"Time goes by so slowly..."

It's been awhile. The first thing I thought of to write was to quote a line from the mid 1950's song 'Unchained Melody'; "Time goes by, so slowly, and time can do so much...."

The song was composed by Alex North, who composed scores for Hollywood movies. In this case, the movie was 'Unchained'. The lyrics were by Hy Zaret, who refused the movie producer's request to put the film title in the lyrics, which is how that title came about. 'Unchained' is a little known (and little seen) 1955 film about a man in an experimental 'prison without walls' who struggles with a decision to escape and reunite with his family, or to finish out his sentence. Among the cast is Todd Duncan, the baritone who was hand picked by George Gershwin to perform the role of Porgy in 'Porgy and Bess'. Mr. Duncan was the first to record the song, by the way. In once scene, filmed at the experimental prison in Chino, California, Dexter Gordon can be seen playing his saxophone. He was incarcerated there at the time, for possession of heroin. His playing was dubbed by Georgie Auld.



The shoreline by our campsite at Little Tupper Lake.
It really is a lovely spot.

There were a number of loons about, including 13 of them
together. That's not a common occurrence, by the way.

I'd been thinking often about getting back to this blog, without doing so. Today, as I was looking something up, this page opened of its own accord. Perhaps I hit a shortcut button, I don't know. It seemed like a good suggestion, so here I am. Since the last entry here, I've managed to keep myself busy, as usual. This year, it took forever to put the garden to bed, as the season extended into November. (I made a ton of pesto which I froze and am happily consuming.) I went off on another adventure camping/canoeing trip to a wilderness area of the Adirondacks (a bit stressful this year, as the old friend with whom I go camping spent the entire week being most disagreeable). And I started up my radio show again after almost a year and a half's sabbatical, etcetera. Christmas was a bit of a bust; the largest dinner I think I ever made was cancelled when friends declined to travel due to snow. Extreme cold a few days later ended up freezing the pipes, which translated into losing heat and hot water. The loss of essential services was not an auspicious start to the new year. What was possibly my personal all time best Christmas tree, and decorating job, was destroyed, destroyed again, and yet again while being moved for the accessing of heating pipes. I could go on with a litany of slights and challenges from the universe, but I've little desire to do so, and I doubt that anyone cares - including myself.

Here's a few of my garden photos, all taken in mid to late October.

I was about to go on about the state of the world, my country, my friends, movies in general, watching a Fred Astaire movie last night, the projected Stephen Spielberg remake of 'West Side Story', spinning this or that fantastical tale along the way (all too true, however), tying it all in with concepts of time, and life as an open air prison; but I've just noticed the hour, and I've already spent too long choosing which photos to post and getting this far. I probably won't be able to get back here for a couple of days, but I do intend to do so. There's so much to note as we sink into the abyss.

'The Last Waltz' and old friends.

A bit over a month or so ago, I discovered that buried deep in the "free movies" section of my cable company's streaming options was one for Turner Classic Movies. I'd often wished they would have one, and suddenly it appeared as though the Cinema Gods had smiled upon the retired movie lover. Titles available at first seemed to be those which had just shown on TCM proper. That has changed a bit, with other titles not on the recent schedules popping in. Most of the titles are only there for 5 or 6 days at a time. As my cable box's digital video recorder is almost always full, I was over joyed to get a second chance to watch titles I had missed, or old friends which I wanted to see again. last night, for instance, I watched a 1942 MGM potboiler about an unfortunate event befalling a gold digging Broadway starlet:

I'll comment on that movie another time, but just as a 'circle of life' kind of thing, I'll note that I used to work in Grand Central Station a long time ago. I will add that it made for a rather interesting almost a double bill, as the late afternoon/early evening had been spent with a friend who came over to see the restored pre-code 'Baby Face', which had been on my DVR for two years waiting for the perfect time to watch it. Notes on that one later, as well.

At any rate, last Saturday night I turned on the video projector, intending to go to the streaming TCM option to see what might be expiring that I'd like to see. I had left the cable box on a Vermont PBS channel; 'The Last Waltz' had just started. My immediate reaction was to email a friend to come over - he had been invited to go to see the live concert but chose not to go. I also figured that it would be constantly interrupted and was being used as pledge bait. That turned out to be correct, but I watched the whole thing (slightly over 3 hours) anyway. It had been a long time since I'd seen it. The concert was the Band's farewell performance, held on Thanksgiving in 1976. Adding to the frustration of the breaks was a pledge promotion for a Blu-ray (only available as part of a set of CDs) which had been restored and approved by the filmmaker (Martin Scorsese), with it's soundtrack remixed by Robbie Robertson (member of The Band who produced the movie) for Dolby 5.1. This was frustrating for a few reasons. 1. I couldn't afford it. 2. I didn't have the room on the DVR to record it. 3. The version they were showing had a standard stereo mix. It was still a delight to see it again. Of course, I looked online to see if this new edition was available. It might be a repackaging of previously available material, or not - information was scarce. Now, I can't go to any website without being confronted with ads for 'The Last Waltz 40th Anniversary' special set.

