Big Band Bash

This week is a continuation of our look at the career of the late Stan Kenton. Stan's birthday is December 15th, 1911 so this seemed like a good time to go back and listen to some of the many exciting recordings he made for Capitol Records in the 1940's. Since this Mosaic Records set has a very informative booklet, I tried to give the dates and arrangers for each song. The Big Band Bash puzzler is...

This week on Big Band Bash I will be presenting a two part show on the music and career of the late Stan Kenton. Stan's birthday was on December 15th so I thought now would be a good time to listen to some of those great, early recordings he made for Capitol Records in the 1940's. The music on the show comes from an out of print Mosaic Records Company set called "The Complete Capitol Studio Record...

With the Thanksgiving holiday fast approaching, I wanted to put together a show for that day as I have never produced a Thanksgiving show before. It turned out a little more difficult than I thought. I could only find one song in my collection that had the title "Thanksgiving". I'm not sure why there were not more results because there are songs written about other holidays. So not to be deterred...

Song pluggers back in the 1920's used to promote songs from just about everyone trying to get their songs played whether they were good or bad. One composer who's songs were always good and made it into many Broadway shows was the late Jerome Kern.  Today's show features the music of Jerome Kern as played by many assorted big bands. We'll be hearing from many of your favorite bands as we learn a l...

Last week I started part 1 of a collection by Columbia Special Products called Great Vocalists of the Big Band Era. This is a six vinyl album set that I found in our station's record library. This set is no longer available but it had a lot of those nice songs from the 30's and 40's. These are the original recordings. This week we continue with part 2. I hope you enjoy the music in this set. Thank...

Great Vocalists of the Big Band Era is a 6 LP set that I found while combing through our record library. This set is no longer available but it has a lot a varied songs and artists in it so a few months back I started digitizing the albums. Digitizing is a process by which the vinyl albums are recorded into a computer and then cleaned up by removing noise and clicks and pops. For the most part the...

Hal McIntyre was an American saxophonist, clarinetist, and bandleader. Glenn Miller heard him play and drafted him as a founding member of the Glenn Miller Orchestra, where he played from 1937 to 1941. Miller encouraged McIntyre to start his own group and starting in 1941 he put together his band where they played many major ballrooms throughout the United States, and played overseas for troops du...

Hello everyone. This week is a continuation of the two part series I started last week on the Dorsey brothers. This was a show I produces several years ago and am rebroadcasting. There are many of your favorite Dorsey hits and the Puzzler is back. I am in the process of producing some new shows and hope to start presenting them next week. Until then, thank you for your continued listening and supp...

Hello everyone. I apologize for missing last week and for being a little late with this week's podcast. My mother fell ill two weeks ago and passed away earlier th is week. Since I haven't had much time to produce a new show, I have gone back into the collection and pulled out two shows that I did on Tommy and Jimmy Dorsey. There is a lot a good music in these shows. We'll being this week with a l...

From the Big Band Bash archives comes this show that I did back in 2012. It is a little rough as I was still learning how to produce BBB. There were many great songs that premiered in 1937 and I picked out some of them on this show as well as some interesting things that was going on in the world at that time. Some of the songs on today's show include Goodnight My Love, Once In A While, It's Delov...

Last week I started a two part birthday salute to the late Count Basie. This week I am going to continue with more early recordings from 1936 - 1939. In addition, I discovered that singer Jimmy Rushing, who was a member of Count Basie's band from 1935 - 1948, celebrates a birthday on August 26. So for the last half of the show we'll hear some of the recordings he made with the Basie band as well a...

August 21st is the birthday of pianist and bandleader William Basie better know as the Count. I checked to see if I had done a birthday salute to him in the past and surprisingly I had not. So I hope you'll tune in and listen to some early Basie recordings from 1936 and 1937 as we learn about the career of one of the greatest of Big Band Leaders, Count Basie. The early 1936 band that the Count led...

Irving Berlin was one of the most prolific composers in the history of American popular song. Starting with Alexander's Ragtime Band he composed hundreds of songs that performers are still singing today. I have gone through my big band collection and pulled out many of his songs performed by various bands. I regret that I ran out of time and didn't get to play a few of my favorites. But we'll hear...

