Showing posts with label Yul Brynner. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Yul Brynner. Show all posts
November 5, 2020
September 30, 2018
20,000 Vinyl LPs 150: The King and I ~ when Deborah danced
~
Today, September 30, is the birthday of Deborah Jane Kerr-Trimmer, known professionally as Deborah Kerr, who was born in 1921. She was a Scottish film, theatre and television actress who won a Golden Globe Award for her performance as Anna Leonowens in the 1956 musical film, The King and I.
The King and I soundtrack
vinyl LP album cover detail
detail photo of album cover by Styrous®
The film is a beautiful study in fashion history (link below).When Sharaff made use of silks from Thailand for stage production of The King and I (1951), she created a trend in fashion and interior decoration. The costumes are the biggest reason this film was the second costliest film in 20th century fox history, which cost four and a half million dollars. Sharaff won best costume design for The King and I and it was she who advised Brynner to shave his head for his role as the King of Siam.
photographer & date unknown
The music by Richard Rodgers with lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II is brilliant but of course, I have favorites. One is the song for the above scene, Shall We Dance? (link below). But my very favorite is Something Wonderful (link below) which is sung by Terry Saunders who portrays Lady Thiang, the wife of the King. It is a poignant paean to deep love for an imperfect lover; it is achingly passionate and beautiful.
Saunders had understudied the role of Lady Thiang in the Broadway production and in 1952 had taken over the role when it was vacant.
Something Wonderful has been covered by the best: Bing Crosby, Doris Day, Carmen McRae, Nina Simone, Shirley Bassey, Barbra Streisand, Carly Simon, Liza Minnelli, Bernadette Peters and probably many others.
The King and I soundtrack
vinyl LP album back cover detail
detail photo of album cover by Styrous®
While it's beautiful, but not my favorite, I've always thought Hello, Young Lovers is an interesting song on several levels. In it, Anna (Kerr) sings of her dead husband as well as surreptitiously telling two young star-crossed lovers, Lun Tha (Carlos Rivas) and Tuptim (Rita Moreno), that all will end well. That doesn't happen but, oh, well, whoever said life was fair.
Marni Nixon actually sang the vocals for Kerr in the film. Nixon was an American soprano and ghost singer for many actresses in movie musicals. In addition to The King and I, she is now well-known as the real singing voices in West Side Story, and My Fair Lady, although this was concealed at the time from audiences. In 1950, Nixon married Ernest Gold who composed the theme song to the movie Exodus.
top photo: Terry Saunders (Lady Thiang )
bottom photo:
Carlos Rivas (Lun Tha) left &
Rita Moreno (Tuptim) right
The King and I soundtrack
bottom photo:
Carlos Rivas (Lun Tha) left &
Rita Moreno (Tuptim) right
The King and I soundtrack
vinyl LP album back cover detail
detail photo of album cover by Styrous®
Moreno disliked most of her film work during this period as she felt
the roles she was given were stereotypical. The one exception was her
supporting role of Tuptim in this film version of The King and I.
The King and I film poster
The King and I soundtrack
vinyl LP album cover
photo of album cover by Styrous®
This album was released at the time the film was, 1956; stereo recordings were new so albums were releast in stereo as well as mono, this origianl issue is a mono High Fidelity recording.
Deborah Kerr was born in Glasgow, Scotland. Her first stage appearance was at Weston-super-Mare in 1937, as "Harlequin" in the mime play Harlequin and Columbine. She then went to the Sadler's Wells ballet school and in 1938 made her début in the corps de ballet in Prometheus. After various walk-on parts in Shakespeare productions at the Open-Air Theatre in Regent's Park, London, she joined the Oxford Playhouse repertory company in 1940, playing, inter alia, "Margaret" in Dear Brutus and "Patty Moss" in The Two Bouquets.
In 1943, aged 21, she made her West End début as "Ellie Dunn" in a revival of Heartbreak House at the Cambridge Theatre, stealing attention from stalwarts such as Edith Evans and Isabel Jeans. "She has the rare gift", wrote critic Beverley Baxter, "of thinking her lines, not merely remembering them. The process of development from a romantic, silly girl to a hard, disillusioned woman in three hours was moving and convincing".
She made clear that her surname should be pronounced the same as "car". To avoid confusion over pronunciation, Louis B. Mayer of MGM billed her as "Kerr rhymes with Star!"
photo of album back cover by Styrous®
She made her Broadway debut in 1953, appearing in the Robert Anderson play, Tea and Sympathy, for which she received a Tony Award nomination. Kerr repeated her role along with her stage partner John Kerr (no relation) in the Vincente Minnelli film adaptation of the drama.
