Capitol Records ~ the inner sleeve: The Capitol Tower

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Capitol Records record sleeve 

photo by Styrous®

 

Sixty-five years ago today, April 6, 1956, Capitol Tower, the home of Capitol Records was dedicated. It was the first circular office tower designed in America.    

 

 

Capitol Records record sleeve detail

detail photo by Styrous®

 

That day is crystal clear in my mind as it was at the pinnacle of the Golden Age of Sci-Fi, I was deep into it and the building was right out of one of the books and pulp magazines I devoured. I thought to myself it was the future coming to life right in front of me. Little did I know my life would witness MANY Sci-Fi fantasies come true.      

 

Located at 1750 North Vine Street in Hollywood, a neighborhood in the central region of Los Angeles, California, it is thirteen stories tall and 92 feet in diameter. The photo below shows the Capitol Records Building seen from the Hollywood and Vine intersection near sunset on June 30, 2009.         

 

      

Capitol Records headquarters building
  photo by Downtowngal

Designed by Welton Becket with Louis Naidorf, a young architect from Becket's office, serving as project designer the earthquake-resistant Capitol Records Tower is the world's first circular office building. Home to several recording studios, it is one of Hollywood's most distinctive landmarks. Although not intended as a tribute to record players, its wide curved awnings and tall narrow tower mimic the appearance of a stack of gramophone records atop a phonograph. The building was commissioned by EMI after its acquisition of Capitol Records in 1955 and was completed on April 6, 1956.           

 

 

Capitol Records tower elevation drawing 
 

According to Atlas Obscura (link below), the light at the top of the tower on the Capitol Records Building sends out a secret message. It was the former president of Capitol Records, Alan Livingston, who got the idea to have the light on top of the building send out a signal in Morse code. The word chosen for this secret message was “Hollywood.” When the building opened in 1956, Samuel Morse’s granddaughter Leila Morse had the honor of turning the light on.    

Capitol Records Building construction - 1955
 photographer unknown

       

Photographer Ted VanCleave has done a series of very dramatic and beautiful black and white images of the Capitol Records Building. Phaidon has issued a book, California Captured which features the tower. According to Slipped Disc, the tower has been shut down and its staff laid off; and Moses Avalon says it has been converted to condos (links below).   

 

 

Capitol Records Building - July 25, 2009 

photo by Jelson25

       

      

Capitol Records, as did other record companies (link below), advertised the artists they represented on the record sleeve of a vinyl LP.  

      

      

  Capitol Records record sleeve ads

photo by Styrous®

 

    

A few of the artists the company recorded included Nat King Cole, Frank Sinatra, Judy Garland, Peggy Lee, Tina Turner, Garth Brooks, Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr, the Beach Boys, Brian Wilson, Megadeth, NF, Everclear, Katy Perry, Mary J. Blige, Halsey, the Beastie Boys, Juice Newton, The Kingston Trio, Neil Diamond, Iron Maiden, Minnie Riperton, Luscious Jackson, Linda Ronstadt, Eagles, Beck, Ray Anthony, Avenged Sevenfold, Don Henley, Yellowcard, Sam Smith, Sparklehorse, Migos, Emeli Sandé, Queen Naija, Helena Paparizou, 5 Seconds of Summer, and Fletcher.    

      

      

      

      

     

Viewfinder links:

      

Ray Anthony          

Beastie Boys        

Garth Brooks         

Nat "King" Cole      

Neil Diamond          

Judy Garland          

The Inner Sleeve        

The Kingston Trio        

Peggy Lee     

Paul McCartney      

Katy Perry          

Record Labels       

Frank Sinatra      

Ringo Starr         

Tina Turner        

Brian Wilson         

     

Net links:

     

Atlas Obscura ~ Capitol Records Building Morse Code      

Moses Avalon ~ Capitol Records Building goes condo          

Phaidon ~ California Captured - The Capitol Records Building        

Slipped Disc ~ Capitol Records Tower is no more     

Totally LA ~ The Iconic Capitol Records Building     

udiscovermusic ~ In Celebration of Capitol Records     

Ted VanCleave ~ Capitol Records Gallery     

     

YouTube links:

