Showing posts with label Fred Waring. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Fred Waring. Show all posts

February 29, 2024

78 RPMs 11: Dinah Shore ~ Sleepy Lagoon

  ~   
78 RPM record, side 2


Today is the birthday of "Leap Year Baby" Dinah Shore born in 1916.  She was an American singer, actress, and television personality, and the chart-topping female vocalist of the 1940's who rose to stardom as a recording artist during the Big Band era.     
 
I love this song, it's one of my favorites; I remember my mom and dad slow dancing to the tune in our living room. It's actually the "B" side of the record. There are other versions I like better but this is the one from my childhood. 
 
The song was recorded by. David Rose, Fred Waring, Glenn Miller and The Platters did an excellent cover of it in the mid-fifties.   
 
It was written by British composer Eric Coates in 1930 with the title, By the Sleepy Lagoon. In 1940 American songwriter Jack Lawrence added lyrics with the approval of Coates; the resulting song, Sleepy Lagoon, became a popular-music standard of the 1940s.            
 
 


Sleepy Lagoon is used as the theme song for the Desert Island Discs radio program broadcast on BBC Radio 4. It was first broadcast on the BBC Forces Programme on 29 January 1942.    

Each week a guest, called a "castaway" during the show, is asked to choose eight audio recordings (usually, but not always, music), a book and a luxury item that they would take if they were to be cast away on a desert island, as they discuss their life and the reasons for their choices. It was devised and originally presented by Roy Plomley. Since 2018 the programme has been presented by Lauren Laverne. More than 3,000 episodes have been recorded, with some guests having appeared more than once and some episodes featuring more than one guest.     

When Desert Island Discs marked its 75th year in 2017, The Guardian called the show a radio classic. In February 2019, a panel of broadcasting industry experts named it the greatest radio program of all time. I find it interesting to hear what musics famous people like and was the inspiration for my "Desert Island" series (link below).     



Sleepy Lagoon was a reservoir beside the Los Angeles River that was frequented by Mexican-Americans. Its name came from the popular song Sleepy Lagoon. The "Sleepy Lagoon murder" was the name that Los Angeles newspapers used to describe the death of José Gallardo Díaz, who was discovered dying near the reservoir with two stab wounds in Commerce, California, United States, on the morning of August 2, 1942. The cause of Díaz's death remains disputed to this day. The Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) arrested several Mexican-American youths for the murder.            
          
         
Sleepy Lagoon murder Defendants - 1942 
 
   
Beginning in the early 1930s and exacerbated by the Great Depression, approximately one million Mexican immigrants and native-born Americans of Mexican descent were forced to leave the United States for Mexico during the Mexican Repatriation as part of a policy by the administration of Herbert Hoover who had scapegoated Mexicans for the Great Depression and instituted stricter immigration policies with the stated intent of freeing up jobs for a narrow demographic of Americans.    
    
The first side of the record has Three Little Sisters; a bouncy forties dance song that is not particularly interesting but fun.      


Dinah Shore ~ Three Little Sisters
78 RPM record, side 1 

   
Tracklist:

Side 1:
 
Three Little Sisters, written by Irving Taylor, Vic Mizzy

Side 2:

Sleepy Lagoon, written by Eric Coates, Jack Lawrence

Companies:

    Record Company – RCA Manufacturing Co., Inc.

Credits:



Notes:

For best results use
RCA Victor Needles

With Orchestra

A: Featured in the Universal film "Private Buckaroo"

Barcode and Other Identifiers

    Matrix / Runout (Label side A): 27875-A
    Matrix / Runout (Label side B): 27875-B
    Matrix / Runout (Runout, side A, stamped): 1 27875A A2 1 I
    Matrix / Runout (Runout, side B, stamped): 1 27875B 1B 3 1 1

Dinah Shore – Three Little Sisters / Sleepy Lagoon
Label:    Victor – 27875
Format:    Shellac, 10", 78 RPM
Country: US
Released: May 1, 1942
Genre:    Pop, Classical, Stage & Screen
Style:    Vocal






Viewfinder links:       
        
