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High Voltage (Count Basie Album)
''High Voltage'' (subtitled ''Basic Basie Vol. 2'') is an album by pianist and bandleader Count Basie featuring performances recorded in 1970 and released on the MPS label. accessed November 16, 2015 Reception awarded the album 4 stars and notes "A dozen generally excellent standards are given overly brief interpretations by the Count Basie Orchestra".Track listing # "" ( |
Count Basie
William James "Count" Basie (; August 21, 1904 – April 26, 1984) was an American jazz pianist, organist, bandleader, and composer. In 1935, he formed the Count Basie Orchestra, and in 1936 took them to Chicago for a long engagement and their first recording. He led the group for almost 50 years, creating innovations like the use of two "split" tenor saxophones, emphasizing the rhythm section, riffing with a big band, using arrangers to broaden their sound, and others. Many musicians came to prominence under his direction, including the tenor saxophonists Lester Young and Herschel Evans, the guitarist Freddie Green, trumpeters Buck Clayton and Harry "Sweets" Edison, plunger trombonist Al Grey, and singers Jimmy Rushing, Helen Humes, Thelma Carpenter, and Joe Williams. Biography Early life and education William Basie was born to Lillian and Harvey Lee Basie in Red Bank, New Jersey. His father worked as a coachman and caretaker for a wealthy judge. After automobiles replaced ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
George Bassman
George Bassman (February 7, 1914 – June 26, 1997) was an American composer and arranger. Biography Born in New York City to a Ukrainian- and Lithuanian-Jewish émigré couple, Bassman was later raised in Boston and began studying music at the Boston Conservatory while still a boy. He studied orchestration and composition formally, but in his teens he left home against his father's wishes to play piano in an itinerant jazz group, and subsequently worked as an arranger for Fletcher Henderson in New York. Through that gig, he became part of the burgeoning swing/big band scene and was soon writing songs as well. Bassman peaked in that career when he and Ned Washington wrote "I'm Getting Sentimental Over You" for the bandleader Tommy Dorsey. Bassman also worked in radio as an arranger for Andre Kostelanetz, and made the move to Hollywood in the mid 1930s. Among his earliest film jobs was orchestrating the Gershwin songs in the Fred Astaire movie '' A Damsel in Distress'' at RKO ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Buddy DeSylva
George Gard "Buddy" DeSylva (January 27, 1895 – July 11, 1950) was an American songwriter, film producer and record executive. He wrote or co-wrote many popular songs and, along with Johnny Mercer and Glenn Wallichs, he co-founded Capitol Records. Biography DeSylva was born in New York City, but grew up in California, and attended the University of Southern California, where he joined the Theta Xi Fraternity. His Portuguese-born father, Aloysius J. De Sylva, was better known to American audiences as actor Hal De Forrest. His father was also a lawyer as well as an actor. His mother, Georgetta Miles Gard, was the daughter of Los Angeles police chief George E. Gard. DeSylva's first successful songs were those used by Al Jolson on Broadway in the 1918 production of ''Sinbad'', which included "I'll Say She Does". Soon thereafter, he met Jolson and in 1918 the pair went to New York and DeSylva began working as a songwriter in Tin Pan Alley. In the early 1920s, DeSylva frequent ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Dorothy Fields
Dorothy Fields (July 15, 1904 – March 28, 1974) was an American librettist and lyricist. She wrote over 400 songs for Broadway musicals and films. Her best-known pieces include "The Way You Look Tonight" (1936), "A Fine Romance" (1936), "On the Sunny Side of the Street" (1930), " Don't Blame Me" (1948), "Pick Yourself Up" (1936), "I'm in the Mood for Love" (1935), "You Couldn't Be Cuter" (1938) and " Big Spender" (1966). Throughout her career, she collaborated with various influential figures in the American musical theater, including Jerome Kern, Cy Coleman, Irving Berlin, and Jimmy McHugh. Along with Ann Ronell, Dana Suesse, Bernice Petkere, and Kay Swift, she was one of the first successful Tin Pan Alley and Hollywood female songwriters. Early life Fields was born in Allenhurst, New Jersey, and grew up in New York City. In 1923, Fields graduated from the Benjamin School for Girls in New York City. At school, she was outstanding in the subjects of English, drama, and baske ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jimmy McHugh
