birmingham this Spring after a visit back home, decided to spend the summer and wrote his wife requesting that, following her appearance with George Burns and Gracie Allen at the Cleveland Auto Show in January…she join him down South.”
The reference to the Cleveland Auto Show in January of 1936 is an error. The Cleveland Auto Show was actually in November of 1935. The article to the right states that the Cleveland Automobile Show ran for a week from November 23rd to November 30, 1935. The big attraction of course, other than the automobiles, were the appearance of George Burns and Gracie Allen in a stage show. George Duffy’s band was relegated to the arena for for the fashion show. Florence is not mentioned in the article or in anything I have found related to the Automobile Show. Burns and Allen did broadcast from the Cleveland Automobile Show but I haven’t found a radio transcription of the show.
Was Florence Suttle still with George Duffy when he appeared in late November in Cleveland at the Automobile Show? I would think it is highly likely she was there because her next appearance that I traced was up in New York state in the Terrace Room of the Hotel Syracuse starting December 12, 1935. The article on the left from the Syracuse Herald, Syracuse, New York on December 9th, 1935 clearly shows that Florence Suttle was still with the Duffy Orchestra and was the featured soloist “Miss Florence Suttle.” Obviously Florence did not head back down south after the Cleveland Automobile Show.
So, where was George Duffy and his Orchestra appearing before starting at the Hotel Syracuse on December 12, 1935? One clue comes from the article earlier in this blahg from the Sandusky Star Journal, Sandusky, Ohio, on September 13, 1935 talking about the Crystal Beach Ballroom performance on September 29th:
“This will be Duffy’s only appearance in this territory, before playing the opening night at Cleveland’s Mayfair Casino, after which he leaves immediately for the west coast.”
We have to assume that the Mayfair Casino
appearance had to occur before the Automobile Show at the end of November. One review of that Mayfair Casino show that I found was from Billboard Magazine on November 23, 1935. The article does not mention the start date of the engagement but I found an interesting radio listing from the Santa Ana Register (Santa Ana, California) on November 8, 1935:
“George Duffy’s Mayfair Casino Orchestra” suggests that Duffy was broadcasting from the Mayfair on November 8.
Another article from Variety on September 4, 1935 noted that Duffy would be at the Mayfair Casino around the beginning of November. And later in the same edition of Variety we find the following notice:
Again there’s the reference of going to the West Coast. Unfortunately the review doesn’t mention Florence Suttle but we do know that she was with George Duffy at Hotel Syracuse in December. When did Duffy get a chance to head to the west coast?
Florence Suttle’s appearances with the George Duffy Orchestra appear to have ended some time in December 1935 during the run at the Hotel Syracuse. The following notice was in the Syracuse Herald on December 29, 1935:
Just as Marjorie Black was replaced by Florence Suttle earlier in 1935 with the George Duffy Orchestra, Florence was out and Terry Walker was in.
Moving into 1936, it appears that Florence was back in Cleveland because she is spotted at two establishments. From the Cleveland Plain Dealer on January 25th, 1936 we learn that Florence is singing with Pinky Hunter’s Lotus Orchestra. This is a reference to the Lotus Gardens in Cleveland where Pinkey (or is it Pinky) was appearing. I could not find a start or end date for Florence Suttle with Pinkey Hunter. The article from January 25th, mentions her being the “wife of the master of ceremonies”. Is this Frank?
On February 21st, the Cleveland Plains Dealer ran the advertisement below:
This time Florence is at the Terrace Cocktail Lounge in Cleveland with the Johnny Joyce Orchestra, having moved on from the Pinkey Hunter Orchestra, performing as the “dainty songbird”.
It wasn’t until, April 17, 1936 that we find the next reference to Florence and it’s the reference alluded to by Professor Raja and Opal Nations. Finally, Florence was appearing at the Mayfair Room of the Book-Cadillac Hotel in Detroit beginning on April 17th. This time she was with the Sam Jack Kaufman Orchestra. The May 9th, 1936 issue of Billboard Magazine carried the review, on the left which was favourable to Florence. Not only that but she had her picture in the Detroit Times on May 13th. This was her first picture since appearing a year earlier with Duffy. The notice under her photo stated the Mayfair was closing for the season on the Saturday which would make it May 16, 1936; therefore ending her run at the Mayfair. I also found an interesting photo advertisement from the Detroit Press, also on May 13, 1936 (click on the photo below for a larger image):
Notice the girl singer in the upper left singing at the Mayfair Room. Unfortunately we don’t know who the mysterious singer is in this advertisement nor the orchestra. The Mayfair Room certainly would have been a step up from any of the dead end ‘blood and bucket bars’ that Professor Raja mentions.
As I have said, Florence was billed at the Mayfair Room from mid-April to May 16th of 1936. She was next spotted in Birmingham, Alabama on May 22, 1936 at the Club Rex where she was billed as Saturday’s Guest Artist. This time she was appearing with Coleman Sachs and his 14-Star Band. The advertisement also says she’s a “CBS and NBC Star Direct From Dan Russo’s Orchestra in Detroit.” Being billed as a CBS and NBC Star must have been from all of those remotes with George Duffy’s orchestra. Were there any radio broadcasts with other orchestras?
