The Musical Innertube - Volume 2, Number 155 - More Music with Bill Trousdale

DON

Today, the Musical Innertube welcomes back somebody very musical. It's Bill Trousdale! Bill and I worked in radio for a number of years, and since we respectively retired from the airwaves, bill has been working to preserve what has happened in the past in the music category here in Pennsylvania. And he is something of a music historian and has one of the bigger, bigger record collections you'll ever see. So, Bill, welcome again to the Innertube. What are we gonna talk about today? What memory lane are we gonna walk down?

BILL

Well, since this is my second appearance, I thought, well, “I'll believe I'll have another,” to quote WC Fields, who was a Pennsylvanian. I would suggest the guests that are listening today may want to have a paper and pencil handy, because there may be names that people will want to jot down and investigate further. One of the guys that was pretty instrumental, so to speak, in regard to gathering information about jazz musicians was a guy in Pittsburgh, a guy by the name of Samuel Charters is a guy you’re gonna want to look up. A name not known to many, but he was born in Pittsburgh and in the 20s he became the country's leading jazz music scholar. He later produced a compilation LP called Country Blues. You might want to look that up. Early family music exposure included Debussy and the music of Bartók, so he obviously had some classical background, but blues singers Bessie Smith and Robert Johnson is where his head was at. Charters feasted on hundreds of jazz musicians who were playing in downtown Pittsburgh and the famous Crawford Grill in the Squirrel Hill section of Pittsburgh. If you're visiting Pittsburgh, there's still lots of hot jazz clubs to check out there. His influences came from the top down, and he would cross reference those jazz artists from the Pittsburgh area and show how they were influenced by other jazz musicians across the country, including names such as Henry Grimes, Shirley Scott, Jimmy McGriff, Dizzy Gillespie and Ethel Walters. Actually, John Coltrane, who’s a notable big wig when it comes to jazz music, is from the Philly area and on N 33rd St. they're currently in the process of renovating his old home to create a John Coltrane Museum. So, if you're in Philly, you may want to come check that out. Few other names from Philly: Billie Holiday, Nina Simone and this guy who cleaned up with a very classy and sexy lady, Astrud Gilberto, for a classic tune that I'm sure many of us are familiar with.

DON

Ah yes, that would be Stan Getz.

(SAMPLE: “GRIL FROM IMPENEMA”)

BILL

“Ahh” is right! I tell you what, that very nice little samba going on there,it makes everybody want to get up and dance now. Well, that's an illustration of the Philly area jazz. But, you know, Pittsburgh had its own influences as well. Some big names out of the Pittsburgh area: Errol Garner, Art Blakely, Tommy and Stanley Turrentine, even George Benson, who is graduated up to present day, came around. But then Billy Eckstein got together with a guy by the name of Miles Davis, you may have heard before, and his vocal styling is so smooth.

(SAMPLE: “AS TIME GOES BY”)

Truly a Musical-romantic-Innertube going on there with Billy Eckstein. Now, throughout Pennsylvania, there's pockets of jazz and blues, and talent is exploding. Burgs and towns and villes, both big and little. In nearby Shenandoah, PA, the Dorsey brothers, Jimmy and Tommy, grew up. Tommy had a big hit in 1936 and with the tune called, “I'm Getting Sentimental Over You,” featuring the voice of Doris Day. Two years earlier, he got the band hooked up with a Cole Porter tune, which really kind of showcased all the fun and frivolity of the era, because back then, “Anything Goes.”

(SAMPLE: “ANYTHING GOES”)

Love these lyrics. Many talents from Pittsburgh, Philly, as well as Chicago and Detroit, made stops in various ballrooms. Now they didn't have TV, they didn't have the latest in technological advances to spread the word. So, they showed up in places like the Valencia in York, the Ballroom there, and played at the Hershey Starlight Room in Hershey and in Lancaster at the Brunswick, Harrisburg at the Penn Harris, and even northern Dauphin County, The Lykens Ballroom. So big bands helped to entertain not only the ballrooms across the country, but in radio, too. Ted Weems, he's a veteran of Pitcairn, Pennsylvania, hired a young, talented singer from, of all places, Canonsburg PA, and that's kind of a note, which we'll get into later, but this young fellow later went on to have a string of hits. Ted Weems also played regularly on the Jack Benny Program, and also on Fibber McGee and Molly, another kind of fun, comical show that you might want to check out. The Weems band also had a weekly program on the Mutual Broadcasting System and soon the nation knew the name of this young fellow from Canonsburg, PA. His name was Perry Como, and he was soon known by his trademark sweater.