James Francis McHugh (July 10, 1894 – May 23, 1969) was an American composer. One of the most prolific songwriters from the 1920s to the 1950s, he is credited with over 500 songs. His songs were recorded by many artists, including Chet Baker, June Christy, Bing Crosby, Deanna Durbin, Ella Fitzgerald, Judy Garland, Adelaide Hall, Billie Holiday, Beverly Kenney, Bill Kenny, Peggy Lee, Carmen Miranda, Nina Simone, Frank Sinatra, and Dinah Washington. Career McHugh began his career in his hometown of Boston, Massachusetts Massachusetts (Massachusett language, Massachusett: ''Muhsachuweesut [Massachusett writing systems, məhswatʃəwiːsət],'' English: , ), officially the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, is the most populous U.S. state, state in the New England ..., United States, where he published about a dozen songs with local publishers. His first success was with the World War I song "Keep the Love-Light Burning in the Window Till the Boys Come Marching Home", and this ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
On The Sunny Side Of The Street
"On the Sunny Side of the Street" is a 1930 song composed by Jimmy McHugh with lyrics by Dorothy Fields. Some authors say that Fats Waller was the composer, but he sold the rights to the song. It was introduced in the Broadway musical ''Lew Leslie's International Revue'' starring Harry Richman and Gertrude Lawrence. Ted Lewis did the first recording of the song in 1930 (Catalog #2144-D), followed by Harry Richman (Catalog # 4747) and both enjoyed hit records with the song. Other notable recordings Having become a jazz standard, it was played by Louis Armstrong, the Nat King Cole Trio, Dave Brubeck, Earl Hines, Benny Goodman, Lionel Hampton, Erroll Garner, Dizzy Gillespie, Art Tatum, James Booker, Count Basie, and Lester Young. The Louis Armstrong version was recorded in the key of C major, but it has been recorded in a range of keys; Ted Lewis recorded it in D major and Ella Fitzgerald in G major. Cover versions date as far back as 1930, when Layton & Johnstone released the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jack Segal
Jack Segal (October 19, 1918 – February 10, 2005) was a pianist and composer of popular American songs, known for writing the lyrics to '' Scarlet Ribbons''. His composition '' May I Come In?'' was the title track for a Blossom Dearie album. Other songs he authored or co-authored are ''When Sunny Gets Blue'', ''That's the Kind of Girl I Dream Of'', ''I Keep Going Back to Joe's'' (with Marvin Fisher), ''A Boy from Texas, a Girl from Tennessee'' (with John Benson Brooks & Joseph Allan McCarthy), ''After Me'' (with Blossom Dearie) and ''When Joanna Loved Me'' (with Robert Wells). It has been estimated that his songs have helped sell 65 million records. Lyrics for the ballad that was perhaps Segal's greatest hit, Scarlet Ribbons (with music composed by Evelyn Danzig Levine), were written in just 15 minutes in 1949, but the song languished until Segal presented it to Harry Belafonte five years later. Belafonte's recording was responsible for making the song a hit. At least 30 ot ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Alan Jay Lerner
Alan Jay Lerner (August 31, 1918 – June 14, 1986) was an American lyricist and librettist. In collaboration with Frederick Loewe, and later Burton Lane, he created some of the world's most popular and enduring works of musical theatre both for the stage and on film. He won three Tony Awards and three Academy Awards, among other honors. Early life and education Born in New York City, he was the son of Edith Adelson Lerner and Joseph Jay Lerner, whose brother, Samuel Alexander Lerner, was founder and owner of the Lerner Stores, a chain of dress shops. One of Lerner's cousins was the radio comedian and television game show panelist Henry Morgan (comedian), Henry Morgan. Lerner was educated at Bedales School in England, Choate Rosemary Hall, The Choate School (now Choate Rosemary Hall) in Wallingford, Connecticut, (where he wrote "The Choate Marching Song") and Harvard University, Harvard. He attended both Camp Androscoggin and Camp Greylock. At both Choate and Harvard, Lerner ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Frederick Loewe
