The Atheist Who Stole Christmas

by Nicole Audrey Spector

How a guy who once pulled over the car upon espying a black glitter rosary on my neck (I was 12 and the rosary was from Claire's Accessories) was ever impelled to give the world a self-declared “Christmas Gift” is ironic. Yet my dad, in making A Christmas Gift For You From Phil Spector was hardly a grinch won over. I don't exaggerate when I say that he'd rather have a tick burrowed in his ear than a sentimental Christian on his back. Or a sentimental Jew for that matter (though one may elicit from him a gentle smirk, a boyhood memory). My dad is so outrightly disgusted with religion that when something bad doesn't happen he says “Thank Darwin!”, a phrase I taught him when he told me he'd give me $500 if I read all of On The Origin Of Species. That's roughly a dollar per page. Add the exhaustive intro and afterthoughts I was also required to read and you have about half that. Not to mention I'd have to provide written notes. Still, not a bad deal for a kid, right? Well, I was 23 and unable to finish it. Point is, my Pops' Christmas music has nothing to do with Christian folklore – it indeed dispossess Christ from Christ-mas, and is concerned only with a mirth and merriment that is wholly secular.

When I visited my dad last Sunday and imparted the news of Christopher Hitchen's death, he gazed at my Einstein T-shirt and frowned. “Einstein should have been more outspoken about the non-existence of God,” he said. A Christmas Gift For You From Phil Spector may as well be called The Atheist Who Stole Christmas or, if you want to get silly, It's My Birthday, Too; So What? – for my father was born on Christmas Day. Around this time of year a lot of people tell me, “You know, it doesn't feel like Christmastime until I listen to your Dad's Christmas album.” The key word is feel. Christmastime, in again the secular sense, has a distinct essence and texture. It's busy, buttery, effulgent, and loud – pairing well with the lavish mania that distinguishes The Wall Of Sound. Nearly 50 years after its incipient release, A Christmas Gift For You is emblematic of an era long gone, but it's not the 1963 time stamp on the work that induces nostalgia. Songs like “Winter Wonderland”, “Frosty The Snowman”, and “Parade Of The Wooden Soldiers” (my childhood favorite) feel to have been born nostalgic, dreamed up in a reverie of how good it feels to be a child at Christmastime. The one original song on the album, “Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)” pines for a Christmas past with Darlene Love belting, “They're singing 'Deck The Halls'/But it's not like Christmas at all/'Cause I remember when you were here/And all the fun we had last year.”



Perhaps my dad had a bit of the Christmas blues himself growing up. He and his older sister, Shirley, were brought up sparingly in a strict but struggling Jewish household. Christmas was of course not observed and though Hanukkah was I can't imagine it was a hugely happy affair. My paternal grandfather Ben suffered from acute diabetes and ended his life when my father was nine, leaving my Grandma Bertha (after whom my dad's record label Mother Bertha Music is coined) to raise the two kids on her own. She moved the family to L.A, where my dad snuck into jazz clubs and at 14, met his hero: jazz guitarist Barney Kessel. It wasn't long under Kessel's wing before my Dad decided that he would never be as good a guitarist as the remarkably under-recognized genius – “not even a close second”, he says, and so, he turned his ambitions toward record making. In my father's few shared memories of growing up, seldom do I get the sense that he was ever doing much of anything aside from growing up – working as hard as he could to assume responsibility for his family. Even the move to L.A from NY, when he couldn't have been more than 12, he remembers as a vehicle for equipping him with the tools he needed to become a young success – to make it big fast.

As far as the family my dad co-created with my mother, Janis, much later in life (he was 42 when my twin brother Phillip. Jr. and I were born) goes, we were raised on Christmas. Hanukkah was there, but off to the side, a corner piece of piety we were unsure how to regard. Phillip and I took turns lighting the menorah (Grandma Bertha probably had one for every light socket in her home), but we didn't quite know what to do with a holiday that, next to Christmas, was so complicated and sombre, so...holy. When Grandma Bertha gave us a dreidel to play with, Phillip and I just stared at it and exchanged worried glances, hoping Grandma would walk away so we could play with real toys.

Jewish as Grandma Bertha was (she took great care in teaching my Mexican Catholic mother how to be a good Jewish wife, mentoring her in the making of many a matzoh ball soup and potato latke), she indulged us our Christmas. Every year she dug the same plastic tree out of a closet, along with other customary Christmas junk – light up Santas and reindeer, boxes of candy canes. Always a sucker for kitsch, my dad would create his own mega marshmallow world in our foyer – replete with fake box presents under a dazzling Rockefeller tree. But the true Christmas fanatic, on either side of my family, was my dad's older sister, Shirley. A virtual Mrs. Claus, Aunt Shirley stormed into rooms with literal bells on, singing the Christmas hits. My father couldn't stand her. She seemed to physically make his skin crawl. Twenty minutes into her company and he was on the brink of a genuine eczema outbreak. To me she was the most wonderful person in the world. She was a brilliant woman, I later learned, but disturbed. She'd go missing for months and eventually years at a time, abducted by some secret darkness in her mind. I only ever saw her as ebullient, glowing. She was a guaranteed presence on Christmas day. She arrived at our house in the late afternoon (the earliest my father would let her in) with her annual trunk load of presents for me and Phillip, singing all the way up our driveway.

A fragment of one such Christmas afternoon exists on VHS, when Phillip and I were about 6 years old. Before the Record button was hit Aunt Shirley somehow guilted my father into getting out his electric guitar. She starts to sing a pitchy falsetto “Silent Night” and my dad strums obediently along, each chord appearing to hurt his face. “All is caaallllm,” Aunt Shirley sings, with proud bravado, “All is brighhhht.” He doesn't let her get very far, abruptly transitioning into “Santa Claus Is Coming To Town”. Aunt Shirley wavers but catches on – used to him changing things up without prior consult. Two verses into that song and my dad ditches Christmas altogether, digressing into an improv jazz bit none of us understand. Aunt Shirley, jilted, but ever-joyous, takes the camera from my mother and interviews her niece and nephew, truly her favorite people in the world, about their Christmas day. “Such a beautiful family,” she says. The camera shuts off.

That video is the only evidence of my mother, father, brother, and me together. There are no family photos. It's the only recording of Aunt Shirley, as far as I know, that exists. She's at least 50 years old there, and as fragile and beautiful as I imagine she was as a girl, that remarkably bright girl whose mind shattered when her father left. It's one of the only videos of Phillip, Jr. A few years later, when we were nine he succumbed to a complicated illness. He died just a few days before Christmas. I don't remember our last Christmas together, but this one on tape looks like it was pretty good, and it's the one that makes every Christmas since feel not like Christmas at all.

