Battlestar Galactica - The Electric Moog Orchestra

Battlestar Galactica

Battlestar Galactica
The Electric Moog Orchestra
Springboard SPB-4112
1978

Main Title Theme From Battlestar Galactica
The Cylon Trap
The Casino On Carillon "It's Love, Love, Love"
The Red Nova
Exploration
Destruction Of Peace
Fighter Launch
Adama's Theme
Let's Go Home-End Title

Percussion Italiano Starring Charles Magnante

Just Say I Love Her

Percussion Italiano
Starring Charles Magnante
Originated and Produced by Enoch Light
Grand Award Records
GA 33 - 426
1961

Personnel: 

Charles Magnante - Accordion

Bob Haggart - Bass

Dominic Maffei - Mandolin

Artie Marotti - Percussion

Moe Wechsler - Piano

Percussion, Bob Rosengarden, Don Lamond & Willie Rodriguez

Al Casamenti - Guitar

Leonid Bolotine - Mandolin

Dick Dia - Mandolin

Tony Mottola - Guitar

Arrivederci, Roma
Ciao, Ciao, Bambina
Ti-Pi-Tin
Mamma
Serenade In The Night
Sicilian Tarantella
Domani
Marina
Come Prima
Speranze Perdute (Lost Hopes)
Legend Of Lovers
Just Say I Love Her

Electronomusic 9 Images - John Pfeiffer

Electronomusic

Electronomusic
9 Images
Composition and Instrumentation by John Pfeiffer

Cover Art: Photo Composition by Dave Hecht of Mr. Pfeiffer and a painting by Thom Neville
Victrola VICS-1371
1968

Cover text: "Electronomusic" – a new but obvious name for musically organized sound built from electronic technology. The label implies sonic results which differ markedly from "electronic music." They do. But other differences apply even more to the aesthetics of sound formation from which the ultimate musical architecture is built. New devices, manipulations, methods of sound organization – the hardware of the system was conceived on a new musical aesthetic: one of which intends to bridge some previous musical experience with the new freedom of electronically oriented sounds. It may be as valid as any new musical philosophy. The validity lies in the listener – the seeker of meaningful aural sensation, musically communicative sound. 

Rather than bend this new aesthetic toward an abstraction, a safe obfuscation with a new language, this premiere collection attempts to conjure up images – mental and emotional pictures of events, scenes, moods. Its purpose: a kind of exploration of the aesthetic idea without stretching the musical credibility gap to the extreme. But an image is your interpretation – a collation of memory, fantasy, imagination – triggered into being by the force of some sensation. Sonic sensation is a powerful image stimulus, and a new art of sound can perhaps prod your psychological forces into creating in you new dimensions of musical experience.

About the Aesthetic

A satisfying musical experience is an acquired taste, bouncing among highly diverse levels of sophistication and exposure. Different cultures thrive on widely different musical vocabularies. Within our taste for musical events the parade of "In" styles gallops along at the pace of fads. But the weight of style moves in a paradoxically logical and orderly fashion, maintaining some shred of a past satisfaction while feeling in the dark. It keeps a toehold on orientation while probing for new islands of expression. The solid ground has most often been musical sound – customary musical instruments, generators of sounds which are immediately identifiable as musically stimulating. Electronically created or modified sound emerging from loud-speakers, possibly from storage or manipulation of the tape machine, can escape all the conventional stylistic limitations. It can, but should it? Taking a leaf from past exper- ience no. Perhaps the logical, transitional step into the fallaciously implied antiseptic world of electronic – music satisfaction is one which balances liberation with orientation-head-in-the-stars-feet-on-the-ground idea.

And in this age of radical avant-gardism, that's not a very popular idea. But as experimentalists, we can't all follow the popular routes. The concept of holding onto some familiar feature of musical orientation while exploring totally new ideas in other features is the basic aesthetic of "electronomusic."

About the Works

This aesthetic discipline is entertained in various ways during these nine studies. The three-part opener retains a similarity to the classic toccata, invention and prelude forms along with a sonic profile of the clavier family. But the diatonic scale is abandoned along with classically ordered overtones. Inharmonic Side-Band forms this sound structure, and the imagery of violence resolving to PEACE is emphasized by a quiet intrusion of the comforting scale that forms our musical security.

