Frank Beacham's Journal

Gordon Parks' American Gothic

American Gothic, Washington, D.C., 1942

Photo by Gordon Parks

Gordon Parks was born 108 years ago today

Gordon Parks shoots some personal shots on the streets of Honolulu in December, 1983

Photo by Frank Beacham

Gordon Parks was born 108 years ago today.

Parks was a photographer, musician, writer and film director. He is best remembered for his photographic essays for Life magazine and as the director of the 1971 film, Shaft.

Born in Fort Scott, Kansas, Parks was the son of Sarah and Jackson Parks. He was the last child born to them. His father was a farmer who grew corn, beets, turnips, potatoes, collard greens and tomatoes. They also had a few ducks, chickens and hogs.

Parks attended a segregated elementary school. The town was too small to afford a separate high school that would facilitate segregation of the secondary school, but blacks were not allowed to play sports or attend school social activities. Blacks were also discouraged from developing any aspirations for higher education.

Parks related in a documentary on his life that his teacher told him that his desire to go to college would be a waste of money. When Parks was eleven years old, three white boys threw him into the Marmaton River, knowing he couldn't swim. He had the presence of mind to duck underwater so they wouldn't see him make it to land.

His mother died when he was fourteen. He spent his last night at the family home sleeping beside his mother's coffin, seeking not only solace, but a way to face his own fear of death. At this time, he left home, being sent to live with other relatives. That situation ended with Parks being turned out onto the street to fend for himself.

In 1929, Parks briefly worked in a gentlemen's club, the Minnesota Club. There he not only observed the trappings of success, but was able to read many books from the club library. When the Wall Street Crash of 1929 brought an end to the club, he jumped a train to Chicago, where he managed to land a job in a flophouse.

At the age of twenty-five, Parks was struck by photographs of migrant workers in a magazine and bought his first camera, a Voigtländer Brillant, for $12.50 at a pawnshop in Seattle, Washington.

The photography clerks who developed Parks' first roll of film, applauded his work and prompted him to seek a fashion assignment at a women's clothing store in St. Paul, Minnesota, that was owned by Frank Murphy.

Those photographs caught the eye of Marva Louis, the elegant wife of heavyweight boxing champion, Joe Louis. She encouraged Parks to move to Chicago in 1940, where he began a portrait business and specialized in photographs of society women.

Over the next few years, Parks moved from job to job, developing a freelance portrait and fashion photographer sideline. He began to chronicle the city's South Side black ghetto and, in 1941, an exhibition of those photographs won Parks a photography fellowship with the Farm Security Administration (FSA).

Working as a trainee under Roy Stryker, Parks created one of his best-known photographs, American Gothic, Washington, D.C. named after the iconic Grant Wood painting, American Gothic.

The photograph shows a black woman, Ella Watson, who worked on the cleaning crew of the FSA building, standing stiffly in front of an American flag hanging on the wall, a broom in one hand and a mop in the background. Parks had been inspired to create the image after encountering racism repeatedly in restaurants and shops in the segregated capitol city.

A later photograph in the FSA series by Parks shows Ella Watson and her family.

Upon viewing the photograph, Stryker said that it was an indictment of America, and that it could get all of his photographers fired. He urged Parks to keep working with Watson, however, which led to a series of photographs of her daily life.

Parks said later that his first image was overdone and not subtle. Other commentators have argued that it drew strength from its polemical nature and its duality of victim and survivor, and so has affected far more people than his subsequent pictures of Mrs. Watson. After the FSA disbanded, Parks remained in Washington, D.C. as a correspondent with the Office of War Information. Disgusted with the prejudice he encountered, he resigned in 1944.

Moving to Harlem, Parks became a freelance fashion photographer for Vogue. He later followed Stryker to the Standard Oil Photography Project in New Jersey, which assigned photographers to take pictures of small towns and industrial centers.

The most striking work by Parks during that period included, Dinner Time at Mr. Hercules Brown's Home, Somerville, Maine (1944); Grease Plant Worker, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania (1946); Car Loaded with Furniture on Highway (1945); and Ferry Commuters, Staten Island, N.Y. (1946).

Parks renewed his search for photography jobs in the fashion world. Despite racist attitudes of the day, the Vogue editor, Alexander Liberman, hired him to shoot a collection of evening gowns.

Parks photographed fashion for Vogue for the next few years and he developed the distinctive style of photographing his models in motion rather than poised. During this time, he published his first two books, Flash Photography (1947) and Camera Portraits: Techniques and Principles of Documentary Portraiture (1948).

A 1948 photographic essay on a young Harlem gang leader won Parks a staff job as a photographer and writer with Life magazine. For twenty years, Parks produced photographs on subjects including fashion, sports, Broadway, poverty and racial segregation, as well as portraits of Malcolm X, Stokely Carmichael, Muhammad Ali and Barbra Streisand.

He became one of the most provocative and celebrated photojournalists in the United States. In the 1950s, Parks worked as a consultant on various Hollywood productions. He later directed a series of documentaries on black ghetto life that were commissioned by National Educational Television.

With his film adaptation of his autobiographical novel, The Learning Tree in 1969, Parks became Hollywood's first major black director. It was filmed in his home town of Fort Scott, Kansas. Parks also wrote the screenplay and composed the musical score for the film.

Shaft, a 1971 detective film by Parks starring Richard Roundtree, became a major hit that spawned a series of films that would be labeled as, blaxploitation. Parks' feel for settings was confirmed by Shaft, with its portrayal of the super-cool leather-clad, black private detective hired to find the kidnapped daughter of a Harlem racketeer.

Parks also directed the 1972 sequel, Shaft's Big Score, in which the protagonist finds himself caught in the middle of rival gangs of racketeers. Parks's other directorial credits include The Super Cops (1974) and Leadbelly (1976), a biopic of the blues musician, Huddie Ledbetter.

In the 1980s, he made several films for television and composed the music and a libretto for Martin, a ballet tribute to Martin Luther King, Jr., which premiered in Washington, D.C. during 1989. It was screened on national television on King's birthday in 1990.

In 2000, as an homage, he had a cameo appearance in the Shaft sequel that starred Samuel L. Jackson in the title role as the namesake and nephew of the original John Shaft. In the cameo scene, Parks was sitting playing chess when Jackson greeted him as, "Mr. P." His first job was as a piano player in a brothel when he was a teenager. Parks also performed as a jazz pianist.

His song "No Love," composed in another brothel, was performed during a national radio broadcast by Larry Funk and his orchestra in the early 1930s. Parks composed Concerto for Piano and Orchestra (1953) at the encouragement of black American conductor, Dean Dixon, and his wife Vivian, a pianist, and with the help of the composer, Henry Brant.

He completed Tree Symphony in 1967. In 1989, he composed and choreographed Martin, a ballet dedicated to Martin Luther King, Jr., the civil rights leader who had been assassinated.

Beginning in the 1960s, Parks branched out into literature, writing The Learning Tree (1963). He authored several books of poetry, which he illustrated with his own photographs, and he wrote three volumes of memoirs.

Gordon Parks received more than twenty honorary doctorates in his lifetime.
He died of cancer at the age of 93 while living in Manhattan, and is buried in his hometown of Fort Scott, Kansas.

He was profiled in the 1967 documentary, "Weapons of Gordon Parks." The film was made by American filmmaker, Warren Forma.

Gordon Parks: A Personal Remembrance

In 1983, I was one of the very few Betacam owners in the United States. Rick Smolen and David Cohen were preparing to host 50 of the world’s best photographers in Hawaii in December, 1983. They were to photograph the entire state in a single day.

In additional to publishing a book, Smolen and Cohen wanted to do a television documentary on the photo shoot. I was recommended when they called Sony to inquire about who had the new one-piece camera recorder. As a result of that call, I was hired for a dream job — one that is still hard to believe to this day.

I would not only teach some of the world’s best photographers to use the Betacam, I would shoot footage myself for the documentary. But the deal even got better. I would work with two photographic legends — Gordon Parks, who would direct, and Douglas Kirkland, who would produce the show.

Parks was already one of the world’s great photographers and filmmakers and Kirkland had been a staff photographer for both Look and Life magazines. He had become famous for his amazing 1961 photos of Marilyn Monroe.

I flew to Hawaii in late November to prepare for the big day, which would be Dec. 2, 1983. Home base was beach-front hotels in Honolulu. We began work immediately.

The easy part was teaching the photographers to use the Betacam. Most, in less than an hour, were better than the network photographers I was already working with. With this group, I learned that a great eye with one camera easily translates to another. This was world-class talent!

Gordon Parks, the legend that he was, was a real taskmaster. I did things for him I would never have done for lesser mortals. One very vivid memory was one of scariest shots of my life.

Gordon had me lay down on a runway at the Honolulu airport and shoot up as a 747 landed only a few feet above my head. It was terrifying, to say the least, but I got the shot and Gordon was pleased. That was all that mattered to me.

After that ritual, we bonded, ate together and he began telling me stories of his extraordinary life and work. This went on for an entire week. We were normally joined by Doug Kirkland, who was equally adept at storytelling. Learning from these masters was something I would never forget.

The day of the big photo shoot, I was pulled in a thousand directions. We had a fleet of 18 helicopters and my day was booked from sunrise shots early in the morning straight up until midnight. We crisscrossed Hawaii. I rolled hours of video tape on every conceivable subject.

It was exhausting, but exhilarating. On that day 64,800 still images were shot. The book had 345 of them — one including our Betacam crew.

The photo coffee table book was published as “A Day in the Life of Hawaii” and the documentary we made aired on public television for years to come.

For me, it was and remains one of the most exciting projects of my life.

Above, Gordon Parks and myself on the last day of our trip, in December, 1983

Camera crew from A Day in the Life of Hawaii

 

Brownie McGhee was born 105 years ago today

Brownie McGhee was born 105 years ago today.

McGhee was a Piedmont blues singer and guitarist, best known for his collaborations with the harmonica player, Sonny Terry.

Born in Knoxville, McGhee grew up in Kingsport, Tennessee. As a child he had polio, which incapacitated his leg. His brother, Granville "Sticks" McGhee, was nicknamed for pushing young Brownie around in a cart.

His father, George McGhee, was a factory worker known around University Avenue for playing guitar and singing. Brownie's uncle made him a guitar from a tin marshmallow box and a piece of board.

McGhee spent much of his youth immersed in music, singing with local harmony group the Golden Voices Gospel Quartet and teaching himself to play guitar. A March of Dimes-funded leg operation enabled McGhee to walk.

At age 22, Brownie McGhee became a traveling musician, working in the Rabbit Foot Minstrels and befriending, Blind Boy Fuller, whose guitar playing influenced him greatly. After Fuller's death in 1941, J. B. Long of Columbia Records had McGhee adopt his mentor's name, branding him "Blind Boy Fuller No. 2."

By that time, McGhee was recording for Columbia's subsidiary, Okeh Records, in Chicago, but his real success came after he moved to New York in 1942, when he teamed up with Sonny Terry, whom he had known since 1939 when Sonny was Blind Boy Fuller's harmonica player.

The pairing was an overnight success. As well as recording, they toured together until around 1980. As a duo, Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee did most of their work from 1958 until 1980 — spending 11 months of each year touring and recording dozens of albums.

Despite their later fame as folk artists playing for white audiences, during the 1940s Terry and McGhee also attempted to be successful black recording performers, fronting a jump blues combo with honking saxophone and rolling piano.

The pair called themselves "Brownie McGhee and his Jook House Rockers" or "Sonny Terry and his Buckshot Five," often with Champion Jack Dupree and Big Chief Ellis. They also appeared in the original Broadway productions of Finian's Rainbow and Cat on a Hot Tin Roof.

During the blues revival of the 1960s, Terry and McGhee were very popular on the concert and music festival circuits, occasionally adding new material but usually remaining faithful to their roots and their audience. With Sonny Terry, McGhee appeared in the 1979 Steve Martin comedy, The Jerk.

In 1987, McGhee gave a small but memorable performance as ill-fated blues singer Toots Sweet in the supernatural thriller movie, Angel Heart. He appeared in a 1988 episode of "Family Ties" titled, "The Blues Brother," in which he played fictional blues musician, Eddie Dupre, as well as a 1989 episode of Matlock entitled, "The Blues Singer."

Happy Traum, a former guitar student of Brownie's, edited a blues guitar instruction guide and songbook for him. Using a tape recorder, Traum had McGhee instruct and, between lessons, talk about his life and the blues.

Guitar Styles of Brownie McGhee was published in New York in 1971. The autobiographical section features Brownie talking about growing up, his musical beginnings and a history of the early blues period from the 1930s onward.

McGhee died from stomach cancer in February, 1996 in Oakland, California at age 80.

Here, Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee perform “Born and Livin’ With the Blues”

Dick Clark was born 91 years ago today

Dick Clark was born 91 years ago today.

Clark was a radio and television personality, as well as a cultural icon who hosted American television's longest-running variety show, American Bandstand, from 1957 to 1987. The show gave many new music artists their first exposure to national audiences, including Ike and Tina Turner, Smokey Robinson and the Miracles, Stevie Wonder, Talking Heads and Simon & Garfunkel.