I've mentioned elsewhere in this blog that in the late 1960's and early 1970's, I used to help run a counter-culture coffee house in Ocean City, NJ, called the Purple Dragon. Ocean City had originally been a Methodist camp meeting. When land was sold, a clause was put in the deeds that should the sale of alcohol ever be legalized on the island, the land would revert to the possession of the Methodist Church. Now, when I say that Ocean City was an island, I do mean that literally, not figuratively. The main bridge was at 9th Street. Across that bridge, on the mainland, was a town called Somers Point. And, on one side of a traffic circle, there was a very large liquor store said to have the highest volume of sales in the entire United States. (Across it's access road was a popular club, 'Your Father's Moustache'.) On the other side of the circle was an even more popular club called Tony Mart's. Just next to it was an old fish market. The Methodist church, which funded the Purple Dragon, got that building and opened another coffeehouse, called The Fish Market. (I think that was supposed to be a display of ecumenical humor.) Now, I spent many an evening at the Fish Market. I only mention this as it is my tenuous connection to Tony Mart's. The Band used to play there under the name of 'Levon and The Hawks', a leftover form the days when they played with Ronnie Hawkins. They were, in fact, playing there when Bob Dylan made them an offer to become his back up band.

Needless to say, I was a fan of both The Band and Mr. Dylan. When Dylan ended a multi-year retirement (after the motorcycle accident), he did so by going on tour backed by The Band. When they played Madison Square Garden as the tour's last stop, I was there - with my friends Richie and Keith. That's the same Richard, by the way, with whom I go on camping and canoe expeditions into wilderness areas of the Adirondacks. (Trips which I credit with maintaining my sanity.) At any rate, I went to see 'The Last Waltz' when it played in the theatres. When another friend, John, bought a building in Brooklyn (in partnership with his brother) to rehab, they threw a party. The idea was that they would have something different going on in each room for guests to enjoy while wandering around. At the time, I was working for a film company which had the rights to 'The Last Waltz', and managed to get my hands on one of the brand new 16mm prints to show in one of the rooms. That's the same John, by the way, who was instrumental in my moving from NYC to Boston, and who took me on my first car culture excursions, as well as my first trips to Vermont. He was also one of the kind folks who helped me move here. I've lost contact with him over the years, much to my regret. So John Chiafalo, if you stumble on this, please get in touch.

Now, I'm not going to go into the whys and wherefores of what is probably the best rock and roll concert film ever made, or some of the problems it had. Or the sadness of the years and realizing that Richard Manuel, Rick Danko, and Levon Helm are no longer with us. What I will say is that if you've never seen it, you owe it to yourself to do so. Here's the concert's, and the movie's, finale (an encore was used as the film's opening). Joining the Band are Bob Dylan, Neil Young, Joni Mitchell, Eric Clapton, Neil Diamond (Huh? - don't worry about it), Paul Butterfield, Dr. John, Van Morrison, and Ronnie Hawkins. Oh, yeah, when you start the clip use the full screen option if it's available to you. And, as the filmmaker requests, turn up your volume.

Yes, memory is now like that comback you thought of a half an hour too late.

About a half an hour after I finished the last post, I finally remembered the film I'd watched (and deleted form the DVR) which I wanted to note someday before I forget it completely. It was Tim Burton's "Big Fish". I like Burton's movies, even the less than successful ones. It's the kind of movie in which no one gets any appendages cut off in clinical detail while fighting invading intergalactic warriors. There aren't even any transforming intergalactic warriors. There is a transformation of sorts, but it's part of a story about a man who is a teller of tall tales, and his relationship with his son. Released in 2003, it probably couldn't get made today, even for an internet only streaming content provider. All in all, a lovely little film I hope to see again someday.

As usual, I'm running late on some things and rushing through others. One item in the "late" category is the posting of my radio show from April the 2nd. The show opened with a few songs to greet the new month, then turned to a meditation of sorts on the idea of a pop song "April in Paris".



By the way, I've noticed that some of my shows posted here through SoundCloud no longer display the player/picture for that episode. Just click on the square and go to my account on SoundCloud - I have shows archived there going back to November 29th, 2014.

There's lots of other stuff and nonsense on which I'd like to catch up, but have little time to do so. Which means that I'm going to post last night's show and go do other things.

I would like to make a mental note that today is the anniversary of my turning on the new transmitter which put WVEW-lp back on the air almost a year after the fire at the Brooks House. This event was on April the 10th, 2012.  I had also turned on the old transmitter when the station made its broadcast debut on September 1st, 2006.  I turned the transmitter on for radio free brattleboro a couple of times, too. It's probably quite wrong to be proud of such things, but I am for many reasons I'm not going to enumerate just now.

Okay, now - last night's show played a few for lyricist E. Y. "Yip" Harburg, whose birthday was April the 8th. And I played a few for Capitol Records, which was founded around this time in 1942. Accounts differ, and I've seen April the 9th (1942) listed as the day the company was founded, the day it changed its name from Liberty Records to Capitol (about a week after the founding), and the day on which its first record was cut. And finally, there was a set for pianist/band leader Martin Denny who practically founded the "Exotica" movement of the late 1950's and early 60's which resulted in a proliferation of Tiki bars and lounges. The image for the sound file for the show is of a woman listening to a crystal radio made out of a coconut shell. It seemed appropriate at the time.