Musical sound owes its life to a string-starting with a vocal cord, moving through plucked, bowed and struck strings, supplemented along the way with air columns for variety. REFLECTION OF A STRING is an ode to this idea-reflecting on it, savoring it, sustaining it. To depart from our old, familiar scale or the identity of a famous string would violate the eulogy, but the Contraformer reflects sounds of strings, sustains, folds them repeatedly – peacefully respectful.

Drops drop, sounds sound – analogies in rhythm. Drops are forms in space. But a "drop" suggests motion; motion and sound are events in time. Can sounds then be DROPS in time? Perhaps.

Dimensions of time and space occupy our physical attention, our physical being. But our conceptual being can warp time and space limitlessly. Fantasy, imagination, emotion – the transformations of physical order – can interpret, clarify, contradict, affirm or deny, even create. It happens in moments. And musical events are moments strung together, time ordered, mood ordered. During those moments sound can order the sensory being to reform time, space and their occupants. While a second measures time, a moment measures experience. Parametric Blocks are stacked in sound to build these MOMENTS.

Flight always has a point of departure, an interface between the solid and the vaporous. To transcend that point of discontinuity the physical world forces a body to exert force, spend energy. And escape is the reward. TAKE OFF generates the metered, rhythmic steam in a familiar pattern, with Transperformer sounds straining to escape.

Forests confront us in many structures of experience. Unique in a sense of massive sameness punctuated with contrasting trivial or meaningful flashes, forests blend redundancy with novelty. In FORESTS an Alphormer structures a continuity of sound within the convention of the tempered scale while a "set" of sonic events flitters in and out of ambiguity.

A pavan is a pavane is a pavone – peacock, to us, but also the inspiration for a classic dance of stately, prideful proportions. This PAVONE is of classic form and tempo, and the Duotonic Transform imagines a dancing couple through two complex overtone structures. One above and one below the basic tones, these two rich formants move constantly- sometimes almost merging, producing a kind of intimate vibrato. Later they move apart so widely that the full auditory range is quietly engaged.

Repetition, symmetry, order – they exist in nature, art, music, fashion. . . . Perhaps they form the discipline of the world, perhaps only the routine, but maybe also the logic. For whatever purpose they were intended, they give us a sense of balance. ORDERS is a study in rhythm (the simplest repetition) in a series of sequential sound patterns – some in rigorous symmetry. Pattern repetition projects the architecture. The sonic material is the lowly sine wave, notoriously uninteresting in its virgin state.

And after following the lesson of an orderly world, tribute is paid to the sonic randomness of a segment of civilization – the modern business office. Simultaneous sounds of business machines normally encountered create a cacophony of disorder. But individually they represent percussion instruments of a mammoth orchestra. We imagine that they could dispose themselves in rigorous rhythm AFTER HOURS.

About the Sound

The names I have applied to the "instrumentation" of these works are shorthand descriptions of the technical methods of producing the various sounds. But they mean as little to the musical results as any instrumentation. Most of the devices and techniques are built around an idea of transformation – converting a known sound into a different but predictable one with controlled parameters. From this concept the sound is essentially "formed" rather than constructed. And the word "form" appears logically in most of the identifying names.

Added all together, this collection is an exercise in musical creativity and, hopefully, the means will be justified by the end. – JOHN PFEIFFER

Side one

Warm-up Canon and Peace
For Inhamonic Side-Band

Reflection of a String
For Contraformer

Drops
For Programmer and Sines

Moments
Events for Parametric Blocks

Side two

Forests
Modes for Alphormer and Set

Pavone
A Doutonic Transform

Orders
For Sequentail Sines

After Hours
For Ordered Simpliformer

Hollywoodwind Jazztet - Jerry Fieldling

Good-Bye

Hollywoodwind Jazzet
Jerry Fielding
Decca Records DL 8669
1958

From the back cover: The Hollywoodwind Jazztet, here presented for the first time on record, is strictly speaking a progressive jazz group. It is a calculated, conservative approach to the medium of jazz with the declared intention of opening up a new appreciation for this field in areas where it does not exist and, at the same time, it is felt that it will quite definitely soothe the ever-searching and adventurous souls of those already addicted to modern Jazz.

