Les Paul Lester William Polsfuss (June 9, 1915 – August 12, 2009), known as Les Paul, was an American jazz, country, and blues guitarist, songwriter, luthier, and inventor. He was one of the pioneers of the solid-body electric guitar, and his prototype ...

and

Mary Ford Mary Ford (born Iris Colleen Summers; July 7, 1924 – September 30, 1977) was an American vocalist and guitarist, comprising half of the husband-and-wife musical team Les Paul and Mary Ford. Between 1950 and 1954, the couple had 16 top-ten hi ...

were a popular 1950s husband-and-wife musical duo who performed and recorded during 1945–1963. They both sang and played guitars. Ford and Paul were music superstars during the first half of the 1950s, putting out 28 hits for

Capitol Records Capitol Records, LLC (known legally as Capitol Records, Inc. until 2007) is an American record label distributed by Universal Music Group through its Capitol Music Group imprint. It was founded as the first West Coast-based record label of note ...

between 1950 and 1957, including "

Tiger Rag "Tiger Rag" is a jazz standard that was recorded and copyrighted by the Original Dixieland Jass Band in 1917. It is one of the most recorded jazz compositions. In 2003, the 1918 recording of "Tiger Rag" was entered into the U.S. Library of Cong ...

", " Vaya con Dios" (11 weeks at No. 1), "

Mockin' Bird Hill "Mockin' Bird Hill" is a song written in 3/4 time by Calle Jularbo, with lyrics by George Vaughn Horton. It is perhaps best known through recordings by Patti Page, Horton's own Pinetoppers, and the duo of Les Paul and Mary Ford in 1951, or by Do ...

" (top 10), "

How High the Moon "How High the Moon" is a jazz standard with lyrics by Nancy Hamilton and music by Morgan Lewis. It was first featured in the 1940 Broadway revue '' Two for the Show'', where it was sung by Alfred Drake and Frances Comstock. In ''Two for the S ...

" (nine weeks at No. 1), " Bye Bye Blues" and "

The World Is Waiting for the Sunrise "The World Is Waiting for the Sunrise" is a post-World War I popular song, with lyrics by American actor Eugene Lockhart, and music composed by Canadian-born concert pianist Ernest Seitz in 1918. He later claimed he conceived the refrain when ...

Background

The couple were introduced to each other by

Gene Autry Orvon Grover "Gene" Autry (September 29, 1907 – October 2, 1998), nicknamed the Singing Cowboy, was an American singer, songwriter, actor, musician, rodeo performer, and baseball owner who gained fame largely by singing in a crooning s ...

in 1945 and were married on December 29, 1949. https://www.pbs.org/wnet/americanmasters/les-paul-chasing-sound/100/ They first appeared in the pop charts in 1950. Between the years 1950 and 1954, Les Paul and Mary Ford had 16 top-ten hits. They had five top-ten hits within nine months. "

Tennessee Waltz "Tennessee Waltz" is a popular country music song with lyrics by Redd Stewart and music by Pee Wee King written in 1946 and first released in January 1948. The song became a multimillion seller via a 1950 recording – as "The Tennessee Waltz" � ...

", "Mockin' Bird Hill", "

" (#1 for nine weeks), "

" and "Whispering". From August 1952 to March 1953 they had five more top-ten hits; "My Baby's Coming Home", "Lady of Spain", "Bye Bye Blues", "I'm Sitting on Top of the World" and " Vaya Con Dios" (#1 for 11 weeks). Their 1954 version of "I'm a Fool to Care" went to No. 6, and was featured in a memorable Southern Comfort commercial in 2013 that got over 1 million views on YouTube. In 2009, they were inducted into the Hit Parade Hall of Fame. Paul and Ford are famous for creating a makeshift recording studio in their garage. In their garage studio, they used

multitrack recording Multitrack recording (MTR), also known as multitracking or tracking, is a method of sound recording developed in 1955 that allows for the separate recording of multiple sound sources or of sound sources recorded at different times to create a ...

