10-28a: The Baby Huey Story 1971 - Stefano Landi : Homo fugit velut umbra / Pluhar 2004 - Dance to the Best of Earl Bostic 1956

1639 – Stefano Landi (Italian composer & teacher, member of Papal chapel)
1755 – Joseph Bodin de Boismortier (French composer)
1768 – Michel Blavet (French flutist & composer)
1779 – Raphael Weiss (German priest, organist & composer)
1854 – James P. Carrell (American minister, singing teacher, composer & shape-note tunebook compiler, The Virginia Harmony)
1875 – William Howard Glover (English composer, violinist & writer on music)
1877 – Johann Herbeck (Austrian conductor & composer, premiered Schubert's Unfinished Symphony)
1912 – Edgar Tinel (Belgian composer)
1914 – Richard Heuberger (Austrian composer, music critic & teacher)
1927 – Eaton Faning (English composer & teacher)
1940 – Andrea d' Angeli (Italian composer, musicologist & teacher)
1959 – Egon Kornauth (Austrian composer & pianist)
1962 – Pierre Froidebise (Belgian organist, composer & music editor)
1963 – Mart Saar (Estonian composer, organist & folksong collector)
1965 – Earl Bostic (American jazz & R&B alto saxophonist)
1970 – Baby Huey (American soul singer)

Another two-parter... check out the shape-note stuff, as well as Earl Bostic & Baby Huey...

10-27b: Tyrannosaurus Rex : Unicorn 1969 - Billie Holiday Lady In Satin 1958 - Max Roach Drums Unlimited 1966 - Xavier Cugat Cugi's Cocktails 1963

1953 – Eduard Künneke (German composer)
1953 – Zdzisław Jachimecki (Polish composer)
1954 – Franco Alfano (Italian composer, completed Puccini's final opera Turandot)
1955 – Vladimir Mikhaylovich Deshevov [Владимир Михайлович Дешевов] (Russian composer)
1969 – Jaime Pahissa (Spanish composer & musicologist, active in Argentina)
1980 – Steve Peregrin Took (English singer, songwriter & percussionist, Tyrannosaurus Rex)
1990 – Xavier Cugat (Spanish-born American Latin dance musician, spent formative years in Cuba)
1991 – Andrzei Panufkin (Polish-born British conductor & composer)
1994 – Robert White (American R&B session guitarist, Motown Records)
2000 – Walter Berry (Austrian bass-baritone)
2002 – Tom Dowd (American recording engineer, Atlantic Records)
2003 – Stephanie Tyrell (American songwriter & record producer)
2004 – Zdenko Runjić (Croatian composer)
2004 – Lester Lanin (American bandleader)
2006 – Jozsef Gregor (Hungarian operatic bass)
2008 – Frank Nagai (Japanese popular singer)
2008 – Ray Ellis (American record producer, conductor & arranger)

With this post, Yesterday in Dead Musicians achieves TWO significant landmarks in its history. And what a glorious history it is, one that stretches all the way back to the second week in August.

First of all, this is our ONE HUNDREDTH post. If you don't believe me, you can scroll down and look at the archive to see for yourself.

Second of all, with this post, YiDM reaches 3000 total page views. Now, I know what some of you, who see this post before most of the others, are going to say: "But it isn't at 3000 yet!" And you would be correct. Can't argue with you there! And my answer to that is that it will be, shortly, once our subscribers and followers see what a great post this is. Trust me on this one. Have I ever let you down before? Don't answer that!

So, it's an emotional moment for me. If you'll excuse me... I'm sorry... just getting a big choked up... and I'd like to give special thanks to that without which we could never have achieved these goals.

Yes, I'm talking to YOU, base-10 counting system! Without you, the numbers 100 and 3000 would be arbitrary and ultimately meaningless. So, THANK YOU, for all the hard work you do, day in and day out, serving as the base by which most people in the world count in this day and age. And if you ask me, hexadecimal never had shit on you!

IVES THANKSGIVING SPECIAL: Symphony 2 / Bernstein 1958 - Thanksgiving & Forefathers' Day / Tilson Thomas 1986

Okay, so I'm a little late with this. However, you know very well that you'll be gnawing on that bird and all the trimmings not just for the remainder of this long weekend, but well into the foreseeable future.