June Christy passed away on June 21, 1990. Since I didn't have a chance to remember her passing at that time I would like to do that on the today's program. I titled the program today, "June Christy Revisited" because I have already dedicated a show to her in the past. I thought we would play a few of those great Kenton sides and a few songs from the forties that she recorded on her own. We'll als...

For a change of pace on this week's show, I'll be presenting a show I did about ten years ago called Big Band Alphabet. We'll be listening to song titles starting with the letter "A" and going to "Q" as I didn't have time to go all the way to "Z". It is a mixed and varied show and I hope I play a song or two from your favorite leaders from the Big Band era. I put together another show on our radio...

Last week on Big Band Bash, I started a two part series from a set from Smithsonian Collections called Big Band Jazz: From the Beginnings to the Fifties. This was a six vinyl album set or a 4 CD set produced by jazz critics and historians Martin Williams and Gunther Schuller. It is not available anymore which is why I wanted to play some of the recordings from this set. Today we will continue with...

Today we start a two part series that was put together from Smithsonian Collections. This set is no longer available but it is called Big Band Jazz: From the Beginnings to the Fifties. It was originally released as a six vinyl album set and then re-released on 4 CDs. In 1973, Smithsonian Collections released "The History of Classic Jazz". Compiled by jazz essayist and historian Martin Williams, th...

This episode of Big Band Bash comes from the BBB vault. Originally produced and broadcast in 2014, this show was a tribute to the late Trigger Alpert who had passed away in Dec 2013. Trigger was an outstanding bassist who played with the Glenn Miller civilian orchestra as well as the Army Air Force Orchestra. Since Trigger did not record much under his own name, I have brought together many of the...

This coming Thursday is the Fourth of July which for us in the United States is celebrated as a day of independence. I don't have a lot of patriotic songs in my collection that I haven't presented at one time or another. So to celebrate July 4th I thought I would present some radio programs that Major Glenn Miller was in charge of. They are called "I Sustain The Wings" and were broadcast in 1944 i...

I am a great fan of the songs and music that comprise the Great American Songbook and I hope you, the listeners, are too. Rodgers, Kern, Berlin, Mercer, Ellington and Porter wrote some of the most endearing songs that make me want to hear them time and again. About a year ago I did a show called the Big Bands play Richard Rodgers. On the show today I have pulled out some of those classic melodies...

Duke Ellington is one of my favorite composers, bandleaders and jazz icons. I have been collecting Ellington music for a long while first on vinyl albums then on cd's and now mp3s. Since I have a pretty extensive collection I can share his music with my listeners. Duke passed away on May 24th 1974 so I am a few weeks late with this program. I always like to remember Duke either on his birthday or...

For part two of our Doris Day tribute, I am going to wind up with some of the great Les Brown recordings and then play a few of her own recordings and then wind up with a radio remote from 09-20-1945 on the One Night Stand program. It is a program featuring Les Brown with Doris Day on the vocals. Doris is featured on two or three numbers and Brown band is in top form. I didn't do much announcing o...

Doris Day - whenever I hear her name I think of the many movies she starred in. But she was a very gifted vocalist whose first hits were made while she was a member of the Les Brown Orchestra. We lost Doris a few weeks ago, she was 97 years old. But thankfully we have the many recordings she made throughout her career. On this program, part one of two, I'll be featuring many of the songs that Dori...

Memorial Day is a federal holiday in the United States for remembering the people who died while serving in the country's armed forces. In 1941, the Mutual Radio Network had the idea of broadcasting Swing Bands remotely from various halls around the country. Coca Cola was sold on the idea, and the first edition of Spotlight Bands was broadcast just days before Pearl Harbor. Patriotism is front and...

This is a show that I produced shortly after the passing of Patty Andrews and Paul Tanner. Paul was the last surviving member of the Glenn Miller Orchestra at the time of his death. Patty was of the singing Andrews Sisters. I pulled this show out of the Big Band Bash archives as I did not have time to produce a new show for this week. This show contains a radio remote featuring the Andrews Sisters...