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![The Four Seasons - December, 1963 (Oh, What a Night) [with lyrics]](http://web.archive.org./web/20130609033253im_/http://i.ytimg.com/vi/nDxhugRKZ8g/default.jpg "Frankie Valli & The Four Seasons' 1975 hit")
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- Lyrics: play full screen play karaoke
- 1963 - New Order
- 1963 - Brazzaville
- 1963 - Rachael Yamagata
- 1963 - I Against I
- 1963 - Monster-In-Law Soundtrack
It was January, 1963
When Johnny came home with a gift for me
He said, "I bought it for you because I love you
And I bought it for you 'cause it's your birthday too"
He was so very nice, he was so very kind
To think of me at this point in time
I used to think of him, he used think of me
He told me to close my eyes
My gift would be a great surprise
I saw tears were in his eyes
He never meant to hurt me, oh God
Johnny, don't point that gun at me
There's so many ways our lives have changed
But please, I beg, don't do this to me
Johnny, don't point that gun at me
Can I save my life at any price?
For God's sake, won't you listen to me?
And though he was ashamed that he had took a life
Johnny came home with another wife
And he often remembered how it used to be
Before that special occasion, 1963
There was too many ways that you could kill someone
Like in a love affair, when the love has gone
He used to think of her, she used think of him
He told me to close my eyes
My gift would be a great surprise
I saw tears were in his eyes
He never meant to hurt me, oh God
Johnny, don't point that gun at me
There's so many ways our lives have changed
But please, I beg, don't do this to me
Johnny, you keep on using me
Can I change my life for any price?
Oh Johnny, won't you listen to me?
He told me to close my eyes
My gift would be a great surprise
I saw hatred in his eyes
But he never meant to hurt me, oh God
Johnny, don't point that gun at me
There's so many ways our lives have changed
But please, I beg, don't do this to me
Johnny, you keep on using me
Can I change my life for any price?
Oh Johnny, won't you listen to me?
I just want you to be mine
I don't want this world to shine
I don't want this bridge to burn
Oh Johnny, do you miss me?
I just want to feel for you
I will always feel for you
I will always feel for you
I will always feel for you
Summer’s been delayed
But I don’t want to think about it
In the shade of a Guar Gum tree
1963
Devils by the lake were spotted
1963
Way across the pond
European trade commissions
Selling jasmine in Istanbul
Suicides and freak conditions
Baby, I'm stuck in the middle and I don't know why
Find the words you sing to me
Sweeter than the words of the bird in the sky
Oh, the days you came around
I feel so good for me
I can take most anything
'Cause what you bring
I find it magical (hey)
I feel like I'm loving you in 1963 (hey)
Flowers in my hair (hey)
Little bitty hearts upon my cheek
Baby, you'll be on my mind
'till I kiss you next time
Baby, come on, take a ride in my little blue bug
Keep the windows down
Don't forget to celebrate the radio's up
Oh, the way you hold my hand
There is no other way
We could take a thousand walks
And laugh all day
I find it magical (hey)
I feel like I'm loving you in 1963 (hey)
Flowers in my hair (hey)
Little bitty hearts upon my cheek
Baby, you'll be on my mind
'till I kiss you next time
I find it magical (hey)
I feel like I'm loving you in 1963 (hey)
Flowers in my hair (hey)
Little bitty hearts upon my cheek
Baby, you'll be on my mind
'till I kiss you next time
Magical (hey)
I feel like I'm loving you in 1963 (hey)
Flowers in my hair (hey)
Little bitty hearts upon my cheek
Baby, you'll be on my mind
'till I kiss you next time
Hey, hey, I find it magical (hey)
Hey, hey, I feel like I'm loving you in 1963 (hey)
Hey, hey, I got flowers in my hair (hey)
You'll never know anything that I've done And you'll never know anything that I've seen Don't you
pretend that you care one bit How have you been, haven't seen you in a while Found your name in
the 'missing person' files Why are you here; there's nothing to prove You'll get nowhere Speak for
yourself, don't be a talk-a-like Try to be righteous, like Tina; not Ike Don't be a private dancer
for life And if you got a mind of your own, why don't you use it And if you got a mind of your
own, why don't you prove it Prove you have brains by blowing them out You'll get nowhere Don't
you realize all this will get you nowhere You scratch the surface at it's most To open up yourself
would make you taste the real thing It has some good times, and some bad But it's better than this
Don't need you here; goodbye for always Your flight outta here has not been delayed Go the hell
away and never come back I never liked what you did and said Suck up to me again; you'll be dead
Baby, I'm stuck in the middle and I don't know why
Find the words you sing to me
Sweeter than the words of the bird in the sky
Oh, the days you came around
I feel so good for me
I can take most anything
'Cause what you bring
I find it magical (hey)
I feel like I'm loving you in 1963 (hey)
Flowers in my hair (hey)
Little bitty hearts upon my cheek
Baby, you'll be on my mind
'till I kiss you next time
Baby, come on, take a ride in my little blue bug
Keep the windows down
Don't forget to celebrate the radio's up
Oh, the way you hold my hand
There is no other way
We could take a thousand walks
And laugh all day
I find it magical (hey)
I feel like I'm loving you in 1963 (hey)
Flowers in my hair (hey)
Little bitty hearts upon my cheek
Baby, you'll be on my mind
'till I kiss you next time
I find it magical (hey)
I feel like I'm loving you in 1963 (hey)
Flowers in my hair (hey)
Little bitty hearts upon my cheek
Baby, you'll be on my mind
'till I kiss you next time
Magical (hey)
I feel like I'm loving you in 1963 (hey)
Flowers in my hair (hey)
Little bitty hearts upon my cheek
Baby, you'll be on my mind
'till I kiss you next time
Hey, hey, I find it magical (hey)
Hey, hey, I feel like I'm loving you in 1963 (hey)
Hey, hey, I got flowers in my hair (hey)
Hey, hey, little bitty hearts upon my cheek...
Send this Playlist by SMS
The Four Seasons - December, 1963 (Oh, What a Night) [with lyrics]
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 3:24
- Updated: 08 Jun 2013
Frankie Valli & The Four Seasons' 1975 hit "December, 1963 (Oh, What a Night)" with lyrics below. Enjoy and please leave your comments! LYRICS: Oh, what a ni...
http://wn.com/The_Four_Seasons_December,_1963_Oh,_What_a_Night_with_lyrics_
Frankie Valli & The Four Seasons' 1975 hit "December, 1963 (Oh, What a Night)" with lyrics below. Enjoy and please leave your comments! LYRICS: Oh, what a ni...
Steve Allen show, Frank Zappa Playing music on a Bicycle 1963
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 16:25
- Updated: 04 Jun 2013
Frank is on the Steve Allen show, playing music using a bi-cycle.
http://wn.com/Steve_Allen_show,_Frank_Zappa_Playing_music_on_a_Bicycle_1963
Frank is on the Steve Allen show, playing music using a bi-cycle.
- published: 28 Apr 2008
- views: 435284
- author: kenwahman
Walter Cronkite announces death of JFK
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 5:44
- Updated: 07 Jun 2013
Walter Cronkite announcing the death of U.S. president John F. Kennedy on November 22, 1963. See 5:00 for the most significant part. R.I.P. Walter Cronkite (...
http://wn.com/Walter_Cronkite_announces_death_of_JFK
Walter Cronkite announcing the death of U.S. president John F. Kennedy on November 22, 1963. See 5:00 for the most significant part. R.I.P. Walter Cronkite (...
- published: 27 Mar 2009
- views: 1136285
- author: maxpowers518
Civil Rights Roundtable 1963
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 30:11
- Updated: 31 May 2013
Marlon Brando, James Baldwin, Harry Belafonte, Charlton Heston, Joseph Minklelwitz, and Sidney Poitier, talk about the Civil Rights Movement of 1963.
http://wn.com/Civil_Rights_Roundtable_1963
Marlon Brando, James Baldwin, Harry Belafonte, Charlton Heston, Joseph Minklelwitz, and Sidney Poitier, talk about the Civil Rights Movement of 1963.
- published: 06 Nov 2009
- views: 88727
- author: DocChannel
1963 Timesharing: A Solution to Computer Bottlenecks
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 27:38
- Updated: 04 Jun 2013
[Recorded: May 9, 1963] This vintage film features MIT Science Reporter John Fitch at the MIT Computation Center in an extended interview with MIT professor ...
http://wn.com/1963_Timesharing_A_Solution_to_Computer_Bottlenecks
[Recorded: May 9, 1963] This vintage film features MIT Science Reporter John Fitch at the MIT Computation Center in an extended interview with MIT professor ...
- published: 07 Jan 2010
- views: 43286
- author: ComputerHistory
The Four Seasons - December, 1963 (Oh, What a Night)
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 3:35
- Updated: 06 Jun 2013
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=liyiT_DGREA&fmt;=18 to watch with better quality ...what a very special time for me [Original Version] Frankie Valli and the Fo...
http://wn.com/The_Four_Seasons_December,_1963_Oh,_What_a_Night
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=liyiT_DGREA&fmt;=18 to watch with better quality ...what a very special time for me [Original Version] Frankie Valli and the Fo...
- published: 04 Oct 2006
- views: 2548320
- author: LesterTheNightfly2
Snow (1963)
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 7:47
- Updated: 08 Jun 2013
Viewers are advised to use the 'watch in high quality' option for this video). 'Snow' is available to buy as part of the BFI DVD 'Geoffrey Jones: The Rhythm...
http://wn.com/Snow_1963
Viewers are advised to use the 'watch in high quality' option for this video). 'Snow' is available to buy as part of the BFI DVD 'Geoffrey Jones: The Rhythm...
- published: 13 Jan 2009
- views: 804996
- author: BFIfilms
November 22, 1963 Reaction to President Kennedy's death.
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 9:47
- Updated: 13 May 2013
This was the evening of November 22, 1963. On this part there is much reaction to the assassination of President Kennedy(which was a little less than 5 hours...
http://wn.com/November_22,_1963_Reaction_to_President_Kennedy's_death
This was the evening of November 22, 1963. On this part there is much reaction to the assassination of President Kennedy(which was a little less than 5 hours...
- published: 30 Aug 2007
- views: 165898
- author: CircuitBreaker1582
The Beatles come to town - RARE 1963 (color)
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 6:49
- Updated: 07 Jun 2013
the Beatles perform in manchester, 1963... some clips before the concert! enjoy.
http://wn.com/The_Beatles_come_to_town_RARE_1963_color
the Beatles perform in manchester, 1963... some clips before the concert! enjoy.
- published: 17 Jul 2006
- views: 1891273
- author: beat68
Bee Gees - Blowing In The Wind (1963)
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 4:10
- Updated: 05 May 2013
This is a video clip from the Bee Gees released in 1963.
http://wn.com/Bee_Gees_Blowing_In_The_Wind_1963
This is a video clip from the Bee Gees released in 1963.
- published: 22 Feb 2010
- views: 620338
- author: MrNatural74
December, 1963 (Oh What A Night) - Frankie Valli & the Four Seasons
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 5:16
- Updated: 05 Jun 2013
Song is from the 1975 album "Who Loves You" and the single was released the same year. In March of 1976, the song was #1 on the Billboard Charts.
http://wn.com/December,_1963_Oh_What_A_Night_Frankie_Valli_the_Four_Seasons
Song is from the 1975 album "Who Loves You" and the single was released the same year. In March of 1976, the song was #1 on the Billboard Charts.
- published: 24 Jan 2009
- views: 1837865
- author: handsmlake
A Change Is Gonna Come, Sam Cooke, 1963
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 3:11
- Updated: 08 Jun 2013
I was born by the river in a little tent Oh and just like the river I've been running ever since It's been a long, a long time coming But I know a change gon...
http://wn.com/A_Change_Is_Gonna_Come,_Sam_Cooke,_1963
I was born by the river in a little tent Oh and just like the river I've been running ever since It's been a long, a long time coming But I know a change gon...
- published: 27 Oct 2009
- views: 4377293
- author: BlackAsWhite1
1963 TV Concert: 'It's The Beatles' Live
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 9:22
- Updated: 06 Jun 2013
Live, television: It's The Beatles 3.45pm, Saturday 7 December 1963 Following their appearance on the BBC television show Juke Box Jury, The Beatles recorded...
http://wn.com/1963_TV_Concert_'It's_The_Beatles'_Live
Live, television: It's The Beatles 3.45pm, Saturday 7 December 1963 Following their appearance on the BBC television show Juke Box Jury, The Beatles recorded...
- published: 05 Jul 2011
- views: 761845
- author: UnreleasedBeatlesHD
Johnny Cash-Ring of Fire 1963
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 1:34
- Updated: 08 Jun 2013
See title.
http://wn.com/Johnny_Cash-Ring_of_Fire_1963
Japanese life and culture in 1963 日本の生活文化
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 7:28
- Updated: 06 Jun 2013
A white collar worker returns home to his family. His income is US$ 2000 a year. Yet he seems comfortable of. His son goes to college. The roots of their lif...
http://wn.com/Japanese_life_and_culture_in_1963_日本の生活文化
A white collar worker returns home to his family. His income is US$ 2000 a year. Yet he seems comfortable of. His son goes to college. The roots of their lif...
- published: 09 Apr 2011
- views: 38917
- author: MichaelRogge
Martin Luther King - I Have A Dream Speech - August 28, 1963
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 17:28
- Updated: 08 Jun 2013
I Have a Dream Speech Martin Luther King's Address at March on Washington August 28, 1963. Washington, D.C. When we let freedom ring, when we let it ring fro...
http://wn.com/Martin_Luther_King_I_Have_A_Dream_Speech_August_28,_1963
I Have a Dream Speech Martin Luther King's Address at March on Washington August 28, 1963. Washington, D.C. When we let freedom ring, when we let it ring fro...
