A Young Aretha Commands Respect and Conquers the World

Aretha Franklin is the greatest voice to ever grace popular music.  

That's all. The evidence is below in this collection of Aretha Live. 

Rock-a-Bye Your Baby With a Dixie Melody (1964)

Running Out of Fools (1964)

Evil Gal Blues - 1964

Shoop Shoop Song - 1965

Do Right Woman (1967)

Dr. Feelgood Live at the Fillmore (1968)

Chain of Fools -1968

Satisfaction (Amsterdam 1968)

Respect -  (Amsterdam 1968)

I Ain't Never Loved a Man (Amsterdam 1968)

Don't Play That Song (1970) on Cliff Richard Show

I Say a Little Prayer (1970)

Aretha, Sarah Vaughan,Peggy Lee and Roberta Flack in

a 1973 television tribute to Duke Ellington - We Love Him Madly 

Aretha and Smokey Robinson trade tunes and memories (1975)

Aretha and Ray Charles It Takes Two to Tango (1975)

The Godfather and Queen of Soul pleasing each other (1987)

Kennedy Center Honors (1994) for Carole King

Aretha's Tribute to Whitney Houston (2014)

Sam Cooke Sings Dylan and does the Cha-Cha with Jackie Wilson

Blowin' in the Wind

Jackie Wilson lip synching to and dancing with Sam Cooke

Tales From the Vienna Woods starring Bugs Bunny

Thanks to the enduring cast of Merry Melodies who taught me everything I care to admit that I know about classical music. 

They Loved Him Madly - A Singer's Tribute to Duke Ellington

A 1973 tribute to Duke Ellington featuring Sarah Vaughan, Aretha Franklin, Peggy Lee, Roberta Flack, Sammy Davis Jr., Billy Eckstine, Joe Wilson and, of course, The Duke.

Frank and Elvis debate rock and roll and each other

Frank Sinatra on rock and roll: "Rock and roll music is sung, played and written for the most part by cretinous goons and by means of its almost imbecilic reiterations and sly, lewd—in plain fact, dirty—lyrics, and as I said before, it manages to be the martial music of every sideburned delinquent on the face of the earth … this rancid-smelling aphrodisiac I deplore." 

Frank on Elvis: “Only time will tell. They said I was a freak when I first hit, but I’m still around. Presley has no training at all. When he goes into something serious, a bigger kind of singing, we’ll find out if he is a singer. He has a natural, animalistic talent.

Elvis on Frank: “He has a right to his opinion, but I can’t see him knocking it for no good reason. I admire him as a performer and an actor but I think he’s badly mistaken about this. If I remember correctly, he was also part of a trend. I don’t see how he can call the youth of today immoral and delinquent."

And then, Elvis donned the tux and abandoned rock and roll for the movies ...sigh.

Love Me Tender/Witchcraft

Stuck on You

Roy Orbison and Johnny Cash; A Story of Friendship

Roy Orbison had the voice of a lonely angel locked out in the cold, desperately pleading to be allowed inside where it was safe and warm.

 

How Private Snafu Won the War or Situation Normal: All F****ed Up!

During WWII, the Army drafted the legendary Hollywood film director, Frank Capra, to produce a series of cartoons to educate the troops on how to win the war. Capra, in turn, conscripted writers Theodore Geisel, (yes, that Dr. Seuss) and his protege, P.D. Eastman, directors Chuck Jones and Frtiz Freleng of Bugs Bunny fame and the vocal stylings of Mel Blanc and the WB studio animators to show the boys how to get it done. This is what they came up with. 

That Sam-I-Am! Are we are all that Sam? I Am.

The greatest bet in the history of English literature was when Bennett Cerf challenged Ted Giesel thusly: "Can you write a book using only 50 words?" 

To which the good doc responded, "I can.". 

These are the 50 words:

Lewis Carroll's Jabberwocky performed by Donovan

When Lewis Carroll fell through the looking glass and landed on the word cloud that is The Jabberwocky, he floated millions of imaginations - including that of Donovan Leitch. 

Lewis Carroll

(from Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There, 1872)

`Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
  Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
  And the mome raths outgrabe.

"Beware the Jabberwock, my son!
  The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!
Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun
  The frumious Bandersnatch!"

He took his vorpal sword in hand:
  Long time the manxome foe he sought --
So rested he by the Tumtum tree,
  And stood awhile in thought.

