Two of A Kind
Woody Herman & Les Brown
This week, In the Mood brings you two of the Swing Era's great reed men: Woody Herman and Les Brown. Both were masters of the clarinet and alto sax. Both were conservatory-trained musicians. Both were popular and successful bandleaders in the 1930s, 40s, 50s and beyond. Both enjoyed long careers stretching into the 1980s. And both were relentless about encouraging young musicians.
We open the show this week with about 20 minutes of great singles from Woody Herman's First Herd. That band recorded mainly for Columbia, and those 1940s Columbias can be problematic to restore. Columbia's EQ curve was a little bizarre compared to those of other record labels, with lots of honky-sounding mid-range, a dead top end, and very little bass on the record. Once you get them clean, you have to EQ the hell out of them to make them sound rich and full. It's always a contest between the bass player and the turntable rumble; it's hard to get enough of the first one without also getting too much of the second. But I think you'll find that we've hit a great-sounding "sweet spot" in that regard.
For our Herman segment, we chose some exciting sides, which was easy to do, since Herman's Herd specialized in that very commodity. We kick off the show with Caldonia, a song written and originally recorded with a hotter-than-hell boogie beat by Louis Jordan. Woody's vocal is just as outrageous as Jordan's, but the band has the boogie tempo smoothed out to a solid, hard swing. And the solos delivered by Woody's upstart sidemen are strictly up-to-date with a strong tinge of Bop. We also hear Woody's soulful tenor sax on Laura, another of his trademark vocals. Along with a handful of potent sides by this band, we also pause to throw back to Woody's earlier assemblage, known as The Band That Plays the Blues, for some enchanting small-group action from his Decca days.
Hour 2 begins with 20 minutes of high quality pop from Les Brown and the Band of Renown. Les started his band at Duke University in 1935, and after a storied string of one-nighters up the East Coast, it gelled into an experienced, swinging, stable outfit. We'll play the band's first hit record, Joltin' Joe DiMaggio, on this show. The record celebrates the Yankee Clipper's historic 56-game hitting streak of the 1941 season. Les and the band enlisted as a unit into the US Army Special Services, and spent the next four years entertaining US military personnel and their families all over the US and around the world. This is why Les's band posted no hit records from December of 1941 until the spring of 1945.
Doris Day had sung with the band for about a year in 1941, and spent her time getting married and starting a family while the band was touring military bases. After the end of hostilities, everybody got back together in LA and got back in the band business. Butch Stone's version of Robin Hood was their first hit after the war, and the second was Sentimental Journey, a song co-written by Brown that spent 13 weeks at the top spot on the charts.
Most of Les's hits from the 40s are also on Columbia, and these 78 singles were a challenge, but the results are quite enjoyable. We'll hear an excellent representation of Les Brown hits from the 40s, and even reach into the 50s, when the band charted once again backing up the Ames Brothers.
So, quite a few similarities between these two bandleaders, Woody Herman and Les Brown. Both reed players and excellent leaders, both on Columbia, both with long careers embracing new faces and new sounds. But these guys had one other thing in common, and that is that they were both extremely well-liked and much-respected by their sidemen. Both were famous for playing high-quality music, routining and rehearsing their bands intelligently, and for treating their musicians the way they wanted to be treated - with affection and respect.
Along with Swingin' Spotlight features on Woody and Les this week, In the Mood brings out all-time favorites from Charlie Barnet, Benny Goodman, Artie Shaw, Stan Kenton, Glenn Miller, Count Basie and more. We'll hear from the great singers of the Swing Era too, like Helen Forrest, Ella Fitzgerald, Mel Torme, Kitty Kallen and Bing Crosby.
I can't wait to hear this show myself!
We have new affiliates carrying the show at new times this week, so be sure to scroll our Facebook Page to see the updated schedule. I've also posted it to this Blog Page for your convenience. As always, feel free to leave us a comment or request.
Be good to one another this week, and above all, Keep Swinging!
Scott
No comments:
Post a Comment