      

The Capitol Tower Opens  (1956)       

The Capitol Tower (1958)       

The Capitol Records Building, Hollywood   

Inside Capitol Records Tower      

     

     

     

     

     

     

 

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

Styrous® ~ Tuesday, April 6, 2021   

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Oscar Brand ~ A man of varied tastes

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Oscar Brand - ca. late 70’s - early 80’s

photo by Nicole Bengiveno /New York Times

 

 

Today is the birthday of Oscar Brand, a Canadian-born American folk singer-songwriter and author with a career spanning 70 years. He composed at least 300 songs and released nearly 100 albums, among them Canadian and American patriotic songs. Brand's music ran the gamut from novelty songs to serious social commentary and spanned a number of genres from folk music to Doris Day to Ella Fitzgerald.    

 

His music was not for everyone. You had to be a person who loved the rich variety of the music traditions, history, language and sounds of different cultures and countries from Appalachia to Zimbabwe. He was known for composing catchy and themed folk songs.     

Brand also wrote a number of short stories. And for 70 years, he was the host of a weekly folk music show on WNYC Radio in New York City, which is credited as the longest running radio show with only one host in broadcasting history.              

Oscar Brand - 1960

WNYC Radio in New York City

 photographer unknown

 

 

He hosted the radio show Oscar Brand's Folksong Festival on Saturdays at 10:00 p.m. on WNYC-AM 820 in New York City, which ran into its 70th year. The show ran more or less continuously since its debut on December 10, 1945, making it the longest-running radio show with the same host, according to the Guinness Book of World Records. Over its run it introduced such talents to the world as Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, Woody Guthrie, Arlo Guthrie, Huddie Ledbetter, Joni Mitchell, Peter, Paul & Mary, Judy Collins, the Kingston Trio, Pete Seeger and the Weavers. In order to make sure that his radio program could not be censored he refused to be paid by WNYC for the next 70 years.          

 

 

 

Judy Collins, Oscar Brand & Gordon Lightfoot

 date & photographer unknown

 

 

He played with such legends of folk music as Lead Belly, Woody Guthrie, Josh White, Jean Ritchie, the Weavers and Pete Seeger. He wrote various books on the folk song and folk song collections, including The Ballad Mongers: Rise of the American Folk Song, Songs Of '76: A Folksinger's History Of The Revolution and Bawdy Songs & Backroom Ballads, the latter comprising four volumes (link below).   

 

Oscar Brand
 date & photographer unknown 

 

He wrote the lyrics to the song A Guy is a Guy, which was recorded by Ella Fitzgerald in 1951 and became a hit for Doris Day in (1952). His score for the 1968 Off-Broadway show, How to Steal An Election sent up the current belief that charisma would help a candidate win. You think?           

 

 

 

 Oscar Brand

date & photographer unknown 

 

 

Oscar Brand was born to a Jewish family in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. His father was a Romanian-born flooring contractor, Isidore Brand. His mother was named Beatrice. In 1927, the family moved to Minneapolis, then to Chicago and ultimately to New York City. As a young man, Brand lived in Borough Park, Brooklyn and graduated from Erasmus Hall High School and later from Brooklyn College with a BS in psychology.         

 

Although Brand was anti-Stalinist and was never a member of any Communist party, the House Committee on Un-American Activities referred to his show as a "pipeline of communism", because of his belief in the rights under the First Amendment of blacklisted artists to have a platform to reach the public. Accordingly, in June 1950, Brand was named in the premier issue of Red Channels as a Communist sympathizer, along with Paul Robeson, Josh White and Pete Seeger. A few years before Mr. Brand was targeted by Red Channels, he had been accused of playing Nazi music by Mayor Fiorello H. La Guardia, whose third and last term was ending around the time Brand’s radio career was beginning. Called to the mayor’s office, Brand explained that the German songs he had played were actually centuries old. As pleased as the mayor was to hear that Nazis had not infiltrated the municipal radio station, he was even more delighted to learn that Mr. Brand worked without pay.      

While Brand was not as well-known or radical an activist as some of his contemporaries, he was a long-standing supporter of civil rights. He told stories of buying food for Leadbelly when the two traveled together in segregated areas, and participated in the 1965 Selma to Montgomery marches.        