What brought Florence Suttle back down south? I think the answer is, her husband Frank. In the article on the right from the Birmingham News (Birmingham, Alabama) from May 22, 1936, Frank Suttle’s name finally resurfaces. The appearance for Florence at the Club Rex was not just for the Saturday night. Her name and Frank’s appeared in ads and articles from May 29, and May 30th in The Birmingham News:
Florence and Frank appeared to pull double duty on May 30th because they not only performed in the evening at the Club Rex but they did an afternoon performance at the meeting of the Birmingham Civitan Club. The program was also broadcast over WSGN and Frank’s old pianist friend Robert McRainey was the accompaniment. The performances at the Club Rex also continued into June as is evidenced from the advertisement and ad from The Birmingham News on June 6th, 1936. “Florence Suttle the radio and stage star has been retained for another week.” I’m not sure what the “stage star” reference refers to unless the article is referencing her 1933 stage appearances at the Majestic in both the “Zig Zags of 1933” and the “Follies of ’34.”
Finally, on June 9th, 1936 we come to the first and only interview that Florence Suttle provided to a newspaper. This is the article I eluded to and quoted from earlier that appeared in The Birmingham News on June 9, 1936:
This is the article where Florence talks about returning down south at the request of her husband Frank. Of course there are some inaccuracies. We know that she did not return immediately after the Cleveland Auto Show, which was in late November of 1935 and not January of 1936, and she did come “last week” because she had been advertised as having been at the Club Rex for at least two weeks. We also notice that Danny Russo is misspelled as “Rouseau” and George Duffy misspelled as “George Duffey”. But everything else is here, if it’s to be believed. She explains about attending the same school as Frank and marrying him after graduating. She talks about appearances in Memphis, Dallas, New Orleans, Shreveport, and her appearance with Jan Garber in Chicago. I have found nothing to dispute or substantiate these claims. We also get another beautiful photo of a young Florence Suttle.
The engagement at the Club Rex in Birmingham continued into mid-July of 1936. Articles would appear in the Birmingham News on June 13th and a week later on June 20th. Florence’s name was still linked with Frank’s at Club Rex and that would continue into July with the last notice on July 18, 1936 in the Birmingham News. It’s not clear when the engagement ended at the Club Rex but Florence’s reunion with Frank provided them with what looked like an eight week engagement at the Club Rex.
I want to jump backwards a little bit to talk about where Frank was before Florence returned to Birmingham. Neither Frank nor Florence were from Birmingham but it soon became clear why Frank showed up in Birmingham in 1936:
That article was from the March 27, 1936 Birmingham News. Bob McRainey, his former schoolmate and piano accompaniment was the draw to Birmingham. The following article from the April 8, 1936 Birmingham News profiles both young men:
So, Bob McRainey was working at WSGN in Birmingham and helped get Frank a job on the radio and then with Coleman Sachs at the Rex. Before Birmingham, Frank was apparently up in Chicago with Danny Russo and his Orioles. Was this the same Danny Russo that Florence had been appearing with before coming to Birmingham? Frank would join Coleman Sachs at the Rex in late March or early April of 1936. This was a full six weeks before Florence Suttle would appear at the Rex.
One can only speculate the real reason why Florence rejoined her husband in Birmingham in May of 1936. Was it one last chance at reconciliation? Was Florence trying to protect her interest? After all, the March 27, 1936 Birmingham News painted Frank as an eligible bachelor quoting him: “Mr. Suttle insisted that he is heartwhole and fancy free and that there are at least six girls in Birmingham who he already fancies freely and he hasn’t been here a week.” If Florence was at all still interested in her husband, she surely would have hurried fast to Birmingham. Maybe all of the articles about Frank and Florence were whims of fantasy to sell newspapers. One thing is clear, Frank’s name appeared much bigger in print at the Rex until Florence started appearing there.
The day after the last notice ran in the July 18, 1936 Birmingham News, featuring Florence’s name in connection with the Club Rex, we find that Florence is still down south but she’s now in Atlanta, Georgia. From the Atlanta Constitution, Atlanta, Georgia from July 19, 1936 we learn that she’s appearing at the Casa Loma starting July 22nd as part of the floor show:Her billing is small and there’s no mention of Frank. (My apologies for the quality of the article scan but it was cut off on the left at the source.) An advertisement with Florence Suttle’s name in small print also ran on July 19th, 1936 in the Atlanta Constitution:
The last article regarding the show at the Casa Loma that featured Florence’s name ran in the July 26th, 1936 Atlanta Constitution. (Again the fault of the cropped image is from the source.) There would be a final advertisement as well in the July 26th, 1936 Atlanta Constitution:
Notice that Florence has now been billed erroneously again as “Frances Sutttle.” This had of course happened a year earlier in June of 1935 at the Crystal Beach Ballroom back in Vermilion, Ohio. If getting the wrong billing wasn’t bad enough, Florence Suttle’s run at the Casa Loma was abruptly ended when the Casa Loma nightclub was raided and closed July 31st, 1936. The Casa Loma had only been open for six weeks. The following article from the August 1st, 1936 Atlanta Constitution explains why:
Solicitor General Claude C. Smith was right, the Casa Loma did not reopen Saturday night August 1st, 1936. In fact there were several arrests and convictions for illegal gambling and the Club would never reopen. The Casa Loma mysteriously caught fire and burned to the ground on November 12, 1936. The final chapter in the Casa Loma saga appeared in the August 20, 1937 edition of the Atlanta Constitution; more than a year after the raid and eventual closure:
What did Florence do after the closure of the Casa Loma? I suspect she wanted to get as far away as possible from Atlanta and the scandal that had been associated with the Casa Loma. It’s been hard to trace her after the closure of the Casa Loma on July 31, 1936. She might have still been in Atlanta waiting for the Casa Loma to reopen as a legitimate night club as the owners had hoped. The trail goes cold after Atlanta for almost five months. It isn’t until December 12, 1936 that her name pops up in an article in the December 16, 1936 Philadelphia Inquirer (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania) about the program at the 20th Century Club and this time she’s receiving accompaniment from Barney Zeeman and his Orchestra. It must have been a short engagement at the 20th Century Club because Florence’s name is not mentioned in ads and articles for the Club late in December and early January of 1937.