to record many of their hits including ‘Lover’, ‘Nola’, ‘Brazil’ and ‘Whispering' with only the two of them."Paul, Les." Encyclopedia of Popular Music, 4th ed. Ed. Colin Larkin. Oxford Music Online. Oxford University Press. Web. February 22, 2015. Paul and Ford divorced acrimoniously in December 1964, which also ended the collaboration between the two. The duo have a star at 1541 Vine Street in the Recording section of the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

Radio and television programs

Paul had hosted a 15-minute

radio Radio is the technology of signaling and communicating using radio waves. Radio waves are electromagnetic waves of frequency between 30 hertz (Hz) and 300 gigahertz (GHz). They are generated by an electronic device called a transmit ...

program, ''The Les Paul Show'', on

NBC The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) is an Television in the United States, American English-language Commercial broadcasting, commercial television network, broadcast television and radio network. The flagship property of the NBC Enterta ...

in 1950, featuring his trio (himself, Ford, and rhythm player

Eddie Stapleton Edgar Thomas (Eddie) Stapleton, (21 November 1930 – 13 November 2005) was an outstanding Australian Rugby union winger who made his mark with the Wallabies and the St George Rugby Club in Sydney in the 1950s. He was a curiosity in that he p ...

) and his electronics, recorded from their home and with gentle humour between Paul and Ford bridging musical selections, some of which had already been successful on records, some of which anticipated the couple's recordings, and many of which presented dazzling re-interpretations of such jazz and pop selections as "

In the Mood "In the Mood" is a popular big band-era jazz standard recorded by American bandleader Glenn Miller. "In the Mood" is based on the composition "Tar Paper Stomp" by Wingy Manone. The first recording under the name "In the Mood" was released by E ...

," "Little Rock Getaway," "Brazil," and "

." Several recordings of these shows survive among

old-time radio The Golden Age of Radio, also known as the old-time radio (OTR) era, was an era of radio in the United States where it was the dominant electronic home entertainment medium. It began with the birth of commercial radio broadcasting in the early ...

collectors today. The show also appeared on television a few years later with the same format, but excluding the trio and retitled ''The Les Paul & Mary Ford Show'' (aka ''Les Paul & Mary Ford At Home'') with "Vaya Con Dios" as a

theme song Theme music is a musical composition that is often written specifically for radio programming, television shows, video games, or films and is usually played during the title sequence, opening credits, closing credits, and in some instances at so ...

. Sponsored by

Warner–Lambert Warner–Lambert was an American pharmaceutical company. History Formerly two separate entities, the first company was started in 1856, when William R. Warner founded a drug store in Philadelphia. Warner went on to invent a tablet coating process ...

Listerine Listerine is an American brand of antiseptic mouthwash that is promoted with the slogan "Kills Microorganism, germs that cause bad breath", Named after Joseph Lister, who pioneered antiseptic surgery at the Glasgow Royal Infirmary in Scotland, L ...

, it was widely syndicated during 1954—55 and was only five minutes long (one or two songs) on film and therefore used as a brief interlude or fill-in on programming schedules. Since Les created the entire show himself, including audio and video, he maintained the original recordings and was in the process of restoring them to up-to-date quality at the time of his death.

References

Sources

*Jacobson, Bob. ''Les Paul: Guitar Wizard''. Madison, Wisconsin: Wisconsin Historical Society Press, 2012. *Larkin, Colin, ed. ''Encyclopedia of Popular Music'', 4th ed. Ed. "Les Paul". Oxford Music Online. Oxford University Press. Web. February 22, 2015. *Shaughnessy, Mary Alice. ''Les Paul: An American Original''. New York: W. Morrow, 1993. *Wyckoff, Edwin Brit. ''Electric Guitar Man: The Genius of Les Paul. Genius at work!'' Berkeley Heights, N.J.: Enslow Publishers, 2008.

External links

Streaming

Episodes of the ''Les Paul Show'' from Old Time Radio Researchers Group Library
{{DEFAULTSORT:Paul, Les and Mary Ford Married couples American musical duos Musical groups established in the 1950s Capitol Records artists Columbia Records artists