Here I go being late with another blahg. Really, I had an excuse. I’ve been working hard to finish the last of the audio podcasts for my book, “Pippa’s Passing.” Also, after living with the book for six months I decided that there was another ending or continued ending that was begging to be told. That made a 21st chapter and I wanted to finish writing it and then create an audio podcast of the alternate/continued ending. I have begun posting the podcasts on various sites. So far 17 chapters are available from wherever you stream podcasts. Here are links to some of them:
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/pippas-passing/id1677898737?ign-mpt=uo%3D4&mt=2
https://open.spotify.com/episode/2xVZwJaI60VflRZTXaSOOH
https://www.audible.ca/pd/Pippas-Passing-Podcast/B0BYV211CC?qid=1679495429&sr=1-1&ref=a_search_c3_lProduct_1_1&pf_rd_p=b278ed0a-c3b2-4491-808c-7cb2190a487c&pf_rd_r=DYK9XZ95DVYDZ3684VPK&pageLoadId=osNGLY5Vv3qxvIPu&creativeId=0d6f6720-f41c-457e-a42b-8c8dceb62f2c
https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/f11c6714-419f-4033-aad6-15cfb125eaf9/pippa’s-passing
In previous blahgs like 12 MONTHS -12 RECORDS -12 SONGS and 12 MONTHS – 12 MORE RECORDS – 12 MORE SONGS, I posted about records I had purchased over a period of time and then shared some tracks from the albums. I thought I would revisit that theme. Over the past year I’ve probably purchased another 12 or more records from thrift stores or record stores and haven’t shared any of it. I’m about to rectify that by posting about some recent additions. I’m only going to post about 7 right now but I’ll look through the stack near my stereo and see if I can do a part two for this blahg. So here we go, in no particular order. Okay, there is going to be one particular order and that will be the last album that I will post about at the end after a ghost story.
The first up is an album called “Ben Bagley’s Irving Berlin Revisited.” This was released in 1967 on the MGM Records label. The reason why I purchased it was that I’m a huge fan of the late great jazz artist Blossom Dearie. The album features two songs by her that I had never heard.
From the album here is Blossom Dearies singing on “It’ll Come To You”:
The second selection of Blossom Dearie from this album is “Wild About You”:
Next up is a mix between dixieland and ragtime. It’s “Those Fantastic Charleston Years” by the The Charleston Hot Peppers. This was put out on the Polydor label in 1962.
From that album are two selections, with the first being the title track “Charleston” :
When my daughter heard the above track she said it reminded her of “It’s A Wonderful Life” with Jimmy Stewart and Donna Reed dancing on the gymnasium floor as it opened up to reveal a swimming pool beneath and Stewart and Reed eventually fall into the water. Great scene and a great memory.
And now we have “When Buddha Smiles”:
It’s back to the vocals again but this time it’s Mel Tormé. I have posted links to Mel in previous blahgs such as THIS IS 100, PART TWO and MY UNBELIEVABLE LIFE- STARRING ME. I didn’t used to be a big fan of Mel’s but I remember when my children were younger we went camping and we had a portable radio. A station we listened to did a respective that evening of Mel Tormé and I was hooked. When I was in Ottawa recently, I picked up the album “Mel Tormé Loves Fred Astaire.” That’s part of the ghost story I will tell later but right now it’s about the music and Mel. This album is a reissue on the Bethlehem label from 1977.
The original album was “Mel Tormé Sings Fred Astaire” issued on Bethlehem in 1956. Still, it’s Mel Tormé and up first is a swinger with Mel singing “Something’s Gotta Give”:
Let’s slow things down and listen to Mel sing “A Foggy Day:”
It’s time to swing again and we’re back to dixieland, “Real Dixieland!”, an album by the Rampart Street Paraders.
This album actually appears to be a compilation of tracks taken from two other albums, “Rampart And Vine” (1955), and “Dixieland, My Dixieland” (1956) both on the Columbia label. I’m going to start things off with “Sugar (That Sugar Baby O’ Mine)” from the Rampart and Vine album:
And now one that swings, from the “Dixieland, My Dixieland” album, here’s “After You’ve Gone”:
Continuing on with the Dixieland theme, I want to talk a little about The Firehouse Five Plus Two. Here’s a quote about this band from the Wikipedia entry:
The Firehouse Five Plus Two was a Dixieland jazz band, popular in the 1950s, consisting of members of the Disney animation department. Leader and trombonist Ward Kimball was inspired to form the band after spending time with members of the Disney animation and sound department and finding that they had a lot in common as jazz aficionados. The lunchtime chats escalated into a full on lunchtime jam session as Kimball, an amateur trombonist, and animator Frank Thomas, a pianist, would find they “sounded pretty good all by ourselves.”
