EARLY MUSIC INFLUENCES
As soon as I was old enough to play music for myself on the old family Zenith console,
I had the choice of these records:
I had the choice of these records:
45 RPM SINGLES
It Makes No Difference Now / Molly Darling (Eddy Arnold)
Don’t Blame It On Me / Bo Weevil (Fats Domino)
Cool Water/ Tumbling Tumbleweeds (Sons Of The Pioneers)
78 RPM RECORDS (singles)
Buttons and Bows / Daddy-O (Dinah Shore)
There’s A Big Rock In The Road / I’m Gonna Be Boss From Now On (Bob Wills & Texas Playboys)
The Happy Wanderer / From Your Lips (Frank Weir-saxophone)
Steel Guitar Rag / Panhandle Rag (Jerry Byrd)
78 RPM RECORDS (classical)
Haydn ‘Surprise’ Symphony #94
Haydn ‘Drum Roll’ Symphony #103
Master Of The Double Bass - Serge Koussevitzky
When the turntable died on the Zenith, I removed the tuner/amp from the cabinet and hooked it to a bare speaker. It looked like a collection of vacuum tubes, wires, and a transformer. I lost the knobs, but the bare pot shafts worked just fine. I placed the radio next to my bed and I was able to pick up distant stations at night with the help from a rigged antennae made of bare wire hooked to the window screen. I listened to popular radio from larger cities like Boston and Chicago, with jazz and classical sprinkled in from stations as far away as Canada.
Early on, I was entranced when late at night I heard JS Bach’s solo Cello Suite #1 played by Pierre Fournier. Many years later as an adult, I tracked down that very recording (now on CD). A few years later, I remember hearing Simon and Garfunkel’s ‘Sounds Of Silence’ on WBZ in Boston months before it was in rotation at my local stations. I was baffled when the the song sounded different than when I first heard it from Boston. I soon figured out that electric 12 string guitar, bass, and drums had been added by the time the song circulated as a hit.
It Makes No Difference Now / Molly Darling (Eddy Arnold)
Don’t Blame It On Me / Bo Weevil (Fats Domino)
Cool Water/ Tumbling Tumbleweeds (Sons Of The Pioneers)
78 RPM RECORDS (singles)
Buttons and Bows / Daddy-O (Dinah Shore)
There’s A Big Rock In The Road / I’m Gonna Be Boss From Now On (Bob Wills & Texas Playboys)
The Happy Wanderer / From Your Lips (Frank Weir-saxophone)
Steel Guitar Rag / Panhandle Rag (Jerry Byrd)
78 RPM RECORDS (classical)
Haydn ‘Surprise’ Symphony #94
Haydn ‘Drum Roll’ Symphony #103
Master Of The Double Bass - Serge Koussevitzky
When the turntable died on the Zenith, I removed the tuner/amp from the cabinet and hooked it to a bare speaker. It looked like a collection of vacuum tubes, wires, and a transformer. I lost the knobs, but the bare pot shafts worked just fine. I placed the radio next to my bed and I was able to pick up distant stations at night with the help from a rigged antennae made of bare wire hooked to the window screen. I listened to popular radio from larger cities like Boston and Chicago, with jazz and classical sprinkled in from stations as far away as Canada.
Early on, I was entranced when late at night I heard JS Bach’s solo Cello Suite #1 played by Pierre Fournier. Many years later as an adult, I tracked down that very recording (now on CD). A few years later, I remember hearing Simon and Garfunkel’s ‘Sounds Of Silence’ on WBZ in Boston months before it was in rotation at my local stations. I was baffled when the the song sounded different than when I first heard it from Boston. I soon figured out that electric 12 string guitar, bass, and drums had been added by the time the song circulated as a hit.
