JazzWax

Barbara, Tom and Roy

In The Wall Street Journal this week, I interviewed Wesley Schultz of the Lumineers on the band's new single, Where We Are, for my "Anatomy of a Song" column (go here). An amazing story of how a new song's lyrics were influenced by a car crash 11 years ago that just missed seriously injuring or killing Wesley and his girlfriend (now wife) Brandy. Photo above of Wesley and Brandy, an hour after the accident, at a salvage yard in Flagstaff, Ariz.

Here's the song...

Also in the WSJ, I interviewed Barbara Eden (above) for my "House Call" column in the Mansion section (go here). Barbara starred in the 1960s sitcom I Dream of Jeannie. Here's Barbara in action...

Here's more of you reading my latest book, Rock Concert: An Oral History...

In London, above, composer-pianist Simon Wallace at the piano. His latest album with wife and vocalist Sarah Moule is Stormy Emotions (33 Jazz), featuring songs Simon wrote with Fran Landesman. For more on Simon and Sarah's relationship with the late lyricist, go here.

In Denton, Texas, Paul Roark, above, hipped one of the Vinyl Lounge's DJs (also above) to Rock Concert. The place looks like fun! As the Denton Record Chronicle noted—"New, switched-on Vinyl Lounge: It’s ‘Austin Powers' meets Tommy Bradford’s van."

Passion or obsession? Tom Fine sent along a link to a wonderful documentary on members of the Audiophile Club of Athens in Greece who are seriously into their high-end stereo rigs. Here it is...

Antonio Carlos Jobim radio. Mark your calendar: On Tuesday, WKCR-FM in New York will play the composer's music for 24 hours (ET) in celebration of his birthday. You can listen from anywhere in the world by going here.  

Roy Eldridge. Next Sunday, January 30, WKCR-FM in New York will play the music of Roy Eldridge for 24 hours (ET) to celebrate the trumpeter's birthday. You can listen from anywhere in the world by going here.  

And finally, here's Bloodstone singing Natural High in 1973...

Visual Music Aboard an Aircraft Carrier

Ever since I spent a day training with the National Guard in the early 1980s for a piece I was writing (complete with poison ivy), I've been fascinated by the ballet of military operations, particularly planes. To get big things done efficiently on aircraft carriers, the Navy designs methods of execution and constantly perfects them—with different groups assigned to handle various parts to ensure safety, speed and success. I love watching this activity. For me, it's like visual music.

Nothing in this realm is more beautiful or more cool than the choreography that takes place on the flight deck, day and night. I've long angled for an assignment to write about the bevy of activity to launch and recover (land) jets, but the idea is a hard sell. That hasn't prevented me from obsessively researching and watching the process on YouTube.

First, Navy jets don't take off from the decks of carriers. They're launched. Once a jet is brought up from below by a team wearing brown jerseys, it's fueled by a team in purple and loaded with ordinances by red shirts. Next, it taxis slowly to a catapult at one end of the deck's three different flight zones (or mini airports) guided by hand and arm signals provided by yellow shirts. Once there and lined up on the catapult's track, the plane's wings are spread and a team in green jerseys attaches the plane's launch bar to the catapult's shuttle embedded in the deck. The person responsible for the setting the correct catapult velocity is the one in green sitting in a hatch on the deck. Settings are based on the size of the plane, the wind and other factors. Last-minute safety inspections by a team in white jerseys also are completed.

Because the flight deck is deafening with the high-pitched screams of jet engines, all personnel wears noise-cutting headphones. As a result, communication among those on deck is done with hand signals. At the helm of these visual conversations at the catapult stage is the "shooter," who also wears yellow. The shooter is the one who will give final clearance to the pilot. When the inspection and catapult attachment are done, each team crouches on deck with eyes on the shooter.

The shooter then raises an arm and rotates three fingers rapidly, which signals to the pilot to go through a checklist of tech steps in the cockpit. Once those are completed, the pilot salutes the shooter, who then holds his or her hand firm, points to each deck group with the other hand for a thumbs up, indicating their tasks are complete. With those confirmations secured, the shooter goes into a streamlined crouch, with one leg bent at the knee and the other extended out nearly flat.

The shooter then touches the deck with his or her hand and lifts it to point down the fly deck, often holding the hand in the shape of a pistol. This signals to the pilot that he or she is cleared to go. Engines are fired and the catapult sling-shots the jet down the runway to accelerate the speed and ensure a safe lift off. Each shooter has a little leeway to exhibit his or her own body-language and hand style when holding attention and delivering the go-ahead to pilots.

That's the long and short of it in broad strokes. Here are a bunch of my favorite videos that illustrate the cool choreography I describe above:    

Here are teams at work on the U.S.S. George H.W. Bush...

Here's an explanation of the different deck teams and their roles...

Here are flight-deck operations on the U.S.S. Enterprise...

Here's what the shooter is responsible for...

Here's another shooter roundup...

Here's what it's like from the cockpit...

And here's where the art comes into play, as each shooter has a slightly different style. The shooters in this video had a very singular style...

Jazz on TV: Don Elliott and Hal McKusick

Yesterday, Jim Eigo sent along a terrific video that Evan Spring posted on the Jazz Research List. The video had been up at YouTube since 2014 and features an episode from a WCBS-TV series in New York called American Musical Theatre. The hour-long show aired from 1959 to 1965—a period considered by many to be the golden age of arts coverage on TV by the CBS network and individual CBS stations. [Photo above of Don Elliott]

Each week, AMT pulled back the curtain on a corner of the arts through in-studio performances by star guests for a studio audience comprised mostly of of local high school students. The series was created and written by Ethel Burns, who was affiliated with New York's Board of Education. Baritone saxophonist Gerry Mulligan wrote a theme for it.

As Evan notes, Dan Morgenstern, the jazz author, journalist and critic, quoted Mulligan in an essay saying that "[Burns] titled the series American Musical Theatre so the Board of Education would want to be involved with it and would like to have their name on it. But she interpreted it for herself to mean jazz. She didn't think they'd go for a jazz series." Series guests included Bob Fosse, Gwen Verdon, Richard Rodgers, Harry Belafonte, Sammy Davis Jr., Stephen Sondheim, Roberta Peters, Betty Comden and Adolph Green, Jule Styne and many others.

In 1960, AMT on WCBS featured an episode on jazz and theater hosted by Jim Morske. A Thurber Carnival had opened on Broadway in February, directed by actor Burgess Meredith. The revue by James Thurber based on his stories, cartoons and humorous short stories in The New Yorker was scored and performed by multi-instrumentalist Don Elliott and a sextet he assembled.

On the WCBS show, we see Elliott on vibes, mellophone and trumpet, leading clarinetist and saxophonist Hal McKusick, guitarist Chuck Wayne, pianist Don Abney, bassist Trigger Alpert and drummer Specs Powell and an orchestra.

A couple of notes: Thurber and Meredith won a special Tony for A Thurber Carnival; the album Burgess Meredith holds up during the show is The Paul Desmond Quartet Featuring Don Elliott (Fantasy), released in 1956. 

Here's the American Musical Theatre episode...