She departed from typecasting with a performance that brought out her sensuality, as "Karen Holmes", the embittered military wife in the Fred Zinnemann film, From Here to Eternity (1953), for which she received an Oscar nomination for Best Actress. The American Film Institute acknowledged the iconic status of the scene from that film in which Burt Lancaster and she romped illicitly and passionately amidst crashing waves on a Hawaiian beach. The organisation ranked it 20th in its list of the 100 most romantic films of all time.
In 1955, Kerr won the Sarah Siddons Award. she experienced a career resurgence when she played the role of the nurse, played by Elsa Lanchester in the 1957 movie, Witness for the Prosecution, on television in the early 1980s. Later, Kerr rejoined screen partner Robert Mitchum in Reunion at Fairborough. She also took on the role of the older Emma Harte, a tycoon, in the adaptation of A Woman of Substance by Barbara Taylor Bradford. For this performance, Kerr was nominated for an Emmy Award.
She departed from typecasting with a performance that brought out her sensuality, as "Karen Holmes", the embittered military wife in the Fred Zinnemann film, From Here to Eternity (1953), for which she received an Oscar nomination for Best Actress. The American Film Institute acknowledged the iconic status of the scene from that film in which Burt Lancaster and she romped illicitly and passionately amidst crashing waves on a Hawaiian beach. The organisation ranked it 20th in its list of the 100 most romantic films of all time.
In 1955, Kerr won the Sarah Siddons Award. she experienced a career resurgence when she played the role of the nurse, played by Elsa Lanchester in the 1957 movie, Witness for the Prosecution, on television in the early 1980s. Later, Kerr rejoined screen partner Robert Mitchum in Reunion at Fairborough. She also took on the role of the older Emma Harte, a tycoon, in the adaptation of A Woman of Substance by Barbara Taylor Bradford. For this performance, Kerr was nominated for an Emmy Award.
1709 Vine Street, Los Angeles, California
Deborah Kerr was nominated six times for the Academy Award for Best Actress, more than any other actress without ever winning. In 1994, however, having already received honorary awards from the Cannes Film Festival and BAFTA, she received an Academy Honorary Award with a citation recognising her as "an artist of impeccable grace and beauty, a dedicated actress whose motion picture career has always stood for perfection, discipline and elegance". She was the ultimate 'Lady'.
She won a Golden Globe Award for "Best Actress – Motion Picture Musical or Comedy" for The King and I in 1957 and a Henrietta Award for "World Film Favorite – Female". She was the first performer to win the New York Film Critics Circle Award for "Best Actress" three times (1947, 1957 and 1960).
Kerr was made a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in 1998, but was unable to accept the honour in person because of ill health.
Deborah Kerr died, aged 86, on the 16th of October, 2007, at Botesdale, a village in county of Suffolk, England, from the effects of Parkinson's disease.
photo by Styrous®
photo by Styrous®
Tracklist:
Side 1:
A1 - Overture
A2 - I Whistle A Happy Tune
A3 - My Lord And Master
A4 - Hello, Young Lovers
A5 - The March Of Siamese Children
A6 - A Puzzlement
Side 2:
B1 - Getting To Know You
B2 - We Kiss In A Shadow
B3 - I Have Dreamed
B4 - Shall I Tell You What I Think Of You?
B5 - Something Wonderful
B6 - Song Of The King
B7 - Shall We Dance?
B8 - Something Wonderful (Finale)
Companies, etc.
Copyright (c) – Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation
Credits:
- Vocals [Anna Leonowens] – Deborah Kerr
- Vocals [Lady Thiang] – Terry Saunders
- Vocals [Lun Tha] – Carlos Rivas
- Vocals [The King] – Yul Brynner
- Vocals [Tuptim] – Rita Moreno
Directed By – Walter Lang
Executive-Producer – Charles Brackett
Featuring – Carlos Rivas, Deborah Kerr, Rita Moreno, Terry Saunders, Yul Brynner
Lyrics By – Oscar Hammerstein II
Music By – Richard Rodgers
Musical Assistance – Ken Darby
Screenwriter – Ernest Lehman
Rodgers And Hammerstein* – The King and I
Label: Capitol Records – W-740
Format: Vinyl, LP, Album, Mono
Country: US
Released: 1956
Genre: Stage & Screen
Style: Musical
Viewfinder links:
Yul Brynner
Golden Globe Award
Deborah Kerr
Rita Moreno
Something Wonderful lyrics
Net links:
Devorah Kerr Filmography
The King and I ~
Plot
Cast
Wonderful World of Cinema ~
Irene Sharaff’s Costumes for The King and I
Fashion & Film ~ The King & I (1956)
YouTube links:
Shall We Dance?