Download:

"Sleigh Ride" mp3
by the Ronettes, 1963.
available on A Christmas Gift for You from Phil Spector

"Parade of the Wooden Ships" mp3
by the Crystals, 1963.
available on A Christmas Gift for You from Phil Spector

"Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)" mp3
by Darlene Love, 1963.
available on A Christmas Gift for You from Phil Spector

"White Christmas" mp3
by Darlene Love, 1963.
available on A Christmas Gift for You from Phil Spector

Good Tidings: Christmas In The Heart

by Polly Bresnick

I'm half Jewish, half Christmas. Jew-ISH. My family lights the menorah when we remember to, usually uncertain of which night we're on, and we mumble out the prayer that even my father barely remembers, with a crescendoing finale of SHALL HANUKKAH! Or is it with a "Ch-"? Does it have an "h" at the end? (I'm barely "culturally Jewish," which is to say that I'm not really religious at all.)

In grammar school I learned that, for Hanukkah, kids traditionally received eight presents — one on each of the holy, candle-lit nights. Also, there was a dreidel and gelt. That all sounded pretty good. On Christmas, of course, children awoke to find piles of gifts under the tree. Also a very appealing concept to my greedy little kid mind. Since I was both, I was thrilled to realize that maybe I'd get to do both! I did. Sort of. But then the deep holiday laze kicked in, and the Hanukkah gifts were skipped. I didn't complain — there were still plenty of Christmas gifts. One year the laze deepened and I was just on the brink of losing track of my belief in your favorite fat man and mine, the one and only chimney diver, bearer of brightly wrapped and bowed boxes, still cold from the icy pole from whence they came, Mr. Santa Claus. My parents figured they could get more sleep on Christmas Eve if they got some of the wrapping done in the weeks before the special day and put them under the tree as they wrapped. I must have gotten confused about my combo-faith (or just uncontrollably impatient for toys), because I started to sneak one present a day back to my bedroom to unwrap in the solitude of my room, hushed and high on the adrenaline of a child's crime. Didn't take long for my parents to notice. They were pretty mad. As Dylan himself laments on his Theme Time radio show, "Some people just don't have the spirit of Christmas. They think it's all about gift-giving. Though, to be more honest, I think a lot of 'em think it's more about gift-getting. Christmas is not about runnin' around the stores, spendin' money, and tryna' buy people's love and affection." It's about a lot of things. Including comfort, joy, figgy pudding, and music.

I love Christmas music. My mom was/is an old-school, screamin' and faintin' Elvis fan, so we have plenty of Elvis Christmas music. I like that "Silent Night" can sound kind of sexy in Elvis's voice. I can't seem to sing along to his "Blue Christmas" without lowering my eyelids and letting my top lip quiver. And I know the lazy velvet of Bing's Christmas repertoire like I know the smell of fresh baked bread. I impatiently look forward to it all year long like a little kid waiting for the first snowfall sticky enough for snowball wars and snow forts and snowmen. But those guys were church-going, God-fearing Christians, right? They can sing those songs however they want to and it will all sound like golden gospel. Those same songs in Bob Dylan's (née Zimmerman's) voice come out as a different gospel, and one that feels no less true. Dylan's voice singing Christmas songs is sweet and comfy. It conjures the gauzy memory of sitting on the rug next to the teetering, over-ornamented tree, when I was too young to even quite know who Santa was or what Christmas meant or that those big shiny colorful boxes had toys in them, but knowing all the words to all the songs and smiling with easy joy because if Christmas music is playing, it must be Christmas.

I first heard Dylan's polka-romp cover of "Must Be Santa" when it was meming around as a music video. It's the stand-out song on Christmas in the Heart, for me. It has a Santa-gone-wild, runaway sleigh energy that truly warms my halfie heart. And it's a weird roller-coaster dream to hear Dylan clowning the "ho, ho, ho's." The video is a little unsettling: Dylan's at a holiday house party and he keeps popping up unexpectedly. He's out of place, but comfortable, still enjoying himself, even amidst the maniacally smiley (super goy) partiers and the drunken chase-brawl that careens through things, sacrilegious and hip and honest in its interruption of the celebration of — what is it? — Christ's birthday? No one other than the camera notices the throwing of glasses or even the man swinging from a chandelier on his way out the door. Everyone, including Dylan, continues the song, knows all the words. The song itself, in humorous contrast to the adult-beverage setting, is a nursery rhyme list of Santa factoid essentials, an instruction manual for how to believe in Santa, a dictation of what to see in your mind's eye as you imagine him. So Dylan singing this song seems like proof that he may not exactly fit in at this Christmas party, but he still knows all the things there are to know about Santa. And really, what American doesn't?

This may offend some die-hard Dylan fans (and/or Tom Waits fans), but "Hark the Herald Angels Sing" comes out sounding a heck of a lot like a Tom Waits song (Dylan drawls it as "HAYrald Angels"), until his angelic back-up singers slip in, mugging sweetly in close harmonies, like the Boswell Sisters or some other assemblage of voices from another time that would sound just right on an old record player, the dustier the better. "Little Drummer Boy" is a bit over the edge for me. Hearing Dylan do the "ba-rum-ba-bum-bum" made me feel embarrassed for him. Though, again, the female back-up singers find some haunting slant-matched harmonies that give this track its own, new idiosyncratic personality. And, perhaps, maybe I just never liked singing this one. In junior-high chorus, I always imagined the little drummer boy as the baby Jesus — a personage I knew far too little about — which made me feel like I wasn't in the club, and maybe Santa wouldn't put anything but coal in my stocking that hung festively next to the rusting and tarnished menorah. Singing "Little Drummer Boy" in chorus as an awkward preteen atheist was about as comfortable as singing the same token Kwanza song every year, which is to say that it was no fun at all.

In "O' Come All Ye Faithful," "The First Noel," and "O' Little Town of Bethlehem," Dylan really does sound to me like a self-conscious Jew in a church (a feeling I have experienced on the few occasions I've been inside of an actual church during an actual service with singing and praising and whatnot). These are the songs I remember my gentile grandfather singing in a booming, choir-trained baritone beside a piano in a living room in Delaware with a fire roaring and "bubble-lights" (which, I believe, have been recalled due to the serious fire hazard they pose) bubbling merrily on the Christmas tree, though I'm not sure this did, in fact, ever happen in my life.

