This week in The Wall Street Journal, I interviewed Ann Dowd for my "House Call" column in the Mansion section (go here). Ann plays the cruel and menacing Aunt Lydia on Hulu's The Handmaid's Tale. Turns out Ann had her own pseudo Aunt Lydia moment as a child while attending Catholic school in Massachusetts. [Photo courtesy of Ann Dowd and Wikipedia]
Here's Ann playing the chilling Aunt Lydia...
And here she is, much sweeter out of character, explaining her challenging role...
Also this week in the WSJ, my "Anatomy of a Song" column on the story behind Donna Summer's On the Radio (go here). I interviewed co-writer and producer Giorgio Moroder, arranger Harold Faltermeyer, Summer's husband Bruce Sudano, recording artist Stephen Bishop, drummer Keith Forsey and alto sax soloist Gary Herbig. Donna Summer died in 2012. Here's Summer singing On the Radio in 1980...
Count Basie. Following my post last week that featured a YouTube video clip of Steve Allen descending eagerly into New York's Birdland in 1956 to sit with Count Basie as the band wailed away on April in Paris and Blee Blop Blues, I received this email from Aurin Primack, whose father was co-owner of the club:
"Marc, great fun to see Count Basie and the club as I remember them, including doorman Peewee Marquette, who used to call me "Little Preemack." The waiter whose back of the head you see at about 5:30 into the clip was named Drayton.
"On another occasion I was at dinner with my dad at the club when I said to him that it was a shame you couldn't dance while Basie was playing. Just then, I felt a tap on my shoulder. A musician who overheard my comment stooped down and explained to me that you could find just two 'lands' on Broadway—Roseland and Birdland. He said that if you wanted to dance, go to Roseland, but Birdland was for serious listeners. Setting me straight was Miles Davis who gave my dad a wink and departed."
Once more, once...
Speaking of Basie, I received the following last week from Bruce Collier, owner of 90th Floor Records...
"Marc, early in 1960, I was at the Blue Note in Chicago with two friends to see the Count Basie Band. A cigarette girl stopped by our table with her camera. 'Picture, guys?,’ she asked. ‘Sure,’ we responded, 'if you can get Basie to join us.’ As you can see from the photo above, she did just that. Although it doesn’t look like it, we were in shock. Joe Williams sitting down with the Count didn’t hurt either. In the photo, from left, is Joe Williams, Jim Thompson, Bruce Collier, Dick Zunkle and Count Basie. Jim and I met at Arlington State in Texas (now University of Texas at Arlington); Dick and I met as seniors in high school. It was amazing to see Sonny Payne then."
Joe Alterman, who plays piano in the style of Red Garland and Ahmad Jamal, will be at New York's Jazz Standard on Sunday, September 2 at 12 p.m. He'll be joined by John Snow on bass and John Fatum on drums. Tickets can be purchased online here or by calling the club at (212) 576-2232.
Tale of the tape. Readers who loved my post on the documentary detailing the rise of the stereo system will love this one on the rise of the reel-to-reel player-recorder...
What the heck. Here's the Billy Taylor Trio with Candido on conga playing Mambo Inn...
Oddball album cover of the week.
Meet Marjorie Meinert. She began as a pop radio organist and became a recording artist in the 1950s. She died in 2009. Not sure what the vintage Popeye weights have to do with her or her talent or why they would attract buyers to purchase the album. The art director must have been a dumbbell.
