Sometimes I really struggle to write this blahg.
I was hoping all month long that I’d find something that would inspire me. Hasn’t happened yet…well at least not much. I have continued to purchase more Warner Archive movies and I know I have to add those to a pile of movies I have to review. I just haven’t been motivated to do that yet.
The only real accomplishment this past month is that I’ve started editing my first novel “False Ducks” which I wrote about 25 years ago. I’m not looking to publish it for the public but I’m going to use Amazon to have one paperback copy for myself. It’s been a little difficult editing the book because some of the humour in it is no longer relevant or appropriate. I like to think I’ve grown since then and so I’ve tried to adjust it today’s market even though it’s just going to be for me. You can learn more about the book at http://www.falseducks.com/false/ and can read samples at http://www.falseducks.com/false/falsies.html. It’s funny that I wrote the book when I was at home with my son Noah from 1994-1998 and yet my daughter Abbie born in 1998, is the one that did a mock up cover for me a number of years later. Here’s what it looks like:
I think I’m going to keep it as the actual cover because it’s an unfinished piece of work and “False Ducks” is an unpublished piece of work…but it’s funny.
When I started avoiding topics for this blahg, not once was I inspired by a previous blahg other than those movie reviews, HAVE YOU WATCHED ANY GOOD MOVIES LATELY? and SCOTT, YOUR CORDIAL MOVIE REVIEWER, which I mean to get back to. No, it wasn’t until last night that I finally found some true inspirations and it hearkens back to my very first blahg, THE BLAHG & THE MOST HAPPY SOUND which I published in November of 2011. It was an introduction to my new blahg and a write up on the band, “Margaret Ann & the Ja-Da Quartet” and their one and only full length LP. Here’s what the cover looks like:
Here’s what I said about this group in my first blahg:
The group consists of Margaret Ann Peterson, her brother Jim on tenor Banjo, Gordon Ellinger on drums, and Don Royer on piano. Margaret was the youngest at 19 and the oldest was Gordon at 23. They all hailed from Greeley, Colorado, did some shows in Florida and New York and eventually appeared on Arthur Godfrey’s Talent Scout program. They also appeared on the Pat Boone Chevy Showroom (April 16, 1959), the Perry Como TV Show (February 21, 1959 & March 9, 1960) and the Garry Moore Show (April 7, 1959). I have yet to find any video of them when they were still the Ja-Da Quartet but…ah I’m getting ahead of myself.
As I listened closely I immediately recognized the voice of Margaret Ann! If you’re a fan of the Andy Griffith Show then you will recognize Margaret Ann playing the character of Charlene Darling, the golden voice of that mountain clan The Darlings. Only then, she was being billed as Maggie Peterson.
Last night Margaret Ann Peterson became my inspiration for this blahg.
Let me explain a minute, how I got here. I have always been a fan of the aforementioned “Andy Griffith Show.” There was a spin-off series called “Mayberry R.F.D.” that had a single season release in 2018:
I had, for several years since that release lamented the fact that the other seasons had not been released. Last month I discovered that a Complete Series set was issued in June of last year:
It’s a great series featuring support cast members like Aunt Bea, Goober Pyle, Howard Sprague, and Emmett Clark from the original “Andy Griffith Show” series along with Ken Berry as Sam Jones who holds it all together. Andy Griffith also makes a couple of appearances. It’s nice to see these characters continuing in some wholesome stories. Well, now I’m in the third season and there was an episode last night where Margaret Ann Peterson guest-starred as “Edna” who worked at the diner. I was happy to see her again in Mayberry and I immediately had to look her up and see what she’s been up to. Sad news, she died in 2022. I had started my blahg series wih Margaret Ann and I felt I had to come back to her. This blahg will be a bit of a tribute to her.
Let’s start with the music. In fact, I think I just want to focus on her music. She didn’t do much acting but her singing on “The Most Happy Sound” and as Charlene Darling on “The Andy Griffith Show” was exceptional. In my first blahg, I posted a couple of YouTube videos which were songs from the album. When I reviewed that blahg, I noticed the YouTube links are no longer active. The two songs were “CRAZY WORDS” and “MY CUTEY’S DUE AT TWO TO TWO TODAY.” Here they are uploaded for your listening pleasure
“CRAZY WORDS”
“MY CUTEY’S DUE AT TWO TO TWO TODAY”
A couple of other YouTube links highlighting Margaret Ann’s singing on “The Andy Griffith Show” are still active in that blahg so I’ll present them again. Here are “Salty Dog” and “There Is A Time”:
I also posted some information about two 45rpm singles that Margaret Ann and her group put out. Here’s what I posted
So what happened to the Ja-Da Quartet? Well, there wasn’t another album but I have discovered that there were two 45 singles. The first, also on the Warner Bros label, like the LP, is #5064 with two songs: “DUDLEY, DIGBY DARLING” & “THE GIRL THAT JOHNNY WALKED HOME.”
The second single is Warner Bros #5124. It contained SECRET (Everybody’s Talking)” & “BILL BAILEY, WON’T YOU PLEASE COME HOME”.
The links I posted for “DUDLEY, DIGBY DARLING” & “THE GIRL THAT JOHNNY WALKED HOME” were YouTube links but only the one for “DUDLEY, DIGBY DARLING” is still active:
I found a different YouTube link for “THE GIRL THAT JOHNNY WALKED HOME”:
When I wrote that first blahg, I didn’t own a copy of the 45 single with “Secret” and “Bill Bailey Won’t You Please Come Home.” I did however, find an audio source for “Secret” and had included that in the blahg:
In February of 2012, I updated the blahg with news that I had obtained a copy of the 45:
UPDATE: FEBRUARY 4th, 2012:
I finally received the 45 of “Secret” backed with “Bill Bailey, Won’t You Please Come Home.” 
It’s taken this long for me to actually record it to my computer and post it here. Although “Secret”, which I reviewed here before, sounds like a late 50s/early 60s vocal group, the flip side is completely different. “Bill Bailey, Won’t You Please Come Home” hearkens back to The Most Happy Sound. Here we have that roaring 20s jazz and swing coming through.
As far as I know, there were no other releases by Margaret Ann with The Ja-Das or the Ja-Da Quartet. I did find a Discogs listing for a single released on the Lou-Jay Records label for Margaret Ann in 1963. The songs are “Counting Stars” and “River Of Love.”
I don’t have access to the audio files but the single is listed on Margaret Ann’s Discogs page along with the two other singles listed above as well as The Most Happy Sound album. I’ll try and track these songs down and will update when I have them.
Margaret Ann continued to perform with the Dillards and there are a number of videos on YouTube of her doing just that. Here’s one from a program called “Nashville Now” and it even features Denver Pyle on the jug along with Margaret Ann and The Dillards performing Salty Dog. Supposedly this was sometime around 1993
At least a decade later she can been seen again with The Dillards at a Blue Grass Festival performing the same song:
I think from that same festival she can be seen performing “There Is A Time”, which she also performed on The Andy Griffith Show:
I wish there were some videos of her with the Ja-Da Quartet when they performed on the Pat Boone Chevy Showroom, the Perry Como TV Show, or the Garry Moore Show. I’ll keep looking but sometimes episodes of early television haven’t always survived.
I’ll close with one more video of Margaret Ann singing as Charlene Darling on the Andy Griffith Show. It’s less than two minutes and it’s a song called “Shady Grove”. Farewell Margaret Ann Peterson. Your voice from these videos and your recordings are indeed still a Most Happy Sound.