As always, I hope any listeners enjoy the show(s).

p.s. Well, what do you know, all of the shows form this year are now displaying their players properly. I'd written an old address I had for Soundcloud's tech support (all such info having vanished from their site), but never heard from them. I'm just glad it's working again. It's not like friends or family are currently waiting with baited breath for each and every post, but I'd like things to be available for anyone who stumbles upon these pages.

I (heart symbol) DVR

If ever there was any doubt that sometimes progress, in the form of technological innovation, can be good, one should look no further than the annoying and overpriced cable box that most of us have these days.

'Rabbit ears' antenna for set top use.

Once upon a time, tv signals were acquired for free via over the air broadcast. Well, nothing is ever really free, I suppose. Except the squandering of my charms, and even that had a cost - but that story is not the subject of this post. If there was a cost beyond the purchase of a television, it was the purchase of some form of antenna. Many people, living near the point of broadcast origin, could make due with nothing, or with rabbit ears. If you lived a little bit away from the source of the broadcasts, there might be a further cost with the purchase of an outdoor antenna, and once the evening network schedules began converting to color the follow up purchase of an antenna rotator to get a clear ghost free image.

Outdoor antenna with motor.

When cable came along, it was cheap, needed no set top box decoder, and carried only broadcast tv - because that's all there was. Broadcast then included the recently arrived UHF channels, which showed old movies and old tv shows. I still treasure the year I lived in my first 'on my own' apartment in Ocean City, NJ, where the cable brought Star Trek (then newly syndicated for re-runs) from a Philadelphia station at 6pm and from a New York City station at 7pm (a bit preferable, as the series from New York was shown in original broadcast order).

The Rotator control, which usually
sat by the 'easy chair'.

Eventually, HBO started up as a pay channel devoted to recent movies, shown uncut. Set top cable box decoders entered the scene. Other 'cable only' channels joined the fray. I suppose this plethora of entertainment could not have happened if the remote control hadn't come along about the same time as the antenna rotator. I was quite impressed by the first remote control we had, which was acquired with my Dad's purchase of our first color tv. Before that, I was the remote control. I didn't mind being told to jump up and change the channel - we didn't know anything different. (And I didn't mind being the remote in visits to my Grandmother or my Uncles. I supposed it was part of the deal of getting fed and being the kid.) Plus there was an extra added benefit of a bit of exercise.

One of the great inventions of all time, the remote control.

When home video recording began, I dove in. I loved recording programs (mostly old movies) that I would otherwise miss, and watching them later. I loved being able to fast forward through the commercials. And I really liked the idea of archiving the movies and programs I liked - at the time the Betamax and VHS cassettes weren't all that expensive.



Yes, I had a Betamax. Just like this.
Later models had better quality and stereo sound.
I got one of those, too.
And I still have it - but it needs a minor repair.

Fast forward to today. Cable now brings ever changing numbers of hundreds of 'stations', can provide what some advertising executive must laughingly refer to as 'high speed internet', Wi-Fi broadcasting that can't be turned off (although a passcode would be require to use it), and a 'land line' telephone line for those of us who prefer to be somewhat old-fashioned with that form of communication. (Today's everything to everybody media device telephones, and their cost, is worth a post of its own.)  Add in high definition and Digital Video Recording, and one's monthly bill for cable can easily reach a level which could inspire expense guilt in rich people (if they were to ever think about it).

The cable companies have, for many years now, given new shades of meaning to the concept of perfidy. They have created a world in which the cost of service isn't the cost of service. There is a rental fee for the set top box, a fee for high definition channels, a fee for this, a fee for that, various taxes, and service levels that boggle the imagination. I was lucky to get the classic movie channel as part of a promotional package - normally, I'd have to get all of the available sports channels to get the one channel in said group that is different (i.e. the classic movie channel). Hmmm, I'd best stop before the subject of this missive changes completely.

After years of ignoring requests to have my bill delivered electronically,
(known as 'going paperless'), I finally gave in and signed up.
It was truly wonderful not to have to deal with all that paper,
make decisions about how long to keep the bill after it was paid, etc.
The only problem? It took the cable company 9 months to stop sending a paper bill.

I should also note that a couple of years ago when I made peace with Comcast and got their service back, I was given their brand new cable box dvr - one of the first of that model given out. Within a year there was a replacement available that would do more - a lot more. Record up to 6 programs at once, and store many, many, many, many more movies and programs - among other improvements. I have yet to get it - I have too many movies and programs stored on my cable box that I haven't had a chance to watch. Oh, the problems of the modern world, eh?

The thing I enjoy the most these days is the DVR. At first I used it just to record programs I wanted to see but which weren't on at my preferred viewing times. Then came the discovery that the rewind function works for 'real time' tv. Let's say that yet another director let yet another actor mumble important lines of speech so badly that they could not be heard. (This problem is sometimes exacerbated by digital sound recording which can't seem to reproduce music and dialogue without it being either too quiet or too loud. Goldilocks would have never found 'just right', if you get my drift.) With DVR, one can simply hit rewind, raise the volume, and watch that part again. With DVR I can start recording a program like the Grammy awards, start watching the recording an hour or so into the program, fast forward through parts I have no desire to see, commercials, and so on and so forth, eventually catching up with the program's actual live broadcast before it is over. With DVR, 'Dancing With the Stars' can be reduced to a half hour's running time. And should a call of nature intrude while watching a broadcast, with DVR one can press the pause button, go outside and take care of business, and return to pick up where the interruption occurred.