And, as in uffish thought he stood,
  The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame,
Came whiffling through the tulgey wood,
  And burbled as it came!

One, two! One, two! And through and through
  The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!
He left it dead, and with its head
  He went galumphing back.

"And, has thou slain the Jabberwock?
  Come to my arms, my beamish boy!
O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!'
  He chortled in his joy.

`Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
  Did gyre and gimble in the wabe;
All mimsy were the borogoves,
  And the mome raths outgrabe.

Facebook is 4 L7s!

I knew it! I knew it all along! The nations' newspaper of record, The Boston Herald, reports that Facebook, the social network giant, has fallen out of favor with the 'cool' crowd. That's why I have so completely and assiduously avoided making the Facebook scene. I knew that Facebook wasn't where the hep cats and groovy chicks were swingin' when they donned their berets and ducked into Starbucks for a cappy with a dash. Hate to break the news to those who have been suckered into the social vortex that is Facebook, but you're all  just so L7! (Now, lemme know when the price on those stock options falls through the floor!) HL 5.15.12

Booker T. and The Mgs were the real deal

If you need to be told why Booker T. and the Mg's were so great, you'll never know. For those who do, this is a great extended version of a tune y'all know well.

Come one, come all and marvel at Mitt's greatest flips!

Come one; come all ye naive brothers and sisters, related heathens and other suckers and marvel at the daring Elephant man on the flying trapeze performing his ever so nimble mid-air twists and turns from this position to that and back again all with nary a hair out of place. Yes, here it is, in one fabulous collection, (edited for brevity), it's Mitt's Greatest Flips and Trips, Volume One.

James Joyce reading Finnegan's Wake from the great beyond.

James Joyce reading Finnegan's Wake from the great beyond. 

I'm not sure how I feel about the talking head, but it's nice to have subtitles to help slice through that brough because this Joyce feller can barely speak American! 

Oil Can Boyd tells all. And it's much more than we needed to know

Oil Can Boyd promotes his book,  "They Call Me Oil Can; Life on the Edge" - and falls off.

http://audio.weei.com/a/55941353/oil-can-boyd-wade-boggs-was-a-bigot-nsfw.htm#q=boyd

A Touch of Harry Nilsson

Harry Nilsson never did a concert tour, never seemed able to focus his talent, and appeared to lose interest in his career long before that talent was exhausted. But he was a charming, engaging singer and song writer, a pleasure to the ear, a natural born wise guy and he deserves to be remembered.  

A dab of Jesse Winchester to soothe the soul

The tender and gentle surface of Jesse Winchester's music and the honey warmth of his voice was undercut by a bittersweet melancholy that enabled his songs to cut deeply enough to move others, (such as the musician sitting alongside him in the first clip), to tears. And those who feared that the hard road he traveled as a conscientious objector who left the U.S. to avoid the Vietnam war,  had left him preternaturally solemn and brooding, will be delighted to find that he could be pretty danged silly too. 

What's So Funny 'Bout Peace, Love and Understanding?

Elvis Costello poses a great all purpose question/accusation: "What's So Funny 'Bout Peace Love and Understanding?"

As I walk through

This wicked world

Searchin' for light in the darkness of insanity.

Jackie McLean + McCoy Tyner + Jack DeJohnette = A Supergroup

Passion Dance

Appointment in Ghana

Woody Guthrie was far more than dust in the wind

"Woody is just Woody. Thousands of people do not know he has any other name. He is just a voice and a guitar. He sings the songs of a people and I suspect that he is, in a way, that people. Harsh voiced and nasal ... there is nothing sweet about Woody, and there is nothing sweet about the songs he sings. But there is something more important for those who still listen. There is the will of a people to endure and fight against oppression. I think we call this the American spirit." John Steinbeck

All that survives of Woody Guthrie in performance are these two very brief clips. But every song that Woody wrote lives on. 

Woody performance clip

John Henry performed by Woody, Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee

This Land is Your Land

I don't need no coffee in my cup when I've got the Spanish Harlem Orchestra in my ears!

I don't need no coffee in my cup when I've got the 

Spanish Harlem Orchestra in my ears!

Biff! Bam! Pow!

(Important public service announcement: A full carton of orange juice is not a marimba and should never be held upside down and shaken while attempting to do the mambo across the kitchen to the sounds of The Spanish Harlem Orchestra. Ooops!)