Episodes he hosted were among the first where blacks and whites performed on the same stage and among the first where the live studio audience sat without racial segregation. Singer Paul Anka claimed that Bandstand was responsible for creating a "youth culture."

Due to his perennial youthful appearance, Clark was often referred to as "America's oldest teenager." In his capacity as a businessman, Clark served as Chief Executive Officer of Dick Clark Productions, part of which he sold off in his later years.

Clark suffered a stroke in December, 2004. With his speech ability still impaired, Clark returned to his New Year's Rockin' Eve show a year later on December 31, 2005. He appear on every New Year's Rockin' Eve show through the 2011–12 show.

Clark died on April 18, 2012 of a heart attack at age 82 following a medical procedure.

Here, Dick Clark in New York City

Photo by Frank Beacham

David Mamet, a playwright, essayist, screenwriter and film director, is 73 years old today

David Mamet, a playwright, essayist, screenwriter and film director, is 73 years old today.

As a playwright, Mamet has won a Pulitzer Prize and received Tony nominations for Glengarry Glen Ross (1984) and Speed-the-Plow (1988). As a screenwriter, he has received Oscar nominations for The Verdict (1982) and Wag the Dog (1997).

Mamet's books include: The Old Religion (1997), a novel about the lynching of Leo Frank; Five Cities of Refuge: Weekly Reflections on Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy (2004), a Torah commentary with Rabbi Lawrence Kushner; The Wicked Son (2006), a study of Jewish self-hatred and antisemitism and Bambi vs. Godzilla, a commentary on the movie business.

He also wrote The Secret Knowledge: On the Dismantling of American Culture (2011), a commentary on cultural and political issues, and Three War Stories (2013), a trio of novellas about the physical and psychological effects of war.

Mamet's feature films that he both wrote and directed include Redbelt (2008), The Spanish Prisoner (1997), House of Games (1987) (which won Best Film and Best Screenplay awards at the 1987 Venice Film Festival and "Film of the Year" for the 1989 London Critics Circle Film Awards).

He also made Spartan (2004), Heist (2001), State and Main (2000) (Winner of a Best Acting - Ensemble award from the National Board of Review), The Winslow Boy (1999), Oleanna (1994) and Homicide (1991)

Homicide was nominated for the Palme d'Or at 1991 Cannes Film Festival and won a "Screenwriter of the Year" award for Mamet from the London Critics Circle Film Awards and Best Cinematography for Roger Deakins from the Los Angeles Film Critics Association Awards.

He made Things Change (1988) (which won the Volpi Cup for Best Actor at 1988 Venice Film Festival for Don Ameche and Joe Mantegna) and the 2013 HBO film, Phil Spector, starring Al Pacino as Spector with Helen Mirren and Jeffrey Tambor.

Mamet has also written the screenplays for such films as The Verdict (1982), directed by Sidney Lumet, The Postman Always Rings Twice (1981), directed by Bob Rafelson, The Untouchables (1987) directed by Brian De Palma, Hoffa (1992), Ronin (1998), Wag The Dog (1997), The Edge (1997) and Hannibal (2001).

Mamet's style of writing dialogue, marked by a cynical, street-smart edge, precisely crafted for effect, is so distinctive that it has come to be called Mamet speak. He often uses italics and quotation marks to highlight particular words and to draw attention to his characters' frequent manipulation and deceitful use of language.

His characters frequently interrupt one another, their sentences trail off unfinished, and their dialogue overlaps. Moreover, certain expressions and figures of speech are deliberately misrepresented to show that the character is not paying close attention to every detail of his dialogue.

Mamet himself has criticized his (and other writers') tendency to write "pretty" at the expense of sound, logical plots.

When asked how he developed his style for writing dialogue, Mamet said, "In my family, in the days prior to television, we liked to while away the evenings by making ourselves miserable, based solely on our ability to speak the language viciously. That's probably where my ability was honed."

Mamet has been married to actress and singer-songwriter Rebecca Pidgeon since 1991. They have two children, Clara and Noah.

Mamet in 2007 in New York City

Photo by Frank Beacham

Allan Sherman, a comedy writer and television producer who became famous as a song parodist in the early 1960s, was born 96 years ago today

Allan Sherman, a comedy writer and television producer who became famous as a song parodist in the early 1960s, was born 96 years ago today.

Sherman’s first album, My Son, the Folk Singer (1962), became the fastest-selling record album up to that time. His biggest hit single, "Hello Muddah, Hello Fadduh," a comic novelty in which a boy describes his summer camp experiences to the tune of Ponchielli's Dance of the Hours.

Born in Chicago to Jewish American parents — Percy Copelon and Rose Sherman — Sherman, like his father, suffered from obesity. His parents divorced during his teenage years, and Allan adopted his mother's maiden name. Due to his parents constantly moving to new residences, young Sherman attended over a dozen public schools in Chicago, New York, Los Angeles and Miami.

Shereman attended the University of Illinois, where he earned mostly "C" grades and contributed a humor column to The Daily Illini, the college newspaper. He never received a degree because he was expelled for breaking into a campus sorority house with his then-girlfriend.

He devised a game show he intended to call “I Know a Secret.” Mark Goodson, a television producer, used Sherman's idea and turned it into “I've Got a Secret,” which ran on CBS from 1952 to 1967. Rather than paying him for the concept, Mark Goodson-Bill Todman Productions made Sherman the show's producer.

Sherman was reported to be warm and kindhearted to all who worked for him. But sparks often flew between Sherman and anyone who was in a position to try to restrain his creativity. As producer of I've Got a Secret, which was broadcast live, he showed a fondness for large scale stunts that had the potential to teeter on the brink of disaster.

He once released 100 rabbits onstage as an Easter surprise for the Madison Square Boys Club, whose members were seated in the studio. The boys were invited to come up onstage to collect their prize. Although the resultant melee made a good story, it did not necessarily make for good TV.

The relationship between Mark Goodson-Bill Todman and Sherman became strained to the breaking point when he finally fought to execute an idea that was destined to fall flat. His plan was to have Tony Curtis teach the panel how to play some of the games he had played as a child growing up in New York City.

The problems manifested themselves when it became obvious that Tony Curtis had never actually played any of the games that Sherman had brought the props for. The situation might have been salvaged had the props worked as planned, but they did not.

The handkerchief parachute failed to open and land gracefully and the spool "tank" which was propelled by rubber band moved painfully slowly. The spot, which aired June 11, 1958, was a disaster and Sherman was fired as producer.

Sherman lived in the Brentwood section of West Los Angeles next door to Harpo Marx, who invited him to perform his song parodies at parties attended by Marx's show-biz friends.

After one party, George Burns phoned an executive at Warner Bros. Records and persuaded him to sign Sherman to a contract. The result was a long playing album of these parodies, My Son, the Folk Singer, which was released in 1962. It sold over a million copies.

The album was so successful that it was quickly followed by My Son, the Celebrity, which ended with "Shticks of One and Half a Dozen of the Other." In 1962, capitalizing on his success, Jubilee Records re-released Sherman's 1951 single on the album, More Folk Songs by Allan Sherman and His Friends.

It was a compilation of material by various Borscht Belt comedians, such as Sylvia Froos, Fyvush Finkle and Lee Tully, along with the Sherman material. One track, a spoof of summer camp entitled "Hello Muddah, Hello Fadduh," became a surprise novelty hit, reaching #2 on the national Billboard Hot 100 chart for three weeks in late summer 1963.

The lyrics were sung to the tune of one segment of Ponchielli's "Dance of the Hours," familiar to the public because of its use in the Walt Disney film, Fantasia. That December, Sherman's "The Twelve Gifts of Christmas" single appeared on Billboard's separate Christmas chart.

Sherman had one other Top 40 hit, a 1965 take-off on the Petula Clark hit, "Downtown," called "Crazy Downtown," which spent one week at #40.

Sherman's career success was short-lived. After peaking in 1963, his popularity declined rather quickly.

After the assassination of John F. Kennedy, impersonator Vaughn Meader vowed to never again do a Kennedy impression, and perhaps because of this ominous shadow – Meader was a very popular parody impressionist of the day – and the resulting reluctance to book such acts, the public saw less of Sherman's type of comedy.

Late in his life, Sherman drank and ate heavily which resulted in a dangerous weight gain. He later developed diabetes and struggled with lung disease. In 1966, his wife, Dee, filed for divorce and received full custody of their son and daughter.

Sherman lived on unemployment benefits for a time and moved into the Motion Picture & Television Country House and Hospital near Calabasas, California for a short time to lose weight.

He died of emphysema at home in West Hollywood in 1973 — ten days before his 49th birthday.

Here, on the Dean Martin Show in 1965, Sherman joins Martin and Vic Damone to perform “I Hate the Beatles”

Abbie Hoffman, the political and social activist who co-founded the Youth International Party ("Yippies"), was born 84 years ago today

Abbie Hoffman, the political and social activist who co-founded the Youth International Party ("Yippies"), was born 84 years ago today.

Hoffman was arrested and tried for conspiracy and inciting to riot as a result of his role in protests that led to violent confrontations with police during the 1968 Democratic National Convention, along with Jerry Rubin, David Dellinger, Tom Hayden, Rennie Davis, John Froines, Lee Weiner and Bobby Seale.

The group was known collectively as the "Chicago Eight." When Seale's prosecution was separated from the others, they became known as the “Chicago Seven.” While the defendants were initially convicted of intent to incite a riot, the verdicts were overturned on appeal.

Hoffman came to prominence in the 1960s, and continued practicing his activism in the 1970s, and has remained a symbol of the youth rebellion of the counterculture era.

Hoffman was 52 at the time of his death on April 12, 1989, which was caused by swallowing 150 phenobarbital tablets and liquor. He had been diagnosed with bipolar disorder in 1980. At the time, he had recently changed treatment medications and was reportedly depressed when his 83-year-old mother was diagnosed with cancer. She died in 1996 at the age of 90.

Some close to Hoffman claimed that as a natural prankster who valued youth, he was also unhappy about reaching middle age, combined with the fact that the ideas of the 1960s had given way to a conservative backlash in the 1980s. In 1984, he had expressed dismay that the current generation of young people were not as interested in protesting and social activism as youth had been during the 1960s.

Hoffman's body was found in his apartment in a converted turkey coop on Sugan Road in Solebury Township, near New Hope, Pennsylvania. At the time of his death, he was surrounded by about 200 pages of his own handwritten notes, many about his own moods.

His death was officially ruled as suicide. As reported by the New York Times, "Among the more vocal doubters at the service today was Mr. Dellinger, who said, “I don't believe for one moment the suicide thing.”

He said he had been in fairly frequent touch with Mr. Hoffman, who had “numerous plans for the future.” Yet the same New York Times article reported that the coroner found the residue of about 150 pills and quoted the coroner in a telephone interview saying, “There is no way to take that amount of phenobarbital without intent. It was intentional and self-inflicted.”

Here, Hoffman discussed the tactics of the Yippies before the Democratic National Convention in 1968

Josh White Jr. is 80 years old today

Josh White Jr. is 80 years old today.

White is a songwriter, musician, actor and artist, and one of five children of Josh White, the famed singer.

Josh White, Jr., became, a “hit” overnight at the age of four, by performing with his legendary father one night at New York's Café Society night club, America's first integrated nightclub. For the next five years, Josh, Jr. performed with his father from New York to Boston to Philadelphia.

In 1949, Josh, Jr. landed his first role on Broadway, and as Josh says, "It was type casting…” White played his father's son in How Long Til Summer? with Dorothy Gish and Don Hanmer.

While continuing a solo acting career, Josh went on to perform and record with his father for the next seventeen years on radio, television, Broadway, concert halls and nightclubs around the world.

White continues to perform today.

Here, Josh White Jr. sings with his father

Samuel Clemens, later known as Mark Twain, was born in Florida, Missouri, on this day in 1835 — 185 years ago

Samuel Clemens, later known as Mark Twain, was born in Florida, Missouri, on this day in 1835 — 185 years ago.

Clemens was apprenticed to a printer at age 13 and later worked for his older brother, who established the Hannibal Journal.

In 1857, the Keokuk Daily Post commissioned him to write a series of comic travel letters, but after writing five he decided to become a steamboat captain instead. He signed on as a pilot's apprentice in 1857 and received his pilot's license in 1859, when he was 23. Clemens piloted boats for two years— until the Civil War halted steamboat traffic.

During his time as a pilot, he picked up the term "Mark Twain," a boatman's call noting that the river was only two fathoms deep, the minimum depth for safe navigation. When Clemens returned to writing in 1861, working for the Virginia City Territorial Enterprise, he wrote a humorous travel letter signed by "Mark Twain" and continued to use the pseudonym for nearly 50 years.

In 1864, he moved to San Francisco to work as a reporter. There, he wrote the story that made him famous, The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County. In 1866, he traveled to Hawaii as a correspondent for the Sacramento Union.

Next, he traveled the world writing accounts for papers in California and New York, which he later published the popular book, The Innocents Abroad (1869). In 1870, Clemens married the daughter of a wealthy New York coal merchant and settled in Hartford, Connecticut, where he continued to write travel accounts and lecture.

In 1875, his novel Tom Sawyer was published, followed by Life on the Mississippi (1883) and his masterpiece, Huckleberry Finn (1885). Bad investments left Clemens bankrupt after the publication of Huckleberry Finn, but he won back his financial standing with his next three books — Pudd'Nhead Wilson (1894), Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc (1895) and Following the Equator (1897).