The DVR also records in high definition (when you pay extra for the high definition in the first place) which includes the tv version of wide screen. Now there's a topic - wide screen tv uses a picture ratio of height to width that is not used by any movie company anywhere, ever. But these days we do away with much of what is possible and exist in the land of someone's definition of "good enough".

Now, I've been enjoying the possibilities of DVR for awhile. But last Saturday, my use of it turned into a triumph. The 4,727th Republican Party's Presidential-Candidate Debate started at 8pm, just as my radio show ended. I used the DVR to record it - in widescreen, color, high def, stereophonic sound, and watched it later. If the candidates had worn different costumes, it might have been mistaken for a World Wresting Federation brawl. The trick when watching is to realize that it is entertainment. Taking any of it seriously would result in a trip to the passport office just in case.

Speaking of my radio show (you must have known I'd get around to it) the first half of last Saturday's show took note of several birthdays, including a few of my favorite performers, like Jimmy Durante. The second half celebrated one of the composers of the Great American Song Book, Harold Arlen.

A young Harold Arlen, about the time he was composing revues for the Cotton Club,
and songs like, 'Stormy Weather', 'Get Happy', and 'Let's Fall in Love".

Arlen never promoted himself the way most of his contemporaries did. As a result, his contributions have been somewhat overlooked. It's odd, really - he composed some of the best pieces in the American Songbook, yet he rarely used the standard song form. He's often thought of as a composer of show music 'blues', yet he only composed a couple of songs in that form. If I'm still doing the show this time next year, I'll have to devote the entire 2 hours to him - there just isn't enough time to play most of his songs that should be played in such a program. Hopefully, I won't have another of my 'senior moments' - this time around I gave the wrong lyricist credit on one of my favorite Arlen songs, "Last Night When We Were Young". The wordsmith was Yip Harburg. As always, I hope any listeners enjoy the show.

Fat Tuesday

Today is Fat Tuesday. When I was a kid (raised Methodist) we used to call it Shrove Tuesday. In Great Britain, it is a day to consume pancakes. We used to consume donuts. I rather liked having a reason to consume donuts. The word "shrove" is derived from "shrive", which refers to a confession of sins, a sort of summing up if you will, for the purpose of repentance and seeking the help of the Almighty to obtain Absolution for your sins. In the case of Shrove Tuesday, one seeks absolution starting the next day (Ash Wednesday). On Fat Tuesday, one parties, joins the greater Mardi Gras Carnivale, gorges on fattening foods, and marvels at the convenience and poetry of the human situation.

With Carnivale crossing my mind, I thought I'd wander over to You Tube and see if any clips were available from "Orfeu Negro", a.k.a. "Black Orpheus". It's the ancient story of Orpheus and Eurydice, set in Rio during Carnivale. The bossa nova score is by Luiz Bonfá and Antônio Carlos Jobim. The film's attitudes towards the poor blacks of Rio are no longer acceptable to many, and I doubt that the film gets many showings now. Perhaps that is why, instead of film clips, the entire movie is available on YouTube - for Free! One used to spend years trying to see a movie like this, waiting for a screening at a revival house in the big city, or going to a museum, or an arts group showing a worn 16mm print. Now it is available at a click. (And, when there is commercial potential left, a fee.) It is unfortunate that today's films buffs will rarely get a chance to see movies like this on a big screen. But still.... Black Orpheus, for free.



Today is Presidential Primary Day in New Hampshire, the first actual vote by the great unwashed masses for this season. New Hampshire is a mostly white state that bears little resemblance to most of the country. Unlike, say, the just held Iowa caucus, in a mostly white state that bears little resemblance to the rest of the country. After today there will hopefully be a respite from the incessant commercials for those campaigning for the nomination. I live in a state which borders New Hampshire. We've been inundated with these advertisements for months. Both political parties, their supporters, their shady secret Political Action Committees, their candidates, the media, and the general populace will have plenty to repent tomorrow. Sadly, this Carnival simply picks up and moves elsewhere for a bit, before moving on again.

It's been a pretty shameful show this time around. Of course, endless campaigning means endless ad revenue to the media, which is now presenting the contest to select the leader of the country as something akin to the reality game shows which pervade broadcast and cable television. It's a constant onslaught of "who insulted whom, who's winning" reporting, presented in the style of a Facebookland Twitterverse of the nasty and belligerent scripted and rehearsed quote. The media companies are supposed to be impartial in their reporting, but that school closed a long time ago. It isn't difficult to figure out which candidates the corporate conglomerates are backing if one pays attention. One must remember, however, that to the media, this is still show business. Here's the Governor of one state, acting very much like the schoolyard bully he is by most accounts. Here's the Governor of another state, scion of a political family with two Presidents already in the till, who is doing so badly in the polls he has called in his 90 year old mother to shill for votes as she pushes forward with her walker - in the snow. I could go on and address some of the real issues, but that proves ultimately (and extremely) disheartening. Reality seems to have little to do with it anymore.