10-27a: Ginette Neveu : Debussy, Ravel, Richard Strauss, Chausson, Suk et al 1938-1948 - Johann Gottlieb Graun Concertos / Haselböck 2005

1771 – Johann Gottlieb Graun (German composer & violinist)
1781 – Herman-François Delange (Belgian violinist & composer)
1796 – Anton Stamitz [Antonín Stamic] (German-Czech composer & violinist, brother of Carl [Karel])
1822 – Christian Frederich Gottlieb Schwencke (German composer, pianist, organist, music editor & church musician)
1833 – Ferdinand Fränzl (German violinist, composer, conductor & opera director)
1848 – Alexander Egorovich Varlamov [Александр Егорович Варламов] (Russian composer)
1864 – Andreas Randel (Swedish composer & violinist)
1925 – Wilhelm Gericke (Austrian conductor & composer, active in Vienna & Boston, Mass.)
1933 – Julius Klengel (German cellist & composer)
1940 – Fini Valdemar Henriques (Danish composer & violinist)
1943 – Béla Reinitz (Hungarian composer & music critic)
1949 – Ginette Neveu (French violinist)
1949 – Jean-Paul Neveu (French pianist)

Well, it looks like it's Le Jour du Violon here at Yestermonth. I can't recall having seen so many prominent fiddlers on the list (this is only half of it, of course - yes, it's another two-fer today), and there's a cellist to boot. And so that violinist we think of the most on October 27th–28th is in very good company, if that expression can be used for something as heartbreaking as the loss of a great and promising young artist.

Ginette Neveu might well be remembered as one of the supreme players of the violin in the past century, had her life not been cut so cruelly short, at the age of 30, when her plane went down in the Azores in 1949, as she embarked on a tour of the Americas. And as if that were not terrible enough, the tragedy went double for the Neveu family, since Ginette's accompanist Jean-Paul, who was also her brother, was on board the aircraft as well.

And perhaps we can find some symbolic significance in the location of the air disaster, in that very part of the ocean where the legendary continent of Atlantis has traditionally been said to have lain (if one takes Plato's account of it literally). For with the stuff of legends, we naturally touch on questions of what was, and what might have been, and what still could be today, had so-and-so occurred or not occurred. A little food for thought, especially for any of you Americans out there who didn't get quite enough to eat during yesterday's Thanksgiving pig-out feast...

10-26: Mahler 10 Cooke version / Noseda 2008 - Hoyt Axton Joy to the World 1971 - Gieseking : Bach Inventions 1950 | Beethoven Piano Concerto 4 1939

1607 - Philipp Nicolai (German pastor, poet & composer)
26/10/1678 - John Jenkins (English composer, lutenist & lyra violist)
1706 - Andreas Werckmeister (German music theorist, organist & composer, early developer of well-tempered tuning)
1733 - Antonio Veracini (Italian composer & violinist, taught violin to his nephew Francesco Maria)
1749 - Louis-Nicolas Clérambault (French organist, harpsichordist & composer)
1756 - Johann Theodor Roemhildt [Römhild] (German composer)
1823 - Josef Preindl (Austrian organist & composer, pupil of Albrechtsberger)
1858 - Isaac Baker Woodbury (American composer & publisher of church music)
1867 - John Fawcett (English organist, choir director, composer & shoemaker)
1874 - Peter Cornelius (German composer, writer about music, poet & translator)
1903 - Sir Herbert Stanley Oakeley (English composer & organist, active in Scotland)
1903 - Victorin de Joncières [Félix-Ludger Rossignol] (French composer & music critic)
1952 – Hattie McDaniel (American singer & actress, Gone with the Wind)
1955 - Arne Eggen (Norwegian organist & composer)
1956 – Walter Gieseking (French-born German pianist & composer)
1966 – Alma Cogan (English popular singer)
1976 - Deryck Cooke (English composer, musicologist & broadcaster, prepared first complete performing edition of Mahler 10th Symphony)
1984 - John Woods Duke (American composer & pianist)
1994 – Wilbert Harrison (American R&B singer, pianist, guitarist & harmonica player)
1995 – Gorni Kramer (Italian jazz bandleader, songwriter & multi-instrumentalist)
1999 – Hoyt Axton, American actor and country music singer-songwriter (b. 1938)
2006 – Tillman Franks, American songwriter (b. 1920)
2009 – George Na'ope, American musician (b. 1928)

It is only with great effort that I post this, being presently in extreme discomfort after having just completed my celebration of the American holiday of Thanksgiving. Please pardon me if my explications are a bit more on the aphoristic side than usual. The presence of Deryck Cooke on our list allows Mahlerstodfest 2011 to continue, with Cooke's performing edition of Mahler's Tenth Symphony. And remember that a well-tempered tuning is not the same thing as an equal-tempered one. I don't know nothin' 'bout tunin' no Claviers, Miss Scarlet. That is all. Ugh. Where did I put that Alka Seltzer...