(SAMPLE: “IT’S IMPOSSIBLE”)

That whole area, that community of Canonsburg was delighted about, Mr. Comos, Mr. C's talents. They even erected a statue of him in that small town. There's also a statue of him in Gettysburg with his famous sweater, and there's also a statue of him in his hometown in Italy, his family's hometown. So, if you’re in Italy, you can always look that up.

DON

Bill, two things I remember about Perry Como from popular culture was, number one, when Steve Martin sang, “It's impossible, to put a Buick up your nose, it's just impossible,” and the other one was when, I think it was SCTV - Perry Como, had a long running television show. It was always remarked how calm and casual he was...

BILL

Absolutely. Yes.

DON

And SCTV did a thing, I think it was Rick Moranis, I think, played Perry Como lying down through the whole show, singing while lying down and talking to his guests while lying down. Again, to give you the impression that that he really didn't put any effort into it.

BILL

Yeah, the, the, the sweater typified that casualness of Mr. Perry Como. I mean nothing, nothing was formal. He would just kind of take it as it goes. But that small town boasted many popular artists back when. One of the first tunes I remember buying and thinking, wow, this is a really neat tune, was done by an artist by the name of Joey Powers, who did a song called “Midnight Mary” about a clandestine relationship with Mary, meeting at midnight, you know, that got my old teenage juices, just  a-flowing. Back in the late 50s, early 60s, there was a plethora of quartets. They had the Four Aces who were from Philly, but the Four Coins hailed from Canonsburg, PA, and they did a tune called “Shangri-La.” It may be attributed to many other people, but they had the big hit. But one other fellow who did very, very well from Canonsburg PA, there was a name that really got right into the nitty gritty of Pennsylvania music when he did his version of this particular tune.

(SAMPLE: “PENNSYLVANIA POLKA”)

JOHN

Polka!

BILL

The mania!

DON

Penn-syl-vania!

BILL

Known as the “Polish Prince,” Bobby Vinton strikes out the band! Of course, he had a string of love ballads back in the 60s as well, so...

JOHN

Hey, Bill, isn't that playing in the background a lot during the Groundhog Day? I swear to gosh, that's in the background a lot.

DON

The movie Groundhog Day?

BILL

I would not doubt that at all.

JOHN

Yes, I think we could look that up. Just another Pennsylvania connection. Keep going, man.

BILL

A Punxsutawney connection to Canonsburg, PA.

DON

There you go.

JOHN

You betcha!

BILL

It it's amazing how it all kind of melds all together. While they say rock'n'roll (started with) a specific song that was released at a specific date, it will be forever debated as to who actually originated it. Nonetheless, Pennsylvania composed several strong candidates for consideration. Les Paul was not from Pennsylvania, but he did play with Ted Weems, and Les Paul came up with the infamous guitar licks and plays that became kind of an indication of where music was going to be going with that rock'n'roll feel. I personally believe rock'n'roll should be designated as part of the Commonwealth history. We had a Pennsylvania DJ by the name of Alan Freed, he set the standard. And he's the guy who picked the phrase “rock and roll” back in 1952 when he did the Moondog Coronation in Cleveland. Now, this song that we're getting ready to play here is a song was first performed in the early 50s, three years before the Moon Doggy coronation in Cleveland, the now home of the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame, where Freed did his “race” music, rock'n'roll radio show. This jumps!

(SAMPLE: “ROCK THIS JOINT”)

Now that's a Philadelphia-born fellow by the name of Jimmy Preston, from Philadelphia County, 1949. Rocking this joint about the same time in 1949, a white group from Chester County, Pennsylvania blended country rock and hillbilly music into rockabilly. A lead guitar player was going to be known later, but his first group was called The Saddlemen and they did this particular tune that had that rock'n'roll feel.