In my opinion, jazz is more and more becoming a throwback to the more legitimate forms, and in forming this group and writing for it, I have put much emphasis on this premise. The writing here is for the most part contrapuntal and the approach is quite academic. Though there may be a tendency to be somewhat frightened by the awesome sound of these terms the result is most restful and satisfying, as it has been for centuries with music embodying these elements. In this case however the harmonies are definitely modern, and the element of the rhythm (it swings) 'is so inherent there develops an additional feeling of subtle excitement based primarily on motion, and NOT on volume. One of the most noticeable modern jazz pre-requisites, namely no blend (which is both a blessing and a blight) is preserved here in justifiable moderation, due to the fact that the legitimate woodwind section is notorious for its lack of silk-smooth blend. More often than not the most average and untrained ear is definitely accustomed to this sound and the business of what some consider to be unlikely parts pro- truding to the point of confusion is tempered downward, mainly because there never arises the necessity of the reed to do battle with the brass. In this album the brass has gone out to pasture.

The group is composed of six woodwinds and three rhythm instruments. The wind players involved are among the best in Hollywood and are what we term free-lance musicians. They do not often get the opportunity to express themselves on the instruments featured here, but many of these names are of course quite familiar to Jazz fans everywhere. They are as follows:

Buddy Collette - Jazz alto, tenor, flute, clarinet, bass clarinet. He has been featured on every record ever made by my big band. He has several albums of his own and is the winner of countless awards.

Joe Camera - Oboe, tenor, clarinet bass clarinet, English horn; is very well known as a Jazz tenor-man, but in this album he emerges as a brilliant oboist. He carries off with great delight the feat of mixing the legitimate oboe sound with the modern phrasing required in this assignment.

Hymie Gunkler - Lead alto, clarinet, bass clarinet, flute. Mr. Gunkler is also a featured soloist with our big band and is a very sensitive musician. His sound is the counterpart of Mr. Collette's-big, full and healthy.

Dominic Fera - Legitimate clarinet, alto, bass clarinet, E flat clarinet. He is a graduate of the Curtis institute and the best clarinetist to come along in many years. He has a frighteningly facile technique which I have tried to use to the fullest advantage and has yet to be stopped by any passage, however difficult.

Howard Peter Terry - Bassoon, tenor, clarinet, bass clarinet. Mr. Terry is now enjoying one of those moments of fulfillment as a very busy utility- man in Hollywood, currently contracted to MGM studios. An excellent bassoonist, he has the advantage of much dance-band experience on the saxophone.

Martin J. Berman - Another of the loan outs from our big band, Mr. Berman is featured here on Baritone and bass saxophone, tenor, bassoon, bass clarinet and clarinet. He plays the heavy instruments with the delicacy of a cello.

Red Callender - Bass, his name as featured string-bass player tells its own story.

John Williams, Jr. - Piano. This young man is fast becoming one of the most sought after men in town. He is a brilliant jazz-AND concert-pianist and also has several albums of his own.

Max Albright - A rare swinging drummer who succumbed to the pressure of the outside world and makes his fortune quietly as a utility- all-around drummer. He is one of the country's outstanding mallet men and we feel it here to be quite apparent that, as a modern jazz player, he can match claws with anyone in the business.

I do the arrangements and conduct.

Our guest soloist Mr. Edgar Lustgarten and his presence on this album, which I consider to be a MOST fortunate occurrence, are more fully covered below. We have selected songs for this group, originals, standards and some satirical pieces, which lend themselves to the kind of treatment we hope to portray. They are as follows:-

1) HOORAY FOR LOVE-In this arrangement the flowing of all parts seems to never cease. I have taken some liberties with the harmonies here but in generality is a swinging exposition of this fine old Harold Arlen tune, with some pleasing jazz by Buddy Collette on Alto.