The rest of the album is perfectly reasonable 'round-the-yule-log fare, with some trickster flourishes here and there. Dylan's poetic sensibility sneaks in as he relishes the swinging alliteration of "Walking in a Winter Wonderland," letting all the w's wash together into a warm and cozy lullaby mumble. There's something deeply satisfying about the cheesy key modulations and boozy swaying rhythms of these songs that I really do know as well as some people know their prayers. I know them so well I don't remember learning the words, as if I were born with the knowledge of them — I know them in a way that really deserves to be described as "by heart" because I know them in my heart and not in my brain. One doesn't get in the Christmas "mindset" one gets into the Christmas spirit. It's reassuring to hear Dylan humoring this cross-section of melodies that I hold so dear. It's as if he's agreeing with me, that Christmas is not in the church or in Macy's or in Daddy Warbuck's Nutcracker-scale living room. It's truly in the heart. And I'm not afraid to say it if my ol' pal Bobby Zimmerman isn't.

Dylan has surprised us so many times, that even a Christmas album wasn't all that shocking to me. The man loves the music of the American everyman. And in this country, where, starting the day after Thanksgiving, it's difficult to find much else on the radio, it doesn't get much more universal than Christmas music. As silly as some of the songs may sound in Dylan's lupine sneer, he sings as if he loves these songs in the same ways I do — and he seems to be proving that these songs are for everyone to sing. As Christmas does in this country, these songs also, for the most part, transcend religion. They're part of the weird warm collective memory of Home and Childhood and Magic.

Download:

"Must Be Santa" mp3
by Bob Dylan, 2009.
available on Christmas In the Heart

"Hark the Herald Angels Sing" mp3
by Bob Dylan, 2009.
available on Christmas In the Heart

"Winter Wonderland" mp3
by Bob Dylan, 2009.
available on Christmas In the Heart

*****************

"Mistletoe" mp3
by Bob Dylan, 2006.
from Theme Time Radio Hour: Christmas and New Year

"Figgy Pudding" mp3
by Bob Dylan, 2006.
from Theme Time Radio Hour: Christmas and New Year

"The Night Before Christmas" mp3
by Bob Dylan, 2006.
from Theme Time Radio Hour: Christmas and New Year


*****************

An All American Trilogy... Boy

"Uncle Sam needs you, Boy
I'm a gonna cut your hair off
Take this rifle, Kid
Gimme that gui-tar
Yea-ah..."

Today, on the 4th of July, when we Americans do what we do to celebrate the signing of the Declaration of Independence (eat meat, drink beer, and blow shit up), let us pause and reflect on the glory that is "The All American Boy."

In 1958, when Bobby Bare was about be inducted into the Army and his pal Bill Parsons was returning from his own call to duty, they teamed up with a forty year old drifter of Irish and Cherokee descent named Orville Lunsford and recorded a one-off demo talking blues called "The All American Boy" at Syd Nathan's King Studios in Cincinnati along with a Parsons original, "Rubber Dolly."

There are many versions of this story, and it's hard to tell what's what. But what we do know is that these two recordings were released as a single on the Fraternity label, and Bare, who had allegedly said that he didn't want his name on the record, got his wish. When the single came out it was credited to Bill Parsons on both sides. The songwriting credit for "The All American Boy went to Parsons and Lunsford, and unbeknownst to Bare who was then overseas, it raced up the charts to #2 a few months later.

Many thought the track to be about Elvis who had also been inducted into the Army, but it was more than likely an autobiographical joke that Bare improvised before he shipped off. Parsons, with a hit on his hands, was touring for Bare's record, including a spot in early 1959 on Buddy Holly's final tour, The Winter Dance Party, where Cricket Waylon Jennings heard Parsons rehearsing one day and asked if that was him on the record. "No, he's in the Army now." When, Bare was discharged, we went on to record a sequel "I'm Hanging Up My Rifle," and later, a third variation, "Brooklyn Bridge," making it a trilogy of sorts.

Mickey Newbury's "An American Trilogy" is an arrangement of two Civil War songs and a folk ballad. Elvis used it as a grand finale to finish his shows in his later years, and it is the staple of every fat Elvis Impersonator's repertoire. What's more American than that?

Happy Independence Day, Folks...


Download:

"All American Boy" mp3
by Bobby Bare, 1958.
available on Singles (1959-1969)

"I'm Hangin' Up My Rifle" mp3
by Bobby Bare, 1960.
available on All American Rock 'n' Roll: The Fraternity Story Vol 2

"Brooklyn Bridge" mp3
by Bobby Bare, 1963.
available on Detroit City


************


"All American Boy" mp3
by Grandpa Jones, 1959.
available on Country Music Hall of Fame

"All American Boy" mp3
by Bob Dylan and The Band, 1967.
available on The Genuine Basement Tapes


************

"An American Trilogy" mp3
by Mickey Newbury, 1971.
available on Frisco Mabel Joy

************

"Dixie" mp3
by Bob Dylan, 2003.
available on Masked & Anonymous

"Glory Hallelujah" mp3
by Furry Lewis with Lee Baker Jr, 1969.
available on Take Your Time

"All My Trials" mp3
by Dave Van Ronk, 1957.
available on The Mayor of MacDougal Street: Rarities 1957-69


*************

The Junky's Christmas

William S. Burroughs tells a Christmas tale for the ages, in which Danny the Carwiper, dopesick and freely sprung from prison, learns the true spirit of giving on Christmas Day. He is rewarded with divine intervention, and scores "for the immaculate fix."

Merry Christmas

Download:

"The Junky's Christmas" mp3
by William S. Burroughs, 1993.
available on Spare Ass Annie & Other Tales

This can also be seen as an animated claymation short:
Francis Ford Coppola Presents
William S. Burroughs' The Junky's Christmas

or found in the book: Interzone

*********************

bonus:

"The Ruling Class" mp3
by Loose Fur, 2006.
available on Born Again in the U.S.A.

top photo: by Loomis Dean, 1959.

Obligatory Yuletide Offering

Here's some stuff.
Don't say we never gave you anything.

Merry Christmas and Season's Greetings
from the Fluville Chamber of Commerce.

Drive Safely.

