Soul man Otis Redding was born 82 years ago today
Otis Redding performs on the TV show, Ready Steady Go, in 1966
Photo from Michael Ochs Archives
Otis Redding was born 82 years ago today.
Redding was a soul singer-songwriter, record producer, arranger and talent scout. He is considered one of the major figures in soul music and rhythm and blues, and one of the greatest singers in popular music.
His open-throated singing was an influence on other soul singers of the 1960s, and he helped to craft the lean and powerful style of R&B that formed the basis of the Stax Sound.
After appearing at the 1967 Monterey Pop Festival, he wrote and recorded "(Sittin' On) The Dock of the Bay,” which became the first posthumous #1 record on both the Billboard Hot 100 and R&B charts after his death in a plane crash.
Born and raised in Dawson, Georgia, Redding left school at 15 to support his family by working with Little Richard's backing band, The Upsetters, and by playing talent shows for prize money.
In 1958, he joined Johnny Jenkins's band, The Pinetoppers, and toured the Southern United States while serving as driver and musician. An unscheduled appearance on a session led to a turning point in his career. He signed a contract with Stax Records and released his debut album, Pain in My Heart, in 1964. This album produced his first Stax single, "These Arms of Mine.”
Although Redding's initial popularity was with African Americans, he later became equally popular among the broader American public. He and his group first played small gigs in the South, then performed at the Whisky au Go Go nightclub, their first concert in the western U.S.
Redding's death was devastating for Stax, which was on the verge of bankruptcy. Later, Stax discovered that Atlantic Records owned the rights to the entire catalog.
By 1967, Redding’s band, The Bar-Kays, had taken to traveling on Redding's Beechcraft H18 to gigs. They flew to Nashville, and on December 9, 1967, appeared on the nationally syndicated Upbeat television show produced in Cleveland. They played three concerts in two nights at a small club called Leo's Casino. After a phone call with his wife and children, Redding's next stop was in Madison, Wisconsin.
On the next day they were to play at the "Factory" nightclub near the University of Wisconsin after the opening act "The Grim Reapers,” precursor of Cheap Trick. Although the weather was poor, with heavy rain and fog, and Redding had been warned to postpone the flight, they did not stop their trip.
Four miles from their destination at Truax Field in Madison, the pilot radioed for permission to land. Shortly thereafter, the plane crashed into Lake Monona.
Redding died at age 26.
Here is Redding, in 1966, performing “Can’t Turn You Loose.”
Gertrude Stein (on left) with Alice B. Toklas outside their home, 1944, with their poodle, Basket
Photo by Carl Mydans
On this day in 1910 — 113 years ago — Alice B. Toklas became the lifetime house mate of avant-garde writer, Gertrude Stein.
Stein, who shared a house with her brother, Leo, for many years, met Toklas in 1907. She began staying with Stein and Leo in Paris in 1909, then moved in permanently in 1910. Stein's brother, Leo, moved out in 1914.
Toklas' love and support of Stein was so important that when Stein wrote her autobiography in 1933, she titled it, The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas, adopting Toklas' persona as the narrator of her own memoirs.
The two women turned their Parisian home at 22 rue de Fleurus into an important artistic and literary salon, where they entertained Picasso, Matisse, Hemingway, Fitzgerald and many other artists of the day. Stein's own avant-garde writing attempted to create a Cubist literature that used words like the strokes of a paintbrush.
Stein was born in Pennsylvania in 1879 and traveled around Europe with her parents and four siblings. The family settled in Oakland when she was seven, and she spent much of her childhood raised by a governess.
Very attached to her older brother, Leo, she followed him to Harvard and studied psychology with William James. She then followed Leo to Johns Hopkins, where she studied medicine for a year, then gave it up.
The siblings moved to Paris in 1903. Her best-known works include the novels Three Lives (1909) and The Making of Americans (1925), her autobiography, and the experimental work, Tender Buttons (1914).
