2001

Remembering September 11th, on the sixteenth anniversary...

Singer Bea Wain

The great Bea Wain, a wonderful singer, died on August 19th.  She was 100 years old

Ms. Wain reached the height of her fame during the big band years. She was, in the 1930s and 1940s, one of the country's most popular singers.  

In the late 1930s she recorded a number of very big hits with Larry Clinton's orchestra, including "Deep Purple," and "My Reverie."  

Bea Wain, with Larry Clinton's Orchestra, 1939 short film

She starred on the radio show Your Hit Parade, during two periods--from 1939 until 1941, and then again from 1943 until 1944 (as noted in John R. Williams's 1973 book This Was Your Hit Parade).

She was married to the legendary radio and television announcer Andre Baruch, who for years was the announcer on the Hit Parade (for both the television and radio versions).  

I had the great pleasure, and honor, of meeting Ms. Wain and Mr. Baruch in 1981, during a trip I made to California. Mr. Baruch died in 1991. 

Here is Ms. Wain, singing "Heart and Soul" with Larry Clinton's band, from a 1939 short film featuring the orchestra.  The record Wain and Clinton's orchestra made of the song was released in 1938.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YsIL07eOqOU

Here, too, is an obituary from The New York Times; videos of Ms. Wain (including the one above) are featured as part of the story.

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/24/arts/music/bea-wain-star-singer-of-the-big-band-era-dies-at-100.html

Dave Garroway, and "It's About TV"

There's a nice interview, on Mitchell Hadley's "It's About TV" blog, concerning the subject of Dave Garroway. The interview--with Jodie Peeler, Ph.D., a professor of communications at Newberry College in South Carolina, who is co-writing a book about Mr. Garroway--was posted on August 23rd.

http://www.itsabouttv.com/2017/08/the-its-about-tv-interview-jodie-peeler.html

Glen Campbell

Glen Campbell was a great singer, and a great guitarist.

Here is a very pretty version of his beautiful hit song from 1968, "Wichita Lineman," written by Jimmy Webb.

The performance is from a PBS concert; I believe it was taped in 2001.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rjzTNWWO7U0&list=RDrjzTNWWO7U0#t=28

"Garroway at Large"

I recently happened upon this brief video, on YouTube.  It is of Dave Garroway's Chicago-based television variety program Garroway at Large, which aired on NBC from 1949 until 1951. (I don't know the specific date of the telecast.)  Later, at the start of 1952, Garroway became the first host of NBC's Today show.

 

Garroway was a captivating performer, and personality.  The video, below--or, more precisely, the video made from a kinescope--is less than two minutes long, but it provides, very quickly, a nice sense of Garroway's calm, leisurely, intimate and witty style.   

There is a particularly charming moment, in the video, featuring Faye Emerson, who was one of early television's biggest stars.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=18eLE5f02dM

Morgan White, Jr., and Donna Halper

My friend Morgan White, Jr., who hosts The Morgan Show, Saturday nights (10 p.m. to midnight) on Boston's WBZ Radio, will be sitting in tonight for host Bradley Jay, on the station's overnight program (midnight to 5 a.m.).

http://player.radio.com/listen/station/wbz-newsradio-1030

At midnight, his guest will be broadcast historian Donna L. Halper.  She's the author of the 2011 book Boston Radio: 1920-2010.  The book is part of Arcadia Publishing's "Images of America" series.

https://www.amazon.com/Boston-Radio-1920-2010-Images-America/dp/0738574104/

Another of her books is Invisible Stars: A Social History of Women in American Broadcasting. The book's second edition was brought out in 2014 by the academic publisher Routledge. The book was originally released in 2001 by the publisher M. E. Sharpe; in 2014, M.E. Sharpe was bought by Routledge.

https://www.amazon.com/Invisible-Stars-History-American-Broadcasting/dp/0765636700/

Halper--who is an associate professor of Communication and Media Studies at Lesley University in Cambridge, Mass.--is one of the people behind an excellent Facebook page which has been referred to previously in this space: "New England Broadcasting History":

https://www.facebook.com/nebroadcasthistory/

Martin Landau

I cannot count the number of times I have seen the outstanding 1959 Alfred Hitchcock film North by Northwest, which starred Cary Grant and Eva Marie Saint.  The film never disappoints.

One of its great supporting performances was by the wonderful actor Martin Landau, who played Leonard, the right-hand man to James Mason's Phillip Vandamm.  

Mr. Landau died on Saturday, at age 89. 

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/16/movies/martin-landau-actor-academy-award-dies-89.html

Another of my favorite performances by Mr. Landau was his supporting role--for which he received an Oscar nomination--in Woody Allen's Crimes and Misdemeanors (1989). 

Mr. Landau's obituary in The Washington Post noted this, about his Crimes and Misdemeanors role:  "Newsweek arts writer Cathleen McGuigan spoke for many critics when she wrote that his 'delicate, tortured performance as a successful man caught in the web of his deceits is a tour de force.'"

https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/obituaries/martin-landau-oscar-winning-actor-who-played-heroes-and-villains-dies-at-xx/2017/07/16/310a5ee6-6a86-11e7-96ab-5f38140b38cc_story.html

Here, lastly, is part of a scene from North by Northwest; the scene includes Cary Grant, James Mason, and Mr. Landau.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IV4IWsXkNI8