***********************************

Download:

"White Christmas" mp3
by Bob Marley and The Wailers, 1963.
available on Destiny: Rare Ska Sides From Studio 1

"Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)" mp3
by Darlene Love, 1963.
available on A Christmas Gift for You from Phil Spector

"If Christmas Can't Bring You Home" mp3
by the Reigning Sound, 2005.
available on Home for Orphans

"Christmas Eve Can Kill You" mp3
by The Everly Brothers, 1972.
available on Stories We Could Tell

"Santa Claus Go Straight To The Ghetto" mp3
by James Brown, 1968.
available on Funky Christmas

"Merry Christmas, I Love You" mp3
by James Brown, 1966.
available on Funky Christmas

"Let's Make Christmas Mean Something This Year" mp3
by James Brown, 1966.
available on Funky Christmas



"All I Want For Christmas" mp3
by Solomon Burke, 1972.
Pride 45-1022
out of print

"Christmas Must Be Tonight (Alternate)" mp3
by The Band, 1975.
available on Northern Lights Southern Cross

"Christmas Wish" mp3
by NRBQ, 1979.
available on Peek-A-Boo: Best of 1969-89

"My Mom and Santa Claus" mp3
by George Jones, 1968.
available on A Good Year For The Roses:
The Complete Musicor Recordings 1965-1971 (Part 2)

"Rock & Roll Santa Claus" mp3
by Huey "Piano" Smith and the Clowns, 1962.
available on Twas the Night Before Christmas

"'Twas The Night Before Christmas" mp3
by Huey "Piano" Smith and the Clowns, 1962.
available on Twas the Night Before Christmas

"Doing The Santa Claus" mp3
by Huey "Piano" Smith and the Clowns, 1962.
available on Twas the Night Before Christmas

"Christmas In Prison" mp3
by John Prine, 1973.
available on Sweet Revenge

"Jesus Christ" mp3
by Alex Chilton, 1975
from Radio Broadcast WLXY Memphis

"The Christmas Song" mp3
by Dexter Gordon, 1970.
available on The Panther!

More Christmas music can be found:
HERE, HERE, HERE, HERE, and HERE.

top photo: © Ted Barron, 2010.

The Fascinating Life of Albino Red

by Joe Schwab

So it’s the final night of Hanukkah 2010 and this will be the last musical candle on the menorah for the Boogie Woogie Flu. A perfect way to end this festival of lights is with the legendary Jewish trumpeter whom during his lifetime crossed paths with both Charlie Parker AND Wayne Kramer. I’m talking about the great red headed Be-Bopper Red Rodney - born Robert Roland Chudnick - a boy that became a man after he received his first trumpet at the age of 13 for his Bar Mitzvah.

Although he was originally self taught, He later studied the trumpet at Jules E. Masterbaum Vocational School in his hometown of Philadelphia. Among his classmates was Buddy DeFranco, the great clarinetist who helped to transform the clarinet from a Big Band staple into a weapon of Be-Bop dexterity. A young alto saxophonist named John Coltrane also attended the school, as well as the often overlooked trumpet master Joe Wilder. In 1942, at the tender age of sixteen, Red left Philly for Atlantic City. Though he was too young for the draft, he wasn’t too young to lie about his age and start hitting the road with the orchestras of Benny Goodman, Jimmy Dorsey, Tony Pastor and Jerry Wald. In 1945 shortly after his return to Philadelphia, Red’s life was changed forever after seeing a set by Dizzy Gillespie. While playing a gig at the Down Beat Club, Red was able to sit in with his hero. Leaving a lasting impression on Dizzy who remembered Red and later introduced him to Charlie Parker after the two had reunited at The Three Deuces in NYC.

For much of the remaining years of the 40’s, Rodney continued playing with Big Bands. Claude Thornhill’s band was at the forefront of taking Be-Bop and smoothing it down into an experimental, yet danceable formula with arrangements by Gil Evans and Gerry Mulligan. He also spent time with the Bop leaning bands of Gene Krupa and Woody Herman, but his life was about to be changed forever when in 1948 Charlie Parker invited Rodney to come to New York to replace Miles Davis in his Quintet.

Despite the fact that Rodney spent time in the hard drug hot beds of the Herman and Krupa bands, he resisted heroin. While playing with Bird in ‘48 and throughout 1949, Parker used himself as an example of why Rodney should avoid the temptations of hard drugs, but as so many Bird disciples before him, seeing was believing. If Charlie Parker could play so brilliantly while high, then why couldn’t he? As legend has it, Parker did a Southern tour in 1949, tagging the light skinned redhead as “Albino Red” as to not lay credence on the fact that it was, indeed, a mixed race Quintet. By 1951, Rodney had succumbed to dope, developed a habit, and became a full fledged junkie leading to only occasional sessions and a short stint with Charlie Ventura. Although he had kicked and began a successful career fronting dance bands in his home town of Philadelphia, the Jazz life had driven him back to Be-bop and heroin use. His life changed dramatically in 1958 while in San Francisco. Broke and out of work, he impersonated an Army officer and stole $10,000 from the Atomic Energy Commission. Caught in 1964, Rodney did prison time on a sentence of 27 months. During this time he received his Bachelors degree and began studying law. After his jail term was up, he continued his law studies only to be detoured by the fact that convicted felons could not apply for the bar.

Music once again became his priority, landing in Las Vegas, accompanying everyone from Barbara Streisand to Elvis Presley. His dependence on heroin was still in effect throughout the 70’s which found him relocating to Europe where in 1975 he was busted once again by U.S. Narcotic agents, this time in the middle of the night. While serving time in 1975 he befriended the MC5’s Wayne Kramer, by teaching him, as Kramer has said, “a Berklee School of Music course in writing and arranging” as well as playing in the prison band with the guitarist.

Finally clean and sober, Rodney’s career once aging took off in the 1980’s with a series of recordings in Europe and the U.S. as well as reuniting with his long time collaborator Ira Sullivan. Much of the final years of Red’s life were spent playing with young musicians such as pianist Gary Dial and saxophonist Chris Potter. While revisiting many of the Be-Bop staples, his youthful sound along with a young band seemed to revitalize Rodney and his career. Having seen Rodney myself in 1993, there's no doubt in my mind that he was rejuvenated and playing the best he had in his career.

In 1994, Rodney died of lung cancer at the top of his powers. He’s survived by his two sons, one of which, Mark Rodney had moderate success in the 70’s as part of the Soft Rock duo of Batdorf and Rodney.


Download:

"Elevation" mp3
by Red Rodney's Be-Boppers / New York City January 29, 1947.
Red Rodney t, Allen Eager ts, Serge Chaloff bs,
Al Haig p, Chubby Jackson b, Tiny Kahn d.
available on Bebop

"Hot House (Long)" mp3
by Charlie Parker Quintet / Live in Chicago, Pershing Hotel, 1949.
Charlie Parker as, Red Rodney tp, Al Haig p,
Tommy Potter b, Max Roach d.
available on Complete Pershing Club Sets

"Swedish Schnapps" mp3
by Charlie Parker Quintet / New York City August 8, 1951.
Charlie Parker as, Red Rodney tp, John Lewis p,
Ray Brown b, Kenny Clarke d.
available on Complete Verve Master Takes

"Little Willie Leaps" mp3
by Red Rodney Quintet / New York City - November 1990.
Red Rodney tr, Chris Potter ts, David Kikoski p,
Chip Jackson b, Jimmy Madison d.
available on Red Alert

********************************

This is the last of eight posts at the Boogie Woogie Flu, in which eight Jewish writers discussed the works of other Jewish artists for eight consecutive nights in celebration of Hanukkah. I'd like to extend my thanks to everyone who contributed these wonderful posts.