Tracing Florence Suttle was easier sometimes in my research when I looked for Frank Suttle. Even Frank’s name is hard to locate for the second half of 1936. The next line I could find for Frank was from the Birmingham News on January 17, 1937. It states that Frank Suttle is now on the stage in New York and is being groomed for the movies. The last we heard from Frank, he was appearing with Florence at the Club Rex in Birmingham and according to the Birmingham News from March 27, 1936, “he joins at Club Rex where he will appear at the weekly dances until he joins Jack Hilton’s English band for a tour of the British Isles.” I could find no reference to the British Isles tour or how Frank ended up in New York. Needless to say, I could not connect Florence and Frank through the last half of 1936 or the first half of 1937.
Our story as it relates to tracing Florence Suttle through the media ends with a very small notice in the Birmingham News on December 4th, 1937. The article relates to Frank Suttle but there is a mention that his wife “Flo, is singing with the Nye Mayhew’s Band in Boston under the name of Linda Keene.” Florence Suttle had finally made the transition to Linda Keene. It had been a long road from Florence McCroy born in 1911 in Hattiesburg, Mississippi and through her married years as Florence Suttle. From 1931 through 1937 she appeared as Florence Suttle starting with the Hattiesburg Lions Club in September of 1931 in Jackson, Mississippi and performances at the Majestic in the same town in 1933 and throughout Ohio with George Duffy and his Orchestra in 1935 and then down to Birmingham at the Club Rex and over into Atlanta for an ill-fated run at the Casa Loma. Finally, ending up in Philadelphia and the 20th Century Club in late 1936. It had been a long road from Jackson and she had put in her time. In the next instalment, I will trace her beginnings as Linda Keene and focus on her recording years up to 1945.
But wait, what became of Spurgeon “Frank” Suttle? In Professor Raja’s article he claims “when her husband became a recluse, Florence took steps to reinvent her stage name.” Frank Suttle was hardly a recluse if he was working in New York in 1937 and was being groomed for the movies. Unfortunately I don’t believe the movies wanted Frank. I can find no reference that Frank Suttle had a Hollywood career. There was in fact a Frank Suttle who did work during the silent film era but he was was born on March 1, 1893 in Edwardsville, Illinois and made only a couple of shorts in 1913 and 1915. Spurgeon “Frank” Suttle never made it onto the silver screen. Frank and Florence, now Linda, separated in 1937 with the divorce coming in June of 1941.
Tracing Frank Suttle, I found this interesting advertisement that puts him back in Mississippi:
The advertisement is from the The Delta Democrat-Times (Greenville, Mississippi) March 26, 1938 and Frank is now “Frankie King” appearing at the Club Casino with Duke Campbell and his Orchestra. He’s billing himself as an RKO Singing Star but I can find nothing for Frankie King in the listings for RKO. The advertisement was followed the next day, March 27, 1938 in The Delta Democrat-Time with the following photo:
Again, I believe that Frank aka Frankie never returned to Hollywood. I can find no reference to the “Campus Frolics of 1938.” The film and Frank’s movie career were probably shelved.
Oh, Frank’s name would pop again over the next couple of years but gone was “Frankie King”. In the Billboard from July 27, 1940 it is announced that Frank Suttle is the new vocalist with Alvino Rey’s band who are set to record for Bluebird. Unfortunately, although Alvino Rey did record with Bluebird, I cannot find any recordings that featured Frank Suttle. Even the comparison to Fred MacMurray probably did not help Frank. After that, the next major announcement for Frank Suttle, using his given name of “Spurgeon” was from the Monroe Morning World (Monroe, Louisiana), October 18, 1942:
Spurgeon Sproule Suttle was a Private in Navigation School. Spurgeon Suttle did survive the war but not much is known of him after this last article. He relocated at some point to Little Rock, Arkansas where his name popped up in Obituaries for his brother, his father, and mother in the 1950s and 1960s. Spurgeon Suttle died on August 31, 1989 in Little Rock, Arkansas. He outlived Florence Suttle/Linda Keene by eight years. I do not know if he ever remarried. I have not been able to locate his obituary. I hope he had a good life.
Well, it’s the first week of June and I haven’t posted a new blahg in almost three months. Where do I begin to explain? Covid 19. Those have to be bad words in any language right now and I’m also not a fan of “the new normal”. I only just returned to work this week. I’ve been off since mid-March. I took a week of holidays the second week of March and was in Toronto to see a concert and saw my children and then when I got back the world went to hell in a hand basket or is it a hand bag or an apple cart. It didn’t matter how we got here but I was off from work for a long time and had no excuse not to write a blahg except that I just couldn’t get motivated. This is the blahg I had in mind the past couple of months and I hope you enjoy it. Go to hell on your own Covid 19 and stop dragging us along with you!
In a previous blahg at the end of 2019 I mentioned that I took over posting “THIS DATE IN SINATRA HISTORY” for a Yahoo Group I belong to. The previous moderator had disappeared mysteriously and there had been no new posts for almost six months. He sent a cryptic email last fall with promises of an update on what had happened to him but then he went silent. I decided last September to revive the daily posts because I didn’t want to see the Yahoo group die due to inactivity. So, each day I dig through past posts and corrections to post things related to Frank Sinatra for a particular day. As it relates to this blahg, here was a radio listing for the entry from April 17:
April 17, 1950 Strictly From Dixie Henry Levine Orchestra NBC Blue Network
WJZ
New York City
10:30 – 11:00 p.m.
