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Interview: Peggy King (Part 2)
Source:
JazzWax by Marc Myers
If you were a TV producer in the 1950s, Peggy King was dream talent. She could sing, act and play off comedians—all while seemingly relaxed and sincere. She wasn't a singing stylist like Peggy Lee or Patti Page, but when it came to doing the industrial work of a weekly live television show—with scripts, rehearsals, impeccable timing, comedy and making the headliner look great, Peggy was perfect. Yesterday, in Part 1 of my interview with Peggy, she talked about growing ...
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Interview: Peggy King (Part 1)
Source:
JazzWax by Marc Myers
The name Peggy King may not be familiar to you, but in the early days of television, she was a singing personality. Back in the early 1950s, in televison's infancy, most TV shows were hosted by name singers and comedians. The TV and movie industries were rivals competing for America's spare time, and film actors were rarely viewed as hosts. What's more, singers and comedians were better suited for long stretches of live TV and they were far more entertaining, ...
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Interview: Helen Merrill on Billie
Source:
JazzWax by Marc Myers
Following my post yesterday about a private audio recording at YouTube of Helen Merrill and Billie Holiday singing a duet at a New York party in November 1956, I had to know what was going on at the time of the recording. Why were they together. Why was Holiday so intent on singing the ending twice with Helen? Who was on piano? It didn't sound like Leonard Feather. So I called Helen and we had a great chat about the ...
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Interview: Ginny Mancini
Source:
JazzWax by Marc Myers
Some of Artie Shaw and Mel Torme's finest recordings came in 1946, when both were signed to the Musicraft label in Los Angeles. Torme at the time fronted a vocal quartet known as the Mel-Tones. What set the Mel-Tones apart was their hip spin on the band vocal groups popular at the time. Torme wrote the vocal arrangements, and their jazz sensibility impressed Shaw. Among the members of the vocal quartet was Ginny O'Connor, who would later marry Henry Mancini. ...
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Interview: Stacey Kent
Source:
JazzWax by Marc Myers
Next Tuesday, singer Stacey Kent will begin a five-night run at New York's Birdland with the legendary bossa nova singer-songwriter Marcos Valle and his band from Brazil. Marcos was part of the generation that followed Antonio Carlos Jobim, Luiz Bonfá, João Gilberto and Vinicius de Moraes in the early 1960s and the composer of dozens of hit songs, among them Summer Samba (So Nice); Chup, Chup, I Got Away; The Answer; Crickets Sing For Anamaria; She Told Me, She Told ...
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Bill Rotella, Son Of Frank Sinatra Songwriter Johnny Rotella, Reflects On Their Careers
Source:
Eric Taylor
Q: When did you decide to enter the music field? A: I didn’t consider music as anything other than “fun” until I was in college. While in college I started jamming with friends and a got a taste of the stage, studio and the road. I began thinking about songwriting and performing more seriously at that point. Q: How old were you when you started? Did you even think of music as a business at all then? A: I began ...
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Ross Prior: From Thrash Metal To Jazz
Source:
Eric Taylor
Q: When did you decide to enter the music field? A: Hmm, would you like the short or long answer? Not long after I played my first band, I guess I realized how happy and free it made me feel. I'd never experienced anything like it before so I was instantly drawn to it. Q: How old were you when you started? Did you even think of music as a business at all then? A: I was quite late to ...
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An Interview With Wren Marie Harrington
Source:
Eric Taylor
Q: What are your goals as an artist? A: My primary goal as a singer is to deepen the level of understanding of the intentions of songs with my particular voice, and a rich variety of languages and musical idioms. I consider the human voice a crucial element in uniting the listener with the spirit of any given song. Words and language are what give us humans our identity in the world, like plumage is to birds, or leaves on ...
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