(SAMPLE: “SUNDOWN BOOGIE”)

You know, a very astute ear might identify that voice as someone that may become more popular in the later 50's. The Saddlemen, which was that group, ceased to exist and later became the Comets led by Bill Haley. Four years later, in 1955, Bill Halley's Comets exploded to the top of the charts with the help of that Pennsylvania born, Windber-native-son Alan Freed. So again, another connection to why Pennsylvania needs to claim the roots of rock'n'roll. Here's Bill Haley.

(SAMPLE: “ROCK AROUND THE CLOCK”)

BILL

Bill Haley is not from Pennsylvania, but he was smart enough to know when he needed to lay claim to Pennsylvania, because he found a home in Chester County and lived the latter part of his life there. As well as, for a period of time, he was a disc jockey at WLBR in Lebanon, PA, so he had his fingers not only in music but also as a as a broadcaster. Another pillar of American music needed to get in the mix, but just a little dram of gospel. The father of gospel music is actually a composer of nine hymns in the Methodist Church, a guy by the name of Charles Tindley. Many attribute his song “I Will Overcome Someday” as providing the conceptual basis for the civil rights anthem, “We Shall Overcome.” His Philadelphia church was one of the largest Methodist congregations in the United States in the 1920s.

American Music's first gospel rock'n'roll star played with a talented individual by the name of Cab Calloway. She was later dubbed the “Queen of Gospel,” the godmother of rock'n'roll. In 1939, Sister Rosetta Tharpe from Philadelphia released this particular tune.

(SAMPLE: “THIS TRAIN”)

BILL

 As Sister Rosetta Tharp style and her electric guitar played influence over the next 7 decades, tales such as Chuck Berry, Carl Perkins, Aretha Franklin, Little Richard, Roy Orbison, Jerry Lewis, and the list continues to grow.

(REPORT ON SISTER ROSETTA THARP’S INFLUENCE ON 60s BRITISH ROCKERS)

BILL

So, the big question is, who really invented rock'n'roll? Consider Sister Rosetta Tharpe released “Rock Me” back in 1942, seven years before “Rock This Joint, "and 10 years before "Rock Around the Clock” with Bill Haley and the Comets. However, all of them could have a legitimate claim to being from Pennsylvania. It seems we may never agree on rock'n'roll’s parentage, but my alter ego says Pennsylvania deserves to take responsibility for the birth of rock'n'roll. Our state deserves to adopt that wayward child that keeps on, you know, creating disharmony in our country. Rock'n'roll may not have been born here, but nonetheless, it did nurture it and seriously influence the infancy of American Music 100%. There's lots of places you can go and look. There's a short film that was done in 1962 called "The Blues” on YouTube, there's a cut called “Searching for Secret Heroes,” WXPN did a documentary on how gospel gave birth to rock'n'roll, and that that's just excellent. There's also a cut on Facebook about the history of Les Paul in 5 minutes, which is pretty amazing considering all the advances he gave to music.

JOHN

We'll return to the Musical Innertube in mere moments, but first, this soothing musical interlude...

DON

Bill Trousdale is a veteran of radio broadcasting and sales, as well as a "Baby-Boomer Marketer."  He was born in Philadelphia, and has lived in Ohio, Texas, New Jersey, and central Pennsylvania. 

 JOHN

He attended Susquehanna University in Selinsgrove, Pennsylvania, and began his broadcasting career at Susquehanna's college station WQSU, where he did color commentary on the first known broadcast of a Hearts tournament.

 DON

From there, he worked at stations in Towanda, PA, Franklin, NJ, Elmira, NY, Lancaster, PA, and York, PA. He worked weekends at WPEN in Philadelphia before landing at WKBO in Harrisburg, where he worked with me for a couple of years.

 JOHN

Bill is founder and president of the Pennsylvania Museum of Music and Broadcast History.

 DON

Find out more about Bill on his Facebook page, https://www.facebook.com/bill.trousdale.587

JOHN

And now we return you to the Musical Innertube, already in progress....

