Big Band Bash

Well I apologize but I ran into some family problems and was not able to finish part two of the Reader's Digest set I promised for this week. So to substitute I have chose a show I previously produced on the Late Gene Krupa. Gene passed away on October 16, 1974. I wanted to note his passing and to rediscover some of the great music he produced. I will try to be back with part two of The Late 1940'...

This is another set I managed to get a copy of. It was produced by Reader's Digest records and called These Were Our Songs, The Late 1940's. This was a seven vinyl album set and rereleased as a four cd set. Featuring music from the years of 1946 - 1949. This is part one and I hope you enjoy the selections I have chosen. Next Week is Part Two. Please visit this podcast at http://bigbandbashfm.blogs...

From the patriotic show, The Victory Parade of Spotlight Bands, I am playing three radio remotes. The bands we will be listening to are Les Brown, Gene Krupa, and Charlie Spivak. The Les Brown show is from April 25, 1945. I hope you enjoy these shows broadcast during World War Two. Please visit this podcast at http://bigbandbashfm.blogspot.com

We continue this week with Part Two of a Reader's Digest collection called These Were Our Songs, The Late 1930's. This featues music from the years of 1936 -1939. This set was originally released as a seven vinyl lp set which was rereleased as a four CD set. I hope you enjoy the music from this Reader's Digest set. Please visit this podcast at http://bigbandbashfm.blogspot.com

I managed to get a copy of this set from Reader's Digest Records. It is called These Were Our Songs, The Late 1930's. This was a seven vinyl album set and rereleased as a four cd set. Featuring music from the years of 1936 - 1939. This is part one and I hope you enjoy the selections I have chosen. Next Week is Part Two. Please visit this podcast at http://bigbandbashfm.blogspot.com

September 21st is right around the beginning of Autumn. I thought I would do something different this week and celebrate the Autun time of the year with songs about September and Autumn. There were several songs with September in the title so I hope you enjoy this show as we begin the Autumn time of the year. Please visit this podcast at http://bigbandbashfm.blogspot.com

This week I am following up with Part 2 of the Time-Life series, The Swing Era, with the second half from the years of 1944-1945. I had so much fun tracking down the originals in this series. As I have done in previous shows from the Time-Life series I am playing the original recordings and following along with the playlist from this set. We'll be hearing from Harry James, Tommy Dorsey, Benny Good...

This week we return to the Time-Life series, "The Swing Era", with the volume from the years of 1944-1945. These were still the war years but there were still some great recordings made. As I have done in previous shows from the Time-Life series I am playing the original recordings. We'll be hearing from Harry James, Tommy Dorsey, Benny Goodman, Gene Krupa, Les Brown and more. There are a few more...

This week on Big Band Bash I'll be taking a look at many of the vocal groups that sang with the big bands and on their own. There were several popular groups back then and we'll be hearing from The Andrews Sisters, The Ink Spots, The Mills Brothers, The King Sisters, and The Pied Pipers. In addition to recordings, I'll be giving a short history of each group many of which are quite interesting. Pl...

We continue this week with Part two of my Big Band Revival. I got the ides from the many churches I see having revivals. I needed to get excited again about the great bands I fell in love with when I was a teenager discovering all these great bands. I am continuing with some of the many recordings I enjoyed and hope you like them too in part two of my Big Band Revival. Please visit this podcast at...

Every now and then I need to revive my love of the Big bands. This program and the next are ones where I have picked out some of the recordings that made me a life long fan of the Big Bands. I loved discovering the geat recordings of Benny and Tommy, The Duke and the Count, Artie and Jimmy to name just a few. I hope you enjoy some of the recordings I loved in a program I call My Big Band Revival....

This week I'm going to be playing the third and final record in this three record set that features many hits from the Bluebird record label. When I was a youngster my dad bought a three record set called The Big Bands. In it were songs that went along with a book by George T. Simon. Each record was devoted to a particular record label. The three labels were Decca, Columbia, and RCA Bluebird. It w...

I'm going to be playing the second record in this three record set that features many hits from the Columbia record label. When I was a youngster my dad bought a three record set called The Big Bands. In it were songs that went along with a book by George T. Simon. Each record was devoted to a particular record label. The three labels were Decca, Columbia, and RCA Bluebird. It was a nice set with...