- published: 21 Jan 2011
- views: 2852401
- author: sullentoys
CIVIL RIGHTS PROTEST ALABAMA 1963
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 2:11
- Updated: 03 Jun 2013
9027, 1963, CIVIL RIGHTS PROTEST IN ALABAMA, POLICE ARREST PROTESTERS, POLICE USE WATER HOSES ON PROTESTERS, http://www.myfootage.com/details.php?gid=58&sgid...;
http://wn.com/CIVIL_RIGHTS_PROTEST_ALABAMA_1963
9027, 1963, CIVIL RIGHTS PROTEST IN ALABAMA, POLICE ARREST PROTESTERS, POLICE USE WATER HOSES ON PROTESTERS, http://www.myfootage.com/details.php?gid=58&sgid...;
- published: 23 Dec 2010
- views: 76457
- author: footagefile13
The Great Escape (1963) Original Trailer
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 2:42
- Updated: 05 Jun 2013
The Trailer For John Sturges' The Great Escape Starring Steve McQueen James Garner BEST ON YOUTUBE.
http://wn.com/The_Great_Escape_1963_Original_Trailer
The Trailer For John Sturges' The Great Escape Starring Steve McQueen James Garner BEST ON YOUTUBE.
- published: 16 Dec 2007
- views: 472062
- author: TheGreatEscapeMovie
Pierwszy Krajowy Festiwal Piosenki Polskiej w Opolu-1963
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 5:50
- Updated: 31 May 2013
http://wn.com/Pierwszy_Krajowy_Festiwal_Piosenki_Polskiej_w_Opolu-1963
BBC Winterwatch 1963 - The Big Freeze
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 58:59
- Updated: 15 May 2013
This is The Big Freeze, a BBC documentary from 1963 presented by Cliff Michelmore, Derek Hart and Kenneth Allsop which looks at the worst British winter of t...
http://wn.com/BBC_Winterwatch_1963_The_Big_Freeze
This is The Big Freeze, a BBC documentary from 1963 presented by Cliff Michelmore, Derek Hart and Kenneth Allsop which looks at the worst British winter of t...
- published: 19 Jan 2013
- views: 7678
- author: TCILPart3
(5) ELFSTEDENTOCHT REINIER PAPING 1963
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 2:04
- Updated: 19 Apr 2013
2013. After 50 years Reinier Paping on a poststamp! In 1963 the Netherlands saw the toughest winter since 100 years. On feb 14th of that year the so called "...
http://wn.com/5_ELFSTEDENTOCHT_REINIER_PAPING_1963
2013. After 50 years Reinier Paping on a poststamp! In 1963 the Netherlands saw the toughest winter since 100 years. On feb 14th of that year the so called "...
- published: 10 Dec 2009
- views: 68171
- author: Matthijs Rodijk
A day in Tokyo, Japan, in 1963 東京
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 6:02
- Updated: 04 Jun 2013
A Japanese family wakes up in Tokyo and goes to work. Great postwar changes were still to take place but even then the city looked hectic. This was still the...
http://wn.com/A_day_in_Tokyo,_Japan,_in_1963_東京
A Japanese family wakes up in Tokyo and goes to work. Great postwar changes were still to take place but even then the city looked hectic. This was still the...
- published: 06 Apr 2011
- views: 155954
- author: MichaelRogge
The Shadows: Atlantis (1963)
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 2:47
- Updated: 06 Jun 2013
UK Hit no. 2.
http://wn.com/The_Shadows_Atlantis_1963
photo: AP / Alexei Nikolsky
07 Jun 2013
By GREGORY L. WHITE and PAUL SONNE. MOSCOW—Russian President Vladimir Putin and his wife said Thursday they are separating after nearly three decades of marriage, setting the stage for the first divorce of a Russian leader since Peter the Great and bringing an end to years of speculation about the state of the couple's union. Enlarge Image. Close. "It was our joint decision," Mr ... Mr ... Mr ... Mrs ... Asked if they were divorcing, Mrs ... Mr ... Close. Mr ... Mrs....(size: 5.6Kb)
photo: AP / Sebastian Scheiner
07 Jun 2013
The Israeli army has significantly increased its manpower on the Syrian border close to the only border crossing between the two countries, which became the scene of a battle between Syrian government and opposition fighters yesterday ... In addition to the extra military deployment, the army told local farmers to keep away from the area yesterday ... The Israeli army refused to comment on the extra deployment ... ....(size: 2.3Kb)
photo: Creative Commons
07 Jun 2013
The National Security Agency (NSA) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) are tapping directly into the central servers of nine leading US Internet companies, The Washington Post has reported. , this has allowed investigators to examine e-mails, photos and other documents of tens of millions of Americans that can be used to track people and their contacts over time ... 468 Source.. Al Jazeera and agencies ... Iran ... ....(size: 7.7Kb)
photo: AP / Reed Saxon
08 Jun 2013
SANTA MONICA, Calif.-A heavily armed gunman killed four people Friday in a terrifying rampage through the streets of Santa Monica that ended when police fatally shot him at a college library where students had been studying for exams. By Friday evening, investigators were still working to piece together the confusing string of incidents that unfolded about noon along Pico Boulevard and on the campus of Santa Monica College ... "No....(size: 6.9Kb)
photo: Creative Commons / ABr /
08 Jun 2013
SAO PAULO — Brazilian indigenous rights activists say the number of Indians killed in Latin America's biggest country has been rising since 2002. The Roman Catholic Church-backed Indigenous Missionary Council says 452 Indians were killed between 2002 and 2010 compared to 167 killed between 1995 and 2002. The council says conflicts between ranchers and Indians account for most of the killings ... Special Report ... Orientalist Artworks ... Middle5....(size: 2.9Kb)
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Jakarta Post
09 Jun 2013
Paper Edition . Page. 2 ... “He passed away at 7.05 p.m. local time in Singapore,” House of Representatives deputy speaker and former PDI-P secretary-general Pramono Anung said in an official statement ... on Sunday ... He started his political career when he was in college when he became the chairman of the Indonesian Nationalist Students Movement [GMNI] in 1963,” said Hanta Yuda, political analyst from the Pol-Tracking Institute ... ....(size: 3.6Kb)
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WPXI
09 Jun 2013
Today is Sunday, June 16, the 167th day of 2013. There are 198 days left in the year. Highlights in history on this date.. 1671 - Rebel Cossack leader Stenka Razin is executed by quartering in Moscow's Red Square. 1779 - Spain declares war on Britain, and begins a four-year siege of Gibraltar ... James Palace in London ... 1960 - U.S ... 1963 - First woman space traveler, Valentina Tereshkova, is launched into orbit from base in Soviet Union ... ....(size: 5.5Kb)
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Detroit news
09 Jun 2013
By Jenny King comments. Jenny King is a Detroit-area freelance writer. Tweet Email Share. A A A. CARY, N.C. — The Tarheels Tigers Pontiac Club gathered the troops at a small shopping center here the first weekend in June to celebrate Pontiacs, Buicks and Cadillacs for a fund raiser and a chance to talk cars ... The Greenville, N.C ... Across the way a like-new 1963 Pontiac Catalina Safari wagon owned by Ken Nagy of Wake Forest, N.C ... 615 W ... ....(size: 7.2Kb)
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The Examiner
09 Jun 2013
Rating for 'Georges Braque and the Cubist Still Life, 1928-1945'. 4. The 44 paintings in "Georges Braque and the Cubist Still Life, 1928-1945", which opened today at D.C.'s The Phillips Collection, will make you want to do just that.View slideshow ... Focuses on tactile textures and historical context ... Braque (1882–1963), trained originally as a decorator, evoked textures like stucco, wood, glass, cloth, and marble ... Rosenberg fled....(size: 8.9Kb)
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The Observer
09 Jun 2013
‘A drama without actors’. After Lunch, 1975 by Patrick Caulfield. Photograph. the estate of Patrick Caulfield. Patrick Caulfield and Gary Hume make a fine pair at Tate Britain. two English painters who created something exhilaratingly new with their medium ... Patrick Caulfield/Gary Hume Tate Britain, London SW1 Starts 5 June 2013 Until 1 September Venue details ... By 1963 the humour and the black outlines had set in ... Café Interior ... Photograph ... ....(size: 9.0Kb)
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The Star
09 Jun 2013
The police have to explain their tardiness in investigating the most infamous land forgery case in Malaysia. This is a heart-rending story, a story about an incessant quest for justice by three generations of a Thai family ... Under section 81(3) of the National Land Code (Penang and Malacca Titles) Act 1963 (Act 518), Form 14A was then treated more or less as proof of ownership over the said lands ... But it came too late for the Boonsoms ... ....(size: 9.5Kb)
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The Examiner
09 Jun 2013
There is a tombstone in Ashby, Massachusetts that reads, “Remember friend, as you pass by, as you are now, so once was I. As I am now, so you must be. Prepare yourself to follow me.” ... A lot of the fear about death has gone from me. I am someone who actually delights in being with people as they are dying ... The body is right there ... That combination led me, as early as 1963, to start to work with dying people and to be available to them ... ... ... ....(size: 14.4Kb)
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The Los Angeles Times
08 Jun 2013
Tommy Davis, whose name oozes excellence and tradition among Dodgers fans, doesn't go to Dodger Stadium much these days. "I like my refrigerator too much," he says. But the 74-year-old Davis, once the gold standard of left fielders, will be on the field and in uniform Saturday. That's when former Dodgers will play an old-timers' game in celebration of the 50th anniversary of their 1963 World Series title. Bill Dwyre. . Also ... Story No. 1 ... 2 ... ....(size: 7.5Kb)
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The Washington Post
08 Jun 2013
He says the exhibit also strives to capture the family’s grief after the death of the president and first lady Jacqueline Kennedy’s newborn son, Patrick Bouvier Kennedy, in August 1963....(size: 1.0Kb)
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Newstrack India
08 Jun 2013
The 76-year-old was speaking ahead of the 50th anniversary of her June 16, 1963, blastoff which propelled her into the record books and made her one of the Soviet Union's most feted astronauts ... Tereshkova spent three days orbiting the Earth in 1963 and is one of only three female Russian astronauts to have participated in a space mission, compared ......(size: 1.9Kb)
This article is about the year 1963. For other uses, see 1963 (disambiguation).
| Millennium: | 2nd millennium |
|---|---|
| Centuries: | 19th century – 20th century – 21st century |
| Decades: | 1930s 1940s 1950s – 1960s – 1970s 1980s 1990s |
| Years: | 1960 1961 1962 – 1963 – 1964 1965 1966 |
| 1963 by topic: |
| Subject |
| By country |
| Leaders |
| Birth and death categories |
| Establishments and disestablishments categories |
| Works and introductions categories |
| Gregorian calendar | 1963 MCMLXIII |
| Ab urbe condita | 2716 |
| Armenian calendar | 1412 ԹՎ ՌՆԺԲ |
| Assyrian calendar | 6713 |
| Bahá'í calendar | 119–120 |
| Bengali calendar | 1370 |
| Berber calendar | 2913 |
| British Regnal year | 11 Eliz. 2 – 12 Eliz. 2 |
| Buddhist calendar | 2507 |
| Burmese calendar | 1325 |
| Byzantine calendar | 7471–7472 |
| Chinese calendar | 壬寅年十二月初六日 (4599/4659-12-6) — to —
癸卯年十一月十六日(4600/4660-11-16) |
| Coptic calendar | 1679–1680 |
| Ethiopian calendar | 1955–1956 |
| Hebrew calendar | 5723–5724 |
| Hindu calendars | |
| - Vikram Samvat | 2019–2020 |
| - Shaka Samvat | 1885–1886 |
| - Kali Yuga | 5064–5065 |
| Holocene calendar | 11963 |
| Iranian calendar | 1341–1342 |
| Islamic calendar | 1382–1383 |
| Japanese calendar | Shōwa 38 (昭和38年) |
| Julian calendar | Gregorian minus 13 days |
| Korean calendar | 4296 |
| Minguo calendar | ROC 52 民國52年 |
| Thai solar calendar | 2506 |
 |
Wikimedia Commons has media related to: 1963 |
Year 1963 (MCMLXIII) was a common year starting on Tuesday (link will display the full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar.
Events[link]
January[link]
- January 1
- Osamu Tezuka's Tetsuwan Atomu (Astro Boy), Japan's first serialized animated series based on the popular manga, debuts on Japanese television station Fuji TV.
- Bogle-Chandler case: CSIRO scientist Dr. Gilbert Bogle and Mrs. Margaret Chandler are found dead (presumed poisoned), in bushland near the Lane Cove River, Sydney.
- January 8 – Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa is exhibited in the United States for the first time, at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C..
- January 14
- George C. Wallace becomes governor of Alabama. In his inaugural speech, he defiantly proclaims "segregation now, segregation tomorrow, and segregation forever!"[1][2]
- The locomotive Flying Scotsman (British Railways No. 60103) makes its last scheduled run, before going into the hands of Alan Pegler for preservation.
- January 18 – Netherlands Due to severe winter conditions the twelfth elfstedentocht almost turns into a total disaster. Of the 9294 participants only 69 manage to finish, making this the heaviest elfstedentocht ever held.
- January 22 – France and Germany sign the Elysée Treaty.
- January 26 – The Australia Day shootings rock Perth, Western Australia; 2 people are shot dead and 3 others injured by Eric Edgar Cooke.
- January 28 – African American student Harvey Gantt enters Clemson University in South Carolina, the last U.S. state to hold out against racial integration.
- January 29 – French President Charles de Gaulle vetoes the United Kingdom's entry into the EEC.
February[link]
- February 8 – Travel, financial and commercial transactions by United States citizens to Cuba are made illegal by the John F. Kennedy Administration.