Stein and Toklas survived the German occupation of Paris and later befriended many American servicemen in the city. After the success of her opera, Four Saints in Three Acts (1934), Stein launched a successful U.S. lecture tour.
Stein is considered one of the most influential thinkers and writers of her time.
She died in France in 1946.
Her last words, according to Toklas, were: "What is the answer? ... In that case, what is the question?"
Thanks History.com
Stein (right) and Toklas in their apartment, 1922
Photo by Man Ray
Gertrude Stein’s apartment at 27 rue de Fleurus in Paris was a Mecca for young artists. Painters, poets, writers and sculptors sought out her advice and companionship.
Her apartment became a "salon" on Saturday night, and attracted the avant garde. She seemed to have her finger on the pulse of all of the artists and expats.
She was particularly good at spotting talented young painters. She would buy their paintings at bargain prices — invest in them — and wait until the paintings became valuable.
Danny Kalb, Washington Square Park, New York City, 2009
by Frank Beacham
Danny Kalb, guitarist who was an original member of the 1960s group, The Blues Project, was born 81 years ago today.
Born in Mount Vernon, New York, Kalb was a protégé of Dave Van Ronk and became a solo performer and a session musician, performing with such folk singers as Judy Collins, Phil Ochs, Pete Seeger and Bob Dylan.
Kalb and the blues ethnomusicologist, Sam Charters, formed the New Strangers. He joined Van Ronk's Ragtime Jug Stompers in 1963. Inspired by the African-American bluesmen Son House, Skip James and Mississippi John Hurt, Kalb experimented with acoustic and electronic music.
Kalb joined Steve Katz, Andy Kulberg, Roy Blumenfeld and Tommy Flanders to form the Blues Project in 1965. Flanders later left the band and was replaced by Al Kooper. They recorded three albums, played frequently at the Cafe Au Go Go and at Murray the K's last "submarine race-watching" spectacular at the RKO 58th Street Theater in New York.
In 1965, the Blues Project performed an eleven-minute rendition of Muddy Waters's "Two Trains Running" in electronic form, with Waters in the audience. When asked what he thought of it, Waters said, "You really got me." Kalb later said, "If I'd dropped dead at that point on the spot because of what we thought of Muddy Waters, then my life would have been well spent."
Personality clashes, drugs and the 1960s lifestyle took their toll on the band. Katz and Kooper left to form Blood, Sweat and Tears.
At the age of 15, Kalb formed the band, Gay Notes, and performed with Bob Dylan on a WBAI-FM concert broadcast in 1961. In 1964, Kalb played second guitar on Phil Ochs's album, All the News That's Fit to Sing, and in 1964 appeared on Judy Collins's Fifth Album.
In 1968, he released Crosscurrents with Stefan Grossman. He was fairly quiet for the next twenty years, but joined Al Kooper for a Blues Project reunion, recorded at the Bottom Line in 1996.
He currently performs solo acoustic gigs, plays acoustic and electric music with the Danny Kalb Trio, including Bob Jones on acoustic bass and Mark Ambrosino on drums and occasionally performs with Stefan Grossman and Steve Katz and with his brother, Jonathan Kalb.
Danny Kalb died on November 19, 2022, at the age of 80.
Here, Kalb and The Blues Project perform “A Flute Thing” at the Monterey Pop Festival in 1967.
Bruce Palmer, bass player for Buffalo Springfield, was born 77 years ago today.
Born in Liverpool, Nova Scotia, and later moved to Toronto, Ontario, Canada, Palmer started out playing in a high school band, which evolved into the successful Robbie Lane & The Disciples. He then graduated to a local, otherwise all-black group, fronted by Billy Clarkson.
Next came British invasion-inspired, Jack London & The Sparrows, which, after Palmer left, evolved into Steppenwolf. In early 1965, he left to join The Mynah Birds and met Neil Young. The group, fronted by future funk legend, Rick James, was signed to Motown Records and did some preliminary recordings before it was discovered that James had been AWOL from the Navy for a year.