10-25b: John Peel / Bill Graham EXTRAVAGANZA!! Can | Codeine | Kinks | Mudhoney | Pond | Santana | Seaweed | Sly & Family Stone | Smiths | Tad | Tim Buckley | Velocity Girl

As promised, my friends, we have a few words from waex to introduce us to tonight's offerings, which feature musicians who did in-studio sessions for John Peel on his BBC 1 radio programme, as well as musicians who were associated with promoter and impresario Bill Graham and his legendary music venues, the Fillmore East in NYC, and the Fillmore West and  Winterland in San Francisco. So... take it away, waex...!

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It takes age to understand time. People of all ages plan what they are going to do, but to understand the modality of the calendar takes maturity. In 1990, you couldn’t hear Bad Brains by searching YouTube. You had to take a risk and - if you had a Camelot Music or Disc Jockey in you area, and if they had a decent hardcore selection - only when you shelled out 15 bucks for a CD could you hear them. If you had an independent store like Ear Xtacy or Great Escape (or in my case, Terrapin Station) in your area, you were lucky enough to have the resources to form an eclectic musical taste.

In 1990, MTV was useless in regards to discovering new music. They had ten cheese-metal videos from the likes of Winger and Warrant that were played in rotation. This would all change in late '91, but 1990 is modal in the sense that '91 knows '90, but '90 has no knowledge of '91. There's that linear time thing! But it could have lasted forever, for all we knew.

Thank god that it was cracking a little before then! In 1988, I had a breakthrough. I discovered college radio at “Beyond the Edge” on WKMS in western Kentucky. There I heard Bad Brains, Black Flag, NoMeansNO, and other then-correctly labeled “underground” bands that I could have never heard anywhere else. I say "correctly-labeled" because in those days, underground bands actually played from beneath the earth's surface. Little-known fact for you wet-behind-the-ears teenagers out there.

While John Peel has no relation to WKMS, I felt it fit to include that short biographical example to stress the fact that radio like the kind Peel did was a sacred thing. Peel was Keter; the crown of radio - that from which all other underground radio emanates. He had taste!

He was the first to play psychedelic and progressive rock, and was a star-maker and a star-lifter. Peel promoted bands in the genres of reggae, indie, alternative, punk, hardcore, breakcore, grindcore, death metal, and British hip-hop, to name just a few.

One could collect the numerous Peel Session CDs. It is perhaps impossible to collect them all: there are just too many. The Peel Sessions were short four-song prerecorded sets featuring a lot of the bands John promoted. And John was a hell of a writer, too. It is a fair comparison to link the modern day blog to the past radio Disc Jockeys. I’m not worthy!

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Oh, yes you are, waex. Just a few more electroshock treatments and your self esteem will be in much better condition...

10-25a: Gregory Isaacs Slum In Dub 1989 - Rockin' Rollin' Roger Miller - Franck Symphony in D minor / Désormière 1951 - Brahms Chorale Preludes / Virgil Fox 1953

1633 – Jean Titelouze (French composer, poet & organist, Rouen cathedral)
1878 – Ludwig Wilhelm Maurer (German composer, conductor & violinist)
1895 – Sir Charles Hallé (German-British pianist & conductor)
1904 – Teresa Milanollo (Italian violinist & composer)
1907 – Edmund Hart Turpin (English organist & composer)
1926 – Frederick Zech, Jr. (American pianist & composer)
1952 – Sergei Bortkiewicz [Сергі́й Бортке́вич] (Ukrainian composer & pianist)
1960 – José Padilla Sánchez (Spanish composer & pianist)
1963 – Roger Désormière (French conductor)
1963 – Abu Bakr Khairat [بو بكر خيرت‎] (Egyptian composer)
1980 – Virgil Fox (American organist)
1983 – Hermann Ambrosius (German composer & teacher)
1985 – Morton Downey, Sr. (American popular singer, pianist & TV personality, "The Irish Nightingale")
1991 – Bill Graham (American rock promoter & music venue owner)
1992 – Roger Miller (American country singer, songwriter, musician & actor)
1993 – Danny Chan Bak-keung [陳百強] (Hong Kong cantopop singer, songwriter & actor)
1998 – Warren Wiebe (American adult contemporary singer & session bass guitarist)
2003 – Robert Strassburg (American conductor, composer, musicologist & teacher)
2004 – John Peel (English disc jockey, radio presenter, record producer & journalist, BBC Radio 1)
2010 – Gregory Isaacs (Jamaican reggae singer & songwriter)

Welcome to Yestermonth in Dead Musicians.

Yes, I've resigned myself to the fact that it would be impossible for us to get even close to getting caught up at this point. But I guess that's okay. These stiffs aren't going anywhere; they'll be just as dead a month later as they are a day later.

