Sound Beat

Up and Atom! It's the music of the Atomic Age.

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

A man as prolific as Charles Trenet (850 songs published over a 60 year career) probably doesn’t rest much, even on the train.

You’re listening to Johannes Brahms and the Banda de Estado Mayor de Mexico. That’s right, a Hungarian danza by a Mexican banda. You're on the Sound Beat. Brahms composed 21 danzas, basing them on Hungarian folk themes. Mostly…in fact, he thought this one, number 5, was based on a folk song, but that song turned out it to be an original composition by Béla Kéler. You may have heard it in the Charlie Chaplin film “The Great Dictator”, in which Chaplin shaves a man to the tune. Brahms himself was cleanshaven until his mid-30’s. And, by the way, described as “Herculean”. Though A late-comer to the no-shave game, he ended up with a magnificent specimen towards the end.  

A trip through the history of recorded sound

As far as boxing names go, there are lots of “Sugar Rays”, plenty of “Golden Boys”…but only one Cinderella Man.

The history books are full of names of inventors who have, through struggle and determination, brought innovation to humankind. But what of those who make the ultimate sacrifice?

Arthur Sullivan was one of Britain’s most important composers, one half of a little theatrical team known as Gilbert and Sullivan.

Mr. Theodore G. Bilbo was a US senator....and not a good one.

...cold was the ground.

Famed lawman Wyatt Earp has been the subject of nearly a dozen movies, but his role as on-set advisor for westerns would have a major impact on film history.

A trip through the history of recorded sound

GRATEFUL ROOTS: Sittin’ On Top of the World

Most anyone alive during the first lunar landing can tell you exactly where they were. For Dr. Story Musgrave it was a very special room in Houston.

Between 1939 and 1952 Bing Crosby and the Andrews Sisters recorded 46 times. Exactly half of those were major hit records.

You’re listening to “Oh, Boy!” by Buddy Holly and the Crickets, and a vocal group you may never have heard of…because they were left out of the credits.

You’re on the Sound Beat…with Anna Canoni, the granddaughter of Woody Guthrie. Woody once said “If you use more than two chords you’re showing off”. But the simplicity of the music provides the perfect backdrop for Guthrie’s lyrics. (Interview) Many credit Woody with inventing the “Talkin’” format, with it’s free-formish, rambling melody.  But Christopher Allan Bouchillon’s recording of “Talking Blues” was made 14 years earlier, in 1926. Want to hear it? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aPrnbGm7jas

One of the best, um, worst(?) baddies of all time.

May the 4th be with you.

How a serious injury influenced the founding of the Church of Christ, Scientist.