When I was a youngster my dad bought a three record set called The Big Bands. In it were songs that went along with a book by George T. Simon. Each record was devoted to a particular record label. The three labels were Decca, Columbia, and RCA Bluebird. It was a nice set with a lot of the hits from the big band era. I came across this set the other day and thought it would be great to hear all tho...

I'm back from vacation and have some new programs under way. Here is the first, spotlighting one of my favorite big bands. Will Bradley was a great trombonist who worked with several name orchestras when he was persuaded to start up his own orchestra in 1939. They had an exciting pianist in Freddie Slack and sperked an interest in boogie woogie with their hit Beat Me Daddy Eight To The Bar. I hope...

May 13th is the birthday of Woody Herman and if he were alive today that would have been his 100th birthday. We continue our celebration of his birthday with some of his hits from the 1940's. These are some of my favorite recordings from the Herman Herd, songs like Caldonia, Early Autumn, Four Brothers, Northwest Passage and more. Plus, in this episode I have a few segments from an interview that...

May 13th is the birthday of Woody Herman and if he were alive today that would have been his 100th birthday. To celebrate this milestone we will be playing some of his early recordings made between the years of 1939 and 1946 on the show today which is part one of two. I was fortunate enough to see the Herman band in person not once but twice. They were a very exciting band and I have been a fan ev...

I am continuing this week with part two of Classic Artie Shaw Bluebird and Victor Sessions which has selected cuts from the Mosaic Record Company's eight disc set of the same name. The sound quality is great and most of these songs are from Artie's classic years. All of the songs on the show are instrumentals as that was how Mosaic elected to produce the set. I hope you enjoy part 2 of The Classic...

In 2011 I bought two 8 disc sets from the Mosaic Record Company. The first was dedicated to the Columbia sides of Benny Goodman which I presented a show on a few weeks ago. The second is what our show today is about. This disc set featured the classic Bluebird recordings of Artie Shaw. For all the vocal fan listeners I have to apologize as this set only focus on the instrumentals. But what a colle...

This week I am going to continue with part two of the Mosaic box set, The Classic Columbia and Okeh Benny Goodman Orchestra Session 1939 -1957. These are many of the recordings that Benny made during those years and these are all instrumental recordings. Benny had some great vocalists during those years but Mosaic kept this set to just instrumentals. Some of the songs we'll be listening to include...

This week we will be listening to selections from a Mosaic Record Company set that I have called the Classic Columbia and Okeh Benny Goodman Orchestra Sessions. This is part one of a show I did back in 2012 and repeated almost three years ago in 2019. These are all the instrumental recordings that Benny did for Columbia and the Okeh record label. Unfortunately the producers of this set omitted all...

This is part two of a program I did on Metronome Magazine. In the issue, there was a section devoted to record reviews. In part one, I started to play many of the records that they were reviewing. We continue with more record reviews from Metronome magazine from March of 1942. The cover featured a blue background and a great picture of Jimmy Dorsey. Many of these songs were not hits for the bands...

May 30, 1909 is the birthday of bandleader and clarinetist Benny Goodman. Instead of playing some of his hits which I've done in past programs, I would like to play two radio remotes. These were recorded Oct 23 and 27, 1937 when the Goodman orchestra was appearing at the Manhattan room of The Hotel Pennsylvania. Benny was the first bandleader that I started listening to when I was a senior in high...

When I was in high school, my dad knew of my interest in the big bands. While out at his job, he found someone that was getting rid of several issues of Metronome Magazine. I still have them and I thought it would be interesting to try to find as many of the record reviews as I could. The cover featured a blue background and a great picture of Jimmy Dorsey. Many of these songs were not hits for th...

This week I am continuing with part two of Big Band Remotes from World War 2 with two remotes from the Victory Parade of Spotlight Bands series. At the same time, however, I am having a birthday salute to a favorite bandleader of mine, the late Artie Shaw. Artie was born on May 23, 1910 and he also appeared on the Spotlight band program for five consecutive weeks in 1945. So to honor Artie I would...