- February 10 – Five Japanese cities located on the northernmost part of Kyūshū are merged and become the city of Kitakyūshū, with a population of more than 1 million.
- February 11 – The CIA's Domestic Operations Division is created.
- The Beatles record their debut album Please Please Me in a single session.
- Sylvia Plath commits suicide in London.
- February 12 – Northwest Orient Airlines Flight 705 crashes in the Florida Everglades killing all 43 persons aboard.
- February 14 – Harold Wilson becomes leader of Britain's opposition Labour Party, and could be within 18 months of becoming prime minister with a general election due in that time.[3]
- February 19 – The publication of Betty Friedan's The Feminine Mystique launches the reawakening of the Women's Movement in the United States as women's organizations and consciousness-raising groups spread.
- February 21 – An earthquake destroys the village of Barce, Libya, killing 900.
- February 27
- Juan Bosch takes office as the 41st president of the Dominican Republic.
- Female suffrage is enacted in Iran.
- February 28 – Dorothy Schiff resigns from the New York Newspaper Publisher's Association, feeling that the city needs at least one paper. Her paper, the New York Post, resumes publication on March 4.
March[link]
- March
- Iron Man debuts in Marvel Comics's Tales of Suspense #39.
- The divorce case of The Duke and Duchess of Argyll causes scandal in the United Kingdom.
- March 4 – In Paris, 6 people are sentenced to death for conspiring to assassinate President Charles de Gaulle. De Gaulle pardons 5 of them but the other conspirator is executed by firing squad a few days later.
- March 5 – In Camden, Tennessee, country music superstar Patsy Cline (Virginia Patterson Hensley) is killed in a plane crash along with fellow performers Hawkshaw Hawkins, Cowboy Copas and Cline's manager and pilot Randy Hughes, while returning from a benefit performance in Kansas City, Kansas for country radio disc jockey "Cactus" Jack Call.
- March 16 – Mount Agung erupts on Bali, killing 11,000.
- March 18 – Gideon v. Wainwright: The U.S. Supreme Court rules that the poor must have lawyers.
- March 21 – The Alcatraz Island federal penitentiary in San Francisco Bay closes; the last 27 prisoners are transferred elsewhere at the order of Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy.
- March 22 – The Beatles release their first album Please Please Me.
- March 23 – Dansevise by Grethe & Jørgen Ingmann (music by Otto Francker, text by Sejr Volmer-Sørensen) wins the Eurovision Song Contest 1963 for Denmark.
- March 27 – In Britain, Dr. Beeching issues a report calling for huge cuts to the UK's rail network.
- March 31 – The 1962 New York City newspaper strike ends after 114 days.
April[link]
- April 1 – The longrunning soap opera General Hospital debuted on ABC.
- April 3 – SCLC volunteers kick off the Birmingham campaign (Birmingham, Alabama) against racial segregation in the United States with a sit-in.
- April 7 – Yugoslavia is proclaimed to be a socialist republic, and Josip Broz Tito is named President for Life.
- April 8 – The 35th Academy Awards ceremony was held. Lawrence of Arabia won Best Picture.
- April 9 – Sir Winston Churchill becomes honorary citizen of the United States
- April 10 – The U.S. nuclear submarine Thresher sinks 220 miles (350 km) east of Cape Cod; all 129 crewmen die.
- April 12
- Martin Luther King, Jr., Ralph Abernathy, Fred Shuttlesworth and others are arrested in a Birmingham, Alabama protest for "parading without a permit".
- The Soviet nuclear powered submarine K-33 collides with the Finnish merchant vessel M/S Finnclipper in the Danish Straits. Although severely damaged, both vessels make it to port.
- April 14 – The Institute of Mental Health (Belgrade) is established.
- April 15 – 70,000 marchers arrive in London from Aldermaston, to demonstrate against nuclear weapons.
- April 16 – Martin Luther King, Jr. issues his Letter from Birmingham Jail.
- April 20 – In Quebec, Canada, members of the terrorist group Front de libération du Québec, bomb a Canadian Army recruitment center, killing night watchman Wilfred V. O'Neill.
- April 21–April 23 – The first election of the Supreme Institution of the Bahá'í Faith (known as the Universal House of Justice, whose seat is at the Bahá'í World Centre on Mount Carmel in Haifa, Israel) is held.
- April 22 – Lester Bowles Pearson becomes the 14th Prime Minister of Canada.
- April 28 – A general election is held in Italy.
- April 29 – Buddy Rogers becomes the first WWF Champion.
May[link]
- May 1 – The Coca-Cola Company introduces its first diet drink, TaB cola.
- May 2
- Thousands of African Americans, many of them children, are arrested while protesting segregation in Birmingham, Alabama. Public Safety Commissioner Eugene "Bull" Connor later unleashes fire hoses and police dogs on the demonstrators.
- Berthold Seliger launches near Cuxhaven a 3 stage rocket with a maximum flight altitude of more than 62 miles (the only sounding rocket developed in Germany).
- May 4 – The Le Monde Theater fire in Dioirbel, Senegal kills 64.
- May 8
- Dr. No, the first James Bond film, is shown in U.S. theaters.
- Hue Vesak shootings: The Army of the Republic of Vietnam opens fire on Buddhists who defy a ban on the flying of the Buddhist flag on Vesak, the birthday of Gautama Buddha, killing nine. Earlier, President Ngo Dinh Diem allowed the flying of the Vatican flag in honour of his brother, Archbishop Ngo Dinh Thuc.
- May 13 – A smallpox outbreak hits Stockholm, Sweden, lasting until July.
- May 15 – Mercury program: NASA launches Gordon Cooper on Mercury 9, the last mission (on June 12 NASA Administrator James E. Webb tells Congress the program is complete).
- May 23 – Fidel Castro visits the Soviet Union.
- May 25 – The Organisation of African Unity is established in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
- May 27 – The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan is singer-songwriter Bob Dylan's second studio album, and most influential, released by Columbia Records.
June[link]
- June 3 – Hue chemical attacks: The Army of the Republic of Vietnam pours chemicals on the heads of Buddhist protestors. The United States threatens to cut off aid to Ngo Dinh Diem's regime
- June 4 – President John F. Kennedy signs Executive Order 11110.
- June 5 – The first annual NHL draft is held in Montreal, Quebec.
- June 10 – The University of Central Florida is established by the Florida legislature.
- June 11
- In Saigon, Buddhist monk Thích Quảng Ðức commits self-immolation to protest the oppression of Buddhists by the Ngo Dinh Diem administration.
- Alabama Governor George C. Wallace stands in the door of the University of Alabama to protest against integration, before stepping aside and allowing African Americans James Hood and Vivian Malone to enroll.
- President John F. Kennedy delivered a historic Civil Rights Address, in which he promises a Civil Rights Bill, and asks for "the kind of equality of treatment that we would want for ourselves."
- June 12
- Medgar Evers is murdered in Jackson, Mississippi (his killer is convicted in 1994).
- Release of the film Cleopatra.
- June 13 – The cancellation of Mercury 10 effectively ends the Mercury program of United States manned spaceflight.
- June 16 – Vostok 6 carries Soviet cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova, the first woman, into space.
- June 17 – Abington School District v. Schempp: The U.S. Supreme Court rules that state-mandated Bible reading in public schools is unconstitutional.
- June 19 – Valentina Tereshkova the first woman in space, returns to Earth.
- June 21 – Pope Paul VI (Giovanni Battista Montini) succeeds Pope John XXIII as the 262nd pope.
- June 26 – John F. Kennedy gives his 'Ich bin ein Berliner' speech in West Berlin.
July[link]
- July 1 – ZIP Codes are introduced in the U.S.
- July 5
- Diplomatic relations between the Israeli and the Japanese governments are raised to embassy level.
- The Roman Catholic Church accepts cremation as a funeral practice.
- July 7 – Double Seven Day scuffle: Secret police loyal to Ngo Dinh Nhu, brother of President Ngo Dinh Diem, attack American journalists including Peter Arnett and David Halberstam at a demonstration during the Buddhist crisis.
- July 12 – Pauline Reade, 16, is abducted by Myra Hindley and Ian Brady in Manchester, England. Her remains would be found in July 1987.
- July 19 – American test pilot Joe Walker, flying the X-15, reaches an altutude of 65.8 miles (105.9 kilometers), making it a sub-orbital spaceflight by recognized international standards.
- July 26
- An earthquake in Skopje, Yugoslavia (now in the Republic of Macedonia) leaves 1,800 dead.
- NASA launches Syncom 2, the world's first geostationary (synchronous) satellite.
- July 30 – The Soviet newspaper Izvestia reports that Kim Philby has been given asylum in Moscow.
August[link]
- August 5 – The United States, United Kingdom, and Soviet Union sign a nuclear test ban treaty.
- August 8 – The Great Train Robbery of 1963 takes place in Buckinghamshire, England.
- August 15 – President Fulbert Youlou is overthrown in the Republic of Congo, after a three-day uprising in the capital.
- August 18 – American civil rights movement: James Meredith becomes the first black person to graduate from the University of Mississippi.
- August 21
- Xa Loi Pagoda raids: The Army of the Republic of Vietnam Special Forces loyal to Ngo Dinh Nhu, brother of President Ngo Dinh Diem, vandalise Buddhist pagodas across the country, arresting thousands and leaving an estimated hundreds dead.
- Cable 243: In the wake of the Xa Loi Pagoda raids, the Kennedy administration orders the US Embassy, Saigon to explore alternative leadership in South Vietnam, opening the way towards a coup against Diem.
- August 22 – American test pilot Joe Walker again achieves a sub-orbital spaceflight according to international standards, this time by piloting the X-15 to an altutude of 67.0 miles (107.8 kilometers).
- August 28 – Martin Luther King, Jr. delivers his I Have A Dream speech on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial to an audience of at least 250,000, during the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom.
September[link]
- September – Marvel Comics releases the first-ever X-Men comic book
- September 5 – British prostitute Christine Keeler is arrested for perjury. On December 6 she is sentenced to 9 months in prison.
- September 6 – The Centre for International Industrial Property Studies (CEIPI) is founded.
- September 7 – The Pro Football Hall of Fame opens in Canton, Ohio with 17 charter members.
- September 10 – Mafia boss Bernardo Provenzano is indicted for murder (he is captured 43 years later, on April 11, 2006).
- September 15 – American civil rights movement: The 16th Street Baptist Church bombing, in Birmingham, Alabama, kills 4 and injures 22.
- September 16
- Malaysia is formed through the merging of the Federation of Malaya and the British crown colony of Singapore, North Borneo (renamed Sabah) and Sarawak.
- In Fort-Lamy, Chad, demonstrations are quelled with 300 dead.
- September 18 – Rioters burn down the British Embassy in Jakarta, to protest the formation of Malaysia.
- September 23 – King Fahd University for Petroleum and Minerals is established by a Saudi Royal Decree as the College of Petroleum and Minerals.
- September 24 – The U.S. Senate ratifies the nuclear test ban treaty.
- September 25 – The Denning Report on the Profumo affair is published in Great Britain.
- September 27– The Littlest Hobo debuts on TV across North America with the first episode entitled "Blue Water Sailor".
- September 29
- The second period of the Second Vatican Council in Rome opens.
- The University of East Anglia is established in Norwich, England.
October[link]
- October 1
- Nigeria becomes a republic; The 1st Republican Constitution is established
- In the U.S., the President's Commission on the Status of Women issues its final reports to President Kennedy.
- October 2 – Los Angeles Dodgers left-handed pitcher Sandy Koufax sets a World Series record by striking out 15 New York Yankees in a 5-2 victory in Game 1 at Yankee Stadium. The Dodgers sweep the series in four straight, with Koufax defeating the Yankees 2-1 in Game 4 at Dodger Stadium.
- October 4 – Hurricane Flora, one of the worst Atlantic storms in history, hits Hispaniola and Cuba killing nearly 7,000 people.
- October 8 – Sam Cooke and his band are arrested after trying to register at a "whites only" motel in Louisiana. In the months following, he records the song "A Change Is Gonna Come".
- October 9 – In northeast Italy, over 2,000 people are killed when a large landslide behind the Vajont Dam causes a giant wave of water to overtop it.
- October 10
- The nuclear test ban treaty, signed on August 5, takes effect.
- The second James Bond film, From Russia with Love, opens in the UK.
- October 14 – A revolution starts in Radfan, South Yemen, against British colonial rule.
- October 16 – The thousandth day of John F. Kennedy's presidency.
- October 19 – Alec Douglas-Home succeeds Harold Macmillan as British Prime Minister.
- October 28 – Demolition of the 1910 Pennsylvania Station begins in New York City. Demolition continues until 1966.
- October 30 – Car manufacturing firm Lamborghini is founded.
- October 31 – 74 die in a gas explosion during a Holiday on Ice show at the Indiana State Fair Coliseum in Indianapolis.
November[link]
- November 1 – Arecibo Observatory officially begins operation.
- November 2 – 1963 South Vietnamese coup: South Vietnamese President Ngo Dinh Diem is assassinated following a military coup.
- November 6
- Vietnam War: Coup leader General Duong Van Minh takes over as leader of South Vietnam.
- Laura Welch (later Bush) causes a car accident that results in the death of Michael Dutton Douglas in her hometown of Midland, Texas.
- November 7 – Wunder von Lengede: In Germany, 11 miners are rescued from a collapsed mine after 14 days.
- November 8 – Finnair flight OH-LCA crashes before landing at Mariehamn airport on the Åland islands.
- November 9
- Miike Coal Mine explosion: In Japan, a coal mine explosion kills 458 and sends 839 carbon monoxide poisoning victims to the hospital.
- A triple-train disaster in Yokohama, Japan kills 161.
- November 10 – Malcolm X makes a historic speech in Detroit, Michigan: Message to the Grass Roots
- November 14 – A volcanic eruption under the sea near Iceland creates a new island, Surtsey.