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Most of my radio show this past Saturday (February 6th) was spent visiting the airwaves and jukeboxes of late January to early February 1945. Frank Lowry, known for his whistling abilities, showed up a couple of times. The finale was a February 6th, 1945 broadcast with Vaughn Monroe and His Orchestra. As always, I hope any listeners enjoy the show.

Once more, Dear Friends, unto the Holiday breech

Yet another attempt at this post (my third)  - Blogger is misbehaving. Word wrap vanished into the sub-electronic ether. Certain words seem to be acting as control codes. Typing after the end of a sentence seems to produce no result. If this continues, Blogger will get a few lumps of coal in its Christmas stocking.

And now (drum roll) the paragraphs it took half an hour to produce, thanks to the magic of cut and paste (cymbals clash):

Well.

It's 55 degrees Fahrenheit outside on the day before Christmas. This is not the usual December weather for Vermont. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I hear Bing Crosby, Rosemary Clooney, Vera Ellen, and Danny Kaye singing, "snow, it won't be long before....". Fat chance. The lyric, by the way, is from the movie "White Christmas". Not this year.

The egg nog, which takes about five hours to make, is now at the stage where it is 'resting' for about three hours in the refrigidaire. (It's the olde Joie de Cuisiner recipe I favour, and contains a somewhat Bibo Vocatus component.) (I am tempted to add a polite "heh, heh", but considering the season, that appellation should really be a "ho, ho, ho", which won't be quite accurate until I've had a few cups of
ye old recipe.)

Hooray, the blogger problem seems to be over. Perhaps there was a site update underway when I started writing. I just popped in to post last Saturday's radio show:

 

Holiday music is an interesting phenomenon. For the first thousand or so years, all the big songwriters did what anyone trying to make a living would do - they went where the money was. Which means that they wrote for the Church. My interest is in the American Pop Song form, which came along much later. While there were a couple of tunes making the rounds in the 1930's, songs like "Jingle Bells", and "Winter Wonderland", Christmas pop didn't really hit the big time until December of 1941. Oh, Irving Berlin had given the idea a shot in the late 1930's with "Hello Mr. Kringle", which was recorded by Kay Kyser, but there wasn't a lot out there unless you wanted to hear Bing's 1935 'Adeste Fideles', with 'Silent Night' on the flip side. (By the way, the Silent Night used an Irish men's chorus and is really quite lovely. Bing recorded the song several times, starting in 1928 with Paul Whiteman. The 1935 release was held up for awhile, as Bing did not wish to profit from a spiritually aligned piece of music. It was released after the label agreed to donate the proceeds to a charity. )

 

In 1940, Irving Berlin sold an idea to Paramount Pictures. As part of the package, he would write all the music for a story about an Inn (with a floorshow, naturally) which would only be open on holidays. Paramount assigned the leads to Bing Crosby and Fred Astaire. Early in 1941, Berlin composed what would become the biggest selling single of all time. No one really recognized what they had at first, "Be Careful It's My Heart" was expected to be the big hit.

 

On December 7th, 1941, the United States was brought into the Second World War by the bombing of the US fleet at Pearl Harbor and Guam. That Christmas day, Bing introduced the song on the Kraft Music Hall radio program, which he hosted. 'Holiday Inn' was released in August of 1942. The almost mythical imagery of a New England winter struck a chord in a nation at war. By that October, "White Christmas" had become the most popular song on the charts, and it stayed there through January of 1943. It was so popular, Decca wore out the original masters and called all the parties back into the studio to recreate the recording five years later.

 

'Holiday Inn" would go on to inspire a chain of motels, and a remake released in 1954. That version, "White Christmas", was released in VistaVision and Technicolor. It almost didn't get made - after the death of his wife, Crosby withdrew to spend more time with his troubled sons. Fred Astaire was unhappy at Paramount and withdrew to go to MGM. When the project got back on track, Donald O'Connor was hired to replace Astaire, but illness intervened. Danny Kaye was brought in. When I worked in film distribution, one of the companies I worked for specialized in repertory and art product. They got the theatrical rights to Paramount Pictures (well, at least the ones that hadn't been sold to Universal). The rights to the "White Christmas" movie were another matter. From what I heard, Mr. Berlin, the Crosby  estate, and Mr. Kaye all had percentages, and all wanted One Million Dollars each. Upfront. And that cost would be on top of dealing with VistaVision, an early widescreen process which had a distortion free image by exposing a larger area of 35mm film and running it horizontally through projectors; i.e. equipment that no longer existed. Somehow it all got done. Truth be told, it's not a particularly good movie, but audiences love it. With a limited amount of time for a release window, it was the company's biggest grosser until they put the classic Warner Brothers cartoons back on screen.

 

At any rate, I digress. After 1942, pop Christmas songs began to fill the charts. Until recently it seemed like every performer who ever existed had to release a Christmas album. There are country Christmases, Hip Hop Christmases, Bebop, Jazz, Lounge, Accordion Christmases, drunks performing Christmas songs, and etc. - the variety is quite incredible and possibly worth some work as a study in mores and marketing.

 

My Holiday shows are comprised of (mostly) non-threatening secular pop songs which are gluten free as an added bonus.

 

 

 

As always, I hope any listeners enjoy the show.