2) SKYLARK-This side is definitely in the category of an experiment that happened to work very well. In trying to find a way to do some ballads that would encompass a sound as different as the rest of the songs, I in- vited Edgar Lustgarten to join us and test the cello as an instrument for capturing the sensuousness of a couple of very warm Hoagy Carmichael songs. Mr. Lustgarten is beyond question one of the finest solo cellists in the world, and adds to his list of impressive credits solo stints in his own field (legitimate music) with the NBC symphony, (under Toscannini) the St. Louis Symphony, and the Chicago Symphony. He was for many years solo-cellist at MGM studios and at present he does just about every record-date where the instrument is used on the West Coast. What we do here has not been tried before, for we use the cello in the same manner as various wind-instruments have been used from the standpoint of phrasing, coupled with certain techniques of the voice which have become accepted as more or less standard in presenting popular songs. The deep, throaty, magnificent tone which Mr. Lustgarten develops on the cello is one of the most virile sounds imaginable, and he plays this lovely song with much sensitivity and shows obvious mastery of the technique of the instrument in any and all registers. As a result of the success of his efforts on these sides he is preparing an album of his own, and I hope we have here opened up, for good and all, a new avenue for the use of the cello in modern music. 

3) NEW ORLEANS POST PARADE-This is a dixieland satire. It is a funny piece, or at least it is intended to be. The song was written some time ago by Sid Robin, and it is a 'woodwindy' impression of all the Dixieland cliches ever invented. All the parts go all different ways and even though it walks right along, it develops into the semi-disorganized, traditional hodge-podge.

4) GOOD-BYE-This one will be remembered as the closing-theme song so closely identified with Benny Goodman. It was written by Gordon Jenkins and is a truly beautiful ballad. Dominic Fera is featured here on soprano saxophone, and Joe Camera does the Tenor solo.

5) A FINE ROMANCE-From the players point of view, this arrangement was far and away the most difficult to play. It features mostly all the saxo- phones, and has much built-in humor in the form of grotesque phrases and tempo variations.

6) ROMANCE-Walter Donaldson wrote this as a waltz, but here it comes off as a swinger with much complex motion. In the middle portion the players gravitate towards their saxophones and suddenly emerge in a burst of new color, from which they soon recover and proceed on out.

7) SWEET PETER-A light song from the repertoire of Rogers and Hart, this is a further example of the ceaseless kind of motion that develops in a grouping such as this. Joe Camera comes off to great advantage on lead oboe, and Buddy Collette on more jazz alto. There is a faint suggestion that the song is about a man with a wooden leg, Peter Stuyvesant, but I leave it to you to find that out for yourselves.

8) MEMPHIS IN JUNE-Here we feature Mr. Lustgarten's cello again. On this side he goes farther afield into the outer reaches of his range but man- ages to capture all the warmth and flexibility of this sort-of-southern blues by Hoagy Carmichael and Paul Frances Webster.

9) THE POINT IN QUESTION-This is a little original of mine. It is a tra- ditional two-part invention which takes a surprising turn, lingers awhile, and proceeds to finish as it began.

10) I WAS THERE WHEN THE SPIRIT CAME-We have here a brief picture. of a sermon. It is a Gospel song by Doris Akers, and the stand-out per- formances are by Hymie Gunkler, on alto, (as the preacher) and Dom Fera, on E Flat clarinet, (as the fervent worshipper).

11) ESSENCE OF CALCULATED CALM-This is another original of mine and it is difficult to put into words exactly what I had in mind when I wrote it. About the only suggestion I can give is to mull over the title, listen to it yourself, and gather from it what you will. To me it seems to be a picture of the studied indifference I have seen on the faces of middle-aged ballroom dancers in certain places on certain occasions.

12) PARIS IN THE SPRING-To complete the album we do here a mild con- trapuntal version of this old descriptive piece. Towards the end it stops leaping and gets very pretty, and for some unexplainable reason I was not able to do anything but stay in that mood 'til the end, it just seemed to want to stay there.

I trust you will find some novelty and excitement and a smattering of humor in these sides. Much credit is due to Bud Dant for his supervision, and to Sonny Burke for discovering this group. I hope it will help usher-in a period of new respect for the odd instruments involved and add new friends for the field of instrumental music on record. 

From March 24, 1958 Billboard: Interesting jazz sound makes use of several instruments seldom heard on jazz combos – (bassons, bass clarinet) in addition to alto sax, clarinet, flute and tenor sax. Fielding's orchestrations manage a fluid sound on several styles, Dixie, modern and mainstream. Those who go for interesting new sounds should find this to their liking.