       

Brand was given the Peabody Award for broadcast excellence in 1982 for his broadcast The Sunday Show on National Public Radio, and was awarded the Personal Peabody Award in 1995 which he shared with Oprah Winfrey.      

 

On February 7, 2010, CBC Radio Sunday Edition celebrated Brand's life on the occasion of his 90th birthday.

Oscar Brand died of pneumonia on September 30, 2016, at his home in Great Neck, New York. He was 96 years old.        

On June 25, 2019, The New York Times Magazine listed Brand among hundreds of artists whose material was reportedly destroyed in the 2008 Universal fire (link below).             

     

      

     

Viewfinder links:

      

2008 Universal fire         

Joan Baez        

Bawdy Songs & Backroom Ballads Vol 2        

Oscar Brand     

Judy Collins     

Doris Day      

Ella Fitzgerald      

Woody Guthrie      

The Kingston Trio      

Lead Belly (Huddie Ledbetter)      

Joni Mitchell        

Peter, Paul & Mary       

Paul Robeson        

Pete Seeger         

The Weavers       

Oprah Winfrey      

     

Net links:

      

Billboard ~ Oscar Brand, 'Radio Host, Dies at 96      

Oscar Brand discography         

NY Times ~ Oscar Brand, Folk Singer, Dies at 96          

Vintage Music FM ~ Oscar Brand       

Washington Post ~ Oscar Brand, folk troubadour, dies at 96    

WNYC ~ Oscar Brand     

     

YouTube links:

      

Oscar Brand ~ Bawdy Songs         

Doris Day ~ A Guy is A Guy      

Ella Fitzgerald ~ A Guy is A Guy            

      

     

     

     

     

     

     

Styrous® ~ Sunday, February 7, 2021   

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Beemer memory 32: Biker days, Enrico Banducci & a hungri i

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The hungry i 

date & photographer unknown 

 

About this time every year I remember January of 1980, the last days of my dancing career at the hungry i nightclub on Broadway in San Francisco, more about this below.       

 

When the hungry i opened in 1950 it played a major role in the history of stand-up comedy and music in the US. It was launched by Eric "Big Daddy" Nord, who sold it to Enrico Banducci in 1951; Banducci also owned Finocchio's Club, an upscale nightclub where famous people, movie and stage celebrities, politicians, etc., came to see the drag shows staged there.   

       

Enrico Banducci - 1969 

photographer unknown

 

 

In its heyday the hungry i featured comedy and folk and other music, with acts such as Maya Angelou (as a Caribbean singer, early in her career), Woody Allen, Malcolm Boyd, Lenny Bruce, Godfrey Cambridge, Dick Cavett, Professor Irwin Corey, Bill Cosby, the Gateway Singers, Vince Guaraldi, The Kingston Trio, Tom Lehrer, The Limeliters, John Phillips (of The Mamas & the Papas led the house band), The Journeymen), Mort Sahl, Ronnie Schell, Barbara Streisand, Jackie Vernon, We Five, Jonathan Winters, and Glenn Yarborough, among others.           

A young Barbra Streisand begged Banducci for a single night at his nightclub, insisting that she would soon be a huge star. Banducci agreed to sign the singer, who had never performed professionally but was soon starring in I Can Get It for You Wholesale on Broadway. The resulting concerts (March–April 1963) were well-attended, giving Streisand nationwide acclaim.      

The hungry i moved to Ghiradelli Square in 1967, where it was primarily a rock venue; it closed there in 1970. When it opened in a new location at 546 Broadway at the corner of Romolo Place in the North Beach neighborhood of San Francisco, it became a strip club.   

 

It would be six or so years later, during my early biker days, that I found myself dancing there. It's hard to believe this was over forty years ago.        

         

The hungry i is where I danced with Pillow, long past its glory days, it became our home base. But we also danced at the Roaring Twenties (where the first of the Dirty Harry series with Clint Eastwood was filmed), Big Al's, the Mabuhay Gardens (when punk bands weren't performing) The Garden of Eden and the On Broadway on the corner of Columbus and Broadway.  