With Bestest Wishes for an extravagantly Merrie Christmas

and a Most Excellent New Year

  

p.s. Dear Santa, if you take requests, please put some coal into the stockings of the folks responsible for spell check programs. They can be quite wonderful, but sometimes.....

The Jeweler

Today, December 6th, is the birthday of Ira Gershwin. Ira was two years older than George. Where George had been something of a delinquent, Ira was quiet, studious, and downright bookish. George quit school when he was a teenager - he was already making an attractive sum as a song plugger for the music publishers of Tin Pan Alley. Ira stayed in a prestigious New York City High School where he formed a life long friendship with fellow student Yip Harburg, the guy who wrote the lyrics for songs like "Buddy Can You Spare a Dime", and "Over the Rainbow". George began writing music for popular songs, and became internationally famous at the age of 21. Ira, who had worked a variety of jobs including one in the Turkish baths his father managed at the time, began writing song lyrics. He refused to cash in on the family name, and worked under the pseudonym 'Arthur Francis', a bit of Ira's humor; those were first names of his youngest brother and sister.

Ira Gershwin

George, who had encouraged Ira's writing, suggested they try creating songs together. After a show done in (I think) Atlantic City, the brothers created their first Broadway show; "Lady, Be Good" which starred Fred Astaire and his sister Adele. Aside from the title tune, the score also featured "Fascinating Rhythm'.

(left to right) Fred Astaire, George Gershwin, Ira Gershwin

With that show, and the shows which followed, George Gershwin changed American music. Ira always made sure the spotlight shone on his brother. Perhaps it is because he shunned the limelight, perhaps it is because his lyrics so perfectly fit George's music that they seemed effortless, but Ira rarely gets his due. He changed what was possible in a song lyric. Where Irving Berlin's songs were written to be easily understood by immigrants with little knowledge of English, Ira's lyrics reveled in sly puns, "sound alike" rhymes, and slang. "Life can be delish, with a sunny disposish." A lyric might mention Beatrice Fairfax (an advice columnist), have an introduction composed of other song titles, or contain the names of Russian composers. Ira once spent three days fussing over one word. Other Broadway lyric writers called him "The Jeweler".

The Gershwin brothers, George on the left, Ira on the right.

The brothers' songs became the soundtrack to the Roaring Twenties and provided the sass to fight off the Great Depression. It was an era when the songs composed for Broadway and Hollywood were the popular songs of the day. Songs like "Embraceable You", "A Foggy Day", "I Got Rhythm", "Someone to Watch Over Me", "They Can't Take That Away From Me", "But Not For Me", and the last song George wrote before his untimely death at 38, "Love Is Here To Stay". Ira wrote the lyric for it, and left the business. When he was coaxed back to work  three years later, he wrote lyrics for the likes of Jerome Kern ("Long Ago and Far Away"), Kurt Weil, Vernon Duke, and Harold Arlen ("The Man Who Got Away"). After the last named song, Ira retired and spent the remainder of his years gathering together, and preserving, his brother's manuscripts and memory. Thankfully, that project preserved his own works.  It's time Ira got his due.

This week's radio show was devoted to the lyrics of Ira Gershwin. A lot of lesser known songs were included at the expense of some of the most famous numbers in the American songbook. As always, I hope any listeners enjoy the show.  



p.s. Ira was the business manager for the brother's works. An interviewer once asked him, "Which comes first, the words, or the music?". Ira replied, "The contract."

It's just a (September) garden in the rain...

It's exciting to be back working on a blog post after just two days. It's still a busy time, so this almost feels like cheating time away from other projects. But I'm about to start making my third cup of coffee; it has rained off and on most of the night and morning, providing gentle percussion for the background noises of life;  my friend Ralph (an absent minded professor if there ever was one) is on the air with a show playing some of the earliest recordings of  "Jass"; and to be quite frightfully honest, I don't mind ignoring catching up on cleaning, doing dishes, and organizing. As of last Sunday, I am 65. I'm retired. I no longer care that I've been on the drop and go lifestyle again and let things get to the point that I have to 'catch up' on the cleaning.

We've had rain a couple of times this week; we certainly needed it. It has been uncomfortably hot and humid again, but this current rain seems to have finally broken that pattern. With the improvement this has brought to the weather, last evening's sleep lasted over 8 hours. I'm normally a 6 hour sleeper; these last couple of weeks I've only managed about 4 to 5 hours in shifts of wakefulness versus slumber. The effects of this have been so pronounced that even in my dreams I don't sleep properly.

Late summer zinnias at Solar Hill

 The garden at this time of year becomes less of a dream and more of a mess. Between the heat, the humid heaviness in the air, and the intensity of the direct sun, I do not accomplish much after 10 or 11 am. I spend a bit of my morning garden time tending to the Solar Hill gardens as well as my own. Solar Hill's beds are a little more formal in style; weeds tend to show and distract. My own spot of alleged heaven is what I attempt to pass off as being in the cottage garden style, which (in my mind at least) is much more forgiving of weeds. After protracted dry spells, the rains startle the weeds into spurts of growth that are awe inspiring. I take some comfort in the thought that at least they fill in the empty patches left by plants which have already gone by for this season.  The rains have also made it difficult to work in the garden. Not just because everything is so wet, and not just because it is easier to pass plant diseases around as one brushes against them. My problem is that I like gardens in the rain, flowers bent over with drops of water as though Disney artists of the 30's had been turned loose in creation of Technicolor multiplane visions. I tend to stand around and stare.