Today, a notable female violinist and composer of the 19th century; the conductor for whom one of Britain's major orchestras is named; and a couple of great musicians who were named Roger, although those respective Rogers aren't pronounced the same. Roger Désormière was one of the greatest French conductors of the mid-20th century, an artist with a remarkably wide repertoire, and with a strong dedication to the music of contemporary composers. Roger Miller was known best for the 'novelty' songs he contributed to country and early rock 'n' roll, songs like "Dang Me," "Chug-A-Lug," "You Can't Roller-skate in a Buffalo Herd," and of course, the classic "King of the Road." He was a very talented singer and guitarist, and a very clever songwriter. Roger that, Houston.

In the non-Roger category, we have Virgil Fox, who started out as brilliant but fairly non-descript pipe organist, but hit it big in the 70s with his "Heavy Organ" concerts and recordings, in which he donned duds of almost Liberace-ish flamboyancy, and attempted to turn young people on to the music of J. S. Bach. I've favorited a couple of videos of him up there on our YouTube channel, if you'd like to check out his schtick.

The really exciting people on our list today, however, aren't discussed in this post. I'm speaking of Bill Graham and John Peel, two guys who proved to be of incalculable importance to the careers of countless rock and pop musicians. They'll be discussed in the next post, later tonight, which will see... yes, you guessed it... THE RETURN OF WAEX, THE LOST ONE !!

10-24a: Music for Henry VII & VIII / Hilliard Ensemble 2008 - Alessandro Scarlatti Il Primo Omicidio / Jacobs 1997 - Dittersdorf Viola & Double-Bass Concertos / Vajnar 1998

1521 – Robert Fayrfax (English court composer)
1725 – Alessandro Scarlatti (Italian composer, father of Domenico)
1785 – Jean-Jacques Robson (Belgian composer)
1789 – Joaquín de Oxinaga (Spanish composer & organist)
1799 – Carl Ditters von Dittersdorf (Austrian composer, violinist & silvologist)
1901 – Paul Henrion (French composer of popular songs)
1902 – Vladislav Zaremba [Владислав Заремба] (Ukrainian composer of Polish ancestry)
1912 – Mykola Lysenko [Микола Лисенко] (Ukrainian composer, pianist, conductor & ethnomusicologist)
1918 – Charles Lecocq (French composer of comic operas & operettas)

Well, we've already read about some musicians today who had other notable musicians in the family, and now we have Alessandro Scarlatti, who is not to be confused with his famous son Domenico, or the three other lesser-known guys from the same family who were also composers.

The name of Scarlatti always makes me think of a line in John Kennedy Toole's A Confederacy of Dunces that I find very funny. It's where the protagonist, Ignatius J. Reilly, proclaims that the greatest composer in history is obviously Scarlatti. That's funny for two reasons. First, because it's an opinion so contrary (as Ignatius J. Reilly generally is) to conventional wisdom - I mean, most people would probably say Bach, or Mozart, or Beethoven, or maybe Handel... but Scarlatti? The other reason it's funny is because he doesn't even say which Scarlatti he's talking about, and anyone who knows something about classical music knows that Alessandro is virtually as famous as Domenico. It's not like when you say "Bach" and it's assumed that Johann Sebastian is the one you mean.

Well, now look what you've gone and done... got me off onto an A Confederacy of Dunces tangent. Damn all of you! Did you know that this hilarious and wonderful novel has to be somewhere near the top of the list of books EVERYONE wishes would be made into a major motion picture, but still hasn't been? First they were going to make it with John Belushi playing Ignatius J. Reilly. Then John Waters was going to make it with Divine. Then John Candy was going to play the role (I think he would have been really great in it). Then Chris Farley was going to do it. And guess what? That's right... THEY ALL POOPED, before their respective projects could even get off the ground! The last actor who was planning on playing the role was Will Ferrell... kind of an odd choice, I think. He's tall enough (which Belushi wasn't). I suppose Will was planning on gaining a few or putting on a fat suit. The project was moving forward. A screen adaptation was made by Steven Soderbergh and Scott Kramer, the entire cast was chosen (with Lily Tomlin as Ignatius's mother), and the director was slated to be David Gordon Green. This was in 2005. The movie was to be filmed on location in the city where the story takes place, NEW ORLEANS. So, there you have it. Dead musicians, dead actors, dead movie projects, dead residents of a drowned city, a dead author who killed himself 12 years before his great novel won him the Pulitzer Prize. Pretty sad.

So anyway, Scarlatti. Also, Carl Ditters von Dittersdorf. That guy was all about Ditters.

