Sound Beat

When British army bandmaster Lieutenant FJ Ricketts was stationed at Fort George in Scotland, he…did as the Scots do, and played a fair amount of golf. The story goes that he came across a certain nicknamed colonel who, rather than yell “Fore” to warn others of his wayward shots, would whistle…a descending minor third.

It stuck in Rickett’s mind like a high-lob to a soft green, and the “Colonel Bogey March” was born, with that whistle…

…serving as the opening line to the melody. The march would be published in 1914 and had already sold millions by the time it was famously included in “Bridge on the River Kwai” in 1957. Which…didn’t hurt sales one bit.

Photo: [CC-BY-2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

You’re listening to Il Miserere, from Il Trovatore, composed by Giuseppe Verdi and recorded by Joe Natus in 1902.

Verdi was a pretty big deal in Italy. It’s said over 200,000 people lined the streets for his second funeral. His first, he requested to be a private affair. As for his life, besides being one of the most brilliant opera composers to have lived, Verdi was elected to Italy’s first national Parliament in 1861.  To be fair, he was probably the most unwilling candidate in political history. Rarely in attendance, when he did show up, he would (of course) work on opera “business”. (Insert lazy politician joke here)

He even made a contribution to the bearding community, lending his name to a judged category. The Verdi, according to worldbeardchampionships.com, is well-groomed, closely trimmed, highly stylish, and sophisticated.

You’re listening to Jim Reeves with I Could Cry, an Abbott 45 from 1953, and…

Gentleman Jim Reeves had 51 top ten hits in a career cut short when a small plane he was piloting crashed in 1964. For your next Morbid Trivia Night: He was taught by the same man who taught Randy Hughes, Patsy Cline’s pilot, who of course had met the same fate a year earlier.

But Reeves’ records kept on coming. RCA Victor continued releasing unpublished songs, mixed with previously released tracks, and people kept buying them. Of those 51 top ten hits we mentioned, 19 came posthumously. And there was a Jim Reeves single on the charts every year from 1970 to 1984, nearly 2 decades after his death.

The public wanted it. In a 1922 poll of some 500 newspapers nationwide, Harry

Wills was selected as the the boxer that people most wanted to see heavyweight

champ Jack Dempsey fight. He got 131,073 votes; second place was 6,000. The

problem was, Dempsey had drawn the “color line” in 1919 after winning the title,

citing deadly riots after the Jack Johnson – James J. Jeffries fight in 1910.

In 1925, the New York State Athletic Commission gave Dempsey an ultimatum:

fight Wills, or find another state to fight in. He chose the latter. Another match

fell through in 1926. When Dempsey lost to Gene Tunney that year, and Wills,

then 37, lost as well, talks of the match ended, as did Wills’ shot at the title. A

month later Howell, Horseley and Bradford recorded this song on a Columbia 10 inch 78.

Image: Black Boxing Gloves, taken by Airman First Class Kerelin Molina as part of official duties. As a work of the

U.S. federal government, the image or file is in the public domain in the United States.

So impressed was Beethoven that when he composed his Symphony Number 3 in E Flat Major, he dubbed it “Bonaparte”. But as the story goes, he became enraged when Napoleon named himself Emperor of the French. Scratching out the title, he renamed it “Eroica”, Italian for “heroic”. You’re listening to Arturo Toscanini conducting the NBC Symphony Orchestra in a Victor recording from 1950.

Time seems to heal all wounds though…when Napoleon died in exile in the early 1820’s, Beethoven remarked that he had “already composed the proper music for that catastrophe”, a nod to the Symphony that once bore the man’s name.

Fans of historical trivia, and Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure, remember Napoleon as a little guy. (Napoleon was 5’6, Beethoven 5’5).

No matter what your line of work..it’s always good to have a back-up plan. Just ask James Kokomo Arnold.

The 18th Amendment ushered in Prohibition in the United States, outlawing the manufacture, transportation and sale of alcohol from 1920 to 1933. During this time, James Arnold was a whiskey bootlegger, who… got the occasional itch to pick up his guitar and play around town. But in 1933 the Amendment was…amended, ending prohibition, and putting Arnold out of work. He turned towards music full-time. In 1934, he recorded Old Original Kokomo Blues. And the name stuck…here’s Kokomo Arnold in 1937 with Red Beans and Rice.

LaRosa probably wished he’d followed his own advice on his last night of work. You see, he was one Arthur Godfrey’s protégés and lead singer on the Arthur Godfrey show. Thing is, he learned his final performance was his “swan song” at the same time as the shocked audience.

At the time, Godfrey’s various shows accounted for 12% of CBS’s nightly business. But the gasps of dismay from the audience were harbingers of change…after firing the red-hot crooner, his popularity plummeted. So why the firing in the first place? Apparently Godfrey took issue with Larosa’s hiring of an agent. Public opinion favored Larosa, so much so that singer Ruth Wallis recorded a song in 1955 entitled “Dear Mr. Godfrey”. Want to hear it?

Vernon Dalhart, one of the founding fathers of country music, got his start in…New York City opera halls?

You’re listening to Vernon Dalhart with Wreck of The Old 97.  He may have started his career in NYC, but he was all cowboy.  Born Marion Slaughter, he took his stage name from the Texas towns he used to drive cattle between: Vernon and, you guessed it, Dalhart.  When he recorded this song in 1924, it became the best-selling single of its time.  Not only that; it was the best-selling non-holiday record in the first 70 years of recorded music.

The opera/country connection isn’t a … traditionally strong one.  Just imagine: Toby Keith is… Don Giovanni.  Dalhart made the leap, though. He’s a member of the Country Music Hall of Fame.

Harry the Hipster Gibson was discovered by fellow pianist Fats Waller, and his frantic, inventive stride/boogie-woogie, proto-rock blend would pave the way for players like Jerry Lee Lewis and Little Richard. Club pianist by night, Juilliard graduate fellow by day, Gibson claimed to have coined the phrase “hipster” sometime in the 30’s and would take it on as his own nickname soon after.

“Who Put the Benzedrine in Mrs. Murphy’s Ovaltine?”, was released by Musicraft in 1944. It’s a little play on the Irish folk song “Who Put the Overalls in Mrs. Murphy’s Chowder”. But that tune never got anyone blacklisted, which this one did for Gibson that year. He’d recover, but it would take time. Over a quarter century, actually, when he’d resurface in the 1970s playing blues rock.

Read more.