Something Wonderful
The King And I Trailer
"It's [acting] an unbelievable terror, a kind of masochistic madness.
March 24, 2018
Raymond Scott & his Electronium
Composer, bandleader and inventor Raymond Scott was among the unheralded pioneers of contemporary experimental music.
His music is familiar to millions because Carl Stalling adapted it in over 120 classic Bugs Bunny, Porky Pig, Daffy Duck, and other Warner Bros. Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies animated shorts.
Of all of Scott's accomplishments, however, none was more important than the Electronium, one of the first synthesizers ever created in 1949. An "instantaneous composing machine," the Electronium generated original music via random sequences of tones, rhythms, and timbres; Scott himself denied it was a prototype synthesizer — it had no keyboard — but as one of the first machines to create music by means of artificial intelligence, its importance in pointing the way towards the electonic compositions of the future is undeniable. His other inventions included the "Karloff," an early sampler capable of recreating sounds ranging from sizzling steaks to jungle drums; the Clavinox, a keyboard Theremin complete with an electronic sub-assembly designed by a then 23-year-old Robert Moog; and the Videola, which fused together a keyboard and a TV screen to aid in composing music for films and other moving images.
Raymond Scott in his studio
photographer unknown
Devo founding member Mark Mothersbaugh purchased Scott's only (non-functioning) Electronium in 1996, with the intention of restoring it to working order. In November 2012, the restoration team was able to get the Electronium running and producing basic sounds.
Mark Mothersbaugh - 1996
photographer unknown
Scott was born in Brooklyn, New York, on September 10, 1908. His real name was Harry Warnow. His brother, Mark Warnow, a conductor, violinist, and musical director for the CBS radio program Your Hit Parade, encouraged his musical career.
He was a 1931 graduate of the Juilliard School of Music,
where he studied piano, theory and composition. Scott, under his birth
name, began his professional career as a pianist for the CBS Radio house band. His older (by eight years) brother Mark conducted the orchestra. Harry reportedly adopted the pseudonym "Raymond Scott" to spare his brother charges of nepotism when the orchestra began performing the pianist's idiosyncratic compositions.
In late 1936, Scott recruited a band from among his CBS colleagues,
calling it the "Raymond Scott Quintette." It was a six-piece group, but Scott thought Quintette (his spelling) sounded
"crisper"; he also told a reporter that he feared "calling it a 'sextet'
might get your mind off music." The original sidemen were Pete Pumiglio
(clarinet); Bunny Berigan (trumpet, soon replaced by Dave Wade); Louis Shoobe (upright bass); Dave Harris (tenor sax); and Johnny Williams (father of the film composer) on drums. They made their first recordings in New York on February 20, 1937, for the Master Records label, owned by music publisher/impresario Irving Mills (who was also the manager of Duke Ellington).
The Quintette represented Scott's attempt to revitalize Swing music through tight, busy arrangements and reduced reliance on improvisation.
He called this musical style "descriptive jazz," and gave his works
unusual titles like New Year's Eve in a Haunted House, Dinner Music
for a Pack of Hungry Cannibals (recorded by the Kronos Quartet in 1993), and Bumpy Weather Over Newark. There is a great video of his War Dance For Wooden Indians on YouTube (link below). While popular with the public, jazz
critics disdained it as novelty music. Besides being a prominent figure
in recording studios and on radio and concert stages, Scott wrote and
was widely interviewed about his sometimes controversial music theories
for the leading music publications of the day, including Down Beat, Metronome, and Billboard.
After serving as CBS radio music director for a number of variety programs (such as Broadway Bandbox) from 1942 to 1944, Scott left the network to pursue other projects. He composed and arranged music (with lyrics by Bernie Hanighen) for the 1946 Broadway musical, Lute Song, which was based on the 14th-century Chinese play Tale of the Pipa (Pi-Pa-Ji) by Gao Ming, and starred Mary Martin and Yul Brynner.
Lute Song publicity still
In 1950 Scott composed his first—and only known—"serious" (classical) work, entitled Suite for Violin and Piano. The five-movement suite was performed at Carnegie Hall on February 7, 1950, by violinist Arnold Eidus and pianist Carlo Bussotti (link below).