Hooray For Love
Skylark
New Orleans Post Parade
Good-Bye
A Fine Romance
Romance
Sweet Peter
Memphis In June
The Point In Question
I Was There When The Spirit Came
Essence Of Calculated Calm
Paris In The Spring

The Dazzling Sound - Keith Williams

Wiki Wiki (Russ Garcia)

Solo (Bob Russell)

The Dazzling Sound
The Exciting Big Band Of Keith Williams

Producer: Russell Keith

Cover Art: Alex de Paolo

Engineers: Ted Keep, John Kraus, Val Valentin

Recorded in Hollywood during the fall of 1956

Liberty Records LRP 3040
1957

From the back cover: Sometimes, with some people, long exchanges of ideas and principles are unnecessary, for rapport. An occasional sentence, an unusual reference, a book – and you touch a well-spring; you strike a lode stone, and you know similar excursions have been undertaken. Here is a kinsman, and you acknowledge the discovery with a quiet respect and a patience the permits each encounter to build to a firm relationship.

I met Keith Williams while he was shuttling between "Limelight" (where he was musical director and conductor for Charles Chaplin), and "Range Rider" – a Gene Autry television series for which he was a staff composer and orchestrator. As a study in contrasts I doubt if any curriculum could have selected two more diverse instructors that Chaplin and Autry. Such courses can produce exceptional men of wide ability. Should the men be observant and flexible they grow and their horizons expand. I met Keith Williams at such a time.

An artist is a restless man – a kinetic force – and periodically as he grows, always trying to attain some impossible goal he sets for himself, he breaks out of his current confines into a new stage; a new development and there is no going back... only more quantitative changes to the next creative explosion.

I wasn't an observer to the evolution the led through interrupted college in September, 1942 to October, 1945, during which time Keith served as an USAAF pilot flying single engine fighter planes. I don't know what musical thought synchronized with the whirr of the propeller or the drone of the airplane engine. Nor am I the chronicler of the days of his return to Occidental College for his degree in music which he obtained in 1948. In the development of a talent one must also report the two and a half years employed as an orchestrator at Walter Lantz Cartoons and the subsequent arranging and orchestrating of twenty-eight full length motion pictures. 

I don't know which f the many paths is the road to achievement; which of the many test tubes the catalyst. I only know that one afternoon out of the clear blue Keith honored me with a phone call asking me if I would like to hear some audition records of a big jazz band. I said, "Whose?" He said his. I said, "Whose arrangement?" He said his. I said, "Who picked up the tab?" He said he had. I was impressed. A man has to believe in himself even if it requires pawning the family pawn shop. I said, "Come on over." And in blew one of the freshest breezes in the way of a band sound I had heard.

That a man has something to say or offer doesn't necessarily make him a town-crier. This role is reserved for other men who have the ability to recognize talent and the knowledge to showcase it. I took the audition tapes to Liberty Records who took them – tab and all – and took Keith to the nearest recording studios to complete the album.

Usually, at this point one is introduced to the compositions and acquitted with the instrumentation and the characteristics of each arrangement. I won and listen to many albums and have read many album notes. When I am told that a lazy, relaxed guitar solo leads me into the exotic "Toscana," or that a brass section in full swing over sparkling rhythm undertakes an all-out rendition of the fine standard "I Remember You," I am not impressed.

To me music is an experience – an adventure and I don't wish to be led by the hand to the next chapter or to have signposts to my next thrill. I want to find out for myself "who's doing what and to whom"... meaning me. After all, I did pay for this right by buying the particular album. I suspect that many people feel the same way.

With musicians of Keith's perspective, they view music as constantly unfolding horizons. Having attained the sound heard in this album a plateau has been reached. There is the hill beyond the hill beyond the hill. Don't expect the same sound, of shall I say the sameness of sound, in every subsequent album. Expect rather always a new experience in each new composition and each new album; an adventure in scope, depth and even texture of sound. That is music... at least to my ears.

Our horizons are limitless because our resources are boundless. Yours as well as Keith's – he's tune it on something. Listen...