Frederick Loewe (, originally German Friedrich (Fritz) Löwe ; June 10, 1901 – February 14, 1988) was an Austrian-United States, American composer. He collaborated with lyricist Alan Jay Lerner on a series of Broadway musicals, including ''Brigadoon'', ''Paint Your Wagon (musical), Paint Your Wagon'', ''My Fair Lady'', and ''Camelot (musical), Camelot'', all of which were made into films, as well as the original film musical ''Gigi (1958 film), Gigi'' (1958), which was first Gigi (musical), transferred to the stage in 1973. Biography Loewe was born in Berlin (Charlottenburg), Germany, to Vienna, Viennese parents Edmund and Rosa Loewe. His father was a noted Jewish operetta star who performed throughout Europe and in North America, North and South America; he starred as Count Danilo in the 1906 Berlin production of ''The Merry Widow''. Loewe grew up in Berlin and attended a Prussian cadet school from the age of five until he was thirteen. At an early age Loewe learned to play ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Get Me To The Church On Time
"Get Me to the Church on Time" is a song composed by Frederick Loewe, with lyrics written by Alan Jay Lerner for the 1956 musical ''My Fair Lady'', where it was introduced by Stanley Holloway. It is sung by the cockney character Alfred P. Doolittle, the father of the one of the show's two main characters, Eliza Doolittle. He has received a surprise bequest of four thousand pounds a year from an American millionaire, raising him to middle class respectability. Consequently, he feels he must marry Eliza's stepmother, the woman with whom he has been living for many years. Doolittle and his friends have one last spree before the wedding and the song is a plea to his friends not to let his drunken merriment forget his good intentions and make sure he gets to his wedding. Covers and parodies *On the children’s show ''Sesame Street'', Oscar the Grouch and his girlfriend Grundgetta get engaged by accident, but they agree to get married anyway to have a huge trashy party. Amid the chaos o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Johnny Mercer
John Herndon Mercer (November 18, 1909 – June 25, 1976) was an American lyricist, songwriter, and singer, as well as a record label executive who co-founded Capitol Records with music industry businessmen Buddy DeSylva and Glenn E. Wallichs. He is best known as a Tin Pan Alley lyricist, but he also composed music, and was a popular singer who recorded his own songs as well as songs written by others from the mid-1930s through the mid-1950s. Mercer's songs were among the most successful hits of the time, including " Moon River", " Days of Wine and Roses", " Autumn Leaves", and "Hooray for Hollywood". He wrote the lyrics to more than 1,500 songs, including compositions for movies and Broadway shows. He received nineteen Oscar nominations, and won four Best Original Song Oscars. Early life Mercer was born in Savannah, Georgia, where one of his first jobs, aged 10, was sweeping floors at the original 1919 location of Leopold's Ice Cream. [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Rube Bloom
Reuben Bloom (April 24, 1902 – March 30, 1976) was an American songwriter, pianist, arranger, band leader, recording artist, vocalist, and author. Life and career Bloom was born and died in New York City. He was Jewish. During his career, he worked with many well-known performers, including Bix Beiderbecke, Joe Venuti, Ruth Etting, Stan Kenton, Tommy and Jimmy Dorsey. He collaborated with a wide number of lyricists, including Johnny Mercer, Ted Koehler, and Mitchell Parish. During the 1920s he wrote many novelty piano solos, which are still well regarded today. He recorded for the Aeolian Company's Duo-Art reproducing piano system various titles including his "Spring Fever". His first hit came in 1927 with "Soliloquy"; his last was "Here's to My Lady" in 1952, which he wrote with Johnny Mercer. In 1928, he made a number of records with Joe Venuti's Blue Four for OKeh, including five songs he sang, as well as played piano. Bloom formed and led a number of bands during his career ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