In 1903, he and his family moved to Italy, where his wife died. Her death left him sad and bitter, and his work, while still humorous, grew distinctly darker. He died in 1910.

Terrence Malick, the film director, is 77 years ago today

Terrence Malick, the film director, is 77 years ago today.

In a career spanning over four decades, Malick has directed six feature films. He made his directorial debut with the drama Badlands in 1973. His second film, Days of Heaven, was released in 1978. After that, he took a long hiatus from directing films.

His third film, the World War II drama, The Thin Red Line, was released in 1998. Seven years later, he released his fourth film, The New World, which was followed by the critically acclaimed and 2011 Palme d'Or winner, The Tree of Life. The following year saw the release of the sixth film directed by Malick, To the Wonder.

Malick has received consistent praise for his work and has been regarded as one of the greatest living filmmakers. He was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Director for The Thin Red Line and The Tree of Life, and the Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay for The Thin Red Line.

He won the Golden Bear at the 49th Berlin International Film Festival for The Thin Red Line, the Palme d'Or at the 64th Cannes Film Festival for The Tree of Life, and the SIGNIS Award at the 69th Venice International Film Festival for To the Wonder.

More than any other active filmmaker, Malick belongs in the visionary company of homegrown romantics like Herman Melville, Walt Whitman, Hart Crane and James Agee. The definitive writings of these authors did not sit comfortably or find universal favor in their own time. They can still seem ungainly, unfinished, lacking polish and perfection.

This is precisely what makes them alive and exciting: "Moby Dick," "Leaves of Grass," "The Bridge" and "A Death in the Family" lean perpetually into the future, pushing their readers forward toward a new horizon of understanding.

While the common conception of Malick as a recluse is inaccurate, he is protective of his private life. His contracts stipulate that his likeness may not be used for promotional purposes, and he routinely declines requests for interviews.

As of 2011, Malick resided in Austin, Texas.

Here, Terrence Malick behind the camera during the production of Days of Heaven, 1978

Chuck Mangione is 80 years old today

Chuck Mangione is 80 years old today.

A flugelhorn player, trumpeter and composer, Mangione achieved international success in 1977 with his jazz-pop single, "Feels So Good." He has released more than thirty albums since 1960.

Born and raised in Rochester, New York, Mangione and his pianist brother, Gap, led the Jazz Brothers group which recorded three albums for Riverside Records. He attended the Eastman School of Music from 1958 to 1963, and afterwards joined Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers, for which he filled the trumpet seat, previously held by greats such as Clifford Brown, Freddie Hubbard, Kenny Dorham, Bill Hardman and Lee Morgan.

In the late 1960s, Mangione was a member of the band, The National Gallery, which in 1968 released the album Performing Musical Interpretations of the Paintings of Paul Klee.

Mangione served as director of the Eastman jazz ensemble from 1968 to 1972, and in 1970, he returned to recording with the album Friends and Love, recorded in concert with the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra and numerous guest performers.

Mangione's quartet with saxophonist Gerry Niewood was a popular concert and recording act throughout the 1970s. Niewood and bandmember Coleman Mellett were among those killed when Continental Airlines Flight 3407 crashed into a Buffalo, New York, area house on February 12, 2009.

Here, Mangione performs “Feels So Good” in 1978

John Mayall is 87 years old today

John Mayall, New York City, 2005

Photo by Frank Beacham

John Mayall is 87 years old today.

An English blues singer, guitarist, organist and songwriter, Mayall’s musical career spans over fifty years. In the 1960s, he was the founder of John Mayall & the Bluesbreakers, a band which has included some of the most famous blues and blues rock musicians.

They include Eric Clapton, Peter Green, Jack Bruce, John McVie, Mick Fleetwood, Mick Taylor, Don "Sugarcane" Harris, Harvey Mandel, Larry Taylor, Aynsley Dunbar, Hughie Flint, Jon Hiseman, Dick Heckstall-Smith, Andy Fraser, Johnny Almond, Walter Trout, Coco Montoya and Buddy Whittington.

Born in Macclesfield, Cheshire, Mayall's father was Murray Mayall, a guitarist and jazz music enthusiast. From an early age, John was drawn to the sounds of American blues players such as Lead Belly, Albert Ammons, Pinetop Smith and Eddie Lang, and taught himself to play the piano, guitars and harmonica.

Mayall spent three years in Korea for national service and, during a period of leave, he bought his first electric guitar. Back in Manchester, he enrolled at Manchester College of Art (now part of Manchester Metropolitan University) and started playing with semi-professional bands.

After graduation, he obtained a job as an art designer but continued to play with local musicians. In 1963, he opted for a full-time musical career and moved to London. His previous craft would be put to good use in the designing of covers for many of his coming albums.

Since the end of the 1960s, Mayall has lived in the United States. A brush fire destroyed his house in Laurel Canyon in 1979, seriously damaging his musical collections and archives.

Mayall has been married twice, and has six grandchildren. His second wife, Maggie Mayall is an American blues performer, and since the early 1980s took part in the management of her husband's career. The pair divorced in 2011.

In late 1963, with his band, the Bluesbreakers, Mayall started playing at the Marquee Club. The lineup was Mayall, Ward, John McVie on bass and guitarist Bernie Watson, formerly of Cyril Davies and the R&B All-Stars. The next spring Mayall, obtained his first recording date with producer Ian Samwell.

The band, with Martin Hart at the drums, recorded two tracks: "Crawling Up a Hill" and "Mr. James." Shortly after, Hughie Flint replaced Hart, and Roger Dean took the guitar from Bernie Watson. This lineup backed John Lee Hooker on his British tour in 1964.

Mayall was offered a recording contract by Decca in 1964, a live performance of the band was recorded at the Klooks Kleek. A single, "Crocodile Walk,” was recorded later in studio and released along with the album, but both failed to achieve any success and the contract was terminated.

In April 1965, former Yardbirds guitarist Eric Clapton replaced Roger Dean and John Mayall's career entered a decisive phase. The Bluesbreakers began attracting considerable attention.

To celebrate his 70th birthday, Mayall reunited with special guests Eric Clapton, Mick Taylor and Chris Barber during a fundraiser show. This "Unite for Unicef" concert took place in 2003 at the Kings Dock Arena in Liverpool and was captured on film for a DVD release.

In November, 2008, Mayall announced on his website he was disbanding the Bluesbreakers, to cut back on his heavy workload and give himself freedom to work with other musicians. Three months later, a solo world tour was announced, with Rocky Athas on guitar, Greg Rzab on bass and Jay Davenport on drums. Tom Canning, on organ, joined the band for the tour which started in March, 2009.

An album was released in September, 2009. Since then, Mayall has continued to tour with the same backing band, minus Canning, who left due to other priorities.

In 2018, Mayall made a new addition to his band; his first female lead guitarist, Carolyn Wonderland.

On June 25, 2019, The New York Times Magazine listed John Mayall among hundreds of artists whose material was reportedly destroyed in the 2008 Universal fire.

Mayall's autobiography, Blues From Laurel Canyon: My Life As A Bluesman, co-written with author Joel McIver, was published by Omnibus Press in August. 2019.

Here, Mayall performs “Hideaway” with Eric Clapton

John Mayall and The Bluesbreakers in concert at the Bottom Line in New York City

Denny Doherty, a founding member of The Mamas & the Papas, was born 80 years ago today

Denny Doherty, a founding member of The Mamas & the Papas, was born 80 years ago today.

A Canadian singer and songwriter, Doherty was born in Halifax, Nova Scotia. He started his musical career in Halifax in 1956 with a band called the Hepsters. With friends Richard Sheehan, Eddie Thibodeau and Mike O'Connell, the Hepsters played at clubs in the Halifax area. The band was together for about two years.

In 1960, at the age of 19, Doherty, along with Pat LaCroix and Richard Byrne, co-founded a folk group, The Colonials, in Halifax, Nova Scotia. When they got a record deal with Columbia Records, they changed their name to The Halifax Three. The band recorded two LPs and had a minor hit, "The Man Who Wouldn't Sing Along With Mitch." They ultimately broke up in 1963.

Later that year, Doherty established a friendship with Cass Elliot when she was with a band called, "The Big Three." While on tour with "The Halifax III," Doherty met John Phillips and his new wife, model Michelle Gilliam.

A few months later, The Halifax III dissolved, and Doherty and their accompanist, Zal Yanovsky, were left broke in Hollywood. Elliot heard of their troubles and convinced her manager to hire them. Thus, Doherty and Yanovsky joined the Big Three (increasing the number of band members to four). Soon after adding even more band members, they changed their name to "The Mugwumps."

The Mugwumps soon broke up also due to insolvency. The Mamas & Papas song "Creeque Alley" briefly outlines this history. Yanovsky went on to join The Lovin' Spoonful with John Sebastian.

About this time, John Phillips' new band, "The New Journeymen," needed a replacement for tenor Marshall Brickman, who had left the folk trio to pursue a writing career. The group needed a quick replacement for their remaining tour dates.

Doherty, then unemployed, filled the opening. After the New Journeymen called it quits as a band in early 1965, Elliot was invited into the formation of a new band, which became "The Magic Cyrcle." Six months later in September,1965, the group signed a recording contract with Dunhill Records.

Changing their name to The Mamas & the Papas, the band soon began to record their debut album, If You Can Believe Your Eyes and Ears. In late 1965, Doherty and Michelle Phillips started an affair. They were able to keep it secret during the early days of the band's new-found success.

When the affair was discovered, John and Michelle moved to their own residence (they had been sharing a house with Doherty), and the band continued recording together.

Eventually the band signed a statement in June, 1966 with their record label's full support, firing Michelle from the band. She was quickly replaced by Jill Gibson, girlfriend of the band's producer, Lou Adler. Gibson's stint as a "Mama" lasted two and a half months.

Due to fan demand, Michelle was allowed to rejoin the band in August, 1966, while Gibson was given a lump sum for her efforts. The band completed their second album (titled simply, "The Mamas and the Papas") by re-recording, replacing or overlaying new vocal parts by Michelle Phillips over Jill Gibson's studio vocals.

After a continuing string of hit singles, many television appearances (including a notable and critically well-received TV special featuring the music of Rodgers and Hart), a successful third studio album ("The Mamas and the Papas Deliver" in March, 1967).

There was also the groundbreaking sociological impact of the Monterey International Pop Festival (which had been organized by John Phillips and Lou Adler) in June, 1967.

An ill-fated trip to England in October, 1967 fragmented the already damaged group dynamic. Cass Elliot quit, after a stinging insult from John Phillips, but returned to complete her parts for the group's overdue fourth album ("The Papas and the Mamas," which was finally released in May, 1968).

By then, Michelle had given birth to John's daughter, Chynna Phillips (in February, 1968) and a formal statement had been released, announcing the band's demise.

Elliot and Doherty remained friends. After the band's breakup, Elliot became a solo act. She eventually asked Doherty to marry her, but he declined.

Denny Doherty died on January 19, 2007 at his home in Mississauga, Ontario, from a second abdominal aortic aneurysm after going to get the first one repaired.

Here, the Mamas and Papas perform “California Dreamin’”

Felix Cavaliere is 78 years old today

Felix Cavaliere is 78 years old today.

A singer, songwriter, music producer and musician, Cavaliere was a member of he Young Rascals and the Peppermint Twist. The other members of The Rascals were Eddie Brigati, Dino Danelli and Gene Cornish. Cavaliere sang vocals on six of their successful singles in the 1960s.

At an early age, he joined The Stereos and moved on to form The Escorts. He later produced albums by other artists such as Laura Nyro and Jimmie Spheeris.

Cavaliere had a solo hit with "Only A Lonely Heart Sees" (1980), which made #36 in the Billboard Pop 100 chart and #2 on the Adult Contemporary chart.

During 1995, Cavaliere was a touring member of Ringo Starr's third All-Starr Band. In 2008, he recorded an album with Steve Cropper, Nudge it Up a Notch, which was released July 29, 2008.

He continues to tour as Felix Cavaliere's Rascals, and on June 18, 2009, Cavaliere, along with former writing partner, Eddie Brigati, was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame.

On April 24, 2010, all four members of the Rascals reunited for the Kristen Ann Carr benefit, which was held at New York's Tribeca Grill. The reunited Rascals appeared at the Capital Theater in Port Chester, N.Y. for six shows in December, 2012 and for fifteen dates at the Richard Rogers Theatre on Broadway (April 15-May 5, 2013).

Their current production, entitled “Once Upon A Dream.” is currently touring North America (Toronto, Los Angeles, Phoenix, Chicago, Detroit, Rochester, and New York City). It is produced by long-time Rascals' fans, Steven Van Zandt and his wife, Maureen.

Cavaliere and his wife currently reside in Nashville.

Here, Cavaliere, with Ringo Starr’s band, performs “Groovin’,” which he wrote with Eddie Brigati and released in 1967

Louisa May Alcott, the novelist and poet, was born 188 years ago today

Louisa May Alcott, the novelist and poet, was born 188 years ago today.

Alcott is best known as the author of the novel, Little Women (1868), and its sequels Little Men (1871) and Jo's Boys (1886).

