Bing Crosby

            On Monday morning I posted a photo on my Boris Vian Facebook page but when I tried to post a link to my blog as I ‘ve done hundreds of times, Facebook blocked me and wanted me to confirm my identity. I spent the next hour and a half trying figure out how to do that. It either involved uploading a copy of my government issued identification or using a Google pin number. I tried to do that but that was a rabble hole as well. I gave up for today. 

            I weighed 89.3 kilos before breakfast, which is the heaviest I’ve been in the morning since last Monday. 

            I played my Martin acoustic for song practice and it went out of tune during every song. 

            I weighed 89.8 kilos before lunch. 

            In the afternoon I took a bike ride downtown and back. It was 21 degrees and I wore my long sleeved shirt unbuttoned on top of my tank top. But it was actually chilly riding north and so I buttoned my shirt. Heading east though I unbuttoned it again. 

            I weighed 89.45 kilos at 17:45. 

            I was caught up in my journal at 18:29. 

            I finished the digitization of the cassette tape I started working on yesterday of a rehearsal with Donna Bartkiw and another with Brian Haddon. I had to record with the microphone to the speaker for this tape but the sound comes out of different speakers for different sections. For the digitization of Donna’s song I needed to put the mic to the left speaker but the final conversation about meeting for the performance at The Riot Gallery came out of the right speaker. Anyway, that’s done. Next I’ll digitize the recording of my performance at Fat Albert’s accompanied by Brian Haddon on recorder back in 1996. 

            I had a small potato with gravy and my last three chicken drumsticks while watching season 5, episode 7 of The Carol Burnett Show. 

            During audience warmup someone asks Carol what she would want to reincarnate as. She says Raquel Welch. 

            The first skit is The Old Folks, Molly and Burt starring Carol and Harvey. They will be leaving soon for the Veterans Day parade. Burt is wearing his WWI uniform. They are sitting in their rockers and Burt is reminiscing about a girl he met in France. He starts singing “Mademoiselle from Armentières” perhaps written by Canadians Edward Rowland and Gitz Rice. Then he sings “Over There” by George M. Cohan, and Molly says “It’s over over here too”. Henry comes in his officer’s uniform and sits with them. He’ll be marching in the parade with Burt but he won’t let Burt forget he was his commanding officer. Henry laments that no one cares about WWI vets but Molly says they do and they begin singing “Before the Parade Passes By” by Jerry Herman from the 1964 musical Hello Dolly. 

            Bing Crosby sings “Put a Little Love in Your Heart” by Jackie de Shannon, Jimmy Holiday, and Randy Myers. He then sings “Love They Neighbour” by Mack Gordon and Harry revel from the 1934 film We’re Not Dressing starring Bing Crosby. 

            In As the Stomach Turns Marion is saying goodbye to her portrait painter. He says he’s never painted anyone in the nude before. He usually keeps his clothes on. 

            Mel Torment the town masochist comes to visit. He tricks her into slamming the door on his hand and then puts his hand in the way as she pours him hot coffee. He begs her to beat him. he says he hates his wife because she’s an angel. Father Sarge the policeman who became a priest comes by to give Marian a ticket for double parking. He says last week he raided his own bingo game. Harvey arrives in drag as a Jewish mother named Marcus and Carol has to turn her head away from the camera to hide her laughing. Marcus tells Mel he knows nothing about suffering since he doesn’t have children. She offers him chicken soup for his problem. He refuses to have any and so she spanks him with a frying pan and he begs for more. 

            Carol approaches Bing and he starts singing a poem the source of which I can’t find: “Pause time in they flight / a vision of such loveliness appears within my sight / Such diffident humility is quite a rare delight”. They perform the song “Sing”, which was written by Joe Raposo for Sesame Street in 1971 and was a hit for the Carpenters. Then they sing “Get Happy” by Harold Arlen and Ted Koehler from the 1930 musical The Nine-Fifteen Revue. 

            Carol introduces the Ernie Flatt Dancers one by one: Carl Jablonski, Don Crichton, Stan Mazin, Ed Kerrigan, Eddie Heim, Roy Smith, Bobbie Bates, Patti Tribble, Shirley Kirkes, Kathie King, Gerri Reddick, and Bonnie Evans. They do an energetic dance to a funky instrumental with the only lyric “Feelin so good”. 