Monday Evening
Henry Levine Orchestra & Soloists
Martha Lou Harp blues singer Guest Singer: Frank Sinatra
The previous listing has been slightly incorrect and looked like this:
April 17, 1950 Henry Levine Orchestra
NBC Blue Network
WJZ
New York City
10:30 – 11:00 p.m.
Monday Evening
Henry Levine Orchestra & Soloists
Martha Lou Harp blues singer
Guest Singer: Frank Sinatra
I’m a stickler for accuracy and when I saw this listing I had to research it and that’s where I came up with the correct title of the show being “Strictly From Dixie” with Henry Levine and his Orchestra. I wasn’t able to find a review or a listing for songs performed by Sinatra so if anyone has a copy of this show or a review or knows the songs performed, please let me know.
Well, that one listing is what sent me down the proverbial rabbit hole as referenced in the title of this blahg. When researching Henry Levine and his Orchestra and “Strictly From Dixie” I came across a box set of 78 rpm records under the title of “Strictly From Dixie” with what is now considered an inappropriate cover. The cover, to the left and which will show a larger version when clicked upon, listed Henry Levine and His Jazz Band and Linda Keene as Soloist. I was not aware of the Band nor the soloist and unfortunately the album of 78rpm records has never been issued on CD or digital format. I eventually found a download of the album having been digitized by a collector from the original 78rpm list. The music was great and this “Linda Keene” soloist was a delight.
I began to research more about Henry Levine and Linda Keene and discovered that both were part of “NBC’s Chamber Music Society of Lower Basin Street”. It was a weekly radio jam session of the 1940s, with two house bands backing guest soloists who were the leading exponents of jazz. Henry Levine was a regular and some of those guest soloists included Lena Horne, Dinah Shore, and Linda Keene. When I came across the information about the “Chamber Music Society of Lower Basin Street” I realized that I had a vinyl LP by that title. I had bought it some time ago at a local Church sale. Funny the things you remember. Well, I pulled out my LP and was saddened to find that my copy did not include any vocals by Linda Keene. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a great album and the music by Sidney Bechet, Henry Levine, and Paul Laval is excellent as are the vocals by Dinah Shore and Lena Horne. But where was Linda Keene?
I have since discovered that there was a CD issued of “NBC’s Chamber Music Society of Lower Basin Street” on the ‘Harlequin’ label. If you look at the image to the left you will see that Linda Keene is included on the CD and there’s even a picture on the bottom right of her. Linda’s only two tracks on the CD are “Somebody Loves Me” and “Georgia On My Mind” with Henry Levine and his Dixieland Philharmonic. I later discovered that Levine left NBC’s “Chamber Music Society of Lower Basin Street” and went to a rival network and started “Strictly From Dixie” and that latter program is the only one on which Linda Keene appeared. The two tracks on the CD were recorded February 2 and February 4, 1942 respectively. How do I know about those recording dates? You’ll have to keep reading but first give a listen to those two tracks:
“Somebody Loves Me”
“Georgia On My Mind”
There is much to be found on the Internet about Dinah Shore and Lena Horne but when it came to Linda Keene I had do a little digging. I just kept coming across 78rpm listings or that one CD or occasional references to her appearances on “NBC’s Chamber Music Society of Lower Basin Street”. Eventually I found a reprint of an article from “Doctor Jazz Magazine” out of Holland. I am not sure of the date of the magazine but here are scans of the article below. Click on each to get a larger sized image.
Koodos if you read the whole article. It’s a fine article and included some information about Linda Keene of which I was not aware. At the end of this article, the following paragraph caught my eye:
“There is only one Linda Keene CD collection available at this time. This is an unheralded collection of most of Keene’s recordings and soundies called ‘The Velvet Voice of the Forgotten Linda Keene’ produced by Prov. Eves I. Raja for Hunter Music in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada.
I was ecstatic about that paragraph and that this CD existed. The only problem is I could find no reference for Prov. Eves I. Raja or for Hunter Music in Hamilton, Ontario. Also World Records, where you could obtain the CD, went out of business a few years ago. I was lucky enough to find the CD artwork online for front and back covers:
If you click on the images you get a larger image and you can make out all of the tracks and their recording dates. That’s how I found out the recording dates for “Somebody Loves Me” and “Georgia On My Mind”. On further research I discovered that almost all of the tracks on the CD had been issued only on 78rpm. Some tracks showed up on compilation box sets of some of the bands but a few are impossible to hear unless you can find the original 78s or track down the elusive CD “The Velvet Voice Of The Forgotten Linda Keene”.
There’s also the words “Soundie” and “Soundies” that show up in the article above and listed on the back of the CD. Here’s what I found out 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.”