- November 16 – A newspaper strike begins in Toledo, Ohio.
- November 18
- The Dartford Tunnel opens in the U.K.
- The first push-button telephone is made available to AT&T customers.
- November 22
- The Beatles' second U.K. album, With The Beatles, is released
- John F. Kennedy assassination: In Dallas, Texas, United States President John F. Kennedy is assassinated, Texas Governor John B. Connally is seriously wounded, and Vice President Lyndon Baines Johnson becomes the 36th President. All television coverage for the next four days is devoted to the assassination, its aftermath, the procession of the horsedrawn casket to the Capitol Rotunda, and the funeral of President Kennedy. Stores and businesses shut down for the entire weekend and Monday, in tribute.
- November 23
- John Kilbride, 12, is abducted by Myra Hindley and Ian Brady in Great Britain.
- The first episode of the BBC television series Doctor Who is broadcast in the United Kingdom.
- The Golden Age Nursing Home fire kills 63 elderly people near Fitchville, Ohio.
- November 24
- John F. Kennedy assassination:Lee Harvey Oswald, alleged assassin of John F. Kennedy, is shot dead by Jack Ruby in Dallas, Texas on live national television. Later that night, a hastily arranged program, A Tribute to John F. Kennedy from the Arts, featuring actors, opera singers, and noted writers, all performing dramatic readings and/or music, is telecast on ABC-TV.
- Vietnam War: New U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson confirms that the United States intends to continue supporting South Vietnam militarily and economically.
- November 25 – U.S. President Kennedy is buried at Arlington National Cemetery. Schools around the nation do not have class on that day, millions watch the funeral on live international television.
- November 29
- U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson establishes the Warren Commission to investigate the assassination of President Kennedy.
- Trans-Canada Airlines Flight 831, a Douglas DC-8 carrying 118, crashes into a wooded hillside after taking-off from Dorval International Airport near Montreal, killing all on board (the worst air disaster for many years in Canada's history).
- Foundation stone for Mirzapur Cadet College is led in East Pakistan (now Bangladesh).
December[link]
- December 3 – The Warren Commission begins its investigation.
- December 4 – The second period of Second Vatican Council closes.
- December 5 – The Seliger Forschungs-und-Entwicklungsgesellschaft mbH demonstrates rockets for military use to military representatives of non-NATO-countries near Cuxhaven. Although these rockets land via parachute at the end of their flight and no allied laws are violated, the Soviet Union protests this action.
- December 7 – Tony Verna, a CBS-TV director, invented Instant Replay and aired it during his direction of a live, televised sporting event, the 1963 Army-Navy Game played in Philadelphia.
- December 8
- A lightning strike causes the crashing of Pan Am Flight 214 near Elkton, Maryland, killing 81 people.
- Frank Sinatra Jr. is kidnapped at Harrah's Lake Tahoe.
- December 10 – In the United States, the X-20 Dyna-Soar spaceplane program is cancelled. Also on this date: Chuck Yeager "while testing an NF-104A rocket-augmented aerospace trainer, he narrowly escaped death when his aircraft went out of control at 108,700 feet (nearly 21 miles up) and crashed. He parachuted to safety at 8,500 feet after vainly battling to gain control of the powerless, rapidly falling craft. In this incident he became the first pilot to make an emergency ejection in the full pressure suit needed for high altitude flights.”
- December 12 – Kenya becomes independent, with Jomo Kenyatta as prime minister.
- December 19 – Zanzibar gains independence from Great Britain as a constitutional monarchy, under Sultan Jamshid bin Abdullah.
- December 21 – Cyprus Emergency: Inter-communal fighting erupts between Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots.
- December 22 – The cruise ship Lakonia burns 180 miles (290 km) north of Madeira, with the loss of 128 lives.
- December 25
- Walt Disney releases his 18th feature-length animated motion picture The Sword in the Stone, about the boyhood of King Arthur. It is the penultimate animated film personally supervised by Disney.
- İsmet İnönü of CHP forms the new government of Turkey (28th government, coalition partners; independents, İnönü has served 10 ten times as a prime minister, this is his last government)
- December 26 – "I Want to Hold Your Hand" and "I Saw Her Standing There" are released in the U.S., marking the beginning of Beatlemania on an international level.
Date unknown[link]
- The 1955 film Oklahoma!, an adaptation of the famed Rodgers and Hammerstein musical, is re-released.
- David. H. Frisch and J. H. Smith prove that the radioactive decay of mesons is slowed by their motion (see Einstein's special relativity and general relativity).
- The Semi Automatic Ground Environment is fully deployed.
- TAT-3 cable goes into operation.
- Ivan Sutherland writes the revolutionary Sketchpad program and runs it on the Lincoln TX-2 computer at MIT.
- Construction of Moscow's Ostankino Tower begins.
- Harvey Ball invents the ubiquitous smiley face symbol.
- The Reformed Druids of North America (RDNA) is founded.
- The IEEE Computer Society is founded.
- The Urdu typewriter keyboard is standardised by the Central Language Board in Pakistan.
- For the first time in four consecutive years, the film The Wizard of Oz is not telecast. Reasons for this remain unknown to this day, but because the film at that time was telecast during the second week of December and the nation was still in mourning over the Kennedy assassination then, it could be that CBS executives decided it would be inappropriate to show it less than three weeks after such a tragic event.
Births[link]
January[link]
- January 2
- David Cone, American baseball player
- Edgar Martínez, American baseball player
- January 4 – Till Lindemann, German singer (Rammstein)
- January 6 – Tony Halme, Finnish boxer and politician (d. 2010)
- January 13 – Jiang Wen, Chinese actor
- January 14 – Steven Soderbergh, American film director
- January 16 – James May, English motoring journalist and television show host
- January 18 – Ian Crook, English footballer
- January 20 – Firebreaker Chip, American professional wrestler
- January 21
- Hakeem Olajuwon, Nigerian basketball player
- Detlef Schrempf, German basketball player
- January 23 – Gail O'Grady, American actress
- January 24 – Arnold Vanderlyde, Dutch boxer
- January 26
- Chin Siu Ho, Hong Kong actor
- José Mourinho, Portuguese football manager
- Riddell Akua, Nauruan politician
- January 30 – Thomas Brezina, Austrian author
February[link]
- February 2 – Eva Cassidy, American vocalist (d. 1996)
- February 3 – Gretel Killeen, Australian journalist
- February 4 – Pirmin Zurbriggen, Swiss alpine skier
- February 11 – Diane Franklin, American actress
- February 14 – Dwayne Wiggins, American singer-songwriter and record producer
- February 17 – Michael Jordan, American basketball player
- February 18 – Rob Andrew, English rugby union player
- February 19 – Seal, English singer
- February 20 – Charles Barkley, American basketball player
- February 21 – William Baldwin, American actor
- February 22
- Vijay Singh, Fiji golfer
- Donald Braswell II, American singer
- Don Wakamatsu, American baseball player
- February 23 – Bobby Bonilla, American baseball player
- February 26 – Chase Masterson, American actress and singer
March[link]
- March 1 – Russell Wong, American actor
- March 2 – Tuff Hedeman, American PRCA World Champion Bull Rider
- March 3 – Martín Fiz, Spanish long-distance runner
- March 4 – Daniel Roebuck, American actor
- March 5 – Joel Osteen, American televangelist and son of John Osteen
- March 6 – Gary L. Stevens, American jockey
- March 7 – Kim Ung-yong, Korean child prodigy
- March 12 – Joaquim Cruz, Brazilian runner
- March 13 – Fito Páez, Argentine musician
- March 14 – Bruce Reid, Australian cricketer
- March 15 – Bret Michaels, American rock singer (Poison)
- March 17 – Alex Fong, Hong Kong actor
- March 18
- Ratna Pathak, Indian film actress
- Vanessa L. Williams, American beauty queen, actress, and singer
- March 20
- Paul Annacone, American tennis player and coach
- Kathy Ireland, American model and actress
- March 21 – Ronald Koeman, Dutch football player and manager
- March 22 – Susan Ann Sulley, British musician
- March 23 – Jose Miguel Gonzalez Martin del Campo, Spanish football player
- March 26 – Natsuhiko Kyogoku, Japanese writer
- March 27
- Charly Alberti, Argentinian musician
- Quentin Tarantino, American actor, director, writer, and producer
- Xuxa, Brazilian television personality
April[link]
- April 3
- Criss Oliva, American metal guitarist (Savatage)
- Karl Beattie, Director, Husband Of Yvette Fielding
- April 4
- Jack Del Rio, American football player and coach
- Graham Norton, Irish comedian and talk show host
- Frank Yallop, Canadian footballer
- April 6 – Rafael Correa, President of Ecuador
- April 8 – Julian Lennon, British musician son of John Lennon
- April 9 – Joe Scarborough, American newscaster
- April 10 – Doris Leuthard, Swiss Federal Councillor
- April 11 – Chris Ferguson, American poker player
- April 12 – Michael English, American Christian musician
- April 13 – Garry Kasparov, Russian chess player
- April 16 – Jimmy Osmond, American singer
- April 17 – Joel Murray, American actor
- April 18
- Eric McCormack, Canadian actor
- Conan O'Brien, American television entertainer and talk show host
- April 19 – Valerie Plame, former United States CIA Operations officer
- April 21
- Ken Caminiti, American baseball player (d. 2004)
- Roy Dupuis, Canadian actor
- April 24 – Tõnu Trubetsky, Estonian rock musician (Vennaskond)
- April 26
- Jet Li, Chinese martial artist and actor
- Colin Scotts, Australian-born American football player
- April 27
- Cali Timmins, Canadian actress
- Russell T Davies, Welsh television producer and writer
- April 29 – Mike Babcock, Canadian ice hockey coach
- April 30 – Michael Waltrip, American race car driver
May[link]
- May 1 – Benjamin LaGuer, American prisoner proclaiming innocence for more than two decades
- May 2 – Ray Traylor, American professional wrestler ("Big Bossman") (d. 2004)
- May 5 – James LaBrie, Canadian vocalist (Dream Theater)
- May 9 – Gary Daniels, British martial artist and actor
- May 10 – A. Raja, Indian politician
- May 11 – Natasha Richardson, English actress (d. 2009)
- May 12 – Jerry Trimble, American actor and martial artist
- May 16
- Jon Coffelt, American artist
- Mercedes Echerer, Austrian actress and politician
- May 19 – Yazz, English singer
- May 23 – Wally Dallenbach Jr., American race car driver and announcer
- May 24
- Joe Dumars, American basketball player
- Rich Rodriguez, American football coach
- May 25
- Mike Myers, Canadian actor and comedian
- Eha Rünne, Estonian shot putter and discus thrower
- May 26 – Clive Cowdery, English insurance entrepreneur
- May 29 – Lisa Whelchel, American actress, singer and writer.