A planned single, "It's My Time" b/w "Go Ahead And Cry," was withdrawn just prior to its scheduled release by Motown. Both sides of this single were included in the 2006 box set, "The Complete Motown Singles, Vol. 6: 1966," released in a limited edition of 6000 by the Universal label, Hip-O-Select, marking the first time any of the 1966 Motown recordings by the Mynah Birds had seen the light of day.
The group was forced to disband, and Young and Palmer drove the former's hearse to Los Angeles in the hope of meeting up with Stephen Stills, a journeyman folk musician with whom Young had played briefly in Canada two years earlier. Young and Palmer ran into Stills while stuck in traffic in Los Angeles, Stills having recognized Young's distinctive hearse.
It was not long before the trio, along with Richie Furay on rhythm guitar and Dewey Martin on drums, formed Buffalo Springfield. The band only had one major national hit, "For What It's Worth," written and sung by Stills. But locally their popularity was rivaled only by The Byrds and The Doors.
Palmer was arrested on numerous occasions for drug possession. These legal problems, compounded by his predilection to sit at home reading mystical texts, led to him being shunned by most of the group. Another arrest led to his deportation from the United States in early 1967.
Palmer was replaced in the band by a rotating group of bassists that included Jim Fielder and Ken Koblun. Shortly thereafter, Young left the group due to tensions with Stills, and Buffalo Springfield played its most prominent concert at the Monterey Pop Festival in June, 1967, with Doug Hastings and David Crosby filling in for Young.
In late May, Palmer returned to the United States disguised as a businessman, and rejoined the band. Young eventually returned as well. However, the group continued to rely on session bassists. Meanwhile, Palmer continued to rack up a lengthy arrest record, which included yet another drug possession bust and speeding without a license.
In January, 1968, Palmer was removed from the band and officially replaced by Jim Messina. Then, after embarking on a tour opening for the Beach Boys, Buffalo Springfield disbanded on May 5, 1968 after a final hometown concert at the Long Beach Sports Arena.
Palmer resurfaced in the summer of 1969 for two weeks as the bassist for Crosby, Stills, Nash, & Young, but was soon replaced by Motown prodigy, Greg Reeves. Back in Toronto, he gigged briefly with Luke & The Apostles in early 1970.
In 1982–1983, Palmer joined as the bassist in Neil Young's Trans Band, playing a mixture of Young classics and electronica-infused material to audiences throughout America and Europe.
Palmer died of a heart attack at the age of 58 on October 1, 2004 in Belleville, Ontario, Canada.
Dee Dee Sharp is 78 years old today.
Sharpe is an R&B singer, who began her career recording as a backing vocalist in 1961.
In 1962, she began a string of successful Billboard Hot 100 Top 10 hits including, "Slow Twistin'" (with Chubby Checker) (#3) for which she was uncredited on the label, "Mashed Potato Time" (#2), "Gravy (For My Mashed Potatoes)" (#9), "Ride" (#5) and "Do the Bird" (#10).
Both "Mashed Potato Time" and "Ride" each sold over a million copies.
"Do the Bird" provided her only entry in the UK Singles Chart, where it peaked at #46 in April, 1963.
In 1967, Sharp married record producer, Kenny Gamble, and recorded under the name Dee Dee Sharp-Gamble. The couple later divorced.
Sharp had a brief career resurgence during the disco era and hit the charts again with her version of 10 CC's "I'm Not In Love." She also joined Lou Rawls, Billy Paul, Teddy Pendergrass, The O'Jays and Archie Bell) as a member of the Philadelphia International All Stars, who had a minor hit with "Let's Clean Up the Ghetto."
In 1980, she spent four weeks at #1 on the Hot Dance Club Play chart with "Breaking and Entering"/"Easy Money," from her album, Dee Dee.
