Sound Beat

The opera house lights dim, the capacity crowd hushes…Then a voice, a high, bright soprano…yes, there it is…fills the air.

But the real fun starts when the singing stops. You see, the year is 1919, and the crowd is taking part in an Edison Tone Test. Before the lights come back up, they’re prompted to guess if what they heard was live, or a diamond disc.

Wax cylinders provided mankind the ability to reproduce sound. By 1912, though, Edison had clarity in mind when he developed the Diamond Disc. Grudgingly. Competitors had started producing flat records over a decade earlier, but Edison wasn’t convinced. Like that guy who held onto eight tracks just a bit too long…except he was the one making them! He produced both until 1929. In fact, many of the cylinders produced during this time, like this one, were… dubs from diamond discs. That’s a whole different level of stubborn.

You’ve been listening to Love’s Old Sweet Song recorded by Marie Rappold in 1919.

The moon has served as muse for countless numbers of poets, from the unnamed and unknown, to Shelley, Dickinson, and Kerouac. But only one of these had to worry about record label execs.

You’re on the Sound Beat.

You’re listening to Jack Kerouac reading his poem “The Moon Her Majesty”, on Dot Records’ Poetry for the Beat Generation, with piano accompaniment by Steve Allen. The recording is significant in that it was released and then immediately recalled after a label exec heard the content and Kerouac’s, lets say, state of mind.

The recall letter came from Bernice Mason: “You will receive a Dot album titled “Poetry for the Beat Generation”. Dot has cancelled the release of the album for obvious reasons. Please do not review it on your publications. Thank you for your cooperation.”

130 copies are believed to have escaped the recall, and this is one of them.

The National Film Board of Canada honored Oscar Peterson with a short film, “Begone Dull Care”, in 1949. It was  directed by Norman McLaren and Evelyn Lambart. Using drawn-on-film animation, McLaren and Lambart paint and scratch directly onto film stock to create a visual representation of Oscar Peterson’s jazz music.

Check it out here!

You’re listening to the Palestrina Choir on a Victor 78 from 1927

And, you’re on the Sound Beat!

The choir is singing the Hymn to Apollo, one of the Homeric hymns: a collection of thirty-three anonymous ancient Greek hymns celebrating individual gods. It’s thought to have been written in 522 BC. Apollo is the son of Zeus, God of the Sun and light. His name was selected for NASA’s third spaceflight program by then manager Abe Silverstein because “Apollo riding his chariot across the Sun was appropriate to the grand scale of the proposed program.”

Grand scale indeed, incorporating President John Kennedy’s stated goal of “”landing a man on the Moon and returning him safely to the Earth”. And though he would never see it, six Apollo missions would land astronauts on the Moon, with twelve men walking on the lunar surface. And every one of them returning home safely.

Charlie Chaplin would become the world’s biggest star, but the first emergence of the Little Tramp played second fiddle to…go-karts. The iconic character debuted in 1914’s “At The Kid Auto Races in Venice”. It was filmed on-location at an actual road race held in Venice, California that year, among a crowd who showed up to watch some auto racing and instead became extras in film history. A year after the film, Chaplin would have never been able to walk those streets unnoticed. A year after that, he would’ve needed bodyguards.

The Victor Military Band was a virtual revolving door of  about a dozen musicians led by Edward T. King, and were the first to record W.C. Handy’s classic “St. Louis Blues”.

Watch the whole film, all six minutes of it, right now!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-j2K3A1S5ak

We’re cool. We’re, as they say, hip. (Do they say that anymore?) Anyway, you’re listening to the very first mash-up, The Flying Saucer, Luniverse record number 101. It was… mashed…up?…by Bill Buchanan and Dickie Goodman in 1956…that’s, uh, one half-century before Glee. See? Hip.

You’ve been listening to part 1 of 2…listen to both right now!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XCrn6QXvHLg&feature=kp

Photo: © Copyright Alan Forbes and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons License

Songs and stories for kids are big business these days, and have a more cheery, nurturing tone than in the “good ol’ days”. We all know how “ring-around-the-rosie” is a little plague poem, and I mean, Brothers Grimm? They actually sound like characters in one of their twisted tales.

But surely the story behind this upbeat number couldn’t be dark. I mean, it’s called Babes In the Wood, and, it’s about……ok. Well, it’s a bit like the Grimm’s Hansel and Gretel.  It comes from an old broadside ballad, in which two children are put in their uncle’s charge after their parents’ death. He promptly claims their inheritance and leads them off into the woods, leaving them to their fated deaths.

The term “babe in the woods” has come to express one’s innocence, or even pitiable naivetee. There’s also a correlation to the haunted Tower of London.

Merle Travis recorded the original 16 tons in 1946…though he did have a little help with its legacy.

You’re on the Sound Beat.

The lyrics of Sixteen Tons paint a grim picture of a Kentucky coal miner’s life.

Tennessee Ernie Ford took a shine to the song, recording and releasing it as a B-side to “You Don’t Have to Be a Baby to Cry” in October of ‘55. Two months later, it was the greatest selling single of all time.

Travis would express his thanks onstage, frequently changing the last stanza to “I owe my soul to… Tennessee Ernie Ford.”

Charles Lindbergh’s solo transatlantic flight made him a hero, garnered him presidential praise, and changed commercial flight forever.

You’re on the Sound Beat.

The 30th president of the United States, bestowing the Flying Cross on Charles Lindbergh. The speech took place in Washington DC on June 11, 1927, just three weeks after Lindy’s achievement. Lindy’s humorous remarks dre laughter from the crowd but he’d leave a bigger mark on the public’s perception of flight. In 1926, the year before his flight, about 6,000 Americans traveled by air. Less than two years later the number had swelled to 180,000!

Hear the entire recording right here.

You’re listening to the Story of Star Wars, a 20th Century Fox LP from 1977 and…

You’re on the Sound Beat.

Ah, the Force. A supernatural power that binds all entities throughout the universe. George Lucas would borrow the idea from many cultures: chi in traditional Chinese culture, mana in Hawaiian; in Hindu culture it’s “prana” the word translating directly as “life force”. And with the possible exception of light sabers, it’s just about the coolest part of the whole Star Wars universe.

Image courtesy of Thomas S., used under Creative Commons license.