So Linda Keene appeared in three of these early music video “soundies” and the audio tracks from each “soundie” is included on the Linda Keene CD. Luckily someone posted a video of all three “soundies” on Youtube in one video:
Gradually, I was able to find most of the audio tracks that were included on the Linda Keene CD as downloads or by ripping the audio from the individual “soundies” into individual audio tracks. I even found a Linda Keene vocal not included on the CD, “Especially For You” recorded with the Jack Teagarden Orchestra on June 23, 1939, the same day she recorded “You’re The Moment In My Life”. Give a listen to both of them:
“Especially For You”
“You’re The Moment In My Life”
I’m not sure why the elusive ones are the four she did with Lennie Hayton but it might be because there hasn’t been a compiled Lennie Hayton box set. I did find a website, http://www.angelfire.com/music5/tony2003/html/lennie_hayton.htm that suggested someone had compiled the complete commercial recordings of Lennie Hayton from 1937-1940 that included the Linda Keene vocals. I believe it was only for private circulation because I have found no other reference to this collection. As I said, I was able to find almost all of the tracks from the Linda Keene CD. Almost means that I couldn’t find them all. In this case, the four missing tracks are the following:
At The Balalaika — Lennie Hayton Orchestra December 7, 1939
The Starlight Hour — Lennie Hayton Orchestra December 7, 1939
One Cigarette For Two — Lennie Hayton Orchestra February 20, 1943
I Love You Too Much — Lennie Hayton Orchestra February 20, 1943
In case you’re wondering, here’s the complete list of recordings by Hayton’s Orchestra from 1937-1940:
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. 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). 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. 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. 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. 3:03
Gone With the Wind (Allie Wrubel‑Herb Magidson). Vocal by Paul Barry. Decca 1341‑A (62320‑A). NY, 7/1/1937. 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. 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. 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. 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. 3:06
Once In A While (Michael Edwards‑Bud Green). Vocal by Paul Barry. (American) Decca 1443‑A (62582‑A). NY, 9/8/1937. 3:00
Once In A While (Edwards‑Green). Vocal by Paul Barry. (Canadian) Decca 1443‑A (62582‑B). NY, 9/8/1937. 3:02
The Morning After (Dorsey‑Jaffe‑Boland). Vocal by Paul Barry. (American) Decca 1443‑B (62583‑B;). NY, 9/8/1937. 3:01
So Many Memories (Harry Woods). Vocal by Paul Barry. Decca 1437‑B (62584‑A). NY, 9/8/1937. . 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. 2:45
At the Balalaika (from “Balalaika”). Vocal by Linda Keene. Varsity 8125 (US‑1130‑1) NY, c. 12/7/1939. 3:15
The Starlit Hour (Parish‑DeRose). Vocal by Linda Keene. Varsity 8125 (US‑1131‑1; as above). NY, c. 12/7/1939. 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. 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. 2:56
The other notes on the page mention Liner notes by John Leifert and all records and transfers by John Leifert. I have found some online information about John Leifert but my attempts to contact him have failed. If anyone has the four tracks by Linda Keene with Lennie Hayton or has a copy of this CD or a better way for me to contact John Leifert, please let me know. As a side note, Lennie Hayton was married to Lena Horne from 1947 until his death in 1971. That’s right, the same Lena Horne that appeared along with Dinah Shore and Linda Keene during the run of “NBC’s Chamber Music Society of Lower Basin Street”. Small world!
I was going to end my blahg about Linda Keene at this point but yesterday I found another undocumented Linda Keene vocal.
This was a listing on Ebay of an “Audition 78” of Linda Keene singing “Muddy Waters”. I don’t know anything more about this 78 nor the song “Muddy Waters”. The price on the auction is $60 Canadian plus another $25 for shipping and import. That’s a little steeper and a little deeper down the rabbit hole than I care to venture. If anyone has a copy of this 78 or a digital copy of the vocal then contact me and I will add it to the collection.
Before I do end this blahg, I want to post a couple more tracks by Linda Keene. The first is his her earliest track that I’ve found “Blue And Disillusioned” with the Bobby Hackett Band from November 4, 1938, followed by one of my favourites the upbeat and enchanting “Number Ten Lullaby Lane” with the Tony Pastor Orchestra from February 18, 1941. The other vocals on “Number Ten Lullaby Lane” are John McAfee, Dorsey Anderson, and Tony Pastor:
“Blue And Disillusioned”
“Number Ten Lullaby Lane”
What a marvellous voice…a treat and a treasure. Imagine, if I hadn’t started re-posting the Sinatra History then I’d never have gone down this rabbit hole and found Linda Keene!
I’m in isolation this week. Last week I was on holidays and on March 8th and 9th I was in Toronto seeing a concert and visiting with my children. My boss felt it best to play it safe and have me isolate this week in case I was exposed to the Covid 19 virus while in Toronto. The above video talks about some movies and music I purchased and am enjoying this week.
I can’t post from any of the DVDs I bought and have watched but I thought I’d give you a sample of some the LPs I mentioned in the above video:
First up is “Cake Walking Babies” from Dave Van Ronk and his “In The Tradition” LP:
Continuing on with Dave Van Ronk and his “Sings The Blues” LP is a track of “Hesitation Blues”
Next up is The Hilltoppers and “At Sundown” from their LP “The Towering Hilltoppers”
Next up is something live. It’s “Bye Bye Blackbird” from Trini Lopez at P.J.’s”
Here we have Benny Goodman with “Diga Diga Do” from his “Happy Session” LP.
Acker Bilk is going to perform “Jump In The Line” from his LP “The Mr. Acker Bilk Omnibus”
Here we go with “On Treasure Island” from Humphrey Lyttelton and his The Best Of Humph 1949-56 LP.
Kenny Ball and his Jazzmen swing out “The Good Life” from their “The Big Ones” LP
And finally it’s the proverbial favourite “Sweet Adeline” from the LP “…to the tables down at Mory’s”… featuring Lee Gotch’s Ivy Barflies
This Covid 19 thing is pretty scary and pretty serious so if you don’t have to go out, don’t. But take care of yourself and those you know. The world will soldier on.