Raised by her transcendentalist parents, Abigail May and Amos Bronson Alcott in New England, she grew up among many of the well-known intellectuals of the day such as Ralph Waldo Emerson, Nathaniel Hawthorne and Henry David Thoreau.

Nevertheless, her family suffered severe financial difficulties and Alcott worked to help support the family from an early age. She began to receive critical success for her writing in the 1860s. Early in her career, she sometimes used the pen name A. M. Barnard, under which she wrote novels for young adults.

Published in 1868, Little Women is set in the Alcott family home, Hillside, later called the Wayside, in Concord, Massachusetts and is loosely based on Alcott's childhood experiences with her three sisters.

The novel was very well received and is still a popular children's novel today, filmed several times. Alcott was an abolitionist and a feminist and remained unmarried throughout her life. She died in Boston on March 6, 1888 of mercury poisoning at the age of 55.

Merle Travis was born 103 years ago today

Merle Travis was born 103 years ago today.

Born in Rosewood, Kentucky, Travis was a country and Western singer, songwriter and musician. His lyrics often described the life and exploitation of coal miners. Among his many well-known songs are "Sixteen Tons," "Re-Enlistment Blues" and "Dark as a Dungeon."

However, it is his masterly guitar playing and his interpretations of the rich musical traditions of his native Muhlenberg County, Kentucky for which he is best known today. "Travis picking," a syncopated style of finger picking, is named after him.

Travis was inducted into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1970 and elected to the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1977.

Travis became interested in the guitar early in life and originally played an instrument made by his brother. He reportedly saved his money to buy a guitar that he had window-shopped for some time. His guitar playing style was developed out of a native tradition of finger-picking in Western Kentucky. Among its early practitioners was the black country blues guitarist, Arnold Shultz.

Shultz taught his style to several local musicians, including Kennedy Jones, who passed it on to other guitarists, notably Mose Rager, a part-time barber and coal miner, and Ike Everly, the father of The Everly Brothers.

Their thumb and index finger picking method created a solo style that blended lead lines picked by the finger and rhythmic bass patterns picked or strummed by the thumbpick. This technique captivated many guitarists in the region and provided the main inspiration to the young Travis.

Travis acknowledged his debt to both Rager and Everly, and appears with Rager on the DVD Legends of Country Guitar (Vestapol, 2002).

At the age of 18, Travis performed "Tiger Rag" on a local radio amateur show in Evansville, Indiana, leading to offers of work with local bands. In 1937, Travis was hired by fiddler Clayton McMichen as guitarist in his Georgia Wildcats. He later joined the Drifting Pioneers, a Chicago-area gospel quartet that moved to WLW radio in Cincinnati, the major country music station north of Nashville.

Travis's style amazed everyone at WLW and he became a popular member of their barn dance radio show the "Boone County Jamboree" when it began in 1938. He performed on various weekday programs, often working with other WLW acts including Louis Marshall "Grandpa" Jones and the Delmore Brothers.

In 1943, he and Grandpa Jones recorded for Cincinnati used-record dealer Syd Nathan, who had founded a new label, King Records. Because WLW barred their staff musicians from recording, Travis and Jones used the pseudonym, The Sheppard Brothers.

Their recording of "You'll Be Lonesome Too" was the first to be released by King Records, subsequently known for its country recordings by the Delmore Brothers and Stanley Brothers as well as R&B legends Hank Ballard, Wynonie Harris and most notably, James Brown.

Merle Travis is now acknowledged as one of the most influential American guitarists of the 20th century. His unique guitar style inspired many guitarists who followed, most notably Chet Atkins, who first heard Travis's radio broadcasts on Cincinnati's WLW Boone County Jamboree in 1939 while living with his father in rural Georgia.

Among the many other guitarists influenced by Travis are Scotty Moore, Earl Hooker and Marcel Dadi.

Today, his son, Thom Bresh, continues playing in Travis's style on a custom-made Langejans Dualette.

Here, Travis performs “Cannonball Rag”

Randy Newman is 77 years old today

Randy Newman is 77 years old today.

Newman is a singer-songwriter, arranger, composer and pianist who is known for his distinctive voice, mordant (and often satirical) pop songs and for film scores.

Since the 1980s, Newman has worked mostly as a film composer. His film scores include Ragtime, Awakenings, The Natural, Leatherheads, James and the Giant Peach, Meet the Parents, Cold Turkey, Seabiscuit and The Princess and the Frog.

He has scored seven Disney-Pixar films: Toy Story, A Bug's Life, Toy Story 2, Monsters, Inc., Cars, Toy Story 3 and Monsters University.

Newman has been nominated for 20 Academy Awards, winning twice. He has also won three Emmys, six Grammy Awards and the Governor's Award from the Recording Academy. He was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2002. In 2007, he was inducted as a Disney Legend.

Born in Los Angeles, Newman lived in New Orleans as a small child and spent summers there until he was 11 years old, his family having by then returned to Los Angeles. The paternal side of his family includes three uncles who were noted Hollywood film-score composers: Alfred Newman, Lionel Newman and Emil Newman. His cousins, Thomas and David, and nephew, Joey, are also composers for motion pictures.

Newman graduated from University High School in Los Angeles and attended the University of California in LA. His parents were both from Jewish families, but Newman's household was not observant. He has since become an atheist. Newman has been a professional songwriter since he was 17.

He cites Ray Charles as his greatest influence growing up, stating, "I loved Charles' music to excess." His first single as a performer was 1962's "Golden Gridiron Boy," released when he was eighteen. The single flopped and Newman chose to concentrate on songwriting and arranging for the next several years.

Newman has credited The Fleetwoods with giving him his first national break. The trio recorded his song, "They Tell Me It's Summer," as the “B” side of one of their hit singles, giving Newman great exposure and royalties.

Newman’s early songs were recorded by Gene Pitney, Jerry Butler, Petula Clark, Dusty Springfield, Jackie DeShannon, The O'Jays and Irma Thomas. His 1968 debut album, Randy Newman, was a critical success but never dented the Billboard Top 200.

Many artists, including Alan Price, Van Dyke Parks, Dave Van Ronk, Judy Collins, the Everly Brothers, Claudine Longet, Dusty Springfield, Nina Simone, Lynn Anderson, Wilson Pickett, Pat Boone and Peggy Lee, covered his songs and "I Think It's Going to Rain Today" became an early standard.

Newman’s 1974 release, Good Old Boys, was a set of songs about the American South. "Rednecks" began with a description of segregationist Lester Maddox pitted against a "smart-ass New York Jew" on a TV show, in a song that criticizes both southern racism and the complacent bigotry of Americans outside of the south who stereotype all southerners as racist yet ignore racism in northern and midwestern states and large cities.

This ambiguity was also apparent on "Kingfish" and "Every Man a King," the former a paean to Huey Long (the assassinated former Governor and United States Senator from Louisiana), the other a campaign song written by Long himself.

An album that received lavish critical praise, Good Old Boys, also became a commercial breakthrough for Newman, peaking at #36 on Billboard and spending 21 weeks in the Top 200.

In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, Newman's "Louisiana 1927" became an anthem and was played heavily on a wide range of American radio and television stations, in both Newman's 1974 original and Aaron Neville's cover version of the song.

The song addresses the deceitful manner in which New Orleans's municipal government managed a flood in 1927, during which, as Newman asserts, "The guys who ran the Mardi Gras, the bosses in New Orleans decided the course of that flood. You know, they cut a hole in the levee and it flooded the cotton fields."

Here, Newman performs “Louisiana 1927”

 “I Love LA”

Short People

Berry Gordy, Jr., the founder of Motown, is 91 years old today

Berry Gordy, Jr., the founder of Motown, is 91 years old today.

A record producer and songwriter in Detroit, Gordy developed his interest in music by writing songs and opening the 3-D Record Mart, a record store featuring jazz. The store was unsuccessful and Gordy sought work at the Lincoln-Mercury plant, but his family connections put him in touch with Al Green (not the singer), owner of the Flame Show Bar talent club, where he met the singer, Jackie Wilson.

In 1957, Wilson recorded "Reet Petite," a song Gordy had co-written with his sister Gwen and writer-producer, Billy Davis. It became a modest hit, but had more success internationally, especially in the UK where it reached the Top 10 and even later topped the chart on re-issue in 1986.

Wilson recorded six more songs co-written by Gordy over the next two years, including "Lonely Teardrops," which topped the R & B charts and got to #7 in the pop chart. Berry and Gwen Gordy also wrote "All I Could Do Was Cry" for the late Etta James at Chess Records.

Gordy reinvested the profits from his songwriting success into producing. In 1957, he discovered The Miracles (originally known as The Matadors) and began building a portfolio of successful artists. In 1959, with the encouragement of Miracles leader Smokey Robinson, Gordy borrowed $800 from his family to create R&B label, Tamla Records.

On January 21, 1959, "Come To Me" by Marv Johnson was issued as Tamla 101. United Artists Records picked up "Come To Me" for national distribution, as well as Johnson's more successful follow-up records (such as "You Got What It Takes," co-produced and co-written by Gordy).

Berry's next release was the only 45 ever issued on his Rayber label, and it featured Wade Jones with an unnamed female back-up group. The record did not sell well and is now one of the rarest issues from the Motown stable.

Berry's third release was "Bad Girl" by The Miracles, and was the first-ever release for the Motown record label. "Bad Girl" was a solid hit in 1959 after Chess Records picked it up. Barrett Strong's "Money (That's What I Want)" initially appearing on Tamla and then charted on Gordy's sister's label, Anna Records, in February, 1960.

The Miracles' hit, "Shop Around," peaked at #1 on the national R&B charts in late 1960 and at #2 on the Billboard pop charts on January 16, 1961. It established Motown as an independent company worthy of notice. Later in 1961, The Marvelettes' "Please Mr. Postman" made it to the top of both charts.

In 1960, Gordy signed an unknown named Mary Wells who became the fledgling label's first star, with Smokey Robinson penning her hits, "You Beat Me to the Punch," "Two Lovers" and "My Guy."

The Tamla and Motown labels were then merged into a new company, Motown Record Corporation, which was incorporated on April 14, 1959. The rest is music history.

The Grand Ole Opry — one of the longest-lived and most popular showcases for country music — began broadcasting live from Nashville on this day in 1925 — 95 years ago

The Grand Ole Opry — one of the longest-lived and most popular showcases for country music — began broadcasting live from Nashville on this day in 1925 — 95 years ago.

The showcase was originally named the Barn Dance, after a Chicago radio program called the National Barn Dance that had begun broadcasting the previous year.

Impressed by the popularity of the Chicago-based National Barn Dance, producers at WSM radio in Nashville decided to create their own version of the show to cater to southern audiences who could not receive the Chicago signal. Both the Grand Ole Opry and the National Barn Dance aired on Saturday nights and featured folk music, fiddling and the relatively new genre of country-western music.

Both shows created a growing audience for a uniquely American style of music and were launching grounds for many of America's most-loved musicians. The singing cowboy, Gene Autry, got his first big break on the National Barn Dance.

The WSM producers recognized that Americans were growing nostalgic for the rural past, so all live performers at the Grand Ole Opry were required to dress in hillbilly costumes and adopt old-time names.

The four-and-a-half-hour Grand Ole Opry program became one of the most popular broadcasts in the South, and like its Chicago cousin, helped make country-western an enduring part of the popular American musical landscape.

Thanks History.com

Paul Shaffer is 71 years old today

Paul Shaffer with Steve Cropper, New York City, 2019

Photo by Frank Beacham

Paul Shaffer is 71 years old today.

Shaffer is a Canadian-American musician, actor, voice actor, author, comedian and composer who was David Letterman's musical director, band leader and sidekick since 1982.

Shaffer was born and raised in Fort William (now Thunder Bay), Ontario, Canada. By his teenage years, had moved on to playing the organ in a band called Fabulous Fugitives with his schoolmates in Thunder Bay. Later, he performed with the "Flash Landing Band" at different venues around Edmonton and the Interior of B.C.

Educated at the University of Toronto, he began playing with jazz guitarist Tisziji Muñoz, performing in bands around the bars there, where he found an interest in musicals. He completed his studies, with a B.A. degree in Sociology, in 1971.

Shaffer began his music career in 1972 when Stephen Schwartz invited him as the musical director for the Toronto production of Godspell, starring Victor Garber, Gilda Radner, Martin Short, Eugene Levy, Dave Thomas and Andrea Martin.

He went on to play piano for the Schwartz Broadway show The Magic Show in 1974, then became a member of the house band on NBC's popular Saturday Night Live (SNL) television program from 1975 to 1980 (except for a brief departure in 1977).

Though Shaffer was at the piano and appeared to be directing the band's actions, Howard Shore was credited as SNL's musical director, eventually turning the actual conducting of the band to sax player Howard Johnson.

Shaffer also regularly appeared in the show's sketches, notably as the pianist for Bill Murray's Nick the Lounge Singer character and as Don Kirshner. He occasionally teamed up with the Not Ready for Prime-Time Players off the show as well, including work on Gilda Radner's highly successful Broadway show and as the musical director for John Belushi and Dan Aykroyd whenever they recorded or performed as The Blues Brothers.

