Sound Beat

You’re listening to Nelson Riddle and His Orchestra with Drive In, a Capitol 78.

Richard Hollingshead learned a lot from his test run of his big idea. He went through various incarnations of the first drive-in at his home in Camden New Jersey, starting with cars lined up one after another and a single speaker behind the screen. Which, obviously, didn’t work. He gradually arrived at disparate spacing, elevated in the back, and the sound delivery would evolve to the in-car speakers we use today. Or, the last time you were at a drive in. His invention saw the light of day, or dusk, in 1933.

Nelson Riddle is recognized as one of the foremost arrangers in popular music history. According to WNYC’s Jonathan Schwarz, “Billie Holiday, Frank Sinatra, Louis Armstrong and Nelson Riddle stand, in my judgement, at the spine of American popular music”

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The iconic pianist and bandleader hopped around the early jazz hotspots…Harlem, Chicago, New Orleans, St. Louis. He put together the Count Basie Orchestra in Kansas City and, with the help of radio broadcasts at KC’s Reno Club, they became one of the premier big bands of the era. They recorded “Aint It The Truth”, a Columbia 78, in 1942. While their club performances put improv at the forefront, the studio recording involved a more complex arrangement. Part of that arrangement: The “call and response” which you hear… right here.

This episode was written in part by Syracuse University student Mark Perkins, as part of the Sound Beat Class Partnership project. To learn more about the program, click here!

That riff can only mean one thing…you’re listening to Chuck Berry…and you’re on the Sound Beat. Okay, two things.

Hearing your daughter play classical music must be a tremendous joy for a parent…and perhaps a source of sheer torment for a sibling. Especially if said sibling is Chuck Berry, who reportedly wrote this song as a response to his sister monopolizing the family piano. He recorded it for Chess records in 1956. It’s the quintessential “us vs. them” song, a signal that the Beethovens and Tchaikovskys had been replaced by the Louis Jordans, Carl Perkins’ and Bo Diddleys. They’re all referenced, somewhat indirectly, in the song’s fourth verse.

If you missed the references, the “blue suede shoes” is a Carl Perkins nod, “Hey diddle-diddle” is a little Bo Diddley shout-out, and  “Early in the mornin'”refers to the same-titled Louis Jordan song. Berry claimed that some of his most well-known riffs were inspired by those of Jordan’s guitarist Carl Hogan. Read more here.

And, of course, if you caught ‘em…good job.

You’re listening to the Jesters with a Decca recording from 1944. Railroads were the nation’s backbone at the time and schedules were of the utmost importance. The engineer set out an hour and a half behind schedule in the wee hours of April 30th 1900. He was determined to make up the time from Memphis to Canton, Mississippi and had just about done so a couple miles outside of Vaughan. But two trains were already taking up the passing tracks at the station, with cars left out on the main line. Jones, somewhat miraculously, slowed the train’s 75 mph speed to 35 at the time of collision. He was killed in the impact, his being the only fatality, and preventing many more.

Image: Casey Jones’ home at the time of his death. This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 License.

The scene: a dimly lit jazz club. A lone spot light illuminates the musicians, plying their trade amidst billowing plumes of smoke. Cigarette smoke, you’d assume…unless you were Harry Anslinger.  Anslinger was appointed the Commissioner of the Federal Bureau of Narcotics in 1937. Policy-wise: think…the McCarthy of marijuana.  His target: International kingpins? Schoolyard pushers?  No.  “Musicians,” he told a senate committee in 1948 “and not good musicians, jazz musicians.” Jazz was exploding at the time, and there was an immediate backlash.  He could’ve used a softer PR tactic…but, come on… the jazz songbook is full of lightly-veiled references to marijuana, from Stuff Smith’s “If You’re a Viper” to Louis Armstrong’s “Muggles”.  And some songs…some songs made no attempt at pretense. You’ve been listening to Dizzy Gillespie, Charlie Parker and others with 1945’s…“Groovin’ High.”