 

I will never forget my time at the hungry i as it was an intrinsic part of my early biker days; I have so many wonderful tales from those days (link below); some I can and will retell; others I cannot and will not. I miss those days but their memories bring me great joy!       

 

The hungry i is still there. The barkers are still hawking on the sidewalk in front and the girls are still doing their thing inside.            

         

 

Viewfinder links:       
               

Joan Baez         

Lenny Bruce          

Bill Cosby         

Clint Eastwood        

hungry i articles       

The Kingston Trio         

The Mamas & the Papas        

John Phillips         
Pillow (She-Beast)       

Barbra Streisand          
Styrous®                

Jonathan Winters          
     

Net links:                    
      

MisterSF ~ Farewell Favorites: hungry i      
   
     
YouTube links:       
     
Hungry i Club, San Francisco - Video Tour     
                  
    
   
     

“Life moves on but memories linger.“
                           ~ Styrous®

     
     
      

Styrous® ~ Tuesday, Jamuary 1, 2021            

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Beemer Memories 
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101 Reel-to-Reel Tapes 35: Joan Baez ~ Farewell, Angelina & goodbye, Pete Seeger

Joan Baez ~ Farewell, Angelina
reel-to-reel label detail

detail photo by Styrous®

Pete Seegar died three days ago. I was sad when I heard the news and the memories of listening to him singing with The Weavers in the 50's flooded back into my mind. I wanted to do a blog entry tribute to him but when I started thinking about the hundreds of songs he'd written I got bogged down and couldn't focus. Which of those songs would I talk about? It's taken me three days to finally decide and it boiled down to one. 

I came to the conclusion that my favorite of all those beautiful and meaningful songs he wrote is the 1960 tune, Where Have All the Flowers Gone?, a sad, quietly bewailing but beautiful protest song. So, now I could start; however, I knew the song but which version? There have been so many great interpretations, which was the best? And what determines what 'best' is. The Kingston Trio did an early, beautiful rendition in 1962. Peter, Paul and Mary did their's. Richie Havens had his turn in 1972, Bobby Darin, Roy Orbison and Eddy Arnold, all took a swing at it. Johnny Rivers came up with an easy rock version; Wes Montgomery did a jazz version; Earth Wind & Fire did a soul version and the list goes on and on. It's been sung in almost every language in the world, Italian, Croatian, Polish, Czech, Chinese, etc.

Marlene Dietrich sang the song in English, French and German. This triggered my memory and I recalled that Joan Baez sang it in German as well. And I realized that of all the variations I've heard, my favorite is her interpretation, Sagt Mir Wo Die Blumen Sind, from the album, Farewell, Angelina; I have the vinyl LP version as well as the reel-to-reel tape. Her voice is beautiful in its gentle protest; it swells and uplifts in flights of wistful dreaming. It's absolutely lovely.

So, Joan is my representative for this tribute to Pete Seegar. After the photos, there is more about Seeger and there are links to music videos at the end of this article.  

Joan Baez ~ Farewell, Angelina
cover photo by Richard Avedon

photo of reel-to-reel box cover by Styrous®

 Joan Baez ~ Farewell, Angelina
reel-to-reel tape box back

photo by Styrous®

 Joan Baez ~ Farewell, Angelina
reel-to-reel tape box back detail

detail photo by Styrous®

 Joan Baez ~ Farewell, Angelina
reel-to-reel tape

photo by Styrous®

Joan Baez ~ Farewell, Angelina
reel-to-reel label detail

detail photo by Styrous®

bit of a bio

Pete Seeger was born on May 3, 1919, at the Midtown Manhattan French Hospital, in New York City, New York. During the summer of 1936, while traveling with his father and stepmother, Seeger heard the five-string banjo for the first time at the Mountain Dance and Folk Festival in western North Carolina near Asheville; it was during this festival he also discovered square-dance and family string bands, including a group of Indians from the Cherokee reservation who played string instruments and sang ballads.

In 1936, at the age of 17, Seeger joined the Young Communist League (YCL) but eventually "drifted away" (his words) from the Party in the late 1940s and 1950s.

