In keeping with this weeks exploration of the easy listening pianists of yore, today I’ve posted three delightful (if you’re in that kind of mood) videos featuring the twin-piano act Ferrante and Teicher, a duo of American pianists known for their clever arrangements of familiar classical pieces, movie soundtracks, and
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nOtgigQp_nshttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6PJ4KUFynlk Yesterday I posted two clips of Roger Williams, the most successful of the so-called ‘easy listening’ pianists of the 1950, 60s and beyond. But before Williams came several other influential and ground-breaking pianists in this highly specialized and often unfairly derided field of music. Chief among them was Carmen
As a jazz pianist–in other words as a decrepit hipster wallowing in a musical genre that few people care about anymore–I should find it easy to mock the ‘easy listening’ pianists of the 1950s and 60s as total squares who sold-out for big money, playing unbelievably sappy and simple arpeggio-ridden
Below is a marvelous short series of clips of Hollywood in the early 1930s as photographed by the then famous (and now forgotten) Burton Holmes, inventor of the ‘travelogue’. Holmes was a moderately successful ‘travel lecturer’ beginning in the late 19th century when this was a particularly exotic profession. He
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OBp1wLMCmeohttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FYspFe9u5RU Apropos of yesterday’s post on the joys of Muzak, above are two TV spots for the Los Angeles FM Muzak station KJOI. My memory is that there were no announcers on the station–it was a solid hour of Muzak-Bed with a canned announcement at the end of the hour
Muzak was an American brand of background music played in retail stores and other public establishments. The name has been in use since 1934 and has been owned by various companies. The soothing, full orchestral arrangements of popular songs were heard in supermarkets, shopping malls and–somewhat infamously–elevators, leading to the
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GXIja9Yze0U Al Jolson and Ruby Keeler were married from 1928 through 1940. Despite both being major stars during that period they only appeared together once, in Go Into Your Dance (1935). The film, directed by Archie Mayo, features Jolson as a self-destructive Broadway star who, after being banned from working
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aWOB9GBqJAAhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=op0NY8Fc5GY&t=55s In yesterday’s post we saw behind-the-scenes of the shooting of the MTM credits sequence. Today we’ll learn about the creation of that famous credit sequences’ equally famous theme song ‘Love Is All Around’. On a segment of CBS Sunday Morning, Sonny Curtis (who wrote among other hits ‘I Fought
I realize that by using the word ‘jazz’ in the title of this post I’ve probably caused at least half of my little audience to quickly move onto another blog (or to compulsively check their email) rather than explore today’s post. But hear me out; as a jazz musician myself
On June 10, 1956, Nat King Cole guested on Ed Sullivan’s famous Sunday night TV broadcast. Sullivan wisely asked Nat to do a piano instrumental–no vocals necessary. The song chosen was ‘Just One Of Those Things’ and, to put it mildly, Nat kills it. This is a superb clip as