I post a weekly diary of the historical notes, arts & science items, foreign news (often receiving little notice in the US) and whimsical pieces from the outside world that I featured this past week in "Cheers & Jeers". For example .....
Even on public TV, one sees some signs of the zeitgeist ....
SEPARATED at BIRTH - two TV hosts: Dean Johnson - from PBS's "Hometime" - and Glenn Beck our pal.
OK, you've been warned - here is this week's tomfoolery material that I posted.
PROGRAMMING NOTE - BiPM announces that he will not be conducting a Cheers & Jeers this coming Monday. Instead, Andy & Inky the Cat will be posting a standard diary.
ART NOTES - black & white drawings by the late Roy Lichtenstein are at the Morgan Library & Museum in New York City through January 2nd.
NEVER UNDERESTIMATE the power of a hand-written letter. Just ask 9 year-old Beatrice Delap, who wrote a letter to Captain Jack Sparrow asking for help from him in organizing a 'mutiny' against her teachers at a Greenwich, England elementary school. Johnny Depp is filming the latest "Pirates Of The Caribbean" in London and answered her letter. In character, in costume .... in person: coming to a hastily-announced school assembly with her letter in-hand .... but suggesting that there were too many police in the area to attempt a mutiny that day.
MONDAY's CHILD is Moose the Cat - or is it Junior the Cat? Pete Rouse, who is Rahm Emanuel's replacement, is a major cat lover.
MUSIC NOTES - a lost flute concerto by the composer Antonio Vivaldi has been discovered at the National Archives of Scotland.
AWARD NOTES - this year's Peace Prize of the German Book Trade (honoring authors whose work advances the cause of peace) is going to the Israeli author David Grossman for his works depicting the Israeli-Palestinian situation. Grossman always had ambivalence about travelling there but decided, "I can come to Germany once a book has been published there under my name".
ART NOTES - works of Mexican Art since 1910 are at the Arkansas Arts Center in Little Rock through November 21st.
NATURE NOTES - rare bumblebees have made a comeback in Kent and Sussex counties in the south of England.
BOOK NOTES - in this space I have written before about the story of Oscar the Cat - whose ability to detect patients nearing the end of life was first chronicled in a New England Journal of Medicine essay. And just recently I finished this book written by the geriatrician who wrote the NEJM essay.
But even though Oscar's name appears in the title - and it's his photo gracing the cover - in reality, he's a secondary character. Rather, this is a gripping tale of how the pernicious condition of dementia affects people as well as caregivers, told through the primary characters of several patients and their families.
I lost my father and mother at age 58 and 66 respectively, and thus spared what others are going through: the medical center where I am employed even offers classes to employees who are becoming caregivers. So, I recommend the book less for Oscar and the other kittehs (though they play a helpful role) but much more for the story it tells.
TUESDAY's CHILD is Pushkin the Cat who rules-the-roost at the Birmingham, England Oratory ... and was spotted by Pope Benedict during his recent UK trip.
POLITICAL NOTES - the government of Greenland - seeking eventual independence from its colonial status as part of Denmark - has had to ask the Danish Parliament to annul a law providing for a separate Greenland currency, as Greenlanders have determined they are not (yet) ready for it.
TV NOTES - Entertainment Weekly nominates "25 TV shows canceled too early".
SEPARATED at BIRTH - Academy Award winner Tilda Swinton (whose mother is Australian) and Australian prime minister Julia Gillard (born in Wales).
LITERARY NOTES - five years after his death, letters by the author Saul Bellow are to be published later this month.
BOOK NOTES - in his soon-to-be-published autobiography the always-colorful Keith Richards describes Mick Jagger as being "unbearable" since the beginning of the 80's and as far as vices go: "I've given up everything now - which is a trip in itself".
ART NOTES - an exhibit exploring the use of Gold in Islamic Art is at the Philadelphia Museum of Art through April, 2011.
SEEMS HARD to BELIEVE in 2010: but Eqypt's last remaining leper colony has been the only home that several leprosy patients have ever known ... and are thus reluctant to leave, despite massive societal change towards sufferers.
DOWN MEMORY LANE - several years ago I read of the death of Jim Gordon - a New York multi-sportscaster of distinction in my youth. But it was only later that I learned that for a brief time his radio co-host (in broadcasting NY Ranger hockey games) was none other than the Winnipeg, Manitoba native Monty Hall - yes, of "Let's Make a Deal" fame. I finally located a street address for Monty Hall's business (Hatos-Hall Productions) and wrote to ask several questions (i.e., how did he get that job, was he on TV also, what caused him to leave and did he have any recollections?) - and here was his response:
LITERARY NOTES #1 - the Northern Ireland poet Seamus Heaney - a previous Nobel Literature Prize winner - has been named winner of the Forward Prize for Human Chain - his most recent collection.