Shaffer was to appear in the duo's 1980 film, but, as he revealed in October, 2009 on CBS Sunday Morning, Belushi dropped him from the project. In a nasty memo to fellow SNL colleagues, Belushi said that he was unhappy that Shaffer was spending so much time on a studio record for Radner.

Belushi said that he had tried to talk Shaffer out of working on the album in the first place in order to avoid sharing Shaffer's talents with another SNL-related project. Shaffer later reported that he was in (unrequited) love with Gilda Radner. He would go on to appear in 1998's Blues Brothers 2000.

Since 1982, Shaffer has served as musical director for David Letterman's late night talk shows: as leader of "The World's Most Dangerous Band" for Late Night with David Letterman (1982–1993) on NBC, for which he also composed the theme song, and as leader of the CBS Orchestra for the Late Show with David Letterman (1993–2015) on CBS.

Letterman consistently maintains that the show's switch to CBS was because NBC "fired Paul for stealing pens" or some other facetious reason. Shaffer has also guest-hosted the show a few times when Letterman was unavailable, including during Letterman's January, 2000 medical leave for quintuple heart bypass surgery, and during the birth of Letterman's son, Harry, in November, 2003.

Shaffer has served as musical director and producer for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony since its inception in 1986 and filled the same role for the 1996 Olympic Games closing ceremonies from Atlanta, Georgia.

Shaffer also served as musical director for Fats Domino and Friends, a Cinemax special that included Ray Charles, Jerry Lee Lewis and Ron Wood.

Little Sammy Davis was born 92 years old today

Little Sammy Davis performs with the Levon Helm Band at the Beacon Theatre, New York City, March 17, 2007

Photo by Frank Beacham

Little Sammy Davis was born 92 years old today.

Davis was a blues musician based in New York's Hudson Valley. Although his musical career began in the 1940s, he was not widely known until the mid-1990s when he began working in radio, singing, playing live on tour and recording studio albums.

Born in Winona, Mississippi, and raised in a one-room shack, Davis learned to play the harmonica at the age of eight. He eventually left home and settled in Florida, where he continued to play the blues in the Miami area while working in orange groves and saw mills to make ends meet.

Throughout the 1940s and 1950s, Davis traveled with medicine shows and played with blues musicians like Pine Top Perkins and Ike Turner. He spent a total of nine years on the road with Earl Hooker, including with the short-lived band of Hooker, Ike Turner, Pine Top Perkins and Albert King, ending when the two titans of Blues Guitar came to blows, thus breaking up the band.

Sammy and Earl recorded four sides for Henry Stone's Rockin' label in 1952 and 1953 (as Little Sam Davis). In the late 1950s, Davis lived in Chicago, performing with Muddy Waters, Jimmy Reed and occasionally fronting Little Walter's Band, The Aces, when Walter didn’t show.

At some point, word had let out that "some guy looks and plays" just like Walter and people THINK he IS Little Walter." One night as Sammy performed on stage accompanied by Hooker, he spotted a policeman at the back of the club. Walter and the officer waited for Sammy to get through with his set and when Sammy got off of the stage, he was arrested on the spot.

To quote Sammy: "Walter was a good guy and told me that yes, you do indeed sound just like me, but you can't be going around letting people think you ARE me."

Sammy was locked up, spent a night in jail before Walter dropped the charges, leaving Davis and Walter friends for the rest of Walter's all too short and tragic life.

He later married and settled in Poughkeepsie, New York, where he was "discovered" by local musician Dan DelSanto of The Arm Brothers. Dan had been looking around locally for blues players for his friend, local folklorist Pete Lowry, during which time he recorded a session for Lowry's Trix Records at Sam's apartment in 1971 that resulted in one "45" single ("Someday Blues"/"Sam's Swing") being released.

Sam also played harp on some of the recordings for Trix by Eddie Kirkland in 1972 at a studio in Mink Hollow, NY. After the sudden death of his wife in 1972/73, Davis basically stopped playing and dropped out of the music scene for the next two decades in spite of efforts by Little Eliot Lloyd, Lowry, a.o. to keep him playing.

Eventually, no one knew if Sammy was alive or dead, or even where he was... some said back to Mississippi, maybe Florida. He had disappeared. In 1990, local DJ Doug Price was getting a haircut at a barber shop in Poughkeepsie, NY when he heard rumors that Davis was sitting in at a Blues Jam at the "Side Track Inn."

Price made mention of Davis's story and played some of his old recordings on WVKR. Then one night, Brad Scribner was hired to play drums at the Jam when Sammy got up to play and was amazed at what he saw and heard.

Brad immediately came home to tell his brother, Fred, who had been supplying Blues Instrumentals for the radio shock jock, Don Imus, and had been actively looking for a singer to progress from background instrumentals to being a featured guest on Imus' radio show, "Imus in the Morning."

Fred Scribner arranged to bring Davis and Midnight Slim into Tom Veneble's Recording Studio in Walden, NY to record a fresh batch of material, including the classic Howlin' Wolf/Mississippi Sheik's song, "Sitting on Top of the World."

Imus interviewed Sammy and Fred via telephone, live and they were an instant hit. Subsequently Imus invited Davis and Scribner to perform regularly on his show, live in the Studio at WFAN Radio in New York City.

The New York Daily News proclaimed the very next day: "Little Sammy Davis and Fred Scribner score on the Imus Show." Sammy and Fred started to appear regularly, soon earning the title of "House Band" for the Imus in the Morning Show for years to come. Imus, in his trademark style, later quipped that Davis had "more harmonicas than teeth" and that Fred looked like a manager of an Ace Hardware Store.

Capitalizing on this Imus fame, Little Sammy Davis and Midnight Slim (Fred Scribner) toured, playing the best blues clubs, colleges and blues festivals on the East Coast and venturing out to the West Coast on occasion as radio and television stations (MSNBC) around the United States joined on.

In 1996, Davis released his first full-length album, I Ain't Lyin, with Fred Scribner producing, playing guitar and co-writing songs. Brad Scribner played drums, the late Brad Lee Sexton performed on bass and Tom Hunter was on piano for Delmark Records. The record was nominated for a W. C. Handy Award and earned Davis a "comeback artist of the year award" from Living Blues magazine.

Davis and Scribner released a second album, Ten Years and Forty Days, on their own label, Fat Fritz Records. As house band for the Imus Show, they were called in each fall for an annual radio/telethon for the "Tomorrows Children's Fund" benefiting children stricken with cancer.

As the years went by, other charitable organizations came on board such as the S.I.D.S Foundation and finally, the Imus Ranch for Children (with terminal illnesses) ending their run when the World Trade Center was destroyed on 9/11.

Around this time, a former guitar student of Scribner's, John Rocklin, brought Sammy up to see legendary drummer/vocalist Levon Helm. Levon, who had played with Sonny Boy Williamson II (Rice Miller), seemed to fall in love with Sammy immediately. Davis began performing with Levon for performances at Helm's home in Woodstock and on tour with Levon Helm and the Barn Burners.

In 2006, Sammy convinced Levon that his guitarist, Fred Scribne, would be the right choice on guitar. Fred joined on and the name of the band became the Levon Helm Band, and Levon started having concerts at his home in Woodstock, NY leading to the release of Midnight Ramble, Volume 1.

In 2002, Arlen Tarlofsky produced and directed a documentary entitled, "Little Sammy Davis." The movie is a musical documentary that looks into the life and music of Sammy Davis.

The documentary was the Jury Selection at the London Film Festival and the Woodstock International Film Festival, and it won the Audience Recognition Award at The AFI/SILVERDOCS Discovery Channel Documentary Film Festival.

In October, 2008, after recording his third album, Travelin' Man' with Scribner, Davis suffered a stroke. He recovered, and was able to resume performing the following Spring.

Since Sammy was no longer permitted to travel on the road anymore, Levon offered Sammy and Fred the opening slot every Saturday at the "Midnight Ramble," but Sammy suffered a second stroke within a year and was left partially paralyzed. He resided in a nursing home/rehab unit in Middletown, NY until his death on February 16, 2018, at the age of 89.

Here is a short documentary on Little Sammy Davis

It’s the 263rd birthday today of William Blake, the English poet, painter and printmaker

It’s the 263rd birthday today of William Blake, the English poet, painter and printmaker.

Largely unrecognized during his lifetime, Blake is now considered a seminal figure in the history of the poetry and visual arts of the Romantic Age. His prophetic poetry has been said to form "what is in proportion to its merits the least read body of poetry in the English language."

His visual artistry led one contemporary art critic to proclaim him "far and away the greatest artist Britain has ever produced."

In 2002, Blake was placed at #38 in the BBC's poll of the 100 Greatest Britons.

Although he lived in London his entire life (except for three years spent in Felpham), he produced a diverse and symbolically rich body of work, which embraced the imagination as "the body of God" or "human existence itself.”

Considered mad by contemporaries for his idiosyncratic views, Blake is held in high regard by later critics for his expressiveness and creativity, and for the philosophical and mystical undercurrents within his work. His paintings and poetry have been characterized as part of the Romantic movement.

Reverent of the Bible, but hostile to the Church of England (indeed, to all forms of organized religion), Blake was influenced by the ideals and ambitions of the French and American Revolutions.

Though later he rejected many of these beliefs he maintained an amiable relationship with Thomas Paine, he was also influenced by thinkers such as Emanuel Swedenborg.

Despite these known influences, the singularity of Blake's work makes him difficult to classify. The 19th-century scholar William Rossetti characterized him as a "glorious luminary," and "a man not forestalled by predecessors, nor to be classed with contemporaries, nor to be replaced by known or readily surmisable successors.”

Blake had an enormous influence on the beat poets of the 1950s and the counterculture of the 1960s, frequently being cited by such seminal figures as beat poet Allen Ginsberg, songwriters Bob Dylan, Jim Morrison, Van Morrison and the English writer, Aldous Huxley.

Here is Blake’s 1786 painting Oberon, Titania and Puck with Fairies Dancing. It’s from William Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream

Musician in the Rain

Photo by Robert Doisneau

Jimi Hendrix was born 78 years ago today

Jimi Hendrix, San Francisco, 1968

Photo by Baron Wolman

Jimi Hendrix was born 78 years ago today.

Born Johnny Allen Hendrix, Hendrix was musician, singer and songwriter. Despite a relatively brief mainstream career spanning four years, he is widely regarded as one of the greatest and most influential electric guitarists in the history of popular music, and one of the most celebrated musicians of the 20th century.

Born in Seattle, Hendrix began playing guitar at the age of 15. In 1961, he enlisted in the U.S. Army and was granted an honorable discharge the following year.

Soon afterward, he moved to Clarksville, Tennessee, and began playing gigs on the Chitlin' Circuit, eventually earning a place in the Isley Brothers' backing band and later finding work with Little Richard, with whom he continued to play through mid-1965. He then joined Curtis Knight and the Squires before moving to England in late 1966 after having been discovered by bassist Chas Chandler of the Animals.

Within months, Hendrix had earned three UK top ten hits with the Jimi Hendrix Experience: "Hey Joe," "Purple Haze" and "The Wind Cries Mary." He achieved fame in the U.S. after his performance at the Monterey Pop Festival in 1967, and in 1968 his third and final studio album, Electric Ladyland, reached #1 in the U.S.

The double LP was Hendrix's most commercially successful release and his first and only #1 album. He headlined the Woodstock Festival in 1969 and the Isle of Wight Festival in 1970 as the world's highest-paid performer before dying from barbiturate-related asphyxia on September 18, 1970 at the age of 27.

Hendrix was inspired musically by American rock and roll and electric blues. He favored overdriven amplifiers with high volume and gain, and was instrumental in developing the previously undesirable technique of guitar amplifier feedback. He helped to popularize the use of a wah-wah pedal in mainstream rock, and was the first artist to use stereophonic phasing effects in music recordings.

"Hendrix pioneered the use of the instrument as an electronic sound source. Players before him had experimented with feedback and distortion, but Hendrix turned those effects and others into a controlled, fluid vocabulary every bit as personal as the blues with which he began," wrote Holly George-Warren of Rolling Stone.

Here, Hendrix performs the “Star Spangled Banner” at Woodstock, 1969

Jimi Hendrix performs Bob Dylan’s "All Along the Watchtower,” Atlanta, 1970

Buffalo Bob Smith, host of the Howdy Doody Show, was born 102 years ago today

Buffalo Bob Smith, host of the Howdy Doody Show, was born 102 years ago today.

Born Robert Emil Schmidt, Smith was from Buffalo, New York. He attended Masten Park High School and got his start in late mornings at WBEN radio in Buffalo.

Smith's popularity in Buffalo won the attention of NBC, which brought him to New York after the war to host early mornings on flagship station WNBC, a post he held through the early 1950s before concentrating on television.

For a time between 1947 and 1953, he appeared mornings on WNBC even while hosting and producing the daily Howdy Doody children's show on the NBC television network in late afternoons.

Smith also was known as a singer and musician, appearing on many top shows of the time before and even after becoming nationally known for the Howdy Doody Show. At first it aired on Saturdays. Then on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, and finally, five days a week.

Howdy Doody was successful from the beginning. It was so popular that people gathered in the streets before appliance store windows to watch it, as they did with baseball games and wrestling matches.