– Bob Russell (Russell wrote the notes as well as "Solo", one of the featured songs on this album)

From Billboard - May 13, 1957: Liberty has captured a good "big band" sound on this disk. Hi-fi-wise it also rates a hearing. The program is nicely balanced between standards and original material and it could do will if pushed. "Wiki-Wiki" is a good bet for hi-fi demo with its emphasis on percussion and bass. Full-color cover will attract.

I Remember You
Carioca
Toscana
Winter Interlude
Easy To Love
Wiki Wiki
Bernie's Tone
Sleeping Princess
When Your Lover Has Gone
Caleta
Solo
Why Not?

Great Swinging Sounds - The Gramercy Six

Pyramid

Great Swinging Sounds
The Gramercy Six
Edison International SDP 502
1959

From the back cover: Al Hendrickson on guitar, Nick Fatool on drums and the bass of Jud DeNaut comprise the original (Artie) Shaw group. Add the tremendous talents of Ray Sherman on harpsichord, Shorty Sherock on trumpet and a gentleman of music you may not know yet, but one who'll be 'large' with you after this introduction – Eddie Rosa on clarinet – and the result is GREAT SWINGIN' SOUNDS!

What stood out to me on this album was the early use of the harpsichord to give the sound a light pop vibe. I have to wonder where the 60s "harpsichord trend" originated from?

Special Delivery Stomp
Cross Your Heart
Mullholland Drive
Keepin' Myself For You
Frensi
Steppin' Out
Summit Ridge Drive
My Blue Heaven
Pyramid
Board Meeting
Smoke Gets In Your Eyes
Launching Pad

Kasongo! - Modern Music Of The Belgian Congo

Tika Koseka (Rumba)

Maboka Marie (Rumba)

Kasongo!
Modern Music Of The Belgian Congo
Capitol T10005
1956

From the back cover: POPULAR MUSIC of the Belgian Congo no longer is restricted to the monotony of thumping conga drums. The contemporary trend is to more and more "civilized" instruments, including the string bass, guitars, the violin-and these recent innovations are now combined with ages- old, traditional and simple instruments such as the likembe to give the modern "sound" an odd combination of old and new.

From the Capital, Leopoldville, in the west, to the lively city of Kasongo to the east, the Belgian Congo is home for 13 million persons – and they all adore music. Even in the most remote rural areas the visitor finds phonographs; old hand-wound, non-electric models of French and British manufacture. The records they play are, obviously, 78 r.p.m. shellacs of various vintages dat- ing back to early Cab Calloway, Maurice Chevalier and – go see for yourself – Guy and Carmen Lombardo. There are, most certainly, more recent discings to be found in the natives" collections. One of the most popular entries of the 1950-56 period was the Italian-made "Anna,' a brisk baion which the Kasongoans called "Number Three" when ordering it in Lingala, their native tongue.

The big holidays in the Congo are the King's birthday, the annual July 1 fete commemorating the declaration of the Congo as a colony of Belgium (and governed by a Governor General who reports directly to the King); June 21, Belgium's Independence Day, and all Catholic holidays. On festive occasions like these an artist like Boniface Koufoudila is top man on the pole. As one of the Belgian Congo's most famed musicians and bandleaders, he is in great demand. His talents are heard, along with other favorites of the broad Kasongo to Leopoldville area, in this collection of contemporary representative popular music of the Congo.

Easily discernible in this album is the likembe, a truly native instrument found only in Africa, and made of a flat wooden sound-box on which are attached thin bamboo or metal keys. The player holds the instrument in both hands, palming the keys with his thumbs. Among the Bantu tribes the likembe is referred to as a mbira or kalimba. In French it is known as a sansa. It is made in various sizes, and with as few as eight keys to as many as 36. It is difficult to play "in tune""

The native language, Lingala, is the principal tongue of the Central River Congo and is common along the Belgian and French banks of the river for several hun- dred miles into the interior. The vocal "style" heard on most of the album selections here, in Lingala-ese, is in parallel thirds and is, the experts say, also found commonly in French Guinea and the northern part of Madagascar. The singing gourd heard here is not unlike the kazoo – or a comb wrapped in tissue paper-except that it is made in various parts of Africa with a small hole cut in the end. The larger the gourd, the deeper the tone.