LITERARY AWARDS #2 - the author and columnist Howard Jacobson has won this year's Man Booker Prize (as the best original full-length novel by a citizen of Britain or Ireland) for The Finkler Question that was published two months ago.
WEDNESDAY's CHILD is Cupid the Cat - an Alabama kitteh recovering nicely from being shot by an arrow. After a Facebook posting, the local Humane Society notes, "There are plenty of people who will want this cat ... but there are still plenty — about 150 — at our shelter needing loving homes, too."
SPORTING NOTES - seeking to attract young people (via the use of superheroes that traditionally the movies use) the National Hockey League has hired veteran comic book author Stan Lee - the creator of Spider-Man, the Hulk and the X-Men - to create 30 new characters (one for each NHL franchise).
YOUNGER-OLDER BROTHERS? - the kid in the "Jerry Maguire" sports-agent film and boxing coach Freddie Roach (the trainer of Filipino multi-title holder Manny Pacquiao).
POLITICAL NOTES - Austria's government is being taken to the European Court for Human Rights by a descendant of the Habsburg Dynasty - as its constitution bars former ruling families from seeking the (largely ceremonial) post of president.
ART NOTES - an exhibit entitled Colossal Masterworks of Ancient Mexico is at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art through January 9th.
ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY nominates '12 Documentaries that Changed the World'.
TRANSPORTATION NOTES - China has started to extend its controversial railway line in Tibet - not only expected to draw more tourists to Mount Everest but also boost trade with South Asia.
THURSDAY's CHILD is JoJo the Cat - no, not the kitteh of our friend tnichlsn - but a black cat nonetheless, who needed to be transported from North Carolina to Pennsylvania ... and which a cat-loving flight attendant volunteered to do.
POLITICAL NOTES - the status of women in South Africa shows definite signs of progress, but it is a struggle.
FRIDAY's CHILD is Phoenix the Cat - a kitteh found in the ashes of a home that burned down last week in Richmond, Virginia and will be up for adoption (after recuperating from some burns).
HISTORY NOTES - a photo gallery of the annual re-enactment of the 1066 Battle of Hastings in Britain .... is one that Ohio Tea Party Republican congressional candidate Rich Iott now probably wishes that he had been partaking in.
SEPARATED at BIRTH - the Viral ChatRoulette singer and pianist Ben Folds.
......and finally, for a song of the week ............... though critics believe that he was not the most advanced or innovative drummer of his era (others choosing Warren 'Baby' Dodds) and certainly not the most subtle: it's difficult to argue that Gene Krupa was not the most important drummer from the 1930's. With a flamboyant style, a seat at the table of one of the most important orchestras and matinée idol good looks (with a resemblance to Tyrone Power) .... the general public's view of drummers changed forever, with drum solos now an accepted phase of the big band era.
The youngest of nine children born (to a an immigrant from Poland) in Chicago just over 100 years ago: Gene Krupa lost his dad at a young age, and he had to begin work at a young age (at a music store) to help support the family. Why the drums? Well, it may not be this way today, but the cheapest item in Brown Music's wholesale catalog was a set of Japanese drums (for $16!) in 1920. Upon entering high school, one of his friends was trumpeter Jimmy McPartland - later the husband of pianist (and NPR host) Marian McPartland. He began playing professionally in Chicago in 1927, as part of Thelma Terry and her Playboys - the first notable jazz band that was led by a woman (but which was not an all-female band). He also recorded with such noted Dixieland jazz stars as Eddie Condon and Bix Beiderbecke.
His first claim-to-fame came in December of that same year in a recording studio: where up-to-now, drummers only used a snare drum and cymbals on record. The recording engineer at Okeh Records was afraid that Krupa wanting to use his entire drum set would 'destroy our equipment' (which would be said by recording engineers about Jimi Hendrix nearly forty years later). But the company was delighted at the results.
In 1929, Krupa moved to New York, working regularly in the band of Red Nichols and hired to play in the pit band (for the play Strike Up the Band by George Gershwin) along with Glenn Miller and, critically, Benny Goodman. Goodman offered him a job in his Benny Goodman Trio - and later the Quartet - the first popular integrated jazz small group (with pianist Teddy Wilson and vibraphonist Lionel Hampton). Indeed, the Ken Burns series "Jazz" showed a clip of the Quartet playing a furious piece that sounded like the style which Cream and Traffic would employ decades later.
But his career broke wide-open when he was asked to join Goodman's full Orchestra in 1934, with Benny promising they'd become a high-octane swing band. Their late-night "Let's Dance" radio shows began to display that innovative style .... but on tour in 1935, audiences only wanted to hear "sweet" ballroom dance music (or so theater owners declared). Nearing the end of the disappointing tour at the Palomar Ballroom in Los Angeles, the audience seemed especially lackluster ... leading Krupa to tell Goodman, "Benny, if we're going to go down: let's go down swinging" - which the West Coast audience (having heard their radio shows in prime time) were waiting for, as they exploded upon hearing King Porter Stomp with Krupa driving the band with force.