An old variety of Morning Glory volunteered near the garden gate. I assisted them in finding their way up the fence and over to the arch of the garden's gate. Oh, by the way, that mess in the back, extending off to the left? That's my area. The dark purple of the old morning glories really captured my attention this year. There was a bit of  black eyed Susan intermingling with them,  but they have gone by. The effect was wonderful - I noticed several people stopping to take pictures.

The above was taken just a few weeks ago as the morning glories were getting started.

Meanwhile, back in the rainy mess of my area...

I like the older double white cosmos, which I start from seed as one never finds it at the garden centers anymore. It grows very tall, 7 feet or more, and when not staked, bends over easily in the rain or a wind. The red cosmos is darker than most varieties now available, also started from seed. But it isn't as proficient a bloomer.  Next year, I'll have to sow more of it.

It's been too hot to edge the beds. I tend to not stake my dahlias - I like the effect of them nodding over after wind and rain have gotten to them.

 I used to have a neighbor gardener who parked her plants across from my spot, and rarely got back to tend to them.
At this point, we haven't seen her for many years.  I've begun cleaning up her area so we can enjoy some f the treasures that were hidden by the weeds - like this charming late blooming daylily. It looks rather smashing against the wild Artemisia.

Meanwhile, the last bloom on any of my daylilies was caught by the sun peaking through the clouds.

I haven't had snow-on-the-mountain in my garden for many years. I've always liked it, and this year was delighted to see it appear in a seed catalogue which specializes in heirloom seeds . Of course I ordered it. Even though I don't have room or proper light to do so, I started it indoors during the last weeks of winter. With any luck I'll find where I put the seed packet so I can do it again next year in case it doesn't seed itself in.

Yes, it's a weedy overgrown mess. I just squint my eyes and tell myself it's Monet.

 

Last night's radio show observed a few birthdays of favorite performers - Dick Haymes, Bobby Short, Yma Sumac, and Mel Torme . The old Philco helped with those observances before tuning in September 1940, managing to catch bits of Burns and Allen, Beat the Band, The Chamber Music Society of Lower Basin Street, Refreshment Time With Singing Sam, and news bulletins (with Edward R. Murrow reporting from London) before settling on Glenn Miller's September 17th Moonlight Serenade from Providence, R.I.



As always, I hope any listeners enjoy the show.

Do Nothing till You Hear From Me

It seems I still can't find the time to fit in a decent post. Can we go for indecent (ba-da-dumb)?

Here's last Saturday's radio show...  which took brief note of a few birthdays before using the old Philco to tune in August 1943 for a broadcast by Duke Ellington from New York City's Hurricane Club.  The broadcast, on August the 14th, featured singer Al Hibbler, whose birthday was August the 16th. In the broadcast, Hibbler gave the first public performance of the lyric (written for him) for "Do Nothing till You Hear From Me", which had been introduced as an instrumental few months earlier. As such, it was a reworked version of Ellington's "Concerto for Cootie".

Duke Ellington with singer Al Hibbler.

As always, I hope any listeners enjoy...

Gosh, but it's been busy.

I've started a couple of posts, only to abandon them when various and sundry emergencies at the radio station, or with life in general, encouraged me to temporarily put them aside. There are now two weeks of my radio show which haven't been posted here. Tonight will add a third. As I find this totally unacceptable, I'm just going to post the shows, and will have to get back to stories of Solar Hill, my garden, and rambles around both another time.

First, the show from the 1st - in which, noticing that August had arrived - August! - a moderate sense of panic encouraged thoughts of grasping what was left of summer. There were dreams of getting in that vacation - kept more or less local, of course.



The program from August the 8th visited the first two weeks of August 1945, ending on the date that used to be noted on the calendar as "VJ Day", August the 14th.



I do hope any readers I may have left (family members, friends 'from away') will excuse me for not having gotten these posted sooner. My humble apologies. I hope folks enjoy these shows. Thanks!
    

Blue Moon...

Oh, my Goodness. Good Lord. Etc.
It's Thursday evening and I still haven't made last Saturday's radio show available here.

There are several things to write about, more garden pictures to post, and no time for any of it. It's been another week of constant motion when awake, but I've no idea what I may or may not have accomplished.

Tomorrow (Friday July 31st) will have the first Blue Moon in several years (using the newer "second full moon in a month" definition).

The radio show, therefore, played a bit of music for a Blue Moon.

The song "Blue Moon", by the way, was not an instant success. It was written for Jean Harlow to sing in a 1934 MGM musical spectacular, "Hollywood Party". At the time it was called "Prayer"; in it Ms. Harlow sought Divine intervention to become a movie star. It wasn't used. MGM later needed a song for an early sequence in "Manhattan Melodrama", the movie John Dillinger shouldn't have gone to see. Larry Hart wrote a new lyric, and "It's Just That Kind of Play" was submitted. It was not used. Then MGM asked for a song for another sequence later in the same film. Hart again went back to work, and this time "The Bad in Every Man" was filmed, sung by Shirley Ross who would later sing "Thanks for the Memory" with Bob Hope. It didn't catch on. BUT...Jack Robbins, the head of MGM's publishing division, liked the song. He wanted to publish it, but asked if a more romantic lyric could be provided. Hart wrote another lyric. It became one of the great classics of the American Song Book, and a jazz standard. (During the show, Blossom Dearie and Bobby Short sing a duet using two of the earlier version's lyrics.)