Well, it’s February 29, Leap Day, 2020 and I thought I’d do something a little different. A Leap Day only comes along every 4 years and for those people who celebrate their Birthday today, I say Happy Birthday. It is not my wife’s Birthday but the story of how I met my wife is almost like being born on February 29th. The stars have to align and if one thing’s off then you miss it all together. That could have happened to me if things had gone differently. Luckily for me, my Leap Day, the day I met my wife all fell into place.
First off, I’m two years older than my wife and the odds we’d end up in the same place to even meet up are astronomical. But wait, we actually met before we met. Sort of. I’ll get to that in a minute. First, I moved into residence at Peter Robinson College, at Trent University in Peterborough in September of 1982. It wasn’t a great experience and I moved out of residence by the end of the month. Voluntarily moved out or asked to leave. Let’s not quibble. For the next two years of University life I lived off campus.
When I left residence I moved in a with family headed by a friend of my Dad. I think his name was Charlie. I don’t remember much else but I was sleeping on a couch in their basement family room so it wasn’t ideal. I then took a room in a house with a woman and her infant son. Her husband was working up north so I never met him. I do know that she make leak soup a lot and sometimes I ended up watching her son. I think that lasted a month before I moved into an apartment on the other side of town. It was a two bedroom apartment and I advertised for a roommate. I can’t remember the name of the guy who moved in with me but it was a bad fit. He was creepy and irresponsible and we had no chemistry. Even Oscar and Felix had chemistry of a sort. I think that it might have been another month then I kicked him out. Then a nice guy named Tim moved in and we got along. He had a good looking sister named Maggie but that went nowhere. Tim and I weren’t really close however to being lasting friends and I never saw either of them again after that year.
I moved home to Belleville in the summer of 1983 after that first year was over. This is significant because I got a summer job working nights at Farrar’s Texaco in Belleville. The Texaco is long gone but at that time it was right across the road from Burger King. Burger King is still there. I used to start work at 11pm and worked until 7am. Sometime between 11 and midnight this good looking blonde young woman used to ride her bike across the road from the Burger King and passed by the back of the Texaco. I never talked to her but I’ll get back to her.
My second year of University wasn’t all the memorable either. I moved into a three bedroom apartment with two Asian students, Jack and Boo Huat. Jack didn’t speak much English so we never talked. Boo Huat had a different girl every night and by the end of the school year I think there were 3 other people living with Boo Huat in his room. Jack had a friend name Carrie that came by occasionally and he had gone to school in Belleville so I didn’t mind him. He, like Jack, was originally from Hong Kong. One night I came home to find the living-room full of other Asian students. Carrie was among them so when I asked what was going on, he replied that they were all there to watch “Love Boat” because the episode had been filmed in Hong Kong and they wanted to see home and possibly faces of people they knew. That was probably the longest conversation I had with any of them. I mostly kept to myself. I ate every night with Jack and Boo Huat and they made amazing Asian cuisine with rice every night. I lost twenty pounds. I used to sneak out to the local Harvey’s for a hamburger. I felt guilty but I needed some of my own type of cuisine.
Okay, so now it was the summer of 1984. I was back at Farrar’s Texaco but the blonde was gone. That summer I thought seriously about what I was going to do for accommodation when I went back to Trent in the fall. I had been lonely my first two years and had made no solid connections with anyone. I didn’t want to live off-campus anymore but moving back into residence was also a scary thought. I remember I had to apply to go back into residence and there was an interview with the Master of Peter Robinson. I wasn’t a big fan of the guy but I passed the interview and was granted a spot in the Reade House residence. Reade house had an East and West side with both upper and lower floors. I believe I was on the East side lower. I was the only third year student on my side. Most were first year students and a couple of second year students including our friend Glenda.
I should point out that Glenda was my wife Jeanette’s friend at the time but I hadn’t met Jeanette yet. Jeanette and Glenda had been on the other side of Reade House in their first year but Glenda had been assigned a room on our side. I remember distinctly the first time I caught sight of Jeanette with Glenda. It was only a back-side view as they were walking away from Reade House toward the dining hall in another building. I’ll be honest, I wasn’t looking at Jeanette’s behind but rather the back of her shirt. She was wearing a Burger King jersey that said “Belleville” on the back. She was the blonde who used to ride her bike behind the Texaco. I didn’t figure out that it was her until later on. Her parents had moved an hour east from Belleville when Jeanette was in her last year of high-school. She wanted to finish out her year at her Belleville school so she lived with Grandmother for the rest of the school year. Conveniently, her grandmother lived two blocks away behind the Texaco! After her first year of University she had moved back in with her parents to the east and that’s why I never saw the blonde in my second year.
I’ll make the story short from here. She and I hit up a friendship because we had both been from Belleville and because of the Texaco Burger KIng connection. If you look at the picture above, it’s the interior of that Burger King as it looks out today on North Front Street. The Scotia Bank (the big red structure with the white letter “S” on it) sits approximately where the Texaco used to sit. My wife is still a big fan of the Burger King original chicken sandwich. Me? Not so much. But I’m a big fan of my wife. Jeanette used to come over to visit Glenda and would always stop in to talk to me. Eventually Glenda had her own residence problems and moved out of Reade House. At that point, Jeanette just kept coming over to visit with me. Unfortunately she had a boyfriend at that time and I could make no in-roads with her…or so I thought.
I remember distinctly when I knew that things were swinging my way. We both went our separate ways at Christmas time. I remember being at home with brothers and playing cards on Christmas day. I had been bragging a bit about this girl and maybe playing up the relationship more than it was at the time. My brothers kept teasing me and saying if we were really a couple why hadn’t she called me yet on Christmas day. I kept saying “she’ll call, she’ll call.” Of course I had no idea if she would call. I was sure she wouldn’t but wanted my brothers to stop bugging me about it. Eventually a call came in for me and my brother Chris said it was Jeanette. I didn’t believe it. I thought I had been set up by the brothers. Not true. It was Jeanette. That was the moment I knew that maybe I had a shot with her.