BILL

One of the things that we often discover is the cross pollination of artists. One of the first tunes that I began to realize there was a cross pollination was from my old partner. His name was - talent wise, he was Kenny Bolognese. That was his real name. But early on he went by Kenny Beau, and later on he was known as Kenny Chandler. He wrote a tune early in his career that was adopted by another group later on. It's called “You're the Right One.”

(SAMPLE: “YOU’RE RTHE RIGHT ONE,” KENNY BEAU)

That tune was written by Kenny in the in the late 50s, and along about the mid 60s, a group down the road in Middletown, known as the Royal Lancers, said, hey, I kind of like that tune. I think we ought to record it as well. Corky Weiss was the lead vocalist, and these are the Royal Lancers doing the same tune.

(SAMPLE: “YOU’RE THE RIGHT ONE,” ROYAL LANCERS)

 Well, not only did we have local talents influencing local talents, we have local talents impacting national television shows. There was an episode, if you were a Murphy Brown fan, you may have caught this particular episode, which opened with a tune from a local group called the Pixies 3 out of Hanover.

(SAMPLE: “442 GLENWOOD AVENUE”)

The girl group music at its peak. The Pixies 3, you know, were also contemporaries of the Crystals and the other girl groups of that era, the Shondelles. The Jordan Brothers toured extensively with Dick Clark, but recently, in an episode of Dexter – a show that I used to watch on a fairly regular basis - featured this particular tune called “Dream Romance.”

(SAMPLE: “DREAM ROMANCE)

 Absolutely spectacular when it came to their vocals and their harmonizing. I mentioned to you on our last session - encouraging people to go back and listen to the first session that we had on the Musical Innertube - of a guy by the name of Tommy Hunt. Tommy Hunt was the lead vocalist of a group called The Flamingos, and he had a solo hit called “Human.” Now, that tune was embraced very, very strongly in Central PA. Not only was it done later by a guy named Daddy C, who sang with the re-formation of a lot of the groups that were in Central Pennsylvania called The Class Of 60 Something, but there was also a version of it done by a group called the Thundering Sentries. This is “Human.”

(SAMPLE:  “HUMAN”)

The production value of that particular tune is only a little rough, but I can thank my friend Phil Schwartz for saving it, because that was archived on one of his LPs on Expat Records. When it comes to people who know an awful lot about Pennsylvania music I I'm just barely scratching the surface. Probably the guy who knows more about it in Philly is a guy by the name of Val Shively. He has a huge record store. I think he's basically sort of retired, but how do you retire from music? You can't. I mean, he knows too much. We can't let him get away with that. My friend Phil Schwartz out of Lancaster. He's actually an optometrist. He does appear every now and again on Sirius radio. A group I didn't play, but definitely he's still playing the piano, and used to play regularly down at the Village, along with Cook E. Jar  in the 60s, Karl Hausman played with the Kit Kats, and he had his piano rockin’. Definitely worth looking up on Facebook. Local guy in Harrisburg, Bobby Fulton, he formed Soulville Records. and spawned groups like the Soulville All Stars and Huey and the Tiffs, various groups in the area. I haven't seen or talked to this guy in years, Dave Silva, he was one of the producers of the music sessions at a place called Baldwin Studios in Mechanicsburg. Baldwin did an awful lot of work for the gospel groups. Heck, I could do a whole show just on gospel music that was recorded at Baldwin. Dan Hartman also produced some music there and helped the some of the younger talents get along, if you will, with their musical career. Valerie and the Chateaus, Valerie’s still around in the Lancaster area. Berry Stump. He sang with a group called the Embers, I believe, and was associated with a guy – and I should have pulled his music - Georgie Wilson did a tune called “Roman Heart,” which, it just makes your toes curl. I mean, he had a voice! He’d start singing, you know, you could hear him counties away. I mean he had that powerful a voice. He didn't even need a microphone. Just phenomenal talent. A group called the Couriers did “Stomping Time Again,” one of the popular dances in the 60s. I just was fortunate enough to run into a guy by the name of Greg Woolard. I took a vacation down in the Yorktown area, and just so happened there was an outdoor concert - not directly related to Pennsylvania music, but definitely in the feel of Pennsylvania music, is what you call the beach sound. He's with a group called the Embers, and done many a fine rock'n'roll shag tune, and just a fascinating fellow. Running into him, he said,”Hey, do you have any information, or more information, about the Mag Men?” So, I had a couple things that I sent down to him. And, that's about all I have for you today. Unless there's something else you'd like to talk about.