10-24b: Lehár The Merry Widow : Schwarzkopf | Wächter | Knapp | Gedda | Steffek | Von Matačić 1956

1940 – Victor Hollaender (German pianist, conductor & composer for stage & film, son of Friedrich)
1948 – Franz Lehár (Austrian-Hungarian composer, known best for operetta The Merry Widow)
1949 – Joaquín Nin y Castellanos (Cuban pianist & composer)
1952 – Frederick Jacobi (American composer & teacher)
1953 – Ernest Irving (English film composer & conductor)
1958 – Martin Fallas Shaw (English composer, conductor & theatrical producer)
1969 – Otto Jochum (German composer, choir director & teacher, brother of Eugen & Georg Ludwig)

Well, I wasn't going to say anything here, aside from noting the familial relationships of Victor Hollaender - whose father was one of the most prominent composers of German cabaret music during those wonderfully decadent years of the Weimar Republic; and Otto Jochum - whose brother Eugen was a very famous conductor, and his other brother Georg Ludwig a somewhat less famous one. Well, there, I've said it - and in any case that last bit of information was in your collage already! Enjoy the operetta...

10-24c: Carl Ruggles Complete / Tilson Thomas 1980 - Oistrakh : Khachaturian | Sibelius Concertos 1965 - Oistrakh / Richter : Shostakovich | Franck Sonatas 1969

1971 – Fernand Quinet (Belgian composer & conductor)
1971 – Carl Ruggles (American composer, conductor, violinist, teacher & painter)
1974 – David Oistrakh [Дави́д О́йстрах] (Ukrainian violinist & conductor)
1976 – Richard Sturzenegger (Swiss composer & cellist)
2005 – Joy Clements (American lyric coloratura soprano)
2007 – Petr Eben (Czech composer, organist & pianist)
2008 – Moshe Cotel (American composer & pianist)

Another THREE-parter today. Don't miss out on this part! One of the best presentations (by MTT, who's always so good at such repertoire) of the complete (and very few) works of Carl Ruggles, that great but loquacious American modernist of the early-to-mid 20th century. And some of the finest recordings made by David Oistrakh, one of the greatest violinists of the 20th century, a great bulldog of a player with an enormous tone and technique and hot-blooded form of expression.

Well, there was a write-up! I'll leave it to you to find out more about Moshe Kotel, and his owner, Ketzel the composing cat...

10-23: Al Jolson 1912-1932 : 81 songs! - Carter Family w/ Johnny Cash Keep On the Sunny Side 1964 - Verdi La Forza del Destino : Price | Tucker | Merrill | Verrett | Schippers 1965

1753 – Columban Praelisauer (German priest, librarian, composer & choir director)
1782 – Joseph Riepel (Austrian music theorist & composer)
1801 – Johann Gottlieb Naumann (German composer, conductor & music director)
1806 – Franz Seydelmann (German composer)
1869 – Jean-Baptiste-Joseph Tolbecque (Belgian violinist, conductor & composer of dance music)
1886 – Johann Nepomuk Kafka (Czech-Austrian composer)
1925 – Vyacheslav Karatïgin [Вячеслав Каратыгин] (Russian music critic & composer)
1942 – Ralph Rainger (American film composer & pianist)
1948 – Eugeniusz Morawski-Dąbrowa (Polish composer & teacher)
1950 – Al Jolson (American popular singer, actor & entertainer)
1954 – Henri Zagwijn (Dutch composer)
1976 – Leonard Lee (American R&B singer, Shirley and Lee)
1978 – [Mother] Maybelle Carter (American country & gospel guitarist, banjoist, autoharpist & singer, Carter Family)
1982 – Jacques Klein (Brazilian pianist)
1984 – James Petrillo (American trumpeter and leader of the American Federation of Musicians, 1940-1958)
1996 – Alexander Kelly (English pianist, piano teacher & composer)
2003 – Tony Capstick (English actor, comedian & musician)
2004 – Robert Merrill (American operatic baritone)

Well, once again, no time or energy or mental concentration for a proper write-up... so go to your links above and be sure to read about the MUSICIANS' STRIKE of 1942, and the ensuing battles between organized musical labor (yes, there really was such a thing - the AFM was at one time more than the glorified booking agent it is now) and the major record labels. And also be sure to read about Mother Maybelle Carter, who had more of an influence on the sound of modern country, and gospel, and bluegrass, and folk music than perhaps any other single person. And of course, read about the World's Greatest Entertainer, Mr. Al Jolson.

Also, readers, prepare yourselves... for the possible return of waex within the next few days... (!!)