- May 31 –Wesley Willis, American outsider musician (d. 2003)
June[link]
- June 5 – Joe Rudán, Hungarian heavy metal singer
- June 6 – Jason Isaacs, British actor
- June 9 – Johnny Depp, American actor
- June 12
- Warwick Capper, Australian rules footballer
- Jerry Lynn, American professional wrestler
- Tim DeKay, American character actor
- June 13 – Bettina Bunge, German tennis player
- June 14 – Graham Brown, Canadian Athlete ("The Rug")
- June 15 – Helen Hunt, American actress
- June 16 – James Fullington, American professional wrestler ("The Sandman)
- June 17 – Greg Kinnear, American actor
- June 18 – Bruce Smith, American football player
- June 20 – Amir Derakh, American musician
- June 22 – Randy Couture, American mixed martial arts fighter
- June 23 – Colin Montgomerie, Scottish golfer
- June 24
- Mike Wieringo, American comic-book artist (d. 2007)
- Preki, Serbia-born American footballer
- June 25
- Doug Gilmour, Canadian hockey player
- George Michael, English singer
- June 26 – Mikhail Khodorkovsky, Russian businessman, former Komsomol activist and oligarch
- June 29 – Anne-Sophie Mutter, German violinist
- June 30 – Yngwie Malmsteen, Swedish guitarist, composer, and bandleader
July[link]
- July 4 – Christopher George Kennedy, American son of Robert F. Kennedy
- July 6 – Miguel De Garikoitz Aspiazu Rubina, Basque separatist
- July 11 – Lisa Rinna, American actress
- July 16 – Phoebe Cates, American actress
- July 17
- Letsie III, King of Lesotho
- Matti Nykanen, Finnish ski jumper
- July 18 – Allen Sarven, American professional wrestler (Al Snow)
- July 22 – Emilio Butragueno, Spanish football player
- July 24
- Julie Krone, American jockey
- Karl Malone, American basketball player
- July 27 – Donnie Yen, Hong Kong actor and martial artist
- July 28 – Gregory Henriquez, Canadian architect
- July 29
- Graham Poll, English football referee
- Jim Beglin, Irish football commentator
- July 30
- Lisa Kudrow, American actress
- Chris Mullin, American basketball player and executive
August[link]
- August 1 – Coolio, American rapper
- August 2 – Laura Bennett, American fashion designer
- August 3 – James Hetfield, American musician (Metallica)
- August 6 – Kevin Mitnick, American computer hacker
- August 7 – Patrick Bouvier Kennedy, son of U.S. President John F. Kennedy and First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy (d. 1963)
- August 8 – Stephen Walkom, Canadian ice hockey official and executive
- August 9 – Whitney Houston, American singer (d. 2012)
- August 13 – Pamela Stein, American actress and model
- August 15 – Valery Levaneuski, entrepreneur, politician, former political prisoner
- August 17 – James Whitbourn, British composer
- August 19 – John Stamos, American actor
- August 22 – Tori Amos, American singer
- August 23
- Hans-Henning Fastrich, German field hockey player
- Kenny Wallace, American race car driver
- Park Chan-wook, South Korean film director and screenwriter
- August 24 – Hideo Kojima, Japanese video-game director
- August 26
- Michael Tao, Hong Kong actor
- Liu Huan, Chinese singer
- August 30
- Michael Chiklis, American actor
- Phil Mills, British race car driver
- August 31
- Todd Carty, British actor
- The Egyptian Lover, American rapper, DJ and producer
September[link]
- September 1 – Carola Smit, Dutch musician
- September 6 – Geert Wilders, Dutch politician
- September 7 – Eric Wright (Eazy-E), American rapper (d. 1995)
- September 8 – Li Ning, Chinese gymnast
- September 9 – Markus Wasmeier, German alpine-skier
- September 10 – Randy Johnson, American baseball player
- September 11 – Joey Dedio, American actor
- September 12 – Norberto Barba, American cinematographer and film director
- September 14 – Robert Herjavec, Canadian businessman, investor, and television personality
- September 16 – Richard Marx, American pop/rock singer
- September 17 – Masahiro Chono, Japanese professional wrestler
- September 19
- Jarvis Cocker, English rock musician (Pulp)
- David Seaman, English football goalkeeper
- September 21
- Cecil Fielder, American baseball player
- Angus MacFadyen, Scottish actor
- September 28 – Steve Blackman, American professional wrestler
- September 29
- Dave Andreychuk, Canadian hockey player
- Les Claypool, American bassist (Primus)
October[link]
- October 1 – Mark McGwire, American baseball player
- October 5
- Laura Davies, English golfer
- Ronni Le Tekrø, Norwegian guitarist (TNT)
- October 6 – Elisabeth Shue, American actress
- October 10
- Anita Mui, Hong Kong singer (d. 2003)
- Daniel Pearl, American journalist (d. 2002)
- Jolanda de Rover, Dutch swimmer
- October 12 – Satoshi Kon, Japanese anime director (d. 2010)
- October 13
- Alan McDonald, Northern Irish footballer
- Mabi de Almeida, Angolan professional football coach
- Ha seungmoo, Korean poet and presbyterian minister
- October 17 – Norm Macdonald, Canadian comedian
- October 22 – Brian Boitano, American figure skater
- October 23
- Thomas Di Leva, Swedish singer
- Wilson Yip, Hong Kong actor and director
- October 25 – John Levén, Swedish bassist (Europe)
- October 26 – Natalie Merchant, American singer, songwriter, and musician
- October 27 – Feyyaz Uçar, Turkish footballer
- October 28
- Mark Kwok, Hong Kong actor
- Lauren Holly, American actress
- October 30 – Kristina Wagner, American actress
- October 31
- Fred McGriff, American baseball player
- Johnny Marr, English musician
- Dermot Mulroney, American actor
- Rob Schneider, American actor
- Sarah Brown, wife of British Prime Minister Gordon Brown
- Barry Sanders, A really cool guy from Calgary, Alberta, Canada
November[link]
- November 1
- Rick Allen, British rock musician (Def Leppard)
- Mark Hughes, Welsh football player & manager
- Katja Riemann, German actress
- November 2
- Craig Saavedra, American filmmaker
- Bobby Dall, American rock bassist (Poison)
- November 4 – Lena Zavaroni, Scottish entertainer (d. 1999)
- November 7 – John Barnes, Jamaican-born English footballer
- November 11 – Kip James, American professional wrestler
- November 13 – Vinny Testaverde, American football player
- November 15 – Benny Elias, Australian rugby player
- November 18 – Dante Bichette, American baseball player
- November 19
- Terry Farrell, American actress
- Jon Potter, British field hockey player
- Peter Schmeichel, Danish football player
- November 21 – Nicollette Sheridan, English actress
- November 22 – Winsor Harmon, American actor
- November 23 – Troy Hurtubise, Canadian inventor
- November 25
- Holly Cole, Canadian jazz singer
- Bernie Kosar, American football player
December[link]
- December 2 – Ann Patchett, American novelist
- December 3 – Terri Schiavo, American right-to-die cause célèbre (d. 2005)
- December 4 – Sergey Bubka, Ukrainian pole vaulter
- December 7 – Mark Bowen, Welsh footballer
- December 8
- Toshiaki Kawada, Japanese professional wrestler
- Greg Howe, American guitarist
- December 12 – Ai Orikasa, Japanese seiyuu
- December 13
- Jake White, South African rugby coach
- Uwe-Jens Mey, German speed skater
- December 14
- Cynthia Gibb, American actress
- Vytautas Juozapaitis, Lithuanian baritone, pedagogue (professor) and TV host
- December 16
- Benjamin Bratt, American actor
- Jeff Carson, American singer
- December 18
- Pauline Ester, French singer
- Charles Oakley, American basketball player
- Brad Pitt, American actor
- December 19 – Jennifer Beals, American actress
- December 21
- Govinda Ahuja, Indian actor and politician
- Jacques Simonet, Belgian politician (d. 2007)
- December 22
- Bryan Gunn, Scottish footballer
- Luna H. Mitani, Japanese-American Surrealist painter
- December 23
- Jim Harbaugh, American football player
- Donna Tartt, American author
- December 26 – Lars Ulrich, Danish-born rock drummer (Metallica)
- December 29
- Francisco Bustamante, Filipino billiard player
- Sean Payton, American football coach
- December 30 – Kim Hill, American Christian singer
Deaths[link]
January[link]
- January 1
- Filippo Del Giudice, Italian film producer (b. 1892)
- Robert S. Kerr, American business and politician, heart attack (b. 1896)
- January 2
- Jack Carson, Canadian actor, stomach cancer (b. 1910) [4]
- Al Mamaux, professional baseball player and manager (b. 1894)
- Dick Powell, American actor, lymphoma (b. 1904) [5]
- January 5
- Rogers Hornsby, American baseball player, heart attack after cataract surgery (b. 1896)
- Erik Strandmark, Swedish film actor, plane crash (b. 1919)
- January 6
- Frank Tuttle, American film director (b. 1892)
- Stark Young, American teacher, playwright, novelist, painter, literary critic, and essayist (b. 1881)
- January 7 – Erik Lundqvist, Swedish athlete (b. 1908)
- January 8
- Boris Morros, American movie producer and FBI double agent (b. 1891)
- Jack Okey, American art director (b. 1889)
- January 10 – Franz Planer, European film cinematographer (b. 1894)
- January 13
- Sonny Clark, American jazz pianist, heart attack (b. 1931)
- Sylvanus Olympio, 1st President of Togo, assassination (b. 1902)
- January 14 – Gustav Regler, German Socialist novelist (b. 1898)
- January 16
- Cesare Fantoni, Italian film actor (b. 1905)
- Gilardo Gilardi, Argentine composer, pianist, and conductor (b. 1889)
- January 18 – Edward Charles Titchmarsh, British mathematician (b. 1899)
- January 21 – Al St. John, American actor, heart attack (b. 1893)
- January 23 – Józef Gosławski, Polish sculptor and medallic artist (b. 1908)
- January 24
- Otto Harbach, American lyricist and librettist (b. 1873)
- Kenneth Western, part of The Western Brothers (b. 1899)
- January 25 – Marion Sunshine, American actoress (b. 1894)
- January 26 – Ole Olsen, American actor, kidney ailment (b. 1892)
- January 27 – Evelyn Francisco, silent film actress (b. 1904)
- January 28
- John Farrow, American film director, heart attack (b. 1904)
- Jean Piccard, Swiss-born chemist and engineer (b. 1884)
- January 29
- Anthony Coldeway, American screenwriter (b. 1887)
- Robert Frost, American poet, heart failure (b. 1874)
- Lee Meadows, professional baseball player (b. 1894)
- January 30
- Jane Gail, American silent movie and stage actress (b. 1890)
- Cecil McGivern, British broadcasting executive and writer (b. 1907)
- Francis Poulenc, French composer, heart failure (b. 1899)
- January 31
- Alasgar Alakbarov, Azerbaijani actor (b. 1910)
- Ossie Vitt, professional baseball player and manager (b. 1890)
February[link]
- February 1
- Louis D. Lighton, American screenwriter and producer (b. 1895)
- Wyndham Standing, English actor (b. 1880)
- February 2 – William Gaxton, star of vaudeville, film, and theatre, cancer (b. 1893)
- February 6 – Piero Manzoni, Italian artist, heart attack (b. 1933)
- February 8 – George Dolenz, American actor, heart attack (b. 1908)
- February 9 – Abd al-Karim Qasim, Prime minister of Iraq, shot to death (b. 1914)
- February 11 – Sylvia Plath, American poet and novelist, suicide (b. 1932)
- February 15
- Edgardo Donato, Uruguayan tango composer and orchestra leader (b. 1897)
- Louis J. Gasnier, French film director (b. 1875)
- Bump Hadley, Major League Baseball pitcher (b. 1904)
- February 16
- Else Jarlbak, Danish film actress (b. 1911)
- László Lajtha, Hungarian composer, ethnomusicologist and conductor (b. 1892)
- February 18
- Monte Blue, American actor, heart attack because of complications from influenza (b. 1887)
- Beppe Fenoglio, Italian writer (b. 1887)
- Tokugawa Iemasa, Japanese politician, 17th head of the former Tokugawa shogunate (b. 1884)
- February 19 – Benny Moré, Cuban singer, cirrhosis (b. 1919)
- February 20
- Ferenc Fricsay, Hungarian conductor, cancer (b. 1914)
- Jacob Gade, Danish violinist and composer (b. 1879)
- Bill Hinchman, professional baseball player (b. 1883)
- February 22 – Arthur Guy Empey, soldier, author, screenwriter, and actor (b. 1883)
- February 24 – Herbert Asbury, American journalist and writer, from a chronic lung disease (b. 1889)
- February 28
- Eppa Rixey, American baseball player (b. 1891)
- Dr Rajendra Prasad, former President of India (b. 1884)
March[link]
- March 1 – Irish Meusel, American professional baseball player (b. 1893)
- March 4 – William Carlos Williams, American writer, stroke (b. 1883)
- March 5
- Patsy Cline, American singer plane crash (b. 1932)
- Cowboy Copas, American country music singer plane crash (b. 1913)
- Ludde Gentzel, Swedish film actor (b. 1885)
- Hawkshaw Hawkins, American country music singer plane crash (b. 1921)
- Cyril Smith, Scottish actor heart attack (b. 1892)
- March 6 – Robert E. Cornish, experimenter (b. 1903)
- March 7 – Joachim Holst-Jensen, Norwegian film actor (b. 1880)
- March 11
- Ignat Bednarik, Romanian painter (b. 1882)
- Joe Judge, American professional baseball player (b. 1894)
- March 16 – Archduchess Elisabeth Marie of Austria (b. 1883)
- March 17
- Thomas L. Lennon, screenwriter (b. 1896)
- Lizzie Miles, African American blues singer, heart attack (b. 1895)
- March 18 – Wanda Hawley, American actress (b. 1895)
- March 21 – Felice Minotti, Italian film actor (b. 1887)
- March 22
- Cilly Aussem, German tennis champion (b. 1909)
- Abraham Ellstein, American composer for Yiddish entertainments (b. 1907)
- Mihály Székely, Hungarian bass singer (b. 1901)
- March 23 – Thoralf Skolem, Norwegian mathematician (b. 1887)
- March 25 – Felix Adler, American screenwriter, abdominal cancer (b. 1884)
- March 26 – Jean Bruce, French writer, car accident (b. 1921)
- March 27 – Harry Piel, German actor, film director, screenwriter, and film producer (b. 1892)
- March 28
- Antoine Balpêtré, French film actor (b. 1898)
- Frank J. Marion, American motion picture pioneer (b. 1869)
- Alec Templeton, Welsh composer, pianist and satirist (b. 1909) or b. 1910)
- March 29
- Pola Gojawiczyńska, Polish writer (b. 1896)
- Wilcy Moore, American professional baseball player (b. 1897)
- March 31 – Harry Akst, American songwriter (b. 1894)
April[link]
- April 1 – Agnes Mowinckel, Norwegian actress and stage producer (b. 1875)
- April 3 – Alma Richards, American Olympic gold medalist (b. 1890)
- April 4
- Jason Robards, Sr., American stage and screen actor, heart attack (b. 1892)
- Oskari Tokoi, leader of the Social Democratic Party of Finland (b. 1873)
- April 6
- Mario Fabrizi, comedian and actor, stress-related illness (b. 1924)
- Otto Struve, Russian–American astronomer (b. 1897)
- April 7 – Amedeo Maiuri, Neapolitan archaeologist (b. 1886))
- April 9
- Eddie Edwards, American jazz trombonist (b. 1891)
- Benno Moiseiwitsch, Jewish-Ukrainian pianist (b. 1890)
- April 11 – Nando Bruno, Italian film actor (b. 1895)
- April 12
- Felix Y. Manalo, First Filipino Executive Minister of the Iglesia ni Cristo (b. 1886)
- Herbie Nichols, American jazz pianist and composer, leukemia (b. 1919)