JOHN

I just want to say that it's such a great cavalcade that you're running past our ears today. and Astrud Gilberto, who we heard the on stage to begin the half hour, she lived in Philly for the last 40 years of her life. She was a Philadelphian, and not many people knew that, and that's the way that she wanted it. But here's this transplant who settled in Philly after a long time. And Billie Holiday, they didn't even have her star on the Walk of Fame for a long time. But she was born in Philly, and when she couldn't play in New York when she was banned from New York, she made her bread playing in Philly when she could. So, I mean, she really is deeply invested in Philadelphia, and the list goes on. I mean, David Bowie and Elton John, I mean, they both, you know, had huge hits through Gamble and Huff and International records. We could have you on for 20 episodes.

BILL

Marian Anderson is a name that should not be passed, either, because her influence – and, I mean, she was not accepted at all in this country. And it wasn't until Eleanor Roosevelt said there's an injustice that she cannot sing at the Daughters of the American Revolution. She got her fame and fortune, basically, starting in Europe, and it wasn't until she came back from Europe that there started to be some recognition, and justly deserved. And there is a museum for Marian Anderson here in Pennsylvania, it’s just a matter of looking it up. So, I encourage anybody who's going to any place in Pennsylvania, start looking into the nooks and crannies of what's going on. I mentioned earlier, a small museum up in northeastern Pennsylvania in Bradford County called the PP Bliss Gospel Songwriters Museum. Now PP Bliss may not be a name that’s immediately familiar with you, but you probably know his tunes - if you go to church, if you don't go to church, you might still know his tunes - but there were several guys up in that area that that did fairly well. McGranahan that did a tune called “Trust And Obey.” And actually, if it wasn't for Steven Foster, we’d never know about Camptown, because those races are 5 miles long, doo-dah.

JOHN

Yeah.

DON

Doo-dah-day. And it's interesting too. There was a recent PBS series that Henry Louis Gates, who does the show Finding Your Roots also produced this show, Gospel. And basically, he talked with people who have been involved in gospel music all their lives, and sort of trace the history of it, and did talk about how it merged into rock and roll. And one of the ways that did was just the energy of gospel music in those black churches, and anybody who played music and then went out and, when rock'n'roll was exploding in the late 50s and early 60s and the energy of rock'n'roll, a lot of people who had experienced the energy of gospel music, especially some of the background players -you know, people who appeared at the Apollo in places like that - took that energy and put it into rock'n'roll. And mixed it with everything else that was coming out. And we had, by the mid 60s, we had rock'n'roll as we all remember it. So, I think that's a very important influence that a lot of people don't get, is that gospel music is just two steps away from rock'n'roll, if not closer.

BILL

Yeah, a little closer. Jitter in the bug right next to each other. There's a group called The Dixie Hummingbirds who are out of Philly, and they did a tune, they borrowed the melody of “Loves Me Like a Rock” for Paul Simon. And there's a little clip at the beginning of their album, their live album, they talk about that. Where they say that that the gospel music was just a continuation of the music that they had Saturday night. They just changed the lyrics a little bit so it would be acceptable to the church congregation the next morning. So, they kinda tongue in cheek talked about how they were interrelated and for those who didn't have enough of the Saturday night crowds, and drinkin’ and carrying on, they always, always could continue Sunday morning, in in church, but they just have to change the lyrics a little bit.

DON

Well, Bill, thanks again for being here, and for another fantastic run through music, early music of Pennsylvania - and really, the nation, because what started here spread really, really rapidly. And again, if you have any suggestions for Bill, please go on our website (www.musicalinnertube.com). You can leave us a voicemail, or you can leave us a message, or you can get in touch with us by e-mail at musicalinnertube@gmail.com, and give us some suggestions, we'll pass them on to Bill, if you want to hear something in a particular program that we will have in the future and, Bill, we'll have you back.

BILL

Thank you. I appreciate the opportunity to expound.