I hope everyone enjoys their Blue Moon.
And enjoys the show, of course.


     

Summer is a Comin' In

Today is a day of Solstice. (Well, it was when this was written - I was almost done when the power went out for an hour. It took until the next morning to get back to finish this up.) Summer arrives early this afternoon (yesterday). It has been raining most of the night and most of the morning. Rains during the week pummeled the garden once again, all but ending the peony season. Of course, if it lasted for several months, peony season would still be too short.

Peonies in the garden...

Peonies from the garden in a vase at home...

One of my old roses, Koenig von Danemark has had a hard time of it during the last many years. It hasn't been happy since it was moved more than ten years ago. (My original garden at Solar Hill became part of an expanded playground for the experimental Neighborhood School House, whose young students are a delight. I picked the page for the link above solely because it has a picture of a friend's daughter, Zawadi.) After giving the rose much attention over two garden seasons, this year it finally began growing and blooming again. One of the week's rainstorms destroyed this year's (heavily fragrant) blossoms; I don't think it is yet back to a size for repeat blossoming. It's show is mainly in June. I think I may chance moving it again for next year's garden. Of course, it will likely take a couple more years after that to prove whether or not the move was worth it. I have a spot in mind, near a couple of other old roses which were new this year. That will mean moving the blue globe thistle again, but I've been disappointed in the variety since I got it. It's taller than one I used to have and quite liked. The blooms on it were only so-so last year. Depending on what it does this year, it may be looking for a home.  I moved it in front of a very tall goats-beard thinking they would look great together. It responded by growing taller still, and blooming later.


The spring's flowers along this path are fading - but that burst of pink on the lower right is the rose I'm talking about, :

 

This is just a reference shot for myself, but see that big mass of white in the back? That's the goats-beard.
In case anyone is wondering, the path in the photo above is just out of camera range on the right.

As the Spring garden fades, the Summer version begins. One of the daylilies has started blooming. The foxglove is shooting up  to begin its' display. The cemetery rose (taken form a friend's family cemetery which goes back to the mid 1700's or so) has begun perfuming the air around it. I don't have much in the way of photos to choose from for this post - between the rains, the cleanup, and a good part of one day dealing with a hugely engorged tick which found its nirvana on my back....

 



One of the cemetery roses found a forgotten foxglove at one edge of the garden.
The cemetery rose (below) left behind in the old part of my garden has spread and seems quite happy too.

 

Blogger is giving me much trouble at the moment, so I'm going to wrap this up and go to the garden..

This week's radio show observed Father's Day and the arrival of Summer, before paying a visit to June the 23rd, 1942 to listen in that night's Glenn Miller Moonlight Serenade. I hope anyone who listens enjoys the show!

Taking note...

There are all sorts of things of which I should take note, and all sorts of things of which I should like to take note. But it's the beginning of June in Vermont. There is the maddening push to dig out enough garden space to finish planting the fruits and vegetables. May ended with another hot spell; it was dryer out than a temperance meeting. Thankfully, June debuted with a couple of days of soaking rain to the delight of every weed seed and root still hiding in the flower beds.

There was the annual Strolling of the Heifers, a tourist oriented event where folks from away can see young maiden cows. It's a whole weekend of the tourist dream of Vermont. I'm surprised we haven't been asked to pick our teeth with  pieces of hay. Of course the last dairy farm in Brattleboro closed down a few years back when the pasture became a Grafton Cheese store. Vermonter (by way of Brooklyn), Senator and now Presidential Candidate Bernie Sanders often shows up to milk a cow. This year he only had time to walk the parade route and offer a few words before being whisked off to a campaign event in New Hampshire. Many of us have met Bernie before, but this time I shook the hand of a man who could become the next President of the United States. Over the years, I've met and/or been friends with a number of famous people. There's a New York thing one gets after living there about acknowledging but not fawning or bothering. I didn't gush or anything, but for the first time in my life I wanted to ask to have my picture taken with a celebrity. The radio station took part in the parade. During the evening hours, I had my radio show, and the station had a concert/dance benefit.

The flower garden, by the way, is coming along. This is year two of the reclamation project from a few years of neglect, little maintenance, and an outright attack attempting dominance by the gout weed. It will be a couple more years yet before it all fills in, but it is getting there.



Saturday's radio show (June 6th) observed a few birthdays of the weekend (all of whom deserve posts of their own) - bandleaders Ted Lewis, Jimmie Lunceford, and Glen Gray; singer Dean Martin; and composer/lyricist Cole Porter, whose birthday is Tuesday, June 9th. While a romp through his songbook will have to wait for next week's show, I did have to play a few...  And finally, the last portion of the show visited the first few days of June, 1944 for the anniversary of D-Day.

So with all that happening, there really hasn't been, and isn't yet, time to tell the story properly. I mean, I did take a few more photos of the garden....

I hope anyone who listens enjoys the show.