Arthur Godfrey was a 50’s tv and radio icon, an aviator, equestrian…but not such a great tour leader.

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You’re listening to The 1000 Islands Song, a Columbia 78 recorded in 1947. The archipelago lies in the St. Lawrence River, on the US-Canadian border. There are actually about 1800 islands, each passing the stringent criteria of :A. being above water level year-round, B. Having an area greater than one square foot and C. bearing at least one living tree.

That island mentioned there, 793, is an actual one, belonging to…Arthur Godfrey. That’s right…it was gifted to him by Grant Mitchell of the 1000 Islands Admiralty in appreciation of the song. Check out more right here.

“BoldtCastle aerial” by Teresa Mitchell; levels adjustment by Howcheng. – Licensed under Public domain via Wikimedia Commons

The opera is based on the play El Trobador, or The Troubador, by Antonio Garcia Gutierrez.  Verdi became so engrossed with the character Azucena, that he nearly named his version “La Vendetta”, (The Revenge) and “La Zingara”, The Gypsy. Either would have been suitable; The plot revolves around the gypsy Azucena, and the revenge she seeks for her mother. You’re listening to Mai Reggendo All Aspro Assalto, sung by Enrico Caruso and Louise Homer.

The aria is from Act II, Scene 1…Azucena has convinced her son Manrico to join her vengeful quest. But with his foe at swordpoint, he stops. The title actually translates as ““At My Mercy Lay The Foe”. So, what stayed his hand? Find out right here.

On this date in 1950, “You Bet Your Life” premiered on NBC. It had been a radio show for 3 years before its TV debut, and was hosted by Groucho.  This tune, “Hooray For Captain Spaulding” served as his intro. It first appeared in the Marx Brothers stage show “Animal Crackers” in 1928, which made it to the silver screen in 1930.

The show featured two contestants who answered questions in different categories, and served as a vehicle for Marx’s ad libbing. Want to see a clip? You bet your life we’ve got it…click here.

“You Bet Your Life” featured many stars of tv, film and other walks of life. William Peter Blatty portrayed an Arabian Prince on the show, a disguise Groucho saw through. He’d use his winnings to take time off and write a little script he called “The Exorcist”. Phyllis Diller was “merely” a housewife before getting her big break on the show.

Coleman Hawkins got it in him one day to stray from the jazz norm, and he opened the door for a new style of music.

Hawkins played tenor sax, which wasn’t really recognized as a jazz instrument until he helped make it one. Body and Soul, heard here from 1939, signaled a stylistic change in jazz; the improvisation throughout the song simply hadn’t been recorded in the genre.  The end result? Bebop, a form of jazz dependent on improvisation and a snappy pace.

Hawkins directly influenced the greats that followed soon after. Thelonious Monk, Dizzy Gillespie and Miles Davis would all play back up for Hawkins.

What extreme honor did the Library of Congress bestow on this recording?

In 2004, Body and Soul was entered into the LOC’s National Recording Registry, for songs that “are culturally, historically, or aesthetically important, and/or inform or reflect life in the United States.”

The first moving-picture machine in history, the kinetoscope, was developed by William Kennedy Dickson , while under the employ of Thomas Edison. One of the biggest problems with early films was the need for, and unavailability of, light. So when Edison built the Black Maria studio in 1893, he had it completely covered in tar paper, to attract light. Not only that, but the ceiling had a retractable window.And, because it was Edison, the whole building was constructed on a turntable that could pivot said retractable ceiling towards the best angle of light.

The first copyrighted film was not a comedy, a thriller, but a…ahem…bodily function. It was entitled “Kinetoscopic Record of a Sneeze”, and known commonly as “Fred Ott’s Sneeze”. Ott was another Edison employee, and his sneeze was arguably the most famous in film history…until Woody Allen’s. For more on the film industry’s early days, follow this link to a great breakdown at AMC.com.