Jimmy Dorsey       
Tommy Dorsey       
Harry James     
Glenn Miller           
The Platters               
David Rose          
Fred Waring       
       
Net links:       
        
Desert Island Discs       
       
YouTube links:       
        
Tommy Dorsey ~ Sleepy Lagoon           
Harry James ~ Sleepy Lagoon           
Glenn Miller ~ Sleepy Lagoon           
The Platters ~  Sleepy Lagoon     
Dinah Shore ~      
       Sleepy Lagoon             
       Three Little Sisters               
        
        
        
        
        
       
        
        
        
        
        
        
Styrous® ~ Thursday, February 29, 2024       
       
 
 
 ~
 
 
 
 
 
 
 













 

December 29, 2020

Charles, Prince of Wales articles/mentions

~       

Fred Waring ‎~ A Visit From St. Nicholas
       
       
        
       
       
        
        
       
       
       
photographer unknown
        
       
        
        
       
       
        
       
       
        
       
       
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Fred Waring articles/mentions

 
  ~    
 A Visit From St. Nicholas          
      
      
     
mentions:           
Christmas ~ 2020           
Dinah Shore ~ Sleepy Lagoon      
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
Fred Waring - 1944
advertising photo
     
      
      
      
      
      
      
     
      
      
      
      
















December 25, 2020

78 RPMs 8: Fred Waring & The Pennsylvanians ‎~ A Visit From St. Nicholas

 ~     
  Illustration – Vander Noot

     
A Visit from St. Nicholas, more commonly known as The Night Before Christmas and 'Twas the Night Before Christmas from its first line, is a poem first published anonymously in 1823 and later attributed to Clement Clarke Moore, who claimed authorship in 1837.    
 
 
 
1912 edition of the poem
illustrated by Jessie Willcox Smith


The poem (link below) has been called "arguably the best-known verses ever written by an American" and is largely responsible for some of the conceptions of Santa Claus from the mid-nineteenth century to today.    
 
A Visit from St. Nicholas was first published on Dec. 23, 1823 in the Troy Sentinel newspaper in upstate New York.        
 
It has had a massive effect on the history of Christmas gift-giving. Before the poem gained wide popularity, American ideas had varied considerably about Saint Nicholas and other Christmastide visitors. A Visit from St. Nicholas eventually was set to music and has been recorded by many artists.   

Various celebrities along with Charles, Prince of Wales & Dame Judi Dench produced a video of a reading of the poem (link below). The video was created to benefit the Actors’ Benevolent Fund, which Prince Charles has supported for over 20 years. The charity supports and stage managers displaced by injury, illness, old age or financial hardship during the coronavirus pandemic.         

Prince Charles tested positive for the coronavirus in March and self-isolated for a week in Scotland with mild COVID-19 symptoms. He later told Sky News he was lucky to have “got away with it quite lightly."        
     
     
Tracklist:

side 1:

A - A Visit From St. Nicholas ('Twas The Night Before Christmas) Part 1 - 3:27

side 2:

B - A Visit From St. Nicholas ('Twas The Night Before Christmas) Part 2 - 3:12

Companies, etc.

    Record Company – Decca Records, Inc.

Credits:

    Illustration – Vander Noot

Fred Waring & The Pennsylvanians ‎– A Visit From St. Nicholas ('Twas The Night Before Christmas)
Label: Decca ‎– DU 88023, Decca ‎– C.U.S. 16
Format: Vinyl, 10", 78 RPM
Country: US
Released: 1949
Genre: Pop, Children's
Style: Story, Choral, Vocal

 
 
         
     
Viewfinder links:     
     
Christmas stuff(ings)     
Clement Clarke Moore     
     
     
Net links:     
      
NPR ~ 'Twas The Night Before Christmas in 2020            
Poetry Foundation ~ 'Twas The Night Before Christmas     
     
YouTube links:     
      
Prince Charles & Judi Dench ~ ‘Twas The Night Before Christmas    
Fred Waring & The Pennsylvanians ~ 'Twas The Night Before Christmas     
     
     
     
       
'Twas the night before Christmas . . . 
             ~ Clement Clarke Moore
     
     
           
       
Styrous® ~ Christmas, Friday, December 25, 2020