Happy Hanukkah,
Ted.



top photo: by William P. Gottlieb, 1948.
above photo: © Ted Barron, 2010.

********************************

Still Meshuguna After All These Years

by Ben Greenberg

Listening to Paul Simon’s music, it isn't immediately apparent that he's Jewish. He sings “Jesus Is The Answer," on an early live record. Then of course, there's the famous lyric, "And here’s to you, Mrs. Robinson / Jesus loves you more than you will know." This year he even recorded a straight-faced Christmas song, and his gospel tinged hit "Loves Me like A Rock" features vocal group, The Dixie Hummingbirds. But upon closer inspection, the man is revealed to be a pure blooded Tribesman. Looking even more closely, perhaps it could have been inferred from songs with titles like “That Was Your Mother,” “The Boy In The Bubble,” “Allergies,” “Voices Of Old People,” and “Diamonds On The Soles Of Her Shoes.” According to Wikipedia (source: Citation Needed) Paul Simon’s parents were Hungarian Jews.

Paul Simon (real name, no gimmicks) was born in Newark, NJ and raised in Queens, and from what I can put together, he was more of a cultural Jew than a religious one. If you are reading the Boogie Woogie Flu and are Jewish, I’m willing to bet that you can identify with that. We are the heathen Jews. We know who we are. I’ll see you all in whatever the Jewish equivalent of Hell is.

From the Late 50s to the early 60s, Simon & Garfunkel, performed alternately as Tom & Jerry and Tico and The Triumphs. During this time, Paul also wrote and recorded solo material under the pseudonyms True Taylor and Jerry Landis—an even more Jewish-sounding name than his real one. He went to London in 1965 to establish himself on the folk scene, and while there, produced what is to my mind one of the greatest folk albums of the era, the eponymously titled debut by Jackson C. Frank. If you ever want to go on a real bummer, read any bio of Jackson Frank. His getting shot through the eye by a passing stranger while sitting on a park bench doesn’t even begin to plumb the depths of travesty that befell this man. In fact, the gunshot through the eye is only usually mentioned briefly, in passing.

Returning to the States, Simon and Garfunkel recorded a string of enormously successful LPs in the years that followed. But rather than open up a new Wikipedia page, let’s just move right along into his solo career, and to what is probably my personal favorite Paul Simon album, the self-titled debut from 1972—the one with Paul hiding under a yeti on the front. It’s got the hits “Me & Julio” and “Mother & Child Reunion”, but this album is packed with lesser-known gems, my favorites of which are the one-two punch of “Peace Like A River” and “Papa Hobo,” both, brilliant songs.

What else can I say about him? Other than that I think the music from The Capeman is vastly underrated, and for anyone who thinks that the interpolation of World Music into Simon’s pop songs began with or around Graceland—I offer up the track “Duncan” from Live Rhymin,’ performed with the South American group Urubamba, recorded in 1974, a full twelve years before Graceland. Pan flute chorus attack! What could be more World Music than that? Also, I offer an unfinished version of the same song with totally different lyrics and sections where he only has a line or two done. It's an interesting take, and a song with a fully different meaning (seemingly about someone named Benson McGuire and someone, possibly Benson, getting something buried deep in his shoulder). Below you can find a suite of songs from the early years, prior to Simon and Garfunkel, and a selection of choice nuggets.

Happy Hanukkah, and here's to you Mrs. Rubinstein...

Download:

"Dancin' Wild" mp3
by Tom & Jerry, 1957.
available on Two Can Dream Alone

"True or False" mp3
by True Taylor, 1958.
available on Two Can Dream Alone

"Motorcycle" mp3
by Tico and the Triumphs, 1961.
available on Two Can Dream Alone

"The Lone Teen Ranger" mp3
by Jerry Landis, 1962.
available on Recorded As Jerry Landis & Artie Garr

"Blues Run The Game" mp3
by Jackson C Frank, 1965.
produced by Paul Simon
available on Blues Run the Game

"Peace Like A River" mp3
by Paul Simon, 1972.
available on Paul Simon

"Papa Hobo" mp3
by Paul Simon, 1972.
available on Paul Simon

"Duncan (demo)" mp3
by Paul Simon, 1972.
available on Paul Simon

"Duncan" mp3
by Paul Simon, 1974.
available on Paul Simon in Concert: Live Rhymin'

"Loves Me Like A Rock" mp3
by Paul Simon, 1973
available on There Goes Rhymin' Simon

"You're Kind" mp3
by Paul Simon, 1975.
available on Still Crazy After All These Years

"God Bless The Absentee" mp3
by Paul Simon, 1980.
available on One-Trick Pony

"Rene And Georgette Magritte With Their Dog After The War" mp3
by Paul Simon, 1983.
available on Hearts and Bones

"Trailways Bus" mp3
by Paul Simon, 1997.
available on Songs from The Capeman

"Getting Ready For Christmas Day" mp3
by Paul Simon, 2010.
from the forthcoming album So Beautiful Or So What
available at paulsimon.com

Ben Greenberg is a senior editor at Grand Central Publishing.

********************************

This is the sixth of eight posts at the Boogie Woogie Flu, in which eight Jewish writers will discuss the works of other Jewish artists for eight consecutive days in celebration of Hanukkah.

Hello Allan...

by Scott Schinder

He's been somewhat forgotten by today's retro tastemakers, but for a few short years in the 1960s, Allan Sherman was a major star. Although he remains best known for his smash 1963 single "Hello Muddah, Hello Faddah!"—a deadpan account of a tortuous summer-camp stay, set to the tune of Ponchielli's "Dance of the Hours"—Sherman was much more than a one-novelty-hit-wonder. Indeed, the eight albums of song parodies that he released on Warner Bros. between 1962 and 1967 comprise a remarkable body of work that shows him to be the greatest musical satirist of his era.

An ingratiating performer, an agile wordsmith and a vivid troubadour of the middle-class Jewish American experience, Sherman mixed post-Borscht Belt humor with pop-culture references to create music whose wit and warmth transcended mere yuks. His standard m.o. was simple enough: borrow a familiar pop, folk, Broadway or classical melody and outfit it with a gloriously absurd set of new lyrics. In his hands, "The Battle Hymn of the Republic" became "The Ballad of Harry Lewis," which recounted the heroic struggle of the titular garment-business drone. "Alouette" became "Al 'N Yetta," a chronicle of a middle-class married couple's TV-watching habits. "Won't You Come Home, Bill Bailey?" became "Won't You Come Home, Disraeli?," in which Queen Victoria laments the absence of her prime minister.