Howdy's popularity being what it was, it was announced in 1948 that he would run for president of all the boys and girls. Harry S. Truman also happened to be running that year, and he won the election over New York Governor Thomas E. Dewey. But Howdy Doody also got many votes.

In 1954, Smith suffered a heart attack and for a time, he did the show from a studio built in the basement of his home in Mount Vernon, N.Y. He returned to the NBC studio in 1955. The final NBC "Howdy Doody" episode aired in 1960.

Later, in 1976, Smith reunited with longtime show producer, Roger Muir, and several of the original cast to produce a new daily syndicated Howdy Doody show.

In 1970 and 1971, he embarked on a live tour of college campuses. The shows, organized by producer, Burt DuBrow, mixed nostalgia with more contemporary humor, such as Buffalo Bob finding a package of Zig Zags (rolling paper) allegedly belonging to Clarabelle.

One show, on April 4, 1971, was recorded and released as an LP, on the label "Project 3 Total Sound Stereo." It was titled, "Buffalo Bob Smith Live at Bill Graham's Fillmore East."

Smith had a summer residence in Grand Lake Stream, Maine, as well as owning radio station WQDY in Calais, Maine. He was well liked by locals, and occasionally hosted local events. He also owned WMKR (now WSYY) radio in Millinocket, Maine.

His other screen efforts include films, "Track Of Thunder" (1968), "Back To The Future III" (1990) and Problem Child 2" (1991), as Father Flanagan. He also made guest appearances on "Happy Days" and "What's My Line," as well as the television specials, "NBC's 60th Anniversary Celebration" (1986), and "It's Howdy Doody Time" (1987).

After his retirement, Smith moved to North Carolina, becoming a member of Pinecrest Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church (ARP) in Flat Rock. He made an infomercial appearance live to promote Howdy Doody Entertainment Memorabilia on July 3, 1998, on QVC. That was his last appearance.

Buffalo Bob Smith died a few weeks later on July 30, 1998, in Hendersonville, North Carolina, just three days before beloved puppeteer, Shari Lewis, whose show took over the time slot that Howdy Doody had died.

Here, Buffalo Bob rehearses for the 40th anniversary Howdy Doody birthday special in Los Angeles in 1987

Photo by Frank Beacham

Buffalo Bob Smith: A Personal Remembrance

Laugh if you will, but you probably wouldn't be reading this column today had it not been for my childhood friends in Doodyville, USA.

I entered Howdy's television world daily and reveled in the antics of Clarabell, Phineas T. Bluster, Dilly Dally, The Flubadub, Chief Thunderthud and Corny Cobb. To me, Buffalo Bob Smith was a mentor and confidant.

And, to this day, I clearly remember those commercials: Wonder Bread, Hostess Twinkies and Cream-Filled Cupcakes, Welch's Grape Jelly and Ovaltine.

It was Howdy that drew me to work in television. One of his sponsors, Blue Bonnet Margarine, offered a paper cutout version of Howdy's characters and television studio. When assembled, one had a replica of Howdy's sets, cameras and even a boom microphone. I played with this toy for hours, "producing" make-believe Howdy shows. This led to construction of a bigger set from cardboard boxes.

My "studio" took up a whole room and was complete with a puppet stage and cardboard television cameras with lenses made from paper towel tubes. Neighborhood kids sat in the makeshift "Peanut Gallery" and we put on endless shows. From that time on, there was never any doubt that I would eventually work in film and television.

Howdy was just a warm childhood memory until November, 1983 when an article appeared in TV Guide titled, "Howdy Doody: the First Hippie." In a tongue in cheek way, the article suggested Howdy was responsible for the rebellious 1960s. Most thought it was just humor. But as happens, the story was picked up by other media and was taken seriously by many, causing an annoyed Buffalo Bob Smith to refute the "charges" on national television.

A Miami-based production company I owned at the time was summoned to Buffalo Bob's home in Ft. Lauderdale to record his response for TV's Entertainment Tonight. I've long forgotten Buffalo Bob's on-camera comments that day, but I could never forget meeting the man in person.

Buffalo Bob Smith was as charming as I remembered him from childhood. After the interview, he sat at his piano and played and sang from his Doodyville repertoire. Then, he took me into his small home office. There, in a glass box, hung the original Howdy Doody puppet. He allowed me to hold Howdy, work his strings and otherwise stand in awe of this tiny doll who so influenced my childhood.

It was pure magic. Something I will never forget.

I later moved to Los Angeles. In 1987, Fries Entertainment produced a television special there to celebrate Howdy's 40th anniversary. I was invited to be in the Peanut Gallery. This time the "Peanuts" ranged in age from two to 45. Many of the older participants brought Howdy dolls and memorabilia from their own childhood.

Buffalo Bob, who turned 70 about the time Howdy turned 40, seemed ageless as he warmed up the new Peanut Gallery. The original Howdy, Phineas T. Bluster and Dilly Dally puppets were operated from an industrial "cherrypicker" suspended high above the studio sets. The actors who originally played Clarabell, Corny Cobb and Chief Thunderthud were back in costume. As I watched these characters come back to life, it was like opening old attic trunk of toys undisturbed since childhood.

Growing up in a small South Carolina town, my first exposure to mass media was radio, magazines, phonograph records and Saturday movies. Television sets were seen only in store windows. In the late 1940's, when Buffalo Bob started his daily show, there were few television sets in the United States and no other programs for children.

On Dec. 31, 1953, the first NBC affiliate television station went on the air in my hometown. Shortly after that, my family bought its first black and white TV set.

The Howdy Doody Show began each weekday afternoon at 5:30. As a five-year-old, I was glued to the box waiting for the words: "Say Kids! What Time is It?"

Eddie Rabbitt was born 79 years ago today

Eddie Rabbitt was born 79 years ago today.

A singer-songwriter and musician, Rabbitt’s career began as a songwriter in the late 1960s, spring boarding to a recording career after composing hits such as "Kentucky Rain" for Elvis Presley in 1970 and "Pure Love" for Ronnie Milsap in 1974.

Later in the 1970s, Rabbitt helped to develop the crossover-influenced sound of country music prevalent in the 1980s with such hits as "Suspicions" and "Every Which Way but Loose." His duets, "Both to Each Other (Friends and Lovers)" and "You and I," with Juice Newton and Crystal Gayle respectively, later appeared on the soap operas Days of Our Lives and All My Children.

Rabbitt was born to Irish immigrants in Brooklyn and was raised in the nearby community of East Orange, New Jersey. His father was an oil-refinery refrigeration worker and a skilled fiddle and accordion player who often entertained local New York City dance halls.

By age twelve, Rabbitt was a proficient guitar player, having been taught by his scoutmaster, Bob Scwickrath. During his childhood, Rabbitt became a self-proclaimed "walking encyclopedia of country music."

After his parents divorced, he dropped out of school at age sixteen. His mother, Mae, explained this action by saying that Rabbitt "was never one for school [because] his head was too full of music." He later obtained a high school diploma after taking courses at night school.

Rabbitt was employed as a mental hospital attendant in the late 1950s but, like his father, he fulfilled his love of music by performing at the Six Steps Down club in his hometown. He later won a talent contest and was given an hour of Saturday night radio show time to broadcast a live performance from a bar in Paterson.

In 1964, he signed his first record deal with 20th Century Records and released the singles, "Next to the Note" and "Six Nights and Seven Days." Four years later, with $1,000 to his name, Rabbitt moved to Nashville where he began his career as a songwriter. During his first night in the town, Rabbitt wrote "Working My Way Up to the Bottom," which Roy Drusky recorded in 1968.

To support himself, Rabbitt worked as a truck driver, soda jerk and fruit picker while in Nashville. He was ultimately hired as a staff writer for the Hill & Range Publishing Company and received a salary of $37.50 per week. As a young songwriter, Rabbitt socialized with other aspiring writers at Wally's Clubhouse, a bar in Nashville. He said that he and the other patrons had "no place else to go."

Rabbitt became successful as a songwriter in 1969 when Elvis Presley recorded his song, "Kentucky Rain." The song went gold and cast Rabbitt as one of Nashville's leading young songwriters. While eating Cap'n Crunch, he penned "Pure Love," which Ronnie Milsap rode to #1 in 1974. This song led to a contract offer from Elektra Records.

In 1977, the Academy of Country Music named Rabbitt "Top New Male Vocalist of the Year." By that time he had a good reputation in Nashville, and was being compared by critics to singer-songwriter, Kris Kristofferson.

Rabbitt used innovative techniques to tie country music themes with light rhythm and blues-influenced tempos. His songs often used echo, as Rabbitt routinely sang his own background vocals. In a process called the "Eddie Rabbitt Chorale," Rabbitt compensated for what Billboard Magazine described as a "somewhat thin and reedy voice" by recording songs in three-part harmonies. His music was compared to rockabilly, particularly the album, Horizon, which was noted as having an Elvis-like sound.

Rabbitt remarked that he liked "a lot of the old Memphis sounds that came out of Sun Records" during the 1950s, and that he "wanted to catch the magic of a live band." He credited such wide-ranging artists as Bob Dylan, Elton John, Steely Dan, Elvis Presley and Willie Nelson with influencing his works.

When putting together an album, Rabbitt tried to make sure he put in "ten potential singles...no fillers, no junk."

On May 7, 1998 in Nashville, Eddie Rabbitt died from lung cancer at the age of 56. He had been diagnosed with the disease in March, 1997 and had received radiation treatment and surgery to remove part of one lung.

Here, Rabbitt performs “Driving My Life Away”

Al Jackson Jr., a founding member of Booker T and the M.G’s, was born 85 years ago today

Photo by B. Carrier

Al Jackson Jr., a founding member of Booker T and the M.G’s, was born 85 years ago today.

Jackson was a drummer, producer and songwriter. He worked for Stax Records and produced many instrumentals for Booker T and band. He was called "The Human Timekeeper" for his drumming ability.

Jackson's father, Al Jackson Sr., led a jazz/swing dance band in Memphis. The young Jackson started drumming at an early age and began playing on stage with his father's band in 1940 at the age of five. He later played in producer/trumpeter Willie Mitchell's band and at the same time was holding down a chair in the popular Ben Branch Band.

Future band mates Steve Cropper and Donald "Duck" Dunn first saw Jackson playing in Mitchell's band at the all-white Manhattan Club.

In an interview with DRUM! Magazine, Mitchell said "Al Junior was about 14 years old then. I said to his father, 'Hey, let’s use your son!' He said, 'Oh, man, he can’t play this shit!' But he did make the gig. He set up his kit – a cymbal, a snare drum and a bass drum – and I kicked the thing off. And, man, that thing went off at 20 tempos!

That was around 7:00 o'clock. And by the time Al’s father came in an hour later, at 8:00 o'clock, Al Jackson Jr. “was swinging that damn band like a pro."

Jackson became one of the most important and influential drummers in the history of recorded music at Stax. He provided an instantly recognizable backbeat behind Rufus Thomas, Carla Thomas, Eddie Floyd, Sam & Dave, Otis Redding and blues guitarist, Albert King, who Jackson also produced.

In the 70s, Jackson co-wrote and played on several hits by Al Green, including "Let's Stay Together" and "I'm Still in Love with You." Four years after the last Booker T. & the MGs album, 1971's Melting Pot, the group got together and decided to wrap up all of their individual productions and devote three years to a reunion of the band.

On September 30, 1975, Al Jackson was scheduled to fly to Detroit to produce a Major Lance session, when he heard a reminder on the radio about the Joe Frazier–Muhammad Ali fight that night. Jackson called Detroit to delay and said he was going to watch "The Thrilla in Manila" on the big screen at the Mid-South Coliseum.

Though still legally married, Jackson was estranged from his wife. In July, 1975, his wife had shot him in the chest. He decided not to press charges, but was in the process of a divorce and was planning to move to Atlanta to begin working with Stax singer/songwriter, William Bell.

Jackson attended the screening with Eddie Floyd and Terry Manning, and after the boxing, he returned home to find intruders in his house. He was told to get down on his knees and then was shot fatally five times in the back. He was dead at 39.

Around 3:00 a.m. on October 1, Barbara Jackson ran out in the street, yelling for help. She told police that burglars had tied her up and then shot her husband when he returned home. Police found nothing in the house out of place and Al Jackson's wallet and jewelry were still on him.

The man believed to have pulled the trigger had reportedly known someone in Memphis and after robbing a bank in Florida, told them to meet him over at Al Jackson's house.

Tracked through Florida to Memphis and then to Seattle, Washington, the suspected triggerman, the boyfriend of Barbara Jackson's friend, Denise LaSalle, was killed by a police officer on July 15, 1976 after a gun battle.

Here, Booker T. and MG’s perform “Time is Tight.” Jackson plays drums

Want to give your family one of the most enduring Christmas gifts of their life (and perhaps yours) for very little money?

Want to give your family one of the most enduring Christmas gifts of their life (and perhaps yours) for very little money?

Then do an oral audio or video “history” of the life of the oldest person in your family. I did an audio history with an elderly grandmother and discovered secrets I would never have known otherwise. Now, generations later, I am still asked for copies of the tape as new generations of the family want to learn of their past. It was one of the best ideas I ever had.