After Christmas things moved slowly and awkwardly in January. I knew I loved her but she made no signs that the feelings were mutual. I started being surly towards her and then one day she got mad at me and walked away. I eventually followed her and we talked it out. She told me she loved me and wasn’t sure why I had been surly with her. I confessed my love and that I was only acting that way because I wasn’t sure if she loved me. It all worked out. It was Leap Day! Well not exactly because it was 1985 and not a Leap Year. But the stars had all aligned.
By the end of that school year Jeanette and I began talking about marriage and had tentatively set a wedding date for May 23rd, two years later in 1987. It seemed all kinds of foolish but we both knew we were right for each other. She had never felt towards previous boyfriends what she felt towards me. And I had never had a girlfriend because I hadn’t met the right girl. Two years of off campus housing and no connections with anyone and then I move back into residence only to meet the girl from Burger King. We eventually got married in 1987 but there we no venues available for May 23rd when we started planning. There was a cancellation at the Royal Canadian Legion for May 30th so we made it work. The picture above is of us dancing at the Legion.
So everything worked out and my Leap Day happened. If I hadn’t dropped out of residence in my first year and then had two uncomfortable and lonely years off-campus for the rest of first year and second year and if Glenda hadn’t been her friend, and if Jeanette hadn’t been the girl from Burger King and if Glenda hadn’t dropped out or if Jeanette hadn’t made that Christmas day phone call then none of this would ever have happened. Best day ever. Except it wasn’t really a day. It was a series of days leading up to that day she told me she loved me and more days leading up to the day I said “I Do.”
Below are some great photos of Jeanette and I leading up to that “I Do” day:
Well, it’s the last day of December in 2019 and tomorrow starts a new year. I can honestly say that I’ll be glad to see this year done. It has not been a stellar year and I’m hoping 2020 will be much better. Part of me believes that even numbered years are luckier. My wife, my three children, and I were all born in even numbered years but that’s probably all a coincidence. There’s no jinx but with the start of a New Year I’m hoping things will improve. This blahg will look back on some things and look forward to some things. 2020 will be what I make it. After all, isn’t foresight 2020? Go with me on this one.
It was a year ago tomorrow that I took that polar dip into Lake Ontario. Here’s the video recap:
I thought I was ready for 2019 but the coldness of Lake Ontario was only the first shock to my reality. My Father would pass away less than three weeks later. In February there would be a homicide at work, in April I began a long road with a mysterious illness. I continued to suffer with my physical health and my mental health took a toll as well. I experienced grief and depression and those plagued me throughout the year. I even had a breakdown on Christmas Eve. I was overwhelmed, I was sick, I was missing my Dad, and it all got to me. My wife, Jeanette, just held me and got me through it all. Christmas was good. The kids were home and we had a good time. Too short though.
I can’t say that 2019 was all bad. My daughter Emily got married to Charlie:
It was a wonderful wedding and certainly the highlight of 2019. It kept me grounded for a long time.
I don’t really want to rehash the whole year. I’ve written about my illness in other blahgs in 2019 and about my grief regarding the passing of my Father. Let me just speak some other truths. I’ve been suffering. My mental health has had its challenges. I’ve had real bouts of depression and I’m scared of what comes next with my physical health. The bout I had before Christmas, prior to my prostate biopsy, was really bad when I had to go off my medication. I did not realize how far the inflammation or whatever this is had progressed and that caused me to get the flu over the Christmas holidays. This caused some depression. I’m not sure what 2020 will bring. I’m waiting for the results of the biopsy and I have to see the specialist in Kingston a week from today. Look for future blahgs on my health updates.
2019 saw me want to run away. I hated what was happening to me. I hated doing my job and living my life. I just wanted to run away to a secluded beach somewhere with someone who wasn’t involved in all of this. I wanted someone who would listen to me and take care of me and keep me distracted. It was a selfish dream and I don’t know if I would have taken it if it was offered to me. They say what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger. I don’t know about that. I don’t feel stronger. I feel different. I’m not the same person who plunged into the water on January 1st, 2019. I’m more afraid and desperate for answers and that beach fantasy. The beach at North Beach on Lake Ontario in January is no fantasy, let me tell you.
I keep thinking that my life is a fake. I remember when I went to University and I thought I shouldn’t be there because I wasn’t as good as everyone else. I wanted to be a Teacher and that never panned out. I managed to fool Trent University into letting me have a Bachelor of Arts Degree in English Literature but I never could crack the front door of Teacher’s College. I did do some teaching while I was at Youthdale but even then I thought I was faking my way through it and they were going to catch up with it. In fact, I’ve had so many jobs over the past thirty years that I think I keep on fooling every employer I have. I just keep doing my best and dazzling them with my right hand while I’m doing slight of hand with my left. I probably shouldn’t give away that trade secret.
Look at my other life goals. I wanted to be a writer as well. I keep on writing but I don’t think anyone’s reading my fiction or my other entertainments. Dead From The Neck Up went nowhere but I keep a website dedicated to it like it’s going to get a resurgence. In fact my falseducks.com website is dedicated to past things I’ve done nothing further with. How sad is that? I only keep it around as a testament to what I’m capable of and what interests me. Probably no one checks out my website and nobody reads these blahgs. Again, how sad is that? And I wonder why my mental health has had its challenges?