Sherman's best tunes boasted multiple layers of audacious wordplay, along with an insight into the human condition that allows his material to connect with contemporary listeners who might not recognize his references to David Susskind, Metrecal and Bo Belinsky. Although his stardom was relatively brief, Sherman would be a seminal influence on virtually every pop parodist who followed (including avowed admirer Weird Al Yankovic, whose first album cover depicts a Sherman LP at the foot of Weird Al's bed).

Sherman wasn't the first parodist to work in the pop medium. Mickey Katz had begun retooling contemporary pop standards with Yiddish schtick in the 1940s, and Homer and Jethro started infusing pop tunes with hillbilly humor at around the same time. But Sherman's deceptively earthy, self-effacing output possessed a verbal sophistication and internal logic that put him in a class of his own. And while Sherman had no discernable affinity for rock 'n' roll (as his "Pop Hates the Beatles" confirms), his songs' gentle sense of subversion marked him as a rock 'n' roller in spirit. The same can be said for his untrained but enthusiastic singing voice, which novelty-song authority Doctor Demento once described as a "shower baritone."

Although his ascent as a recording artist was something of a fluke, Sherman had already been an entertainment-business professional for over a decade by the time he became a household name. Born Allan Copelon in Chicago on November 30, 1924, he suffered through a bleak childhood, adopting his mother's maiden name Sherman after his ne'er-do-well father walked out on the family when Allan was six. He and his mother relocated frequently, and Allan was often left with relatives for months at a time. At some point during his youth, he began writing parody numbers, which he'd sing for friends at parties.

After flunking out of college and being discharged from the Army for medical reasons, Sherman arrived in New York on V-J Day in 1945, with aspirations of becoming a professional entertainer. He managed to find a series of short-lived jobs as a low-level gag writer on various radio shows and in the embryonic TV industry, largely on the strength of a file of stolen jokes that he and his wife had compiled.

Sherman actually made his first record in 1951, releasing a single containing a pair of his song spoofs. Although that disc was little noticed by the public, he achieved a major break the same year, when legendary game-show producers Mark Goodson and Bill Todman turned a Sherman concept into the long-running CBS hit I've Got A Secret. Rather than pay him for the lucrative idea, Goodson and Todman hired Sherman as the show's producer. The gig gave him numerous opportunities to exercise his creativity in the nascent medium, but Sherman's penchant for elaborate studio stunts eventually got him fired, after a stunt featuring Tony Curtis misfired during a 1958 live broadcast.

In 1961, Sherman moved west to produce the short-lived game show Your Surprise Package. He then took an even shorter-lived position as producer of Steve Allen's new syndicated talk show, from which he was fired before the show even hit the airwaves. An extended period of joblessness followed, but fate would soon lead Sherman back to his true calling.

Although he was unemployed, Sherman had won numerous high-profile fans while performing his songs at Hollywood parties. Those admirers included such showbiz heavyweights as Jack Benny, George Burns, Jerry Lewis and Sherman's next door neighbor Harpo Marx. Another new pal was powerful agent Bullets Durgom, who reportedly helped Sherman to get the attention of Warner Bros. Records by having him record a risqué number to be played at a Warner executive's retirement party.

Sherman won a record deal with Warner Bros., a company that had achieved limited results with music but which had scored big with Bob Newhart's early standup comedy LPs. It was decided that Sherman's first album should consist of reworkings of public-domain folk songs. That approach would avoid the hassle of getting music publishers' permission to rewrite mainstream pop material, as well as allowing the label to take advantage of the then-current folk-music craze.

Sherman's debut LP My Son, the Folk Singer, was cut at a Hollywood studio on the evening of August 6, 1962—the day after Marilyn Monroe's death—in front of an invited studio audience that included Harpo Marx, Theodore Bikel and Johnny Mercer. Released two months later, My Son, the Folk Singer quickly became one of the fastest-selling albums in history, selling nearly a million copies (a massive quantity by early-'60s standards) and reaching the top spot on Billboard's album chart. The album wasn't just a hit; it was a cultural phenomenon. President John F. Kennedy was even supposedly spotted crooning Sherman's "Sarah Jackman" in the lobby of New York's Carlisle Hotel.

The unsung hero of My Son, the Folk Singer, and of most of Sherman's subsequent releases, was composer/arranger Lou Busch, whose lush, mellifluous orchestrations provided a perfect, straight-faced contrast to Sherman's absurdist lyrics and lovably gawky bellow. Sherman described the juxtaposition thusly: "You're looking into Tiffany's most elegant show window, and in the middle of the window is a black velvet pillow, and right in the middle of the pillow is an onion. That's me."

By all accounts, Sherman had a tough time adjusting to his abrupt stardom, and his initial discomfort with the idea of performing for large audiences of strangers cost him some high-profile television appearances. Despite his misgivings, he soon became a familiar presence on the TV variety shows of the period—including some of those that had previously fired him. He also achieved considerable success as a concert attraction, headlining Carnegie Hall on New Year's Eve 1963. By the following summer, Sherman was enough of a beloved institution that he spent a week guest-hosting Johnny Carson's Tonight Show.

Sherman's sophomore album, My Son, the Celebrity, appeared in 1963. It largely continued in its predecessor's funny footsteps, also reaching the Number One spot on the Billboard album chart. My Son, the Nut, released later that year, achieved the same distinction. It also launched Sherman onto AM radio with "Hello Muddah, Hello Faddah!" which spent three weeks as America's Number Two pop single. later winning a Grammy as the year's top comedy recording.

"Hello Muddah, Hello Faddah!" became an instant cultural touchstone, spawning a Milton-Bradley board game (which Sherman hawked in a TV commercial), a children's book and a stage musical incorporating several Sherman compositions. It also became Number One in Hong Kong, and reportedly inspired versions Hebrew, Dutch, Swedish, Finnish, Norwegian and Esperanto versions. Sherman also rewrote a new version of "Hello Muddah" sequel with updated lyrics, which he debuted on The Tonight Show. Although not released on record, the sequel's popularity was such that radio stations played tapes of Sherman's TV performance.



Although "Hello Muddah, Hello Faddah!" made Sherman more famous than ever, it proved to be his last major success. He continued appearing on TV and performing on stage, but subsequent albums (including the Peter and the Wolf takeoff Peter and the Commissar, a collaboration with the Boston Pops Orchestra) sold disappointingly, and 1967's Togetherness marked the end of his recording career. More disappointment followed when the 1968 Broadway musical The Fig Leaves Are Falling, for which Sherman wrote the book and lyrics, closed after four performances.