In 1939, Seeger took a job in Washington, D.C., assisting Alan Lomax, a friend of his father's, at the Archive of American Folk Song of the Library of Congress. His job was to help Lomax sift through commercial "race" and "hillbilly" music and select recordings that best represented American folk music, a project funded by the music division of the Pan American Union (later the Organization of American States). Lomax encouraged Seeger's folk singing vocation, and Seeger was soon appearing as a regular performer on Alan Lomax and Nicholas Ray's weekly Columbia Broadcasting show Back Where I Come From (1940–41) alongside of Josh White, Burl Ives, Lead Belly, and Woody Guthrie.

In the spring of 1941, the twenty-one-year-old Seeger performed as a member of the Almanac Singers along with Millard Lampell, Cisco Houston, Woody Guthrie, Butch and Bess Lomax Hawes, and Lee Hays. Seeger and the Almanacs cut several albums of 78s on Keynote and other labels, Songs for John Doe (recorded in late February or March and released in May 1941). During the Communist fear panic, copies of Songs for John Doe were removed from sale, and the remaining inventory destroyed, though a few copies may exist in the hands of private collectors.

He sang on radio in the 1940's and was a member of The Weavers in the 1950's. Their recording of Goodnight, Irene, by Lead Belly, topped the charts for 13 weeks in 1950.

His songs include: Where Have All the Flowers Gone?, If I Had a Hammer (The Hammer Song), Turn! Turn! Turn! (lyrics adapted from Ecclesiastes) which was covered by the Byrds, We Shall Overcome (also recorded by Joan Baez), and so many, many others. Link to his discography below.

Pete Seeger was 94 when he died peacefully in his sleep around 9:30 p.m., on January 27, 2014, at New York's Presbyterian Hospital. According to his grandson, Kitama Cahill-Jackson, Seeger was still as active as ever, out chopping wood ten days prior to his death.

Track listing:

Side 1:

1. "Farewell, Angelina" (Bob Dylan) – 3:13
2. "Daddy, You Been on My Mind" (Bob Dylan) – 2:15
3. "It's All Over Now, Baby Blue" (Bob Dylan) – 3:21
4. "The Wild Mountain Thyme" (Traditional, arranged Francis McPeake Family) – 4:34
5. "Ranger's Command" (Woody Guthrie) – 3:13
6. "Colours" (Donovan Leitch) – 3:02

Side 2: 

1. "Satisfied Mind" (Joe "Red" Hayes, Jack Rhodes) – 3:22
2. "The River in the Pines" (Traditional) – 3:33
3. "Pauvre Ruteboeuf" ("Poor Ruteboeuf") (Léo Ferré, Ruteboeuf) – 3:28
4. "Sagt Mir wo die Blumen sind" ("Where Have All the Flowers Gone?") (Pete Seeger) – 4:00
5. "A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall" (Bob Dylan) – 7:36

Personnel:

• Joan Baez – vocals, guitar
• Bruce Langhorne – electric guitar (2, 3, 6, 7, 11)
• Ralph Rinzler – mandolin (7)
• Richard Romoff – string bass (4, 10)
• Russ Savakus – bass
• Producer: Maynard Solomon 

Vanguard - VTC 1707

Links to videos:

The Weavers: Wasn't That a Time! the complete film on YouTube

The Weavers: Wasn't That a Time!  DVD on PBS

Where Have All the Flowers Gone? links:
       Pete Seeger singing A cappela on YouTube 
       Pete Seeger in concert on YouTube
       Joan Baez - Sagt Mir Wo Die Blumen Sind on YouTube 
       Joan Baez in concert in English on YouTube 
       The Kingston Trio on YouTube

       Peter, Paul and Mary on YouTube
       Peter, Paul and Mary concert version on YouTube
       Marlene Dietrich on YouTube
       Johnny Rivers on YouTube    
       Earth Wind & Fire on YouTube

link to Pete Seeger discography

Where Have All the Flowers Gone? is a timeless, borderless song that has no category and will live as long as there is war, poverty and saddness in the world.

"Oh, when will they ever learn?"

                          - Pete Seeger (May 3, 1919 – January 27, 2014)

Styrous® ~ Thursday, January 30, 2014

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