- April 14
- Arthur Jonath, German Olympic athlete (b. 1909)
- Kodō Nomura, Japanese novelist and music critic, acute pneumonia (b. 1882)
- Mahapandit Rahul Sankrityayan, Indian Historian, writer, and scholar (b. 1893)
- April 15 – Edward Hearn, American actor (b. 1888)
- April 23
- Ferruccio Cerio, Italian film writer and director (b. 1904)
- Paul Fejos, Hungarian film director (b. 1897)
- Harry Harper, professional baseball player (b. 1895)
- Don C. Harvey, American television and film actor, cardiac arrest (b. 1911)
- Frederick Peters, American film actor (b. 1884)
- April 24 – Leonid Lukov, Soviet film director and screenwriter (b. 1909)
- April 25 – Christopher Hassall, English actor, dramatist, librettist, lyricist, and poet, heart attack (b. 1912)
- April 26 – Roland Pertwee, English playwright, screenwriter, director, and actor (b. 1885)
- April 27 – Kenneth Macgowan, American film producer (b. 1888)
- April 30
- Giovanni Grasso, Italian film actor (b. 1888)
- William C. Mellor, American cinematographer, heart attack (b. 1903)
- Bryant Washburn, American film actor, heart attack (b. 1889)
May[link]
- May 1 – Lope K. Santos, Filipino writer, Father of Philippine National Language and Grammar (b. 1879)
- May 2 – Van Wyck Brooks, American literary critic and writer (b. 1886)
- May 6 – Monty Woolley, American actor (b. 1888)
- May 7
- Theodore von Kármán, Hungarian-American engineer and physicist (b. 1881)
- Max Miller, British Music Hall Comedian and Actor (b. 1894)
- May 11 – Herbert Spencer Gasser, American physiologist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1888)
- May 12
- Robert Kerr, Canadian sprinter (b. 1882)
- Aiden Wilson Tozer, American Protestant pastor (b. 1897)
- May 18 – Ernie Davis, American football player, first African-American to win the Heisman Trophy (b. 1939)
- May 24 – Elmore James, American blues guitarist (b. 1918)
- May 31 – Edith Hamilton, German-born author (b. 1867)
June[link]
- June 1 – Alfred V. Kidder, American archaeologist (b. 1885)
- June 3
- Pope John XXIII (b. 1881)
- Nazim Hikmet, Turkish poet (b. 1901)
- June 7 – ZaSu Pitts, American actress (b. 1894)
- June 9 – Jacques Villon, French painter (b. 1875)
- June 10 – Anita King, American actress and race car driver (b. 1884)
- June 11
- Thich Quang Duc, Vietnamese Buddhist monk (suicide) (b. 1897)
- Syed Abdul Rahim, First ever Indian national football manager (b. 1909)
- June 12 – Medgar Evers, African-American civil rights activist (b. 1925)
- June 18 – Pedro Armendariz, Mexican actor (suicide) (b. 1912)
- June 27 – John Maurice Clark, American economist (b. 1884)
July[link]
- July 6 – Georg, Duke of Mecklenburg, head of the House of Mecklenburg-Strelitz (b. 1899)
- July 10 – Teddy Wakelam, English sports broadcaster and rugby union player (b. 1893)
- July 12 – Slatan Dudow, Bulgarian film director (b. 1903)
- July 18 – Jack Solomon, American restaurateur (b. 1896)
August[link]
- August 1 – Theodore Roethke, American poet (b. 1908)
- August 2 – Oliver La Farge, American writer (b. 1901)
- August 4 – Tom Keene, American actor (b. 1896)
- August 9 – Patrick Bouvier Kennedy, American infant son of President and Mrs. Kennedy
- August 10
- Estes Kefauver, American politician (b. 1903)
- Ernst Wetter, Swiss Federal Councillor (b. 1877)
- August 11 – Clem Bevans, American actor (b. 1879)
- August 17 – Richard Barthelmess, American actor (b. 1895)
- August 18 – Clifford Odets, American playwright (b. 1906)
- August 20 – Joan Voûte, Dutch astronomer (b. 1879)
- August 22 – William Morris, 1st Viscount Nuffield, British businessman and a philanthropist (b. 1877)
- August 23 – Larry Keating, American actor (b. 1896)
- August 24 – James Kirkwood, Sr., American film director (b. 1875)
- August 27
- Allama Inayatullah Khan Mashriqi, Indian founder of the Khaksar Movement (b. 1888)
- W. E. B. Du Bois, American civil rights activist (b. 1868)
- August 30 – Guy Burgess, British spy, one of the Cambridge Five (b. 1911)
- August 31 – Georges Braque, French painter (b. 1882)
September[link]
- September 3 – Louis MacNeice, Irish poet (b. 1907)
- September 11 – Suzanne Duchamp, French painter (b. 1889)
- September 12 – Modest Altschuler, Belarus-born American composer (b. 1873)
- September 17 – Eduard Spranger, German philosopher and psychologist (b. 1882)
- September 19 – David Low, New Zealand cartoonist (b. 1891)
- September 25
- Alexander Sakharoff, Russian dancer and choreographer (b. 1886)
- Kurt Zeitzler, German Army officer (b. 1895)
October[link]
- October 7 – Gustaf Gründgens, German actor (b. 1899)
- October 11
- Jean Cocteau, French writer (b. 1889)
- Édith Piaf, French singer (b. 1915)
- October 15 – Alan Goodrich Kirk, American admiral (b. 1888)
- October 24
- Karl Bühler, German psychologist and linguist (b. 1879)
- Beverly Wills, American actress (b. 1933)
- October 25 – Roger Désormière, French conductor (b. 1898)
- October 29 – Adolphe Menjou, American actor (b. 1890)
- October 31 – Henry Daniell, English actor (b. 1894)
November[link]
- November 1
- Elsa Maxwell, American gossip columnist (b. 1883)
- Le Quang Tung, Vietnamese military leader (b. 1923) (assassinated)
- November 2
- Ngo Dinh Diem, President of South Vietnam (b. 1901) (assassinated)
- Ngo Dinh Nhu, Vietnamese military leader (b. 1910) (assassinated)
- November 12 – José María Gatica, Argentine boxer (b. 1925)
- November 15 – Fritz Reiner, Hungarian conductor (b. 1888)
- November 21 – Robert Stroud, American prisoner and Alcatraz "Birdman" (b. 1890)
- November 22
- C. S. Lewis, Irish-born British critic, novelist (The Chronicles of Narnia) and Christian apologist (b. 1898)
- John F. Kennedy, 35th President of the United States (b. 1917)
- J. D. Tippit, American police officer with the Dallas Police Department (b. 1924)
- Aldous Huxley, British writer (Brave New World) (b. 1894)
- Wilhelm Beiglböck, German Nazi physician at Dachau concentration camp (b. 1905)
- November 24 – Lee Harvey Oswald, American alleged assassin of President John F. Kennedy (b. 1939) (assassinated)[6]
- November 26 – Amelita Galli-Curci, Italian opera singer (b. 1882)
- November 28 – Ernesto Lecuona, Cuban composer (b. 1896)
- November 30 – Phil Baker, American comedian and radio personality (b. 1896)
December[link]
- December – Andy Kennedy, Northern Ireland footballer (b. 1897)
- December 2
- Sabu Dastagir, Indian-American actor (b. 1924)
- Thomas Hicks, American runner (b. 1875)
- December 5 – Karl Amadeus Hartmann, German composer (b. 1905)
- December 12
- Theodor Heuss, 5th President of Germany (b. 1884)
- Yasujiro Ozu, Japanese filmmaker (b. 1903)
- December 14 – Dinah Washington, African-American jazz/blues singer (b. 1924)
- December 15 – Rikidōzan, Korea-born Japanese professional wrestler (b. 1924)
- December 21 – Jack Hobbs, English cricketer (b. 1882)
- December 25 – Tristan Tzara, French poet (b. 1896)
- December 26 – Gorgeous George, Professional Wrestler (b. 1915)
- December 28
- Paul Hindemith, German composer (b. 1895)
- A. J. Liebling, American journalist (b. 1904)
Nobel Prizes[link]
- Physics – Eugene Paul Wigner, Maria Goeppert-Mayer, J. Hans D. Jensen
- Chemistry – Karl Ziegler, Giulio Natta
- Physiology or Medicine – Sir John Carew Eccles, Alan Lloyd Hodgkin, Andrew Fielding Huxley
- Literature – Giorgos Seferis
- Peace – International Committee of the Red Cross, League of Red Cross Societies
References[link]
- ^ The American Experience: George Wallace: Settin' the Woods on Fire: Timeline (1952 – 1972), Public Broadcasting Service, 2000
- ^ Michael J. Klarman. "Brown v. Board: 90 Years Later", Humanities: The Magazine of the National Endowment for the Humanities, March/April 2004
- ^ [1]
- ^ http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0007217/bio
- ^ http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0694090/bio
- ^ The Warren Commission Report
http://wn.com/1963
This page contains text from Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1963
This article is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License, which means that you can copy and modify it as long as the entire work (including additions) remains under this license.
This article is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License, which means that you can copy and modify it as long as the entire work (including additions) remains under this license.
For other people named Steve Allen, see Steve Allen (disambiguation).
| Steve Allen | |
|---|---|
 Steve Allen and Jayne Meadows at the 39th Emmy Awards in September 1987. |
|
| Born | Stephen Valentine Patrick William Allen (1921-12-26)December 26, 1921 New York City, New York |
| Died | October 30, 2000(2000-10-30) (aged 78) Los Angeles, California |
| Occupation | Actor, comedian, television personality, musician, writer |
| Years active | 1940s–2000 |
| Spouse | Dorothy Goodman (m. 1943-1952; divorced) Jayne Meadows (m. 1954-2000; his death) |
Stephen Valentine Patrick William "Steve" Allen (December 26, 1921 - October 30, 2000) was an American television personality, musician, composer, actor, comedian, and writer. Though he got his start in radio, Allen is best known for his television career. He first gained national attention as a guest host on Arthur Godfrey's Talent Scouts. He graduated to become the first host of The Tonight Show, where he was instrumental in innovating the concept of the television talk show. Thereafter, he hosted numerous game and variety shows, including The Steve Allen Show, I've Got a Secret, The New Steve Allen Show, and was a regular panel member on CBS' What's My Line?
Allen was a "creditable" pianist,[1] and a prolific composer, having penned over 14,000 songs,[citation needed] one of which was recorded by Perry Como and Margaret Whiting, others by Steve Lawrence and Eydie Gorme, Les Brown, and Gloria Lynne. Allen won a Grammy award in 1963 for best jazz composition, with his song The Gravy Waltz. His vast number of songs have never been equaled. Allen wrote more than 50 books, has two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame and a Hollywood theater named in his honor The Steve Allen Theater.[2]
Contents |
Life and career[link]
Early life[link]
Allen was born in New York City, the son of Billy and Isabelle Allen (née Donohue), a vaudeville comedienne, who performed under the stage name Belle Montrose.[3] Allen was raised on the south side of Chicago by his mother's Irish Catholic family. Milton Berle once called Allen's mother "the funniest woman in vaudeville."
Allen's first radio job was on station KOY in Phoenix, Arizona, after he left Arizona State Teachers College (now Arizona State University) in Tempe, while still a sophomore. He enlisted in the U.S. Army during World War II and was trained as an infantryman.[citation needed] He spent his service time at Camp Roberts, near Monterey, California and did not serve overseas. Allen returned to Phoenix before deciding to move back to California.
Career[link]
File:Allen.JPG
The hand prints of Allen in front of Hollywood Hills Amphitheater at Walt Disney World's Disney's Hollywood Studios theme park.
Allen became an announcer for KFAC in Los Angeles and then moved to the Mutual Broadcasting System in 1946, talking the station into airing a five-nights-a-week comedy show, Smile Time, co-starring Wendell Noble. After Allen moved to CBS Radio's KNX in Los Angeles, his music-and-talk half-hour format gradually changed to include more talk on a full-hour, late-night show, boosting his popularity and creating standing-room-only studio audiences. During one episode of the show reserved primarily for an interview with Doris Day, his guest star failed to appear, so Allen picked up a microphone and went into the audience to ad lib for the first time.[4] His radio show attracted a huge local following, and in 1950 it replaced Our Miss Brooks, exposing Allen to a national audience for the first time.
Allen's first television experience had come in 1949 when he answered an ad for a TV announcer for professional wrestling. He knew nothing about wrestling, so he watched some shows and discovered that the announcers did not have well-defined names for the holds. When he got the job, he created names for many of the holds, some of which are still used today.
After CBS radio gave Allen a weekly prime time show, CBS television believed it could groom him for national small-screen stardom and gave Allen his first network television show. The Steve Allen Show premiered at 11 am on Christmas Day, 1950, and was later moved into a thirty-minute, early evening slot. This new show required him to uproot his family and move from LA to New York, since at that time a coast to coast program could not originate from LA. The show was only a modest ratings success, and was canceled in 1952, after which CBS tried several shows to showcase Allen's talent.[5]
Allen achieved national attention when he was pressed into service at the last minute to host Arthur Godfrey's Talent Scouts because Godfrey was unable to appear. Allen turned one of Godfrey's live Lipton commercials upside down, preparing tea and instant soup on camera and then pouring both into Godfrey's ukulele. With the audience (including Godfrey, watching from Miami) uproariously and thoroughly entertained, Allen gained major recognition as a comedian and host.
He was a regular on the popular panel game show What's My Line? (where he coined the popular phrase, "Is it bigger than a breadbox?") from 1953 to 1954 and returned frequently as a panelist after Fred Allen died in March 1956, until the series ended in 1967.
[edit] The Tonight Show
Main article: Tonight Starring Steve Allen
Leaving CBS, he created a late-night New York talk-variety TV program in 1953 for what is now WNBC-TV. The following year, on September 27, 1954, the show went on the full NBC network as The Tonight Show, with fellow radio personality Gene Rayburn (who later went on to host hit game shows such as Match Game, 1962–1982) as the original announcer. The show ran from 11:15 pm to 1:00 am on the East Coast.
While Today developer Sylvester "Pat" Weaver is often credited as the Tonight creator, Allen often pointed out that he had previously created it as a local New York show. Allen told his nationwide audience that first evening: "This is Tonight, and I can't think of too much to tell you about it except I want to give you the bad news first: this program is going to go on forever... you think you're tired now. Wait until you see one o'clock roll around!"[citation needed]
It was as host of The Tonight Show that Allen pioneered the "man on the street" interviews and audience-participation comedy breaks that have become commonplace on late-night TV.
