Sound Beat

You’re listening to “The Airplane” from an RCA Victor Youth Series 78 entitled “LET’S PLAY”. It was produced by Helen Myers in 1946.

The year before that, New York mayor Fiorello Laguardia left offic…

On today’s episode we’re talking electronic music…and the importance of a thorough resume.

You’re on the Sound Beat.

Miklos Rosza had long considered using electronic music in a film. He got his cha…

Why did Governor Dewitt Clinton build a giant ditch across New York state? To get to the other side.

From the time the first shovel went into the ground in 1817, critics blasted the Erie Canal projec…

The American B-24 Bomber Lady Be Good departed a Libyan Air Base on a bombing raid in April 1943.  She did so into a sandstorm, and disappeared for 15 years.

World War II raged, and then ended. Still…

You’re listening to the Carter Family’s rendition of “Honey in the Rock”, a Coral Record from 1949, and you’re on the Sound Beat.

Frederick A. Graves originally wrote the song in 1895, but his versio…

You’re listening to one of the most distinctive signature sounds in all of recorded music, and…

You’re on the Sound Beat.

That telltale whoop belongs to Sonny Terry, one of the most influential harmo…

Holiday was born Eleanora Fagan, and nicknamed Lady Day. This 1946 recording of “Big Stuff” represents something of an anomaly in her career. It emerged only multiple, vigorous recording sessions. He…

For those who celebrate it, the big day is here. Many parents are bleary-eyed and sipping coffee while the kids riot in merry madness. But short as it was, your night was probably more restful than o…

The story goes like this: Fats Waller, the great stride pianist, is playing in a club when he spots Art Tatum walk through the door. Waller stops, turns to the audience and announces: “I just play th…

Niccolo Paganini was the Jim Morrison of his day. He partied, drove the ladies wild, and was even rumored to have dabbled in the occult.

Paganini was a violin virtuoso. He could play three octaves ac…

It’s that age old tale of love and marriage…and money.
You’re listening to the Opening Overture of Franz Lehar’s 1910 operetta Der Graf von Luxemburg. We are often our own harshest critics; before it…

Considered one of the most influential saxophonists in history, Lester “Prez” Young succeeded Coleman Hawkins at the height of the swing era.

You’re on the Sound Beat

He’s backed by his quintet on th…

Waltzing Matilda is one of Oz’s best loved songs and a common refrain at national sporting events. Peter Dawson is another Aussie favorite; the bass-baritone’s recording career spanned half a century…

In the 1920s and 30s, boxing was one of the most popular sports in the country.  It and other forms of entertainment provided cheerful moments of respite from the gloom the Depression cast over the n…

You’re listening to “the Cajun national anthem”, sung and…fiddled…by Harry Choates on a Modern Music 78, and…

You’re on the Sound Beat.

Choates initially recorded “Jole Blon” (translated as “pretty b…

You’re listening to Edward M. Favor who recorded Mary and the Lamb to cylinder in 1892. But…it wasn’t the first recording of the poem…as a matter of fact, Edison himself used the first couplet as the…

Ledbetter, better known as Leadbelly, was twice convicted: once for trying to kill a man, and once for following through with it.  After the first, he wrote a song of appeal to the governor of Texas,…

You’re listening to Big Maceo, a pioneer of Chicago Blues, and you’re on the Sound Beat.

Big Maceo, also known as Maceo Merriweather, recorded Worried Life Blues in 1941. It was released by Bluebird …

Two strums…two strums were all it took to make music history.

An electric pulse hits the listeners’ ears twice. Let’s hear it again:  Few people at the time had heard the sound recorded. The year was…

Most Atomic-era records seem to achieve, or at least attempt, a bit of humanistic fraternity…a “we’re all in this together” sort-of-vibe. Not so with this decidedly un-P.C. tune. It recounts the atta…