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Kessel Plays Standards
''Kessel Plays Standards'' (subtitled ''Barney Kessel Volume 2'') is an album by guitarist Barney Kessel released on the Contemporary Records, Contemporary label and featuring eight tracks originally released on the ''Barney Kessel Volume 2'' 10-inch album which were recorded at sessions in 1954 along with an additional four tracks from 1955.Contemporary Records discography accessed May 25, 2015 Kessel wrote in the liner notes that it was his purpose "in this album to use an instrumentation that hadn't been recorded before, or at least rarely recorded, and to capture some different sounds, combinations of different instruments."Kessel, Barney (1956). ''Kessel Plays Standards'' (liner notes). Barney Kessel. Los Angeles: Contemporary Records. Back ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Barney Kessel
Barney Kessel (October 17, 1923 – May 6, 2004) was an American jazz guitarist born in Muskogee, Oklahoma. Known in particular for his knowledge of chords and inversions and chord-based melodies, he was a member of many prominent jazz groups as well as a "first call" guitarist for studio, film, and television recording sessions. Kessel was a member of the group of session musicians informally known as the Wrecking Crew. Biography Kessel was born in Muskogee, Oklahoma in 1923. Kessel's father was an immigrant from Hungary who owned a shoe shop. His only formal musical study was three months of guitar lessons at the age of 12. He began his career as a teenager touring with local dance bands. When he was 16, he started playing with the Oklahoma A&M band, Hal Price & the Varsitonians. The band members nicknamed him "Fruitcake" because he practiced up to 16 hours a day. Kessel gained attention because of his youth and being the only white musician playing in all African American ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
(I'd Like To Get You On A) Slow Boat To China
"On A Slow Boat to China" is a popular song by Frank Loesser, published in 1948. The song is a well-known pop standard, recorded by many artists, including a duet between Rosemary Clooney and Bing Crosby (for their album '' Fancy Meeting You Here'' (1958)), Ella Fitzgerald, Joni James, Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Jimmy Buffett, Fats Domino and Liza Minnelli. In the UK, the biggest hit version was recorded in 1959 by Emile Ford and the Checkmates peaking at #3 in the official singles chart. Ronnie Dove recorded the song for his 1966 album Ronnie Dove Sings the Hits for You. Bette Midler and Barry Manilow recorded the song for Midler's album ''Bette Midler Sings the Rosemary Clooney Songbook'' (2003). Miss Piggy performed the song with actor Roger Moore in an episode of ''The Muppet Show''. Paul McCartney sang this song to honor Frank Loesser. Hit recordings Idiom Frank Loesser's daughter, Susan Loesser, authored a biography of her father, ''A Most Remarkable F ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
A Foggy Day
"A Foggy Day" is a popular song composed by George Gershwin, with lyrics by Ira Gershwin. The song was introduced by Fred Astaire in the 1937 film '' A Damsel in Distress''. It was originally titled "A Foggy Day (In London Town)" in reference to the pollution-induced pea soup fogs that were common in London during that period, and is often still referred to by the full title. The commercial recording by Astaire for Brunswick was very popular in 1937. Other recordings * Frank Sinatra – ''Songs for Young Lovers'' (1953) *Ella Fitzgerald on her Ella Fitzgerald Sings the George and Ira Gershwin Song Book from Verve Records, 1959. * Charles Mingus – '' Pithecanthropus Erectus'' (1956) * Louis Armstrong with Ella Fitzgerald – ''Ella and Louis'' (1956) * Billie Holiday – ''Songs for Distingué Lovers'' (1957) * Red Garland – ''Red Garland at the Prelude'' (1959) * Frank Sinatra — ''Ring-a-Ding-Ding!'' (1961) * Judy Garland — ''Judy at Carnegie Hall'' (1961) * George Ben ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Irving Mills
Irving Harold Mills (born Isadore Minsky; January 16, 1894 – April 21, 1985) was an American music publisher, musician, lyricist, and jazz artist promoter. He sometimes used the pseudonyms Goody Goodwin and Joe Primrose. Personal Mills was born to a Jewish family in Odessa, Russian Empire, although some biographies state that he was born on the Lower East Side of Manhattan in New York City. His father, Hyman Minsky (1868–1905), was a hat maker who had immigrated from Odessa to the United States with his wife Sofia ''(née'' Sophia Dudis; born 1870). Hyman died in 1905, forcing Irving and his brother, Jacob ''(aka'' "Jack"; 1891–1979), to work odd jobs including bussing at restaurants, selling wallpaper, and working in the garment industry. By 1910, Mills was listed as a telephone operator. Mills married Beatrice ("Bessie") Wilensky (1896–1976) in 1911 and they subsequently moved to Philadelphia. By 1918, Mills was working for publisher Leo Feist. His brother, Jack, was ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Irving Gordon
Irving Gordon (February 14, 1915 – December 1, 1996) was an American songwriter. Biography Irving Gordon was born in Brooklyn, New York, to a Jewish family, and later lived on Coney Island. He was named Israel Goldener but later changed his name to Irving Gordon. As a child, he studied violin. After attending public schools in New York City, Gordon worked in the Catskill Mountains at some of the resort hotels in the area. While working there, he took to writing parody lyrics to some of the popular songs of the day. In the 1930s, he took a job with the music publishing firm headed by talent agent Irving Mills, at first writing only lyrics, but subsequently writing music as well. After Gordon was introduced to Duke Ellington in 1937, Ellington sometimes invited him to put lyrics to his compositions. However working with Ellington was probably one of the most difficult commissions there was, since most of the Ellington songs were really instrumental pieces whose singable potentia ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Duke Ellington