By that point, Sherman, ill-prepared emotionally to deal with his sudden fame, had already had paid a heavy personal price for his success. His longtime wife Dee (whose pictured on the cover of My Son, the Celebrity) had divorced him in 1966 and gained full custody of the couple's two children. He would subsequently lose his money and his health as well. Sherman dealt candidly with his insecurities, and his use of humor to keep some of his demons at bay, in his 1965 autobiography A Gift of Laughter, which is long out of print but well worth reading.

Although his days as a record-maker were over, Sherman continued working in TV, contributing to some of Bill Cosby's specials, making occasional Tonight Show appearances and providing the voice of Dr. Seuss' animated Cat in the Hat in a much-loved 1971 special. He also won acclaim as author of the 1973 book The Rape of the A*P*E*, a controversial meditation on the sexual revolution and American puritanism.

By that point, Sherman had fallen upon hard times financially and health-wise, fighting diabetes, emphysema, high blood pressure and the effects of his overindulgence in food and alcohol. Despite his troubles, he continued working on new material, developing a non-musical standup act that had convinced Warner Bros. to sign him to a new recording deal.

Before a new album could be completed, though, Sherman died on November 20, 1973—just ten days short of his 49th birthday, and a mere decade after "Hello Muddah, Hello Faddah!" had stormed the charts. Steve Allen, who had remained a friend and supporter even after Sherman was fired from his talk show, delivered the eulogy at his funeral, and later penned a touching tribute to Sherman in his 1982 book More Funny People.

Rhino released My Son, the Greatest, a single-CD Sherman compilation, in 1988, and issued the comprehensive My Son, the Box in 2005. The latter is pricey and now out of print, which is OK since it's more Sherman than any sane person needs. A smarter bet is Collectors' Choice's recently released individual reissues of Sherman's four best albums: My Son the Folk Singer, My Son the Celebrity, My Son the Nut and For Swingin' Livers Only.

Download:

"Al 'n Yetta" mp3
by Allan Sherman, 1963.
available on My Son the Celebrity

"Sarah Jackman" mp3
by Allan Sherman, 1962.
available on My Son the Folk Singer

"Shake Hands With Your Uncle Max" mp3
by Allan Sherman, 1962,
available on My Son the Folk Singer

"Mexican Hat Dance" mp3
by Allan Sherman, 1963.
available on My Son the Celebrity

"Barry Is The Baby's Name & Horowitz & Get On The Garden Freeway"
by Allan Sherman, 1963.
available on My Son the Celebrity

"When I Was A Lad" mp3
by Allan Sherman, 1963.
available on My Son the Celebrity

"The Twelve Gifts Of Christmas" mp3
by Allan Sherman, 1964.
available on Songs for Swingin Livers Only




********************************

This is the fifth of eight posts at the Boogie Woogie Flu, in which eight Jewish writers will discuss the works of other Jewish artists for eight consecutive days in celebration of Hanukkah.

Jewy Ramone

by David Gordon


RIP Jeff Hyman

Believe it or not, it wasn’t always cool to be a skinny, nerdy Jewish kid from Queens. Williamsburg was where my mom took me to buy cheap school clothes from the Hasidic shopkeepers. Long Island City was a wasteland where we went to wreck shit as kids or later on, as young artsy types, to make Super 8 films of ourselves wrecking shit. Those were the days when cool downtown people loathed Brooklyn and one could, literally, go for weeks without crossing above Fourteenth Street or going west of Broadway. In that Old World atmosphere, I had Manhattanite friends who had barely ever set foot in Brooklyn, (a trip to BAM maybe or the Botanical Gardens) but who never, ever touched Queens. Nowadays, just being a native makes me one of the last Mohicans, but back then I was definitely second-class. I was also 125 pounds, allergic and bronchial, sniffly and pasty, bookish and and pathologically shy. I hung in the back of jazz clubs, haunted used record stores, kung-fu triple features, midnight gore films and dusty book and comic shops, but it never crossed my mind that anyone like me could actually do anything cool like that. All those heroes were from a different tribe: cooler, older, richer, poorer, blacker or whiter.

Then, one spring evening, I was sitting in the passenger seat of my parents’ car, parked on the Upper East Side, waiting for them to finish getting their hair cut and twirling the radio dial. I don’t know what year it was, but I was young enough that my family all still got our hair cut together. Somewhere in the air, I stumbled across a tune that changed my life, (for the second time –– the first was hearing what I learned was Bitch’s Brew). I didn’t know the name of the band or the song, but from the minimal lyrics it was easy to guess: "I Just Wanna Have Something To Do."

Coming into consciousness as I did around 1980, in the second wave of punk, or post punk or whatever, and having been drawn first to blues and jazz, and loving the old Stones and Who but finding their shows and recent albums appalling, I would not, at the time, have described myself as a rock fan at all, finding the whole concept embarrassing and overblown, commercial mush for the meathead masses. Nor did the loudness and speed of the Ramones shock me. But it made me re-connect to rock and roll as something that mattered, that was not made for waving a lighter in Giants Stadium, but for prowling the streets, riding the subway, sitting on the stoop waiting for something to come by, writing bad poems, stealing books and doing whippets. It was alive, in all the best and worst senses of the word.

Much of that incredible vitality came from anger, aggression and hopeless energy, the amazing power they unleashed. But there was something else, something that wasn’t there, for me, with The Sex Pistols or The Clash. A note of longing, of yearning, of loss. A bittersweet tone, a beauty, that I think came from Joey’s singing, from his voice. I recognized it immediately in that song, in the choked off last word to the line “I just want to be with you…” and the haunting sweep of the repeated “tonight,” that opens up to take in the world of everything we love and can’t touch. It shows up in many other places too, in “I Want to Live,” in “I Wanna Be Sedated,” even in the dark majesty of “Don’t Bust My Chops” or the strange sob in the immortal “Somebody Put Something in My Drink.”

I connect this note, this tone, both deep and soaring, to blues, to doo-wop, to Sinatra, to Iggy, to something ancient and poetic but also completely modern American urban: the heart in the beast in the jungle. That feeling always grabs me by the throat. I know it’s anathema to say this, but I love those songs as much as the Beatles. Maybe more. Once, when I was in the fashion business (another story) we recruited the cheerleaders from the local, mainly Hispanic high school to perform, and as they leapt and yelled and waved their pom-poms, and formed a pyramid, I had them blast, “I Just Wanna Have Something To Do.” It gave me chills. I think the DJ and I hugged.

In the recent Ramones documentaries, there were two bits I found especially moving: the map that showed where the Ramones played across the country and the world and which bands sprang up in those cities, as if, seeing the guys from Queens triumphant, kids everywhere suddenly realized they could do it too. And I love the footage from Latin America, where crowds of fanatical teens filled stadiums and chased the limo, chanting for Los Ramones.