By the middle of the 1960s, Scott began turning increasingly away
from recording and performing to focus on writing and inventing; a 1969
musical celebrating the centennial of Kentucky Bourbon was his last
orchestral work, with his remaining years spent solely on electronic
composition. Among his latter-day innovations was an early programmable
polyphonic sequencer, which along with the Electronium later caught the
attention of Motown chief Berry Gordy Jr., who in 1971 tapped Scott to
head the label's electronic music research and development team. After
retiring six years later, he continued writing — his last known piece,
1986's Beautiful Little Butterfly, was created on MIDI technology.
During the second half of the 1960s, as his work progressed, Scott
became increasingly isolated and secretive about his inventions and
concepts; he gave few interviews, made no public presentations, and
released no records. In 1966-67, Scott (under the screen credit "Ramond
Scott") composed and recorded electronic music soundtracks for some
early experimental films by Muppets impresario Jim Henson.
In 1969, Motown Records impresario Berry Gordy, tipped off about a mad musical scientist engaged in mysterious works, visited Scott at his Long Island labs to witness the Electronium in action. Impressed by the infinite possibilities, Gordy hired Scott in 1971 to serve as director of the Motown
electronic music and research department in Los Angeles, a position
Scott held until 1977. No Motown recordings using Scott's electronic
inventions have yet been publicly identified.
Berry Gordy in Motown studio, 1960s
photographer unknown
Largely forgotten by the public by the 1980s, Scott suffered a major stroke in 1987 that left him unable to work or engage in conversation. He died on February 8, 1994, in North Hills, Los Angeles, California; he was 85 years old.
His legacy underwent a revival in the early 1990s after Irwin Chusid discovered a vast collection of unreleased recordings of rehearsals and studio sessions. In 1992, the release of Reckless Nights and Turkish Twilights on Columbia produced by Irwin Chusid (with Hal Willner as executive producer) was the first major-label CD compilation of his groundbreaking 1937–39 six-man quintet. A year earlier, Irwin Chusid and Will Friedwald produced a CD of live Scott quintet broadcasts titled The Man Who Made Cartoons Swing for the Stash label. Around this time, the director of The Ren & Stimpy Show, John Kricfalusi, began hot-wiring his cartoon episodes with original Scott quintet recordings. In the late-1990s, The Beau Hunks (a Dutch ensemble originally formed to perform music created by Leroy Shield for the Laurel and Hardy movies) released two albums of Scott's sextet (a.k.a. "Quintette") repertoire, Celebration on the Planet Mars and Manhattan Minuet (both released on Basta Audio-Visuals).
Viewfinder links:
Duke Ellington
King Crimson & "Boz" Burrell
Kronos Quartet
Net links:
Raymond Scott website
Raymond Scott blog
Discography (LP and CD)
NY times ~
Beethoven Sonata and Scott Novelty at Carnegie Hall
Boing Boing ~ Raymond Scott: The First 100 Years
University of Missouri ~ Raymond Scott Collection
San Diego Reader ~
Carl Stalling & Raymond Scott: composers of Looney Tunes music
Weirdo Music ~ Raymond Scott: Soothing Sounds For Baby
NY Times ~ Raymond Scott, 85, Composer For Cartoons and Stage, Dies
YouTube links:
Raymond Scott -
Twilight in Turkey
Cindy Electronium (1959)
Ectoplasm (1957)
Happy Birthday To You - 1940
The Raymond Scott Quintette -
War Dance For Wooden Indians
Ali Baba Goes to Town - 1937
Suicide Cliff
Manhattan Minuet - 1939
Mark Mothersbaugh & Raymond Scott's Motown Electronium
Styrous® ~ Saturday, March 24, 2018
San Diego Reader ~
Carl Stalling & Raymond Scott: composers of Looney Tunes music
Weirdo Music ~ Raymond Scott: Soothing Sounds For Baby
NY Times ~ Raymond Scott, 85, Composer For Cartoons and Stage, Dies
YouTube links:
Raymond Scott -
Twilight in Turkey
Cindy Electronium (1959)
Ectoplasm (1957)
Happy Birthday To You - 1940
The Raymond Scott Quintette -
War Dance For Wooden Indians
Ali Baba Goes to Town - 1937
Suicide Cliff
Manhattan Minuet - 1939
Mark Mothersbaugh & Raymond Scott's Motown Electronium
Styrous® ~ Saturday, March 24, 2018
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