Edward Kennedy "Duke" Ellington (April 29, 1899 – May 24, 1974) was an American jazz pianist, composer, and leader of his eponymous jazz orchestra from 1923 through the rest of his life. Born and raised in Washington, D.C., Ellington was based in New York City from the mid-1920s and gained a national profile through his orchestra's appearances at the Cotton Club in Harlem. A master at writing miniatures for the three-minute 78 rpm recording format, Ellington wrote or collaborated on more than one thousand compositions; his extensive body of work is the largest recorded personal jazz legacy, and many of his pieces have become standards. He also recorded songs written by his bandsmen, such as Juan Tizol's " Caravan", which brought a Spanish tinge to big band jazz. At the end of the 1930s, Ellington began a nearly thirty-year collaboration with composer-arranger-pianist Billy Strayhorn, whom he called his writing and arranging companion. With Strayhorn, he composed multipl ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Prelude To A Kiss (song)
"Prelude to a Kiss" is a 1938 ballad composed by Duke Ellington, with lyrics by Irving Gordon and Irving Mills. Background and composition This composition is in the key of D-flat major but makes extensive use of the secondary dominant chords, secondary ii–V–I progressions, diatonic circle of fifths, and evaded cadences. The song is extremely chromatic and complex, employing sophisticated mathematics that were rare at this time in jazz: Ellington's rising semitones (G-G#-A-A#-B) at the end of the bridge mirror the opening of both A sections (B-A#-A-G#-G). By the late 1930s, swing was at the height of its popularity. Using his fame and artistic freedom, Ellington became more ambitious and experimental, writing "Prelude to a Kiss", which abandoned the Tin Pan Alley style hooks and dance tempo for melodic lines and harmonies found more often in classical music. He recorded this piece as an instrumental in August 1938 before returning to the studio a few weeks later to recor ... [...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] |
Harry Warren
Harry Warren (born Salvatore Antonio Guaragna; December 24, 1893 – September 22, 1981) was an American composer and the first major American songwriter to write primarily for film. He was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Original Song eleven times and won three Oscars for composing " Lullaby of Broadway", "You'll Never Know" and "On the Atchison, Topeka and the Santa Fe". He wrote the music for the first blockbuster film musical, '' 42nd Street'', choreographed by Busby Berkeley, with whom he would collaborate on many musical films. Over a career spanning six decades, Warren wrote more than 800 songs. Other well known Warren hits included "I Only Have Eyes for You", "You Must Have Been a Beautiful Baby", " Jeepers Creepers", "The Gold Diggers' Song (We're in the Money)", "That's Amore", "There Will Never Be Another You", "The More I See You", "At Last" and "Chattanooga Choo Choo" (the last of which was the first gold record in history). Warren was one of America's most ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jeepers Creepers (song)
"Jeepers Creepers" is a popular song and jazz standard. The music was written by Harry Warren and the lyrics by Johnny Mercer for the 1938 movie '' Going Places''. It was premiered by Louis Armstrong and has been covered by many other musicians. The song was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Original Song in 1938 but lost to "Thanks for the Memory". The song was included in the 1984 Smithsonian collection ''American Popular Song: Six Decades of Songwriters and Singers'' and in the 1998 album ''The Songs of Harry Warren.'' Patti Austin sang "Jeepers Creepers". Background In 1930s Hollywood, black actors were not filmed singing to each other, so Armstrong sang it to a racehorse named Jeepers Creepers. The phrase "jeepers creepers", a minced oath for "Jesus Christ," predates both the song and film. Mercer said that the title came from a Henry Fonda line in an earlier movie. The lyrics include: Jeepers Creepers, where'd ya get those peepers? Jeepers Creepers, where'd ya get th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sam Coslow
Sam Coslow (December 27, 1902 – April 2, 1982) was an American songwriter, singer, film producer, publisher and market analyst. Coslow was born in New York City. He began writing songs as a teenager. He contributed songs to Broadway revues, formed the music publishing company Spier and Coslow with Larry Spier and made a number of recordings as a performer. With the explosion of film musicals in the late 1920s, Hollywood attracted a number of ambitious young songwriters, and Coslow joined them in 1929. Coslow and his partner Larry Spier sold their publishing business to Paramount Pictures and Coslow became a Paramount songwriter. One of his first assignments for the studio was the score for the 1930 film ''The Virtuous Sin''. He formed a successful partnership with composer Arthur Johnston and together they provided the scores for a number of films including Bing Crosby vehicles. Coslow became a film producer in the 1940s and won the Academy Award for Best Short Film for hi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Arthur Johnston (composer)
Arthur James Johnston (January 10, 1898 – May 1, 1954) was an American composer, conductor, pianist and arranger. Life and career Born in New York City, he began playing piano in movie houses, and went to work for Fred Fisher's music publishing company at the age of 16. He met, and was soon hired by, Irving Berlin, becoming Berlin's personal arranger, and director of early '' Music Box Revues''. His first hit song was "Mandy Make Up Your Mind", co-written with George W. Meyer, Roy Turk and Grant Clarke for Florence Mills to sing in the show ''Dixie to Broadway''. Biography by Jason Ankeny, ''Allmusic.com'' Retrieved 12 January 2021 In 1929, he moved to Hollywood, where he o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