My grandmother lived a life that spanned the 20th Century. She was born in 1900 and died at the end of the century. To do the series of audio interviews, I used a published time line of the century I bought in a bookstore. It featured highlights from each year of dance, music, cooking, inventions — whatever was popular at the time.

When I asked her what dance she did when she was 16, she answered the Cakewalk. “Honey, I was the Cakewalk champion,” she told me. “I ran off and got married after a cakewalk.” This was news to everyone!

On this day in 1942 — 78 years ago — Casablanca, a World War II-era drama starring Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman, premiered in New York City

Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman on the set of Casablanca, 1942

On this day in 1942 — 78 years ago — Casablanca, a World War II-era drama starring Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman, premiered in New York City.

The film premiered at the New York’s Hollywood Theater to coincide with the Allied invasion of North Africa and the capture of Casablanca.

In the 1,500-seat theater, the film grossed $255,000 over ten weeks. It went into general release on January 23, 1943, to take advantage of the Casablanca Conference, a high-level meeting in the city between British Prime Minister Winston Churchill and American President Franklin D. Roosevelt.

Casablanca went on to become one of the most beloved Hollywood movies in history. In the film, Bogart played Rick Blaine, a former freedom fighter and the owner of a North African nightclub, who is reunited with the beautiful, enigmatic Ilsa Lund (Bergman), the woman who loved and left him.

Directed by Michael Curtiz, Casablanca opened widely in theaters across America on January 23, 1943, and was nominated for eight Academy Awards, including Best Actor for Bogart. It took home three Oscars, for Best Picture, Best Director and Best Adapted Screenplay.

The film featured a number of now-iconic quotes, including Rick’s line to Ilsa: “Here’s looking at you, kid,” as well as “Round up the usual suspects,” “Louis, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship” and “Of all the gin joints in all the towns in all the world, she walks into mine.”

Bogart was born on December 25, 1899, in New York City, and during the 1930s established his movie career playing tough-guy roles. He gained fame as Detective Sam Spade in The Maltese Falcon (1941), which marked John Huston’s directorial debut.

Bogart and Huston later collaborated on such films as The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948) and The African Queen (1951) with Katharine Hepburn, which earned Bogart a Best Actor Oscar.

In 1945, Bogart married his fourth wife, the actress Lauren Bacall, with whom he co-starred for the first time in 1944’s To Have and Have Not. Bogey and Bacall became one of Hollywood’s legendary couples and went on to appear together in The Big Sleep (1946), Dark Passage (1947) and Key Largo (1948).

Among Bogart’s other film credits are The Barefoot Contessa (1954), with Ava Gardner; Sabrina (1954), with Audrey Hepburn, and The Caine Mutiny (1954), which earned him another Best Actor nomination. Bogart’s final film was The Harder They Fall (1956). He died on January 14, 1957.

Casablanca was also the movie for which the Swedish-born actress Ingrid Bergman is perhaps best remembered. Bergman, born August 29, 1915, received a Best Actress Academy Award nomination for 1943’s For Whom the Bell Tolls, which was followed by a win in the same category for 1944’s Gaslight.

She was nominated for the Best Actress Oscar again for 1945’s The Bells of St. Mary’s and 1948’s Joan of Arc. Bergman worked with the acclaimed director Alfred Hitchcock on Spellbound (1945), Notorious (1946) and Under Capricorn (1949).

In 1949, the then-married Bergman began a romance with director Roberto Rossellini that created a huge scandal after she became pregnant with his child. (Bergman and Rossellini, who later married, had three children together, including the noted actress, Isabella Rossellini.)

Although Bergman won another Best Actress Academy Award for 1956’s Anastasia, the actor Cary Grant accepted the award on her behalf, and Bergman did not return publicly to Hollywood until the 1958 Oscars, at which she was a presenter.

She won her third Academy Award, in the category of Best Supporting Actress, for 1974’s Murder on the Orient Express. Her final Oscar nomination, in the Best Actress category, was for 1978’s Autumn Sonata, which was helmed by famed Swedish director Ingmar Bergman (to whom she was not related). She died on August 29, 1982.

Thanks History.com

Here, Bergman asks Sam (Dooley Wilson) to play it again

“That, ladies and gentlemen, is a MOVIE STAR!”

Robert McKee, the screenwriting teacher, to his class when showing Ingrid Bergman’s screen entrance to Casablanca.

In the 1930s, the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade wasn’t yet made up of corporate billboards for bad movies and cartoons. The balloons were instead weird animals and dead-eyed people

In the 1930s, the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade wasn’t yet made up of corporate billboards for bad movies and cartoons. The balloons were instead weird animals and dead-eyed people.

This image, from the Associated Press archives and featured in The Wire, is from the 1930 parade. It shows disembodied heads floating past New York windows.

John McVie is 75 years old today

John McVie is 75 years old today.

A British bass guitarist best known as a member of rock groups John Mayall & the Bluesbreakers and Fleetwood Mac, McVie’s surname, combined with that of Mick Fleetwood, was the inspiration for the band's name. He joined Fleetwood Mac shortly after its formation by guitarist Peter Green in 1967, replacing temporary bassist, Bob Brunning.

In 1968, McView married blues pianist and singer Christine Perfect, who became a member of Fleetwood Mac two years later. John and Christine McVie divorced, however, in 1977. Around this time, the band recorded the album, Rumours, a major artistic and commercial success that borrowed its title from the turmoils in McVie's and other band members' marriages and relationships.

McVie was born in Ealing, west London, to Reg and Dorothy McVie and attended Walpole Grammar School. At 14, he began playing the guitar in local bands, covering songs by The Shadows. He soon realized that his friends were learning lead guitar so he decided to play the bass guitar instead.

Initially, he just removed the top two (E and B) strings from his guitar to play the bass parts until his father bought him a pink Fender bass guitar, the same as that used by McVie's major early musical influence Jet Harris, The Shadows' bass player.

McVie was in class with Roger Warwick, a baritone sax player who had studied under Don Rendell and was to emerge in the London rock-jazz scene. Their teacher, Mr. Howell (a pianist), although not really appreciating this "funny" music, was intelligent and open-minded enough to give pupils space and time to use school facilities to practice and listen to the new wave.

McVie’s first experience making music with a group of like minds was in the back room of a house in Lammas Park Road. Although only possessing a Framus acoustic with top two strings removed, McVie showed a determination and ability that would take him to success as a professional musician.

McVie's first job as a bass player was in a band called the "Krewsaders," formed by boys living in the same street as McVie in Ealing, West London. The Krewsaders played mainly at weddings and parties.

Around this time, John Mayall began forming a Chicago-style Blues band, John Mayall's Bluesbreakers. Initially, Mayall wanted to recruit bass player Cliff Barton of the Cyril Davies All Stars for the rhythm section of his new band. Barton declined, however, but gave him John McVie's phone number, urging Mayall to give the talented young bass player a chance in the Bluesbreakers.

Mayall contacted McVie, and asked him to audition for his band. Soon after, McVie got an offer to play bass in the Bluesbreakers. He accepted while still holding down his daytime job as a tax inspector for a further nine months before becoming a musician full-time.

Under Mayall's tutelage, McVie, not having had any formal training in music, learned to play the blues mainly by listening to B. B. King and Willie Dixon records given to him by Mayall. In 1966, a young Peter Green was asked to join Mayall's Bluesbreakers as the band's new lead guitar player, after Eric Clapton, the third guitarist with the band, had left.

Some time later, after the recording of A Hard Road, drummer Aynsley Dunbar was replaced by Mick Fleetwood. Green, McVie and Fleetwood quickly forged a strong personal relationship, and when John Mayall gave Green some free studio time for his birthday, Green asked McVie and Fleetwood to join him for a recording session.

Produced by Mike Vernon, they recorded three tracks together, "Curly,” "Rubber Duck" and an instrumental, "Fleetwood Mac.” Later the same year, after having been replaced by Mick Taylor in the Bluesbreakers, Peter Green opted to form his own band, which he called "Fleetwood Mac," after his preferred rhythm section (Fleetwood and McVie).

Mick Fleetwood immediately joined Green's new band, having been dismissed earlier from the Bluesbreakers for drunkenness. However, McVie initially was reluctant to join Fleetwood Mac, not wanting to leave the security and well-paid job in the Bluesbreakers, forcing Green to temporarily hire a bassist named Bob Brunning.

A few weeks later McVie changed his mind, however, as he felt that The Bluesbreakers musical direction were shifting too much towards jazz, and he joined Fleetwood Mac on bass in December, 1967. With McVie now in Fleetwood Mac, the band recorded its first album, Fleetwood Mac. The album was released in February, 1968, and became an immediate national hit, establishing Fleetwood Mac as a major part in the English Blues movement.

While on tour, Fleetwood Mac would often share venues with fellow blues band, Chicken Shack. It was on one such occasion that McVie met his future wife, the lead singer and piano player of Chicken Shack, Christine Perfect. Following a brief romance of only two weeks, McVie and Perfect got married with Peter Green as best man.

With the couple being unable to spend much time together because of the constant touring with their bands, Christine (now McVie) quit Chicken Shack to become a housewife to spend more time with John. However, following the departure of Peter Green from Fleetwood Mac in 1970, McVie successfully persuaded Christine to join him in Fleetwood Mac.

On October 27, 2013, Fleetwood Mac announced on their Facebook Page that McVie had been diagnosed with colon cancer and would be undergoing treatment. He continued to play with the band during their 2014 On With The Show tour following an improvement in his condition.

Here, McVie with Fleetwood Mac perform on Midnight Special in 1973

On this day in 1832 — 188 years ago — the first streetcar in America made its maiden voyage in New York City. It ran from Prince Street to 14th Street — along the Bowery

On this day in 1832 — 188 years ago — the first streetcar in America made its maiden voyage in New York City. It ran from Prince Street to 14th Street — along the Bowery.

The streetcar’s inventor, a young Irish immigrant, John Stephenson, traveled the new route with the New York City mayor. The first streetcar was drawn by horses, but glided on steel rails. It provided a smoother ride than the horse-drawn omnibuses of the time, which bumped over cobblestones.

By the 1860s, Manhattan had 14 horse-streetcar lines. Streetcars wouldn’t fall out of fashion for a very long time — though horses would. By 1917, only one horse-streetcar line operated in the city, and it reportedly collected just 30 cents a day in fares.

Thanks New York Times

Anna Mae Bullock — known by her stage name Tina Turner — is 81 years old today

Anna Mae Bullock — known by her stage name Tina Turner — is 81 years old today.

Turner is a singer, dancer, actress and author, whose career has spanned more than half a century.

Born and raised in the American South, she is now a Swiss citizen. She began her musical career in the mid-1950s as a featured singer with Ike Turner's Kings of Rhythm, first recording in 1958 under the name, "Little Ann." Her introduction to the public as Tina Turner began in 1960 as a member of the Ike & Tina Turner Revue.

Success followed with a string of notable hits credited to the duo, including "River Deep – Mountain High" (1966), "Proud Mary" (1971) and "Nutbush City Limits" (1973), a song which she wrote.

In her autobiography, I, Tina, she revealed several instances of severe domestic abuse against her by Ike Turner prior to their 1976 split and subsequent 1978 divorce.

Raised as a Baptist, she melded her faith with Buddhism in 1974, crediting the religion and its spiritual chant of Nam Myoho Renge Kyo for helping her to endure during difficult times. After her divorce from Ike Turner, she rebuilt her career through performances, though she initially struggled to make an impact on the music charts as a solo artist.

In the early 1980s, she launched a comeback with another string of hits, starting in 1983 with the single "Let's Stay Together," followed by the 1984 release of her fifth solo album, Private Dancer, which became a worldwide success.

"What's Love Got to Do with It," the most successful single from the album, was later used as the title of a biographical film adapted from her autobiography.

In addition to her musical career, Turner has also experienced success in films, including a role in the 1975 rock musical, Tommy, and a starring role in the 1985 Mel Gibson blockbuster film, Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome, as well as a cameo role in the 1993 film, Last Action Hero.

One of the world's most popular entertainers, she is often called "the queen of rock." Turner has been termed the most successful female rock artist, selling more concert tickets than any other solo performer in history. Her combined album and single sales total approximately 100 million copies worldwide. She is noted for her energetic stage presence, powerful vocals and career longevity.

In 2008, Turner returned from semi-retirement to embark on her Tina!: 50th Anniversary Tour. Turner's tour became one of the highest selling ticketed shows of 2008–2009.

The biographical musical, Tina, is now running on Broadway.

Here, Turner performs “What’s Love Got to Do With It”

The Last Waltz, The Band’s motion picture concert, was held 44 years ago today

The Last Waltz, The Band’s motion picture concert, was held 44 years ago today.

Performed on Thanksgiving Day, November 25, 1976, at the Winterland Ballroom in San Francisco, The Last Waltz was advertised as the end of The Band’s illustrious touring career.

The concert saw The Band joined by more than a dozen special guests, including Paul Butterfield, Eric Clapton, Neil Diamond, Bob Dylan, Emmylou Harris, Ronnie Hawkins, Dr. John, Joni Mitchell, Van Morrison, Ringo Starr, Muddy Waters, Ronnie Wood, Bobby Charles and Neil Young.

The event was filmed by director Martin Scorsese and made into a documentary of the same name, released in 1978. The film features concert performances, scenes shot on a studio soundstage and interviews by Scorsese with members of The Band.