            The rest of the show is the story The Drunkard’s Daughter. Carol plays the daughter and Bing plays the drunkard. She believes he’s given up demon rum but he’s sneaky. She is playing piano and it sounds wrong. She finds a hidden bottle inside. She reminds him that he promised her late mother that he would give it up. He says he’ll take this instrument of the devil and throw it into the flame. He tosses his late wife’s portrait into the fireplace. Meany and Moe the villainous bankers come to foreclose on the house. They are played by Harvey Korman and Paul Lynde, and Harvey again imitates Lynde’s distinctive voice. The audience boos. The bankers say “Boos don’t bother us”. The drunkard says, “Booze don’t bother me either”. They offer to save the home if they can both marry the daughter. They try to take her by force but then Sergeant Jack Strongheart of the Mounties arrives played by Lyle. Meanie and Moe take the drunkard to the tavern to get him drunk so he will sign over the house and his daughter. At the tavern Vicki plays a French showgirl called The Painted Lady. The daughter tries to stop the bankers with the help of Strongheart. The bankers get the Painted Lady to tempt the Mountie. He asks the audience how he should choose between an hour of passion and a life of happiness and they cheer for the daughter. Strongheart tells the daughter, “I’ll see you in an hour”. She tells the bankers she’ll marry both of them and seals the deal with a drink and gets them drunk. A bunch of anti-booze women come in and smash up the place. Everybody repents including the Painted Lady. Bing Crosby played drums for a high school dance band called the Musicaladers for two years until 1925. In 1925 he played with The Clemmer Trio providing musical soundtracks for silent films in movie theatres. He started studying law but was more interested in playing drums for a jazz band. He moved to LA with Al Rinker and their syncopated music was very popular with college students. From 1929 to 1930 he was with the Rhythm Boys in New York. He became a lead singer for several popular big bands like Bix Beiderbeck, Tommy Dorsey, and Hoagy Carmichael. In 1928 he had his first #1 hit with “Ol’ Man River”. The Rhythm Boys appeared in the film King of Jazz. The president of CBS heard a record of Bing singing “I Surrender Dear” and he put him on the radio. In 1931 the radio show “Fifteen Minutes with Bing Crosby” became a hit. “Out of Nowhere”, “At Your Command” and “I Found a Million Dollar Baby in a Five and Ten Cent Store” were among the biggest hits of the year. He became a radio star which led to his appearance in the film The Big Broadcast in 1932 featuring radio stars. He became a movie star. He made money during the Depression while other stars floundered. He helped to save the phonograph record business from collapsing. He hosted Kraft Music Hall from 1936 to 1946 and his popular theme song “Where the Blue of the night Meets the Gold of the Day” featured his trademark whistling. Whereas before, singers had to belt out songs without microphones in theatres, Crosby popularized crooning and phrasing (giving equal emphasis to the words and music). He wrote or co-wrote the lyrics for 22 songs. The biggest hit among those was “I Don’t Stand a Ghost of a Chance With You”. He had 41 #1 hits. He did a series of Road comedies with Bob Hope. He was the most popular performer for troops fighting in WWII. The day after he introduced a song on the radio at least 50,000 copies were sold. He won an Academy Award for his performance in Going My Way in 1944. He starred in The Country Girl, She Loves Me Not, The Bells of St Mary’s (for which he was nominated for an Oscar), Blue Skies, Road to Utopia, Pennies from Heaven, Holiday Inn, The Road to Hong Kong, Road to Singapore, Road to Zanzibar, Road to Morocco, Road to Rio, Road to Bali, The Adventures of Ichabod and Mister Toad, High Time, Now You Has Jazz, Little Boy Lost, Man On Fire, Rhythm on the River, He co-starred in Going Hollywood. At the turn of the century he was the third most popular movie actor in history. He introduced the songs White Christmas (the biggest selling song of all time), Swinging on a Star, and In the Cool Cool Cool of the Evening. He was the first performer to pre-tape his radio shows and to copy his studio recordings onto magnetic tape. With taping he elevated the art of radio production. He invested in the Ampex tape recorder company and gave one to Les Paul with which Paul invented multitrack recording. He also helped to advance the development of videotape. He owned several TV stations. He spent two months in jail for drunk driving around 1930. . He advocated decriminalization of cannabis. In 1948 he was considered the most admired man alive. Bing Crosby Productions produced Ben Casey and Hogan’s Heroes. He owned a lot of stock in Minute Maid and did commercials for the product. He always wore a hat because he was bald by his early thirties. He was notorious for his bad taste in casual clothing. He had 23 gold records and two platinum: White Christmas and Silent Night. He was a big admirer of Louis Armstrong’s voice and Al Jolson’s performing. He helped to expose Armstrong to film audiences. The creators of Columbo wanted Bing to play the detective. He turned it down because he thought it would interfere with his golfing. In his last TV appearance he sang a duet with David Bowie. He died in 1977 while playing golf in Spain after a sold out performance at the London Palladium. He won the match and said “Let’s go get a Coke” before his heart attack. At that time he was the biggest selling recording artist in history. He owned 15% of the Pittsburgh Pirates. His son Gary wrote Going My Own Way, which depicted his father as cruel, cold, and abusive. Two of his sons died by suicide. He said there wasn’t a thing Judy Garland couldn’t do except look after herself.