Saturday Morning Cartoons featuring Leaping Beauty - A True Story

Fractured Fairy Tales - Leaping Beauty - A True Story

David Danced Before the Lord. Duke Ellington wrote the music

"Every man prays in his own language and there is no language that God does not understand". - Duke Ellington

An excerpt from Duke Ellington's First Sacred Concert featuring Bunny Briggs tapping and Jon Hendricks scatting.

1965

To Be Or Not To Be, You Say?

If mankind were limited to only one existential question, surely it would be either: To Be Or Not To Be? or, Is There Anything Billy Shakespeare Didn't Think Of?

Here are several versions of Hamlet's most famed soliloquy performed by some of the most celebrated thespians of the past century, all pondering the same questions; all sans answers.

Which among them, one may ask, is the greatest performance? 'Tis a resolution devoutly to be wished.

"God is In the House" Art Tatum; the greatest improvising pianist in the history of recorded music

"Anything you do with your right hand, I'll do with my left". - Art Tatum to Bud Powell

"Ladies and Gentleman, I only play the piano, but tonight, God is in the house". - Fats Waller as he left the band stand.

"First you speak of Art Tatum. Then you take a long breath. Then you speak of other pianists." - Dizzy Gillespie

Humoresque

Yesterdays

Art Tatum and Ben Webster's sumptuous collaboration - 1956

Art Tatum & Ben Webster - The Album (1956)

track listing is  1. all the things you are 2. Gone with the Wind 3. Have You Met Miss Jones 4. Day and Night 5. Where or When 6. My Ideal 7. My One And Only Love 8-12 are solo takes of 1-5 respectively

Sonny Rollins is The Saxophone Colossus

At age 88, Sonny Rollins has finally laid down his saxophone. He was a titanic talent and one of the most important players in jazz history; a distinctive player, an innovative, imaginative improviser and the composer of a number of the most celebrated jazz  greatest compositions in history, standing shoulder to shoulder with his contemporary and friend, John Coltrane. 

Beginning with his emergence in the great (and tragic) Clifford Brown/Max Roach Quintet in the early 1950's and continuing for the next 60 years, Sonny Rollins held true to his vision and earned his sobriquet, "Saxophone Colossus." 

In 2011, he was received the Kennedy Center award for his contribution to American art and culture. 

St. Thomas  - 1959

Alfie's Theme - 1973

(Mortitat) Mack The Knife - 1981

Sunday Morning Jazz; A True Guitar Summit

Worshiping at the altar of rock's guitar gods is grand and understandable, but the fact that most of the great jazz guitarists are almost entirely ignored and unheard is truly lamentable. Here are three of the very best; Barney Kessell, Kenny Burell and, in the only clip known to exist, my own favorite, Grant Green. No, they're not Hendrix, Clapton and Page but they can play more than any of those more celebrated brethren and they deserve a listen. 

Van Morrison and Them

Them may not have been the most innovative, flashiest, toughest or grittiest band to emerge from the Isles in the 1960's and Them sure weren't surrounded by anyone who knew how to promote and present Them, but Them had one thing going for them ... and that was Van Morrison.

Mystic Eyes/Gloria 1965

Here Comes The Night - 1965

Baby Please Don't Go - 1965

Eric Clapton and Layla visit Wynton Marsalis for a tour de force of New Orleans

Eric Clapton visits Wynton Marsalis and drops Layla off at St. James Infirmary. 

Harry The Hipster Gibson

Rock and Roll had many fathers (and several mothers). Some endure, others have been forgotten. Harry The Hipster may be among the forgotten but with his boogie woogie piano and bad boy style it's easy to place him as a bridge to Jerry Lee and the like. 

Who Put The Bezadrine in Mrs. Murphy's Ovaltine?

Piano Boogie Jump

Handsome Harry the Hipster

Julie London was Michelle Pfeiffer before Michelle Pfeiffer was Julie London

Remember Michelle Pfeiffer in The Fabulous Baker Boys as the chanteuse poured into the red sequins sprawled on top of the piano? Sure you do. She was modeled after Julie London. Here's why.

Accounts are that Julie was actually quite shy and recoiled from the pinup/chanteuse image, but she certainly carried it off well.

Of her own voice, she said, "It's only a thimbleful of a voice and I have to use it close to the microphone. But it's kind of oversmoked and it automatically sounds intimate".  Sounds good to me.