A triple-LP soundtrack recording, produced by Rob Fraboni, was issued in 1978. The film was released on DVD in 2002 as was a four-CD box set of the concert and related studio recordings. The Last Waltz has been widely hailed as one of the greatest concert films ever made, although it has been criticized for its focus on Robbie Robertson.

Levon Helm, in his 1993 autobiography, “This Wheel's on Fire,” expressed serious reservations about Scorsese's handling of the film, claiming that Scorsese and Robertson (who produced the film) conspired to make The Band look like Robbie Robertson's sidemen.

He said that Robertson, who is depicted singing powerful backing vocals, was actually singing into a microphone that was turned off throughout most of the concert (a typical practice during their live performances).

Helm also discusses Manuel's and Hudson's minimal screen time, such as when Manuel sings during the closing number "I Shall Be Released," but Manuel is hidden behind the phalanx of guest performers. There are several shots catching Ronnie Hawkins looking around but not singing, yet Manuel remains invisible.

Helm went so far as to say that Last Waltz was "the biggest fuckin' rip-off that ever happened to The Band," citing that he, Manuel, Danko and Hudson never received any money for the various home videos, DVDs and soundtracks released by Warner Bros. after the project.

In the book, the producer John Simon also states that, except for Levon's drums and vocals, all of the soundtrack was overdubbed.

Here is the trailer for “The Last Waltz,” released in 1978

Bob Dylan with members of the Band

Thanksgiving dinner for 5,000 at the Winterland Ballroom in San Francisco before the Last Walt concert, 44 years ago today

Photo by Gary Fong

The Band performs “The Weight” at the Last Waltz with the Staples Singers

Ringo Starr, Ron Wood, Bob Dylan, Neil Young, Eric Clapton, Neil Diamond and The Band perform "I Shall Be Released"

Forty-six years ago, Nick Drake died of an overdose of prescription antidepressants in his home in Warwickshire, England

The timeworn cliché that no great artist is appreciated during his lifetime has rarely held true for pop musicians in the era of rock and roll.

Far more modern pop stars have outlived their popularity and commercial viability than have achieved it for the first time only decades after their deaths.

One glaring exception to this rule, however, was the English singer-songwriter Nick Drake, a performer far better known today than at any point during his lifetime.

On November 25, 1974 — 46 years ago today — Nick Drake died of an overdose of prescription antidepressants in his home in Warwickshire, England. His death brought an end to a tragically short recording career, but it set the stage for one of the biggest posthumous "comebacks" in popular music history, fully a quarter-century later.

Nicholas Rodney Drake was born in 1948 in Rangoon, Burma, and came of age in England during the creative musical ferment of the 1960s. Though clearly influenced by the likes of Bob Dylan and frequently referred to as a folk singer, Drake's sound is unique enough to defy easy categorization.

Discovered at the age of 20 while playing live in various London venues, Drake completed his first album, Five Leaves Left, within a year. A work of delicate, melancholy beauty, Five Leaves Left, now commonly earns a place on lists of "Greatest Ever" albums lists, but it sold extremely poorly in its day.

A longtime sufferer of serious depression, Drake did little to improve his commercial fortunes by withdrawing from society and refusing to play live or grant interviews. In the years after his death, Drake’s music earned him a cult following, but nothing approaching stardom.

Increasingly cited by contemporary stars as a musical influence over the course of the 1980s and 90s, however, Drake stayed on the fringes of the popular consciousness long enough to gain stardom by an unlikely means some 25 years after his death, when a memorable Volkswagen television commercial was set to the title track of his final album, Pink Moon.

After airing for the first time in February, 2000, the VW ad featuring "Pink Moon" led Nick Drake to sell more albums within the next year than he ever sold during his lifetime.

Nick Drake in his only known monologue

Thanks History.com

Eddie Boyd, the blues piano player, was born 106 years ago today

Eddie Boyd, the blues piano player, was born 106 years ago today.

Born on Stovall's Plantation near Clarksdale, Mississippi, Boyd moved to the Beale Street district of Memphis in 1936 where he played piano and guitar with his group, the Dixie Rhythm Boys. He followed the great migration northward to the factories of Chicago in 1941.

Boyd wrote and recorded the hit songs "Five Long Years" (1952), "24 Hours" (1953) and the "Third Degree" (co-written by Willie Dixon, also 1953). He toured Europe with Buddy Guy's band in 1965 as part of the American Folk Blues Festival. He later toured and recorded with Fleetwood Mac and John Mayall and the Bluesbreakers.

Tired of the racial discrimination he experienced in the United States, Boyd first moved to Belgium where he recorded with the Dutch band, Cuby and the Blizzards. He settled in Helsinki, Finland in 1970, where he recorded ten blues records, the first being Praise to Helsinki (1970). He married in 1977.

Boyd died in 1994 in Helsinki just a few months before Eric Clapton released the chart-topping blues album, From the Cradle, that included Boyd's "Five Long Years" and "Third Degree."

Here, Boyd performs “Praise To My Baby”

Jimmy Johnson, the blues guitarist and singer, was born 77 years ago today

Jimmy Johnson, the blues guitarist and singer, was born 77 years ago today.

Born in Holly Springs, Mississippi, several of Johnson's brothers had careers in music. Among them are soul musician, Syl Johnson, and Magic Sam bassist Mack Thompson.

In his younger years, Johnson played piano and sang in gospel groups. He and his family moved to Chicago in 1950, where he worked as a welder and played guitar in his spare time.

He began playing professionally with Slim Willis in 1959, changing his last name to Johnson like his brother, Syl.

As a guitarist, he was influenced by both Buddy Guy and Otis Rush and played with Freddy King, Albert King, Magic Sam, Otis Rush and Eddy Clearwater.

In the 1960s, he played R&B music, working with Otis Clay, Denise LaSalle and Garland Green. By the late 1960s, he had released his first single.

By 1974, he performed the blues, working with Jimmy Dawkins and touring Japan with Otis Rush in 1975.

Johnson’s first solo material appeared on Alligator Records and Delmark Records in 1978-79, when he was fifty years old.

He was an award-winner at the first Blues Music Awards held in Memphis in November, 1980.

His career continued to pick up until December 2, 1988, when his touring van crashed in Indiana, killing his keyboardist, St. James Bryant, and bassist Larry Exum.

Johnson was injured and took an extended hiatus from the music industry, but returned to record for Verve Records in 1994.

In 2002, he recorded with his brother, Syl. He remained active and among other things toured Europe in 2009, playing both the UK as well as Copenhagen Blues Festival in Denmark.

On June 7, 2019, while performing at the 36th annual Chicago Blues Festival, Chicago Major Laurie Lightfoot officially declared it to be Jimmy Johnson Day. He died from kidney failure in 2019 at the age of 76.

Here, Johnson performs “Jockey” and “In the Midnight Hour” in 1994

This week in 2010 — ten years ago — a restaurant in Amherst, Massachusetts fell victim to a prankster who had them make 178 pizzas by claiming they were for singer Bob Dylan and his crew

This week in 2010 — ten years ago — a restaurant in Amherst, Massachusetts fell victim to a prankster who had them make 178 pizzas by claiming they were for singer Bob Dylan and his crew.

An imposter, carrying backstage credentials, walked into Antonio's Pizza restaurant and placed the huge order worth more than $3,900. He told the owner the pizzas were for Dylan and his crew who had appeared in concert in Amherst, Massachusetts.

The staff at Antonios worked until 5.30 am to make the pizzas — but were left stunned when no one collected the order.

Though the culprit got away with the prank, he later felt bad about it, got a lawyer and settled the bill with the restaurant.

On this day in 1952 — 68 years ago — The Mousetrap, a murder-mystery play by Agatha Christie, opened in London’s West End

On this day in 1952 — 68 years ago — The Mousetrap, a murder-mystery play by Agatha Christie, opened in London’s West End.

It would go on to have the longest initial run of any play in history, with more than 23,000 performances to date. In addition to The Mousetrap, the highly prolific Christie penned dozens of other plays, novels and stories, a number of which were adapted for television, film and radio.

Christie was born Agatha Miller on September 15, 1890, in Torquay, England. Her first novel, The Mysterious Affair at Styles, was published in 1920 and introduced Detective Hercule Poirot.

The mustachioed Belgian sleuth would appear in some 30 novels, including 1926’s The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, 1934’s Murder on the Orient Express, 1937’s Death on the Nile and 1942’s Five Little Pigs. The final Poirot novel was 1975’s Curtain. On screen, a string of actors portrayed Poirot, starting with Austin Trevor in the 1931 film, Alibi.

Albert Finney earned a Best Actor Oscar nomination for his portrayal of Poirot in 1974’s Murder on the Orient Express. The film, which was directed by Sidney Lumet, earned a total of six Academy Award nominations and featured an all-star cast that included Lauren Bacall, Ingrid Bergman and Sean Connery.

Peter Ustinov played Poirot in a half-dozen movies, including 1978’s Death on the Nile and 1988’s Appointment with Death. Since 1989, the English actor David Suchet has portrayed Christie’s fictional detective on the British TV series, Poirot.

Another famous Christie creation, spinster and amateur sleuth Jane Marple, appeared in some earlier short stories but made her novel debut in The Murder at the Vicarage, first published in 1930. The tweedy Miss Marple, featured in a dozen books, first appeared on the big screen in 1962’s Murder, She Said, starring the Academy Award-winning English actress Margaret Rutherford.

Angela Lansbury took on the roll of Miss Marple in 1980’s The Mirror Crack’d, which co-starred Elizabeth Taylor and Rock Hudson. Lansbury went on to star as the crime-solving mystery writer Jessica Fletcher, a character reportedly inspired in part by Miss Marple, in the popular TV series Murder, She Wrote, which originally aired from 1984 to 1996.

Helen Hayes and Joan Hickson are among the other actresses to play Miss Marple.

The acclaimed big-screen adaptations of Christie’s work that featured characters other than Poirot and Marple include 1957’s suspenseful courtroom drama Witness for the Prosecution, directed by Billy Wilder (Double Indemnity, Sunset Boulevard) and starring Tyrone Power, Marlene Dietrich and Charles Laughton. The film received six Oscar nominations, including Best Picture.

Dubbed the “Queen of Crime,” Agatha Christie was one of the top-selling writers in history. She died at the age of 85 on January 12, 1976.

Virgil Thomson, the composer and critic, was born 124 years ago today

Virgil Thomson, the composer and critic, was born 124 years ago today.

Thomson was instrumental in the development of the "American Sound" in classical music. He has been described as a modernist, a neoclassicist, a composer of "an Olympian blend of humanity and detachment" whose "expressive voice was always carefully muted" until his late opera Lord Byron which, in contrast to all his previous work, exhibited an emotional content that rises to "moments of real passion.”

Born in Kansas City, as a child Thompson befriended Alice Smith, great-granddaughter of Joseph Smith, founder of the Mormon faith. After World War I, he entered Harvard University thanks to a loan from Dr. Fred M. Smith, the president of the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, and father of Alice Smith.

His tours of Europe with the Harvard Glee Club helped nurture his desire to return there. At Harvard, Thomson focused his studies on the piano work of Erik Satie. He studied in Paris on fellowship for a year, and after graduating, lived in Paris from 1925–1940.

In Paris, he forged relationships with such prominent cultural figures as James Joyce, Ernest Hemingway, e.e. Cummings, Aaron Copland, Ezra Pound, Igor Stravinsky, Pablo Picasso, Orson Welles, Jean Cocteau and Gertrude Stein. He eventually studied with Nadia Boulanger and became a fixture of "Paris in the twenties." His most important friend from this period was Gertrude Stein, who was an artistic collaborator and mentor to him.

Following the publication of his book, The State of Music, he established himself in New York City as a peer of Aaron Copland and was also a music critic for the New York Herald-Tribune from 1940 through 1954. His writings on music, and his reviews of performances in particular, are noted for their wit and their independent judgments.

His definition of music was famously "that which musicians do," and his views on music are radical in their insistence on reducing the rarefied aesthetics of music to market activity. He even went so far as to claim that the style a piece was written in could be most effectively understood as a consequence of its income source.

In the 1930s, he worked as a theater and film composer. His most famous works for theater are two operas with libretti by Gertrude Stein. They are Four Saints in Three Acts, especially famous for its use of an all-black cast, and The Mother of Us All. He also did incidental music for Orson Welles' Depression-era production of Macbeth, set in the Caribbean, known as the “Voodoo Macbeth.”

Thomson was famous for his revival of the rare technique of composing "musical portraits" of living subjects, often spending hours in a room with them before rushing off to finish the piece on his own. Many subjects reported feeling that the pieces did capture something unique about their identities even though nearly all of the portraits were absent of any clearly representational content.

Later in life, Thomson became a sort of mentor and father figure to a new generation of American tonal composers such as Ned Rorem, Paul Bowles and Leonard Bernstein, a circle united as much by their shared homosexuality as by their similar compositional sensibilities. Women composers were not part of that circle, and some have suggested that, as a critic, he pointedly ignored their works or adopted a patronizing tone.

Thomason died on September 30, 1989 in his suite at the Chelsea Hotel in Manhattan.

He is pictured in a 1947 photograph by Carl Van Vechten