The embonga and the sebene are rhythm patterns, extremely popular in this twentieth century with the dance- loving natives in and near Kasongo. But similarly popular are the biguine (beguine) and the rumba. The waltz, however, apparently is yet to find favor.

So much for the music... The listener will learn to discover new sounds with every playing, new and fresh rhythm patterns, charming and subtle vocal nuances never discernible in European and North American music of the hour. One may also envision the gigantic Watusi tribal members of the Congo, or lovely Lake Kivu, or the Ruwenzori mountains, or the pygmies of the Ituri Forest or – and this is reaching – the mighty, hidden forces deep inside still – active Nyamalagira Volcano. For these are the places, people, and the music which may make the Belgian Congo of the 1950s one of the world's great tourist attractions of the 1980s. Kasongo! 

Ntango N'Akomi Likolo (Embonga)
Bino Botuna Bosele (Sebene)
Marie (Biguine)
Tika Koseka (Rumba)
Keba Mama, Keba! (Enbonga)
Eyebo (Rumba)
Etoiles Des Neiges (Rumba)
Helene (Rhumba)
Kobota Malamu (Rumba)
Tembele Tembele (Sebene)
Maboka Marie (Rumba)
Moni Moni Non Dey (Sebene)

Escaped In Sound - Al Nevins

Escapade In Sound

Escaped In Sound
Al Nevins And His Orchestra

Photo: Mitchell Bliss
RCA LPM 1166
1956

From the back cover: Maybe it takes a fancy cook and a prize-winning architect to concoct something as creative as this. Maybe that is the least likely combination that you would look for in a musician who is both imaginative and terrifically alive, but Al Nevins is that kind of a person. He has about him an irrepressible touch of Lewis Carroll, Peter Pan, Oscar of the Waldorf, and Frank Lloyd Wright. What is most important at this moment is that he has built an album of music that is colorful, spirited, delicious and unique.

The colorful versatility of Nevins' talent is reflected in his music, and it sounds fine. Once upon a time, to begin the story with a truly historic phrase, Nevins studied architecture. He did it so well that he won prizes. Today that reservoir of talent is expressed generally in interior decorating for his friends and what's more – when they ask him what to do about dressing up the living room, they are probably devouring a meal that he has cooked on his own stove in his own fabulous place in his own palatable way. The guy is a whiz with Lobster Bisque.

But more than that he is a whiz with music. These are no idle words tossed blithely to the four winds. They are backed by something as snow- capped as Mount Washington. That something is this album. Escapade in Sound is all that its name implies, and a great deal more too. It will tickle your tweeter and wow your woofer, for the fi is as hi as an elephant's eye (Oscar Hammerstein will just have to forgive me for that one). Here is sound in cascades, not sound in calisthenics or sound from the bottom and top of the leaning Tower of Pisa. But sound that is true and kaleidoscopic and wonderfully right. Nor is it sound for effect. This is sound with a preconceived continuity of purpose, sound with the deft, Hemingway touch of striking simplicity.

All too often an album is little more than a collection of songs, banded together with no rhyme or reason, and all seemingly pulled from the same ball of yarn. When Al Nevins-he started out in Washington in classical music and has hence learned to play every stringed instrument well put aside his guitar and his famous role as one of the original members of The Three Suns to turn producer and musical director for this stunning album, he thought immediately in terms of an over-all production. Escapade in Sound was to be no rambling trip down the cobblestones of Tin Pan Alley. This initial big enterprise was to have a theme – it was to tell a story in music. So it does. Here is a night of romance and high adventure. Here the fellow dudes up in top hat, white tie and tails, and she in a gorgeous gown of icy blue, to sip cocktails for two in the moonlight; to watch and wonder as that old devil moon plays its incomparable tricks; to be mad about the boy and to admit that she's driving him crazy; to get away from it all and rub elbows with the low-brows of the evening who cry "love for sale"; to wander into that certain chillness, stillness of the dawn's early light where anything goes; and finally, home and tired, to find two dreamy people turning out the lights to go to sleep.