The Steve Allen Show[link]
In 1956, NBC offered Allen a new, prime-time, Sunday night variety hour, The Steve Allen Show, aimed at dethroning CBS's top-rated Ed Sullivan Show. The show included a typical run of star performers, including early TV appearances by Elvis Presley and Jerry Lee Lewis. Many popular film and television stars were guest stars, including Bob Hope, Kim Novak, Errol Flynn, Abbott and Costello, Esther Williams, Jerry Lewis, Martha Raye, The Three Stooges, and a host of others.
The show's regulars were Tom Poston, Louis Nye, Bill Dana, Don Knotts, Pat Harrington, Jr., Dayton Allen, and Gabriel Dell. All except film veteran Dell were relatively obscure performers prior to their stints with Allen, and all went on to stardom. The comedians in Allen's gang were often seen in "The Man in the Street," featuring interviews about some topical subject. Poston would appear as a dullard who could not remember his own name; Nye was "Gordon Hathaway," fey Madison Avenue executive; Dana played amiable Latino "Jose Jimenez"; Knotts was an exceedingly jittery man who, when asked if he was nervous, invariably replied with an alarmed "No!"; Harrington was Italian immigrant "Guido Panzini"; Dayton Allen played wild-eyed zanies answering any given question with "Why not?". Gabe Dell usually played straight men in sketches (policemen, newsmen, dramatic actors, etc.).
Other recurring routines included "Crazy Shots" (also known as "Wild Pictures"), a series of sight gags accompanied by Allen on piano; Allen inviting audience members to select three musical notes at random, and then composing a song based on the three notes; a satire on radio's long-running The Answer Man and a precursor to Johnny Carson's Carnac the Magnificent (Sample answer: "Et tu, Brute."/Allen's reply: "How many pizzas did you eat, Caesar?")
The live Sunday night show aired opposite The Ed Sullivan Show on CBS and Maverick on ABC. One of Allen's guests was comedian Johnny Carson, a future successor to Allen as host of The Tonight Show. Among Carson's material during that appearance was a portrayal of how a poker game between Allen, Sullivan, and Maverick star James Garner (all impersonated by Carson) would transpire. Allen's programs also featured a good deal of music; he helped the careers of singers Steve Lawrence and Eydie Gorme, who were regulars on his early Tonight Show, and Sammy Davis, Jr.
Allen's show also had one of the longest unscripted "crack-ups" on live TV when Allen began laughing hysterically during "Big Bill Allen's Sports Roundup." He laughed uncontrollably for over a minute, with the audience laughing along, because, as he later explained, he caught sight of his unkempt hair on an off-camera monitor. He kept brushing his hair and changing hats to hide the messy hair, and the more he tried to correct his appearance the funnier it got.
Allen helped the recently invented Polaroid camera become popular by demonstrating its use in live commercials and amassed a huge windfall for his work because he had opted to be paid in Polaroid Corporation stock.
File:Steve allen lenny bruce.png
Steve Allen (left) and Lenny Bruce.
Allen remained host of "Tonight" for three nights a week (Monday and Tuesday nights were taken up by Ernie Kovacs) until early 1957, when he left the "Tonight" show to devote his attention to the Sunday night program. It was his (and NBC's) hope that the Steve Allen show could defeat Ed Sullivan in the ratings. Nevertheless the TV Western Maverick often bested both The Ed Sullivan Show and The Steve Allen Show in audience size.[6] In September 1959, Allen relocated to Los Angeles and left Sunday night television (the 1959-'60 season originated from NBC Color City in Burbank as The Steve Allen Plymouth Show, on Monday nights). Back in Los Angeles, he continued to write songs, hosted other variety shows, and wrote books and articles about comedy.
Later TV projects[link]
From 1962 to 1964, Allen re-created The Tonight Show on a new late-night The Steve Allen Show, which was syndicated by Westinghouse TV. The five-nights-a-week taped show was broadcast from an old vaudeville theater renamed The Steve Allen Playhouse on 1228 N. Vine St. in Hollywood.[7] (Several sources have erroneously identified Allen's show using the name of his theater.)
The show was marked by the same wild and unpredictable stunts and comedy skits that often extended down the street to a supermarket known as the Hollywood Ranch Market. He also presented Southern California eccentrics, including health food advocate Gypsy Boots, quirky physics professor Dr. Julius Sumner Miller, wacko comic Prof. Irwin Corey, and an early musical performance by Frank Zappa.[8]
During one episode, Allen placed a telephone call to the home of Johnny Carson, posing as a ratings company interviewer, asking Carson if the Television was on, and what program he was watching. Carson didn't immediately realize the caller was Allen, and the exchange is classic humor from both, beginning to end. A rarity is the exchange between Allen and Carson about Carson's guests, permitting him to plug his own show on a competing network.
One notable program, which Westinghouse refused to distribute, featured Lenny Bruce during the time the comic was repeatedly being arrested on obscenity charges; footage from this program was first telecast in 1998 in a Bruce documentary aired on HBO. Regis Philbin took over hosting the Westinghouse show in 1964, but only briefly.
The show also featured plenty of jazz played by Allen and members of the show's band, the Donn Trenner Orchestra, which included such virtuoso musicians as guitarist Herb Ellis and flamboyantly comedic hipster trombonist Frank Rosolino (whom Allen credited with originating the "Hiyo!" chant later popularized by Ed McMahon). While the show was not an overwhelming success in its day, David Letterman, Steve Martin, Harry Shearer, Robin Williams, and a number of other prominent comedians have cited Allen's "Westinghouse show," which they watched as teenagers, as being highly influential on their own comedic visions.
Allen later produced a second half-hour show for Westinghouse, titled Jazz Scene, which featured West Coast jazz musicians such as Rosolino, Stan Kenton, and Teddy Edwards. The short-lived show was hosted by Oscar Brown, Jr.
Allen hosted a number of television programs up until the 1980s, including The New Steve Allen Show in 1961 and the game show I've Got a Secret (replacing original host Garry Moore) in 1964. In the summer of 1967, he brought most of the regulars from over the years back with The Steve Allen Comedy Hour, featuring the debuts of Rob Reiner, Richard Dreyfuss, and John Byner and featuring Ruth Buzzi, who would become famous soon after on "Laugh-In." In 1968–71, he returned to syndicated nightly variety-talk with the same wacky stunts that would influence David Letterman in later years, including becoming a human hood ornament; jumping into vats of oatmeal and cottage cheese; and being slathered with dog food, allowing dogs backstage to feast on the free food. During the run of this series, Allen also introduced Albert Brooks and Steve Martin to a national audience for the first time.
A syndicated version of I've Got A Secret hosted by Allen and featuring panelists Pat Carroll and Richard Dawson was taped in Hollywood and aired during the 1972-73 season. In 1977, he produced Steve Allen's Laugh-Back, a syndicated series combining vintage Allen film clips with new talk-show material reuniting his 1950s TV gang. From 1986 through 1988, Allen hosted a daily three-hour comedy show heard nationally on the NBC Radio Network that featured sketches and America's best-known comedians as regular guests. His cohost was radio personality Mark Simone, and they were joined frequently by comedy writers Larry Gelbart, Herb Sargent, and Bob Einstein.
Composer, actor, and author[link]
Allen was an accomplished composer who wrote over 10,000 songs. He began his recording career in 1953 by signing with Decca Records's Brunswick Records sublabel.[9] In one famous stunt, he made a bet with singer-songwriter Frankie Laine that he could write 50 songs a day for a week. Composing on public display in the window of a Hollywood music store, Allen met the quota, winning $1,000 from Laine. One of the songs, Let's Go to Church Next Sunday, was recorded by both Perry Como and Margaret Whiting. Allen's best-known songs are "This Could Be the Start of Something Big" and "The Gravy Waltz," the latter having won a Grammy award in 1963 for Best Jazz Composition. He also wrote lyrics for the standards "Picnic" and "South Rampart Street Parade." Allen composed the score to the Paul Mantee imitation James Bond film A Man Called Dagger (1967), with the score orchestrated by Ronald Stein.
Allen was also an actor. He wrote and starred in his first film, the Mack Sennett comedy compilation Down Memory Lane, in 1949. His most famous film appearance is in 1955's The Benny Goodman Story, in the title role. The film, while an average biopic of its day, was heralded for its music, featuring many alumni of the Goodman band. Allen later recalled his one contribution to the film's music, used in the film's early scenes: the accomplished Benny Goodman could no longer produce the sound of a clarinet beginner, and that was the only sound Allen could make on a clarinet! In 1960, he appeared as the character "Dr. Ellison" in the episode "Play Acting" of CBS's anthology series The DuPont Show with June Allyson though his The Steve Allen Show had been in competition with the June Allyson program the preceding season.
From 1977 to 1981, Allen was the producer of the award-winning PBS series, Meeting of Minds, a "talk show" with actors playing the parts of notable historical figures and Steve Allen as the host. This series pitted the likes of Socrates, Marie Antoinette, Thomas Paine, Sir Thomas More, Attila the Hun, Karl Marx, Emily Dickinson, Charles Darwin, and Galileo Galilei in dialogue and argument. This was the show Allen wanted to be remembered for, because he believed that the issues and characters were timeless and would survive long after his death.[citation needed]
Allen was a comedy writer and author of more than 50 books, including Dumbth, a commentary on the American educational system, and Steve Allen on the Bible, Religion, and Morality. Twenty of his books were concerned with his views about religion.[10] Perhaps influenced by his son's involvement with a religious cult, he became an outspoken critic of organized religion and an active member of such humanist and skeptical organizations as the Council for Media Integrity, a group that debunked pseudoscientific claims.[11]
Allen and rock music[link]
Allen was notoriously contemptuous of rock 'n' roll music, although he was showman enough to scoop Ed Sullivan by being one of the first to present Elvis Presley on network television (after Presley had appeared on the Tommy and Jimmy Dorsey Stage Show and Milton Berle shows). "Allen found a way... to satisfy the Puritans. He assured viewers that he would not allow Presley 'to do anything that will offend anyone.' NBC announced that a 'revamped, purified and somewhat abridged Presley' had agreed to sing while standing reasonably still, dressed in black tie."[12] In fact, on this occasion, Allen had Elvis wear a top hat and the white tie and tails of a "high class" musician while singing "Hound Dog" to an actual hound, who was similarly attired. According to Jake Austen, "the way Steve Allen treated Elvis Presley was his federal crime. Allen thought Presley was talentless and absurd, and so he decided to goof on him. Allen set things up so that Presley would show his contrition by appearing in a tuxedo and singing his new song 'Hound Dog' to an elderly basset hound..."[13] Elaine Dundy says that Allen smirkingly presented Elvis "with a roll that looks exactly like a large roll of toilet paper with, says Allen, the 'signatures of eighteen thousand fans.' " Presley looked "at Steve as if to say, 'It's all right. I've been made a worse fool in my life,' and after he patted the basset hound he is about to sing Hound Dog to, he wiped his hands on his trousers as if to wipe away Steve Allen, the dog, and the whole show."[14] Guitarist Scotty Moore later said that Elvis and the members of his band were "all angry about their treatment the previous night." "The next day, as Elvis entered the RCA studios to record 'Hound Dog,' fans greeted him with signs that declared, 'We Want the Real Elvis' and 'We Want the Gyrating Elvis.' In the press, critics were no kinder with the singer than they had ever been, this time pronouncing him a 'cowed kid' who had demonstrated, once again, that he 'couldn't sing or act a lick.' "[15] In a column in Newsweek, John Lardner wrote, "Like Huckleberry Finn, when the widow put him in a store suit and told him not to gap or scratch, [Elvis] had been 'fouled' by NBC's attempt to 'civilize him... for the good of mankind.'"[16] Presley often referred to the Allen show as the most ridiculous performance of his career.
The singer "was later featured in a mediocre cowboy sketch with Allen, Andy Griffith, and Imogene Coca. As 'Tumbleweed Presley,' his big joke was, 'I'm warning you galoots, don't step on my blue suede boots.' "[17][18] That apparent mockery was consistent with other situations in which Allen had singers in such comic scenarios on his show, in contrast to the simple "singing in front of a curtain" style of the Sullivan show. The house singers on the early Tonight show were subjected to many such stunts. In addition, Allen's skit with Presley actually was less a put-down of Presley and mainly a satire of country music stage shows like the Grand Ole Opry and the Louisiana Hayride, the Shreveport-based country music radio show (over KWKH) Presley performed on in 1954 and 1955. It's highly debatable, given Presley's spirited performance, whether unlike the top hat and tails performance, there was any put-down motivation on Allen's part with this particular skit, since he could have easily done it in any of his other programs.
In a 1996 interview Allen was asked about the show. Asked if NBC executives expressed any concerns about Elvis's planned appearance, Allen replied that he'd "read more nonsense about " it, and "a lot of wrong reports have gotten into the public -". "If there ever was, I never heard about it. And since it was my show, I think it would have brought to my attention. " Regarding Elvis's movements he stated "No! I took no objection to the movements I'd seen him make on the Dorsey Brothers show. I didn't see a problem. Of course, I had read about some of the controversy, much of it generated by Ed Sullivan, who was opposite of our show on CBS. It didn't matter to me. I was using good production sense in booking him."[19]
In his book "Hi-Ho Steverino!" Allen wrote the following: "When I booked Elvis, I naturally had no interest in just presenting him vaudeville-style and letting him do his spot as he might in concert. Instead we worked him into the comedy fabric of our program." "We certainly didn't inhibit Elvis' then-notorious pelvic gyrations, but I think the fact that he had on formal evening attire made him, purely on his own, slightly alter his presentation."[20]
Allen also appeared on the shows of entertainers, even the rock and roll program The Pat Boone Chevy Showroom on ABC.