Eventually this led to the first jazz concert ever held at Carnegie Hall in January, 1938. And in particular: their performance of the Louis Prima tune Sing, Sing, Sing - with a memorable drum solo by Krupa - became one of the NPR 100 most important American musical works of the 20th Century. Indeed, Krupa became so popular among fans that Goodman began to resent having to feature a sideman in every tune, and after a public quarrel in Philadelphia, Krupa left to form his own Orchestra in March, 1938.
Gene Krupa was also beginning to make his mark away from the bandstand. He was the author of the influential instructional Gene Krupa Method book and appeared in movie roles (the 1939 Bob Hope film Some Like it Hot and "Beat the Band") and in 1941 launched an annual "Gene Krupa Drum Contest" - whose first winner would be the future star Louis Bellson (the husband of Pearl Bailey, and who died only last year). Years later, he formed the Krupa-Cole Drum School in 1954 (along with drummer Cozy Cole).
Krupa's first orchestra had early success, but really blossomed when trumpeter Roy Eldridge and a nineteen year-old singer Anita O'Day joined his band. In her book High Times, Hard Times Anita O'Day always spoke highly of Gene. And in addition to "After You're Gone" and "Rockin' Chair", the orchestra had a major hit with Let Me Off Uptown - with the white woman (O'Day) and the black man (Eldridge) trading lyrics which were edgy for the day.
If this were the old VH-1 "Behind the Music" - the turning point in Gene Krupa's life came in the summer of 1943, when he was arrested in San Francisco on a marijuana charge (along with contributing to the delinquency of a minor). Both are widely believed to have been trumped-up charges, and Krupa was acquitted of the latter one. But he spent a good deal of his money fighting the drug charge, to no avail: convicted and sentenced to ninety days. This was a big deal publicity-wise in those days, and he fell into a funk (with Roy Eldridge unable to keep his old band afloat, and it folded). Then, he was offered a job by his old boss, Benny Goodman - and though their partnership did not last long, it revived his spirit. Gene Krupa formed a second Orchestra, with future baritone sax star Gerry Mulligan writing some innovative charts, and also featuring Red Rodney.
As big bands faded around 1950, Krupa went on to perform with the Norman Granz Jazz at the Philharmonic series, lead small groups, square-off against Buddy Rich in Drum Battles - and was then portrayed by Sal Mineo in the 1959 Gene Krupa Story film: which strayed frequently from the truth but featured Gene himself on the soundtrack. He posed for the famous 1958 A Great Day in Harlem photo - unsurprisingly, posing alongside many of his fellow drummers who appeared that day.
But a 1960 heart attack and worsening back trouble slowed Gene's career down, although he did continue to record, perform in various Benny Goodman Orchestra reunion shows and taught drums along the way. His career ended full-circle: with his final recording in 1972 with old friend Eddie Condon and his final concert with Benny Goodman in August, 1973. Gene Krupa died in October, 1973 at the age of 64 and is buried in Calumet City, Illinois. In 1978 the Modern Drummer Hall of Fame made him its very first inductee.
As Les Paul was to do for guitars and recording equipment: Gene Krupa also left a legacy in the field of drum sets. The H.H. Slingerland drum company of Chicago (which began in 1928) was made famous by Gene Krupa, and they worked with him on one noted innovation: manufacturing the first tuneable tom-toms (on both top and bottom heads) that gave drummers a wide range of sounds. He also worked with the Turkish-founded, Massachusetts-based Avedis Zildjian cymbal makers, standardizing their range of cymbals (i.e., crash, ride, pang) as well as developing the modern hi-hat cymbals (an elevated pair operated by a foot pedal) which were previously a floor-level set-up, making stick playing impossible.
Some other legacies: stand-up comedians owe him a debt, as it was Krupa who is credited with popularizing the rim shot (of comedy club fame). And finally, when Gene Krupa taught drums in the late 1960's: among his pupils was one Peter Criscuola ... later known as Peter Criss of the band Kiss.
As a bandleader, Gene Krupa's best-known hit was "Drum Boogie" (co-written with Roy Eldridge) and it was a featured song in the 1941 Gary Cooper-Barbara Stanwyck film Ball of Fire where Gene Krupa and his band performed the tune (with Martha Tilton overdubbing the vocals for Barbara Stanwyck). And below you can listen to it.
You hear the rhythm romping
You see the drummer stomping
The rhythm ought to bend you
It's really going to send you
Drum boogie, drum boogie
It really is a killer
Drum boogie, drum boogie
The drum boogie-woogie