CBGB is gone, my hearing is going, and Jeff Hyman, in the foreshortened perspective of time seems like what he always was: another great Jewish songwriter and New York pop-singer. But for the angry, lonely, hungry, horny, dorky and lame, for young people all over the world who know they are fucked, that they have nothing but their lives to bet, Joey Ramone will always be a hero. This, to me, is the message behind every Ramones tune: You are a star, and your life, today, is a song.

Download:

"I Just Want To Have Something To Do" mp3
by the Ramones,
available on Road to Ruin

"Listen To My Heart" mp3
by the Ramones, 1976.
available on Ramones

"Today Your Love, Tomorrow The World" mp3
by the Ramones, 1976.
available on Ramones

"It's A Long Way Back To Germany (U.K. B-Side)" mp3
by the Ramones, 1977.
available on Rocket to Russia

"Slug" mp3
by the Ramones, 1977.
available on Rocket to Russia

"Commando" mp3
by the Ramones, 1977.
available on Leave Home

"The KKK Took My Baby Away" mp3
by the Ramones, 1981.
available on Pleasant Dreams

"My Brain Is Hanging Upside Down (Bonzo Goes To Bitburg)" mp3
by the Ramones, 1986.
available on Animal Boy

"We're A Happy Family" mp3
by the Ramones, 1977.
available on Rocket to Russia

"Rockaway Beach" mp3
by the Ramones, 1977.
available on Rocket to Russia

"I Want You Around (Original Version)" mp3
by the Ramones, 1977.
available on All The Stuff (And More), Vol. 2

"Questioningly" mp3
by the Ramones,
available on Road to Ruin

"Danny Says (demo)" mp3
by the Ramones, 1980.
available on End of the Century

"What A Wonderful World" mp3
by Joey Ramone, 2004
available on Don't Worry About Me

"Bye Bye Baby" mp3
by Ronnie Spector and Joey Ramone, 1999.
available on She Talks to Rainbows

top photo: © Roberta Bayley, 1977.

********************************

This is the fourth of eight posts at the Boogie Woogie Flu, in which eight Jewish writers will discuss the works of other Jewish artists for eight consecutive days in celebration of Hanukkah.

We Three Tonys

by Dave the Spazz

Today, on this, the third day of Hanukkah, we once again pay tribute to a very special can of olive oil--one that fueled the consecrated flame in the 2nd Temple of Jerusalem back in 165 BC. Judah Maccabee and his followers, fresh from kicking some Syrian ass in the desert, returned to their temple to find it desecrated and littered with false idols. Only one can of olive oil could be found to light the ceremonial menorah, and while it was a very good brand (blessed by the High Priest of Yochanan, no less) it still was not expected to last more than one night. Judah and his followers naturally were stunned when the olive oil lasted for seven additional nights. Dreidels twirled, latkes sizzled and the "miracle of the container of oil" inspired solidarity and thriftiness amongst the tribes.

Two thousand years later, three exemplary Hebrews rose forth from the land, each one fated to enjoy success way past their own Semitic expiration dates. Each one, as a way to cloak his Jewish identity to better assimilate into society, reinvented himself as a "Tony." There have been other pop culture Jews that dwelt in the Olive Garden of life (think Chico Marx and Jay Black) but none soared as high or lasted as long as this Tony trifecta.

Born Christmas Day, 1912, singer Alvin Morris coasted along the heights of success that spanned the musical tastes of the 20th century. Not long after forming his first band in high school ("The Red Peppers"), Alvin changed his name to Tony Martin, signed with Decca Records and subsequently burned up pop charts nationwide. Tony's fondness for Mediterranean ballads soiled the collective panties of the record buying public and his triumphs in radio, motion pictures and TV proved that his faux-Italian schtick was no flash in the saucepan. Still crooning cantatas as recently as 2009, Tony's career might be considered a twist on the old Italian adage: "Meglio un giorno da Tony che cento da Alvin--Better one day as a Tony than a hundred as an Alvin."




In the summer of 1935, Arthur Rosenberg of Tulsa, Oklahoma removed himself from his place of residence at Northwestern University and traveled to New York City for a complete do-over. Arthur picked up serious chops studying with noted acting teacher Sanford Meisner, who as the creator of the highly regarded Meisner Technique emphasized an emotional realness in his work. Actors were encouraged to "live truthfully under imaginary circumstances" and the newly christened Anthony Randall took that lesson to heart. For the next five decades Mr. Randall channeled his inner fussiness into a lucrative and very funny livelihood that spanned radio, motion pictures and television. His role as Felix Unger in the TV version of The Odd Couple was a master stroke and one which entertainingly defined the second half of his career. Randall's candle burned bright to the end--the acting jobs never dried up and at age 75 he married a woman fifty years his junior who bore him two children. His last film was released one year after his death--2005's It's About Time where he played a character named "Mr. Rosenberg."



In the late 1940s Bronx born Bernard Schwartz had a lot of nothing going for him. Killing time with neighborhood kid Joey Fortgang (the future Joe Franklin) wasn't cutting it, so he slicked back his hair and flew west to destiny land. His good looks brought him some work at the studios and soon bit parts in melodramas led to better roles, eventual matinee idol status, well-deserved critical acclaim and finally a bewigged psychotronic career acting in any piece of crap that was hurled at him. From Spartacus to Lobster Man from Mars, Tony Curtis approached every job with an impassioned gusto that might be described as the Hungarian Jew version of La Dolce Vida. The self-knighted "American Prince" lived hard and fast while his bilious private life kept tabloids and gossipers in business for more than five decades. When Curtis passed away at the age of 85 in September 2010, he took a big chunk of old time Hollywood with him (along with an iphone, an Armani scarf, driving gloves, a Stetson hat and a copy of his favorite novel "Anthony Adverse.")

And so it is, on this, the third day of Hanukkah we pay tribute to three improbable journeys by three Jews named Tony. There's still no explanation as to why that can of Yochanan olive oil lasted so long. Perhaps it was a miracle, a sign from above--one that confirmed that His people were now under His protection. Or maybe there was a Tony Maccabee who passed by the temple to drop off a can of olive oil on his way to getting his chariot tuned up.

Download:

"On Moonlight Bay" mp3
by Tony Martin, date unknown.
available on Harbor Lights & Other Favorites

"You're So Vain" mp3
by Tony Randall and Jack Klugman, 1973.
from The Odd Couple Sings
out of print
can be found at WFMU's Beware of the Blog







********************************

This is the third of eight posts at the Boogie Woogie Flu, in which eight Jewish writers will discuss the works of other Jewish artists for eight consecutive days in celebration of Hanukkah.