This past year I also took over posting “THIS DATE IN SINATRA HISTORY” for a Yahoo Group I belong to. The previous moderator disappeared mysteriously and there had been no new posts for almost six months. I revived it because I didn’t want to see it die. So, each day I dig through past posts and corrections to post things related to Frank Sinatra for a particular day. For example, here’s part of what I posted for December 31st
Studio
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Radio 1941 Hollywood Palladium New Year’s Eve show
Wednesday evening
Network: NBC
Tommy Dorsey & His Orch
1. I’m Getting Sentimental Over You
2. What Is This Thing Called Love Jo Stafford
3. Somebody Loves Me Connie Haines
4. Blues In The Night Frank Sinatra
5. Lana Turner speaks for the USO
6. Swing High
tape incomplete
Television
1970 Frank And Dean New Years Eve Thursday evening
Network: NBC
Time 10:00 PM – 11:00 PM EST
Guests: Frank Sinatra, Ruth Buzzi, The Goldigger
Frank & Dean medley: Love Is Just Around The Corner/My Kind Of Girl/But Beautiful/ L.O.V.E./I Get A Kick Out Of You/Goody Goody/Guys And Dolls
Frank & Dean medley: What Is This Thing Called Love/Did You Ever See A Dream Walking/ I Can’t Give You Anything But Love
Dean & Ruth Buzzi sketch
Dean song parodies
Jimmy Durante is the mystery guest behind the door
Dean Young At Heart
Frank Something (Lennie Hayton arg.)
Frank, Dean, Ruth Buzzi,Kay Medford New Year’s Eve sketch
Frank, Dean, Ruth do impressions of famous stars
Frank, Dean & Golddiggers medley
Welcome To My World/Now Is The Hour/So Long, It’s Been
Good To Know You/Auld Lang Syne
Dean signs off
Concerts
1939 Shea Theatre, Buffalo, New York Harry James with Frank Sinatra Sinatra left James during this engagement
(On Screen: “Balalaika” starring Nelson Eddy & Ilona Massey)
1940 Paramount Theatre, New York City (December 18 – Jan 14) Tommy Dorsey Orchestra with Frank Sinatra
1941 Hollywood Palladium, California (12-30-41 thru 2-23-42) Tommy Dorsey Orchestra with Frank Sinatra
I try to add images and updated information like this one for the 1941 Hollywood Palladium, California :
The process has kept me busy and I think others are enjoying the posts but sometimes I feel like I’m faking my way through this all, too. I’m no expert. I rely on the expertise of others and I’m a good researcher. I sometimes can add to or dispel the myth of previous postings. Sometimes I think anyone with a computer can do that.
So, what’s in store for 2020? I don’t know. Maybe it will be more of the same. Maybe I’ll keep stumbling through the year and faking my way through things. That’s a process that scares me. I think sometimes I’m good at my job, which I don’t like to talk about, but then maybe I’m fooling myself as well. I get up every day and I go to work because that’s what I know how to do. It’s better than sitting at home and lamenting all the things I’ve never done and how I’m going to keep up the illusion of a happy person. My contract is up for renewal in April. I hope I’m still there.
I’ve been watching my son Noah and my daughter Abbie struggle this past year. Abbie is still in school and I think she worries about her future and what she’s going to do with her life. I think she’ll figure it out. Fake it until you make it. That’s worked for me. Noah also is not sure about his future. He started a Youtube channel last year and he’s now up to 10,000 subscribers. All the while, he works at Starbucks and hates his job. He’s got real potential and his most recent video has some good thoughts about what is in store for 2020 for him. I find it really inspiring:
Again, where does that leave me? I don’t know. I’m 57 and if I haven’t figured it out now, I probably never will. I’m still faking it until I’m making it. If I have one skill, that’s it. The key is to be in pain, struggle with your mental health, fake it, and figure it out as you go along. I’m going to break down again. I’m going to be afraid. I’m going to want to run away. Maybe this is the new trend for me. Emily and Charlie seem happy but they’re still trying to figure things out like Noah, like Abbie, like me, like us all. It’s okay to be sad or mad or in pain or want to run away. It’s okay. It will be okay. That will be my mantra for 2020:
, in a long time, in a single month, I’m going to put up another blahg. Twice in one month is a record I haven’t accomplished that often but if I’m going to make that 100 blahgs goal this year, then I’ll have to continue to double down. 
Today is December 24th, 2020 and I haven’t written a new blahg since my last one, 
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First up is “Cake Walking Babies” from Dave Van Ronk and his “In The Tradition” LP::format(jpeg):mode_rgb():quality(90)/discogs-images/R-3018177-1311944148.jpeg.jpg)
Continuing on with Dave Van Ronk and his “Sings The Blues” LP is a track of “Hesitation Blues” :format(jpeg):mode_rgb():quality(90)/discogs-images/R-4090157-1462569215-1055.jpeg.jpg)
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Next up is something live. It’s “Bye Bye Blackbird” from Trini Lopez at P.J.’s”:format(jpeg):mode_rgb():quality(90)/discogs-images/R-6879506-1428603505-1588.jpeg.jpg)
Here we have Benny Goodman with “Diga Diga Do” from his “Happy Session” LP.
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Kenny Ball and his Jazzmen swing out “The Good Life” from their “The Big Ones” LP
And finally it’s the proverbial favourite “Sweet Adeline” from the LP “…to the tables down at Mory’s”… featuring Lee Gotch’s Ivy Barflies
I’m not the same person who plunged into the water on January 1st, 2019. I’m more afraid and desperate for answers and that beach fantasy. The beach at North Beach on Lake Ontario in January is no fantasy, let me tell you. 