More recent appearances included a performance at Pontins in the UK for the Northern Soul Show, and at the 2008 Detroit Jazz Festival. In May, 2009, she appeared in Belgium at the Salle De L'Hotel de Ville.
Here, Sharp performs “Mashed Potato Time.”
Elvin Jones was born 96 years ago today.
Jones was a jazz drummer of the post-bop era. He showed interest in drums at a young age, watching the circus bands march by his family's home in Pontiac, Michigan. He served in the United States Army from 1946 to 1949 and subsequently played in a Detroit house band led by Billy Mitchell.
He moved to New York in 1955 and worked as a sideman for Charles Mingus, Teddy Charles, Bud Powell and Miles Davis. From 1960 to 1966, he was a member of the John Coltrane quartet (along with Jimmy Garrison on bass and McCoy Tyner on Piano), a celebrated recording phase, appearing on such albums as A Love Supreme.
Following his work with John Coltrane, Jones led several small groups, some under the name The Elvin Jones Jazz Machine. His brothers Hank Jones and Thad Jones were also jazz musicians with whom he recorded during his career.
Jones died of heart failure in Englewood, New Jersey on May 18, 2004.
Here, Jones performs with John Coltrane in Italy, circa 1960s.
As twilight faded over Pasadena, California on September 9, 1894, an artificial sun flickered to life for the first time.
High above town in the San Gabriel Mountains stood a wonder of the new electric age: a 60-inch General Electric searchlight, by many accounts the largest light in the world. This massive projector first dazzled audiences at the 1893 Chicago World's Fair. Now it would perform its nightly spectacle in the mountains above Los Angeles.
Up above, on the summit of Thaddeus Lowe's Echo Mountain resort, tourists wrapped themselves in blankets and huddled around the searchlight as its operator fired it to life. When running at 200 amperes — a current generated by a Pelton water wheel in a nearby canyon — the carbon arc lamp burned with the intensity of 90,000 to 100,000 candles.
A massive reflecting lens mirror, built in France, magnified that blaze to 375 million candlepower. This dazzling beam blanched the flatlands below. It wandered the streets of Pasadena. It streamed through the windows of San Gabriel farmhouses with the ardor of day.
Lowe's publicist claimed you could read a newspaper under its light from 35 miles away. It was definitely visible 60 miles away on Catalina Island, a hot white dot hovering just above the horizon.
Some watched the show with amusement. Children lit signal fires or flashed red lights to attract the operator's attention. The mischievous ones bounced the sunbeam back with hand-held mirrors. Others reacted with alarm. Horses startled. Roosters crowed. Lovers cursed.
In an 1895 dispatch, author Grace Ellery Channing recalled the scene atop Echo Mountain: “Now its tunnel of light went sweeping across the plain below, resting here and there where a red light signaled for a visit. Down below that beam had almost dazed us with its brightness; here we could stare into the very eye of the monster without blinking, for the rays do not focus so near.
“Away, back and forth, went the finger, now stretching out into a full hand of light, now narrowing to so fine a line that it could be but barely perceived…But the prettiest thing of all was to watch the stream of bats and insects across the golden beam. As these entered it they, too, became golden, so that there as a continual flight of golden wings and shapes darting from the dark into the dark, with a golden moment's apotheosis between.”
The searchlight was just one of the modern marvels collected by Lowe, a pioneering aeronaut who had commanded the Union Army's Balloon Corps during the Civil War. At Echo Mountain, his "White City," Lowe placed an observatory with a 16-inch refracting telescope and hired a renowned astronomer to manage it.
He is best remembered for his Mount Lowe Railway, the world's first-all electric mountain railroad, which climbed 3,000 feet into the San Gabriels over white-knuckle cliffs and a soaring, 1,300-foot funicular. But nothing signaled the dawn of a new electric age in the Southland like Lowe's searchlight, its sun-shaft overthrowing the dark of night.
Summertime, 1943
Painting by Edward Hopper