These superb songs, composed by such distinguished gentlemen as Irving Berlin, Cole Porter and Noel Coward, somehow blend together into a marvelous whole, and to each listener it will tell the same story in a different, exciting way. That is something upon which Al Nevins holds no patent, but you must agree that he has a remarkable affinity for music- making with taste and discretion. The tonal effects are those of a true artist and it is Al Nevins who is the painter, for this masterpiece is entirely his creation: it is his idea, his continuity, his music, and it is yours to enjoy over and over again. – FRED REYNOLDS Music Editor, Hi-Fi Music at Home Magazine

Top Hat, White Tie And Tails
Moonlight Cocktail
Cocktails From Two
Old Devil Moon
Mad About The Boy
Let's Get Away From It All
Love For Sale
Escapade
You're Driving Me Crazy
In The Still Of The Night
Anything Goes
Let's Put On The Lights

West Meets East - Dig? - The Seven Players

The Mirage

West Meets East - Dig?
The Seven Players
Arranged and Conducted by Irv Spice

Executive Producer: Herman D. Gimbel
Produced by Eddie Newmark

Engineering: William Hamilton

Art Director: Charles Blodgett

Cover Photo: Gai Terrell
Audio Fidelity AFLP 2166
1966

From the back cover: I interviewed my son about how he came to write the instrumentals for this album, "West Digs East -Dig?"... with the help of Irv Spice, the well known arranger and conductor.

It wasn't very hard to interview my son. He was home on a furlough from basic training at Fort Dix and I only had to step from my office into the living room where he was at the piano.

Actually, I could remember the beginning. . . .

He and Nai Bonet, the beautiful little Oriental dancer, had been collaborating on creating a new dance and a song that went with it, "Jelly Belly" which was sort of a Belly Rock.

During this collaboration, my son became tre- mendously impressed with the Eastern music which he'd never before given much ear to.

Suddenly he saw the possibilities, and he went to work quite furiously.

But let him tell it...

"This music is an attempt to join together two distinctively different styles. . . the subtle, melodious qualities of the East and the strong, rock rhythms of the West. The result is, hopefully, a new and excit- ing sound. "THE CAREFREE CAMEL" and "SPHINXETTE" explore the possibilities of a light hearted approach to the task, while "MIRAGE", "NOMAD", "ASIA MINOR", "BAZAAR", and "SHISHKABOB" represent a more serious approach.

The idea for this album was originally suggested by Eddie Newmark, A&R man for Audio Fidelity, when he and I were working on Jelly Belly. Jelly Belly was a dance with lyrics explaining how to do the dance. It seemed that an album of instrumental music in the same vein might be a successful under- taking. So... I wrote seven tunes, Eddie called in Irv Spice to do the arrangements, and got a group of instrumentalists together, "The Seven Players", and we cut the album. The album includes two beautiful pieces by Irv Spice, "THE SULTAN'S DREAM", and "SAHARA SUNRISE". Also on the album is "ZORBA THE GREEK"."

"So," he says, "I wrote seven tunes."

What he doesn't say is that he wrote the seven tunes in a week.

Well, I love this album, my Beautiful Wife adores it, and my Gorgeous Mother-in-Law, my son's grand- mother, is absolutely nuts about it. – Earl Wilson

The Carefree Camel
Sphinxette
Zobra The Greek
The Mirage
The Nomad
Asia Minor
The Bazaar
The Sultan's Dream
Sahara Sunrise
Shishkabob

Love Country - Hypnotic Harps

Hey Jude

Love Country
Hypnotic Harps
Soloist - Gayle Levant

Produced by Allan Capps & Martin Cooper
GRT Records GRT-10001

One treat in life for me is to find light pop albums that feature covers of popular artists released in the 60s or 70s. You never know to what lengths the label will go to produce their knock-off "hits of the day".

The last idea on the idea pile must have been to cover songs arranged for the harp. OK... the last idea may have been to use a kazoo.

The harpist struggles with some of the arrangements because... well... she is playing the harp.

Time For Us
Hey Jude
Little Green Apples
Will You Be Staying After Sunday
Cycles
Love Country
Windmills Of Your Mind
By The Time I Get To Phoenix
Born To Be With You
Wichita Lineman
More Today Than Yesterday
Love Country Reprise