The band was also formative in creating the Good Time Jazz label under fellow aficionado Lester Koenig, who managed all the band’s releases from 1940’s The Firehouse Five Plus Two Story, Volume 1 to 1970’s Live at Earthquake McGoon’s. Walt Disney was approving of the band, letting them play at the company’s Christmas parties, at Disneyland, and other social functions, on the single condition that they never fully leave their jobs at the studio.
I think I may have another Firehouse Five Plus Two album somewhere so I’ll look around and see what I have and maybe post about it in the future. Maybe I just bought the same album again. Who knows? Obviously, I don’t! The album I picked up recently at a thrift store in Ottawa is “The Firehouse Five Story, Vol. 2”.
First up is a jazzy song that asks the question, “Who Walks In When I Walk Out?”
Of course, if you’re going to have a song by the Firehouse Five Plus Two then you have to have a song associated with a Firehouse. Here’s “Firechief Rag”:
The next album from which I want to offer up samples is one I picked up at a local pawn shop in Belleville. Greenbacks Pawnshop has a huge selection of used records. I picked up the 1962 album “Billy Eckstine & Quincy Jones – At Basin Street East” for $10.
“Billy Eckstine does some fabulous singing on this album backed by the Quincy Jones Orchestra. The very first track on the album is a favourite of mine entitled “Alright, Okay, You Win”:
I often catch myself singing “Alright, Okay, You Win” because I remember seeing Joe Williams sing this on a tribute to Frank Sinatra back in 1990. Check out this video of Joe Williams’ performance:
This next selection from “Billy Eckstine & Quincy Jones – At Basin Street East” is a bit of a cheat because I can offer up four songs because they’re all included in a Duke Ellington medley. Here are “Don’t Get Around Much Anymore”, “I’m Just A Lucky So And So”, “Caravan”, and “Sophisticated Lady”:
Now for the Ghost Story. In the middle of March this year, I took a week of holidays and over a couple of days, my wife and I went to Ottawa to visit a friend and to check out record, dvd, and thrift store haunts. One of the places I love to visit is “The Turning Point” which has a large selection of used DVDs and records. Here’s a shot of the store from the front:
In case you couldn’t tell from the photo, they profess to being “Ottawa’s #1 CD Store”, “Ottawa’s #1 Record Store”, and “Ottawa’s #1 DVD Store.” Oh yeah, and they’re haunted! True story. I think my friend Bryan and I were there about 5 or so years ago and the owner mentioned it to us at the time but I don’t think I ever believed him. Now, I’m a believer.
Here’s a shot of the upstairs where they keep all of their used records:
Notice that all of the records are stacked upright and the centre aisle has trays of these stacked records. I had gone through one section looking for some Billy Joel and Bruce Springsteen that my son didn’t already own but to no avail. I ended up picking up the Mel Tormé record I mentioned earlier in this blahg. When I go to record stores I’m also on the hunt for old Dixieland Jazz albums so I had just walked past one of these trays of stacked records and I said aloud to my wife “I wonder if there’s any Dixieland Jazz around here.” Suddenly, half of one of the stacks flipped forward and because I was facing the rear of the stack that was flipped, I ended up seeing the back cover of this album:
Needless to say, I was a little taken aback but was determined to buy this record recommended by a ghost. The official title of the album is “New Orleans Dixieland Superstar Jazz Artists” by, of course, New Orleans Dixieland Superstar Jazz Artists. Here’s the front cover:
I don’t know the year of the record but research suggests that Shalom Records operated between the late 1960s to sometime in the 70s. After finding this treasure, I went downstairs to pay for my purchases and to tell the owner about my encounter with the ghost. He wasn’t surprised in the least. He said this sort of things happens a lot and sometimes it’s a very convenient ghost. The owner said on a number of occasions someone would come into the store and ask for something the store didn’t have but then the very next day someone would bring the item in. That too, happened more than the owner cared to say. Well, it worked in his favour and mine because I now own this record and can offer up selections. The first is a number with a vocal by Sweet Emma Barrett on “Sister Kate”:
Unfortunately there are no songs on this album with ‘ghost’ or ‘spirit’ in the title but we do get “The Saints” which is of course the great dixieland standard, “When The Saints Go Marching In.”
That’s it for this time. I don’t know if there really is a Ghost at The Turning Point but I’d like to think there is or else the owner has an invisible helper. Okay, just one more from this ghost gifted album that I paid for. I’ll close with another great standard, “Way Down Yonder In New Orleans.”