Later career[link]
In the late 1970s early 80s, Steve Allen recorded a solo piano Pianocorder album for the Pianocorder Contemporary Artists Series, joining other illustrious artists-pianists of the day such as Liberace, Floyd Cramer, Teddy Wilson, Roger Williams, and Johnny Guarnieri to name a few. His solo album was very popular. Pianocorder was founded by Joseph Tushinsky. The Pianocorder was the first modern mechanical player piano made for the public that used solenoids to power the keys. Later, it was bought out by Yamaha-Disklavier and discontinued and is known today as the Yamaha Disklavier. During the late 80s, Allen and his second wife Jayne Meadows made numerous appearances on the drama St. Elsewhere, playing Victor Erlich's estranged parents.
The 1985 documentary film Kerouac, the Movie starts and ends with footage of Jack Kerouac reading from On the Road as Allen accompanies on soft jazz piano from The Steve Allen Plymouth Show in 1959. "Are you nervous?" Allen asks him; Kerouac answers nervously, "Noo," a take-off on the character usually played by Don Knotts.
Allen appeared in a PSA advocating for New Eyes for the Needy in the 1990s.
Also, Allen made a cameo appearance at Wrestlemania VI in a skit with The Bolsheviks. Allen told the Bolsheviks that he was going to play the Soviet National Anthem while The Bolsheviks sang along; however, Allen simply stalled playing other notes while never actually playing the anthem.
Personal life[link]
Steve Allen was married to Dorothy Goodman in 1943 and they had three children, Steve Jr., Brian, and David. That marriage ended in divorce in 1952. Allen's second wife was actress Jayne Meadows, sister to actress Audrey Meadows. The marriage of Allen and Meadows produced one son, Bill Allen. They were married from 1954 until his death in 2000.
Allen received a traditional Irish Catholic upbringing.[10] He later became a secular humanist and Humanist Laureate for the Academy of Humanism, a member of CSICOP and the Council for Secular Humanism.[10] He received the Rose Elizabeth Bird Commitment to Justice Award from Death Penalty Focus in 1998. He was a student and supporter of general semantics, recommending it in Dumbth and giving the Alfred Korzybski Memorial Lecture in 1992. In spite of his liberal position on free speech, his later concerns about the lewdness he saw on radio and television, particularly the programs of Howard Stern, caused him to make proposals restricting the content of programs, allying himself with the Parents Television Council.[21] His full-page ad on the subject appeared in newspapers a day or two before his unexpected death. Allen's views evolved in the last dozen years of his life, as he called himself an "involved Presbyterian".{[fact}} He had been married for decades to Jayne Meadows, who was the daughter of a Christian missonary.[10]
Allen made a last appearance on The Tonight Show on September 27, 1994, for the show's 40th anniversary broadcast. Jay Leno was effusive in praise and actually knelt down and kissed his ring.
He was a Democrat whereas his wife was a Republican[22].
Death[link]
On October 30, 2000, Allen was driving to his son's home in Encino, California, when his car was struck by another vehicle backing out of a driveway. Neither Allen nor the other driver believed he was injured and damage to both vehicles was minimal, so the two exchanged insurance information and Allen continued on.
Shortly after arriving at his son's home (after carving pumpkins with his grandchildren and taping a radio tribute to an old friend, satirist Paul Krassner), Allen did not feel right and decided to take a nap. While napping, he suffered a massive heart attack and was pronounced dead shortly after 8 p.m. Autopsy results concluded that the traffic accident earlier in the day had caused a blood vessel in his chest to rupture, causing blood to leak into the sac surrounding the heart (known as haemopericardium.[23]) In addition, he suffered four broken ribs as a result of the accident.
Allen was two months shy of his 79th birthday at the time of his death. He is interred in an unmarked grave at Forest Lawn Memorial Park-Hollywood Hills in Los Angeles.
Allen has two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame — a television star at 1720 Vine St. and a radio star at 1537 Vine St.
Works[link]
Shows[link]
- Songs for Sale (1950–1952)
- What's My Line? (regular panelist, 1953–1954; frequent guest panelist 1954-1967)
- Jukebox Jury (1953)
- Talent Patrol (1953–1955)
- The Steve Allen Show (1956–61)
- The Tonight Show (1954–1957, NBC)
- The Steve Allen Westinghouse Show (1962–1968)
- I've Got a Secret (1964–1967, 1972–1973)
- The Steve Allen Show (Filmways production, 1968–1969)
- Match Game (panelist, 1974)
- Meeting of Minds (1977–1981, PBS)
- Steve Allen Comedy Hour (1980–1981)
- The Start of Something Big (1985–1986)
- Space Ghost Coast to Coast (1997, one episode, Guest)
- Homicide: Life On The Street (1998): Steve and Jayne appeared as guests (January 16, 1998).
Songs[link]
- "Theme from Picnic"
- "This Could Be the Start of Something Big"
- "Pretend You Don't See Her, My Heart"
- "The Gravy Waltz"
- "The Saturday Evening Post"
- "Impossible"
- "Cool Yule"
Comedic Discography[link]
- "Man in the Street" (1963) (Signature 1004)
- "Funny Fone Calls" (1963) (Dot 3472, re-issued as Casablanca 811-366-1-ML)
- "More Funny Fone Calls" (1963) (Dot 3517, re-issued as Casablanca 811-367-1-ML)
Musical Discography[link]
![[icon]](http://web.archive.org./web/20130609033253/http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Wiki_letter_w_cropped.svg){kind=small} |
This section requires expansion. |
- Songs for Gentle People (Dunhill, 1967)
- Soulful Brass with Oliver Nelson (Impulse!, 1968)
- Soulful Brass #2 with Oliver Nelson (Flying Dutchman, 1969)
Books[link]
| Year | Title | Notes | Identifiers |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1955 | Steve Allen's Bop Fables | illustrated by George Price | OCLC 1006762 |
| 1955 | Fourteen for Tonight | short stories | OCLC 1034835 |
| 1956 | The Funny Men | OCLC 329974 | |
| 1956 | Wry on the Rocks | poems | OCLC 1150685 |
| 1958 | The Girls on the 10th Floor and Other Stories | short stories | OCLC 1131890; ISBN 0-8369-3608-6 (1970 printing) |
| 1959 | The Question Man... | photographs by Gene Lester | OCLC 1150647 |
| 1960 | Mark It and Strike It: An Autobiography | OCLC 25533614 | |
| 1962 | Not All of Your Laughter, Not All of Your Tears | Steve's first novel | OCLC 1626391 |
| 1964 | Dialogues in Americanism | transcript of three debates: Allen vs. William F. Buckley, Jr.; Robert M. Hutchins vs. L. Brent Bozell, and James MacGregor Burns vs. Willmoore Kendall | OCLC 397431 |
| 1965 | Letter to a Conservative | OCLC 1150594 | |
| 1966 | The Ground is Our Table | photographs by Arthur Dubinsky | OCLC 358823 |
| 1967 | Bigger than a Breadbox | with commentary by Leonard Feather; illustrations by Rowland B. Wilson | OCLC 717481 |
| 1969 | A Flash of Swallows: New Poems | poems | ISBN 0-8375-6734-3; OCLC 5024 |
| 1972 | The Wake | ISBN 0-385-07608-8 | |
| 1973 | Princess Snip-Snip and the Puppy-Kittens | illustrated by David Gantz | |
| 1973 | Curses! or... How Never to Be Foiled Again | illustrated by Marvin Rubin | ISBN 0-87477-008-4 |
| 1974 | What To Say When It Rains | ISBN 0-8431-0357-4 | |
| 1975 | Schmock-Schmock! | ISBN 0-385-09664-X | |
| 1978 | Meeting of Minds | ISBN 0-517-53383-9; 1989 printing: ISBN 0-87975-550-4 | |
| 1978 | Chopped-Up Chinese | ||
| 1979 | Ripoff: A Look at Corruption in America | with Roslyn Bernstein and Donald H. Dunn | ISBN 0-8184-0249-0 |
| 1979 | Meeting of Minds, Second Series | ISBN 0-517-53894-6; 1989 printing: ISBN 0-87975-565-2 | |
| 1980 | Explaining China | ISBN 0-517-54062-2 | |
| 1981 | Funny People | ISBN 0-8128-2764-3 | |
| 1982 | Beloved Son: A Story of the Jesus Cults | ISBN 0-672-52678-6 | |
| 1982 | More Funny People | ISBN 0-8128-2884-4 | |
| 1986 | How to Make a Speech | ISBN 0-07-001164-8 | |
| 1987 | How to Be Funny: Discovering the Comic You | with Jane Wollman | ISBN 0-07-001199-0; 1992 printing: ISBN 0-87975-792-2; 1998 revised edition: ISBN 1-57392-206-4 |
| 1989 | The Passionate Nonsmoker's Bill of Rights: The First Guide to Enacting Nonsmoking Legislation | with Bill Adler, Jr. | ISBN 0-688-06295-4 |
| 1989 | "Dumbth": And 81 Ways to Make Americans Smarter | ISBN 0-87975-539-3; 1998 revised edition: ISBN 1-57392-237-4 | |
| 1989 | Meeting of Minds, Vol. III | ISBN 0-87975-566-0 | |
| 1989 | Meeting of Minds, Vol. IV | ISBN 0-87975-567-9 | |
| 1990 | The Public Hating: A Collection of Short Stories | ISBN 0-942637-22-4 | |
| 1990 | Steve Allen on the Bible, Religion & Morality | ISBN 0-87975-638-1 | |
| 1992 | Hi-Ho, Steverino: The Story of My Adventures in the Wonderful Wacky World of Television | ISBN 0-942637-55-0; large-print edition: ISBN 1-56054-521-6 | |
| 1993 | More Steve Allen on the Bible, Religion & Morality | ISBN 0-87975-736-1 | |
| 1993 | Make 'em Laugh | ISBN 0-87975-837-6 | |
| 1994 | Reflections | ISBN 0-87975-904-6 | |
| 1995 | The Man Who Turned Back the Clock, and Other Short Stories | ISBN 1-57392-002-9 | |
| 1995 | The Bug and the Slug in the Rug | ISBN 1-880851-17-2 | |
| 1996 | But Seriously...: Steve Allen Speaks His Mind | ISBN 1-57392-090-8 | |
| 1999 | Steve Allen's Songs: 100 Lyrics with Commentary | ISBN 0-7864-0736-0 | |
| 2000 | Steve Allen's Private Joke File | ISBN 0-609-80672-6 | |
| 2001 | Vulgarians at the Gate: Trash TV and Raunch Radio—Raising the Standards of Popular Culture | ISBN 1-57392-874-7 |
Allen's series of mystery novels "starring" himself and wife Jayne Meadows were in part ghostwritten by Walter J. Sheldon, and later Robert Westbrook.
- The Talk Show Murders (1982), ISBN 0-440-08471-7
- Murder on the Glitter Box (1989), ISBN 0-8217-2752-4
- Murder in Manhattan (1990), ISBN 0-8217-3033-9
- Murder in Vegas (1991), ISBN 0-8217-3462-8
- The Murder Game (1993), ISBN 0-8217-4115-2
- Murder on the Atlantic (1995), ISBN 0-8217-4647-2
- Wake Up to Murder (1996), ISBN 1-57566-090-3
- Die Laughing (1998), ISBN 1-57566-241-8
- Murder in Hawaii (1999), ISBN 1-57566-375-9
Politics[link]
Allen was keenly interested in social justice and wrote pamphlets on a variety of issues, including the problems facing migrant workers, as well as the problems of capital punishment and nuclear weapons proliferation. He once considered running for Congress from California, calling his politics "middle-of-the-road radicalism".[24]
References[link]
- ^ LIFE February 13, 1956. p. 56.
- ^ Anthony Dalessandro (February 1, 2006). "The God and Satan Show". LA Times. http://www.laweekly.com/2006-02-02/stage/the-god-and-satan-show/. Retrieved 2012-01-05.
- ^ Stephen Allen Biography (1921–2000)
- ^ The Official Website of Steve Allen
- ^ Ben Alba, Inventing Late Night: Steve Allen and the Original Tonight Show (Prometheus Books, 2005), pp. 40-42
- ^ "Maverick". The Museum of Broadcast Communications. http://www.museum.tv/archives/etv/M/htmlM/maverick/maverick.htm. Retrieved 2007-10-20. "Maverick premiered on September 22, 1957, and pretty soon won over the viewers from the powerful opposition of CBS's The Ed Sullivan Show and NBC's The Steve Allen Show, two programs that had been Sunday night favourites from the mid-1950s."
- ^ http://cinematreasures.org/theater/1419
- ^ Slaven, 1996, Electric Don Quixote, pp. 35–36. and Youtube
- ^ Billboard Sep 12, 1953
- ^ a b c d Godsmack. OC Weekley. Published March 1, 2007.
- ^ "A Tribute to Steve Allen]," Paul Kurtz, Skeptical Inquirer magazine, January/February 2001.
- ^ Glenn C. Altschuler, All Shook Up: How Rock 'n' Roll Changed America (Oxford University Press, 2003), p.90.
- ^ See Austen, Jake, TV-A-Go-Go: Rock on TV from American Bandstand to American Idol (2005), p.13.
- ^ Dundy, Elaine, Elvis and Gladys (University Press of Mississippi, 2004), p. 259.
- ^ Altschuler, p.90.
- ^ Cited in Altschuler, p.90.
- ^ See for yourself
- ^ Jake Austen, TV A-Go-Go: Rock on TV from American Bandstand to American Idol (2005), p.13.
- ^ http://www.elvispresleymusic.com.au/steve_allen.html
- ^ The Steve Allen Comedy Show
- ^ TV legend Steve Allen dies. BBC News. Published 31 October 2000.
- ^ http://articles.latimes.com/1997-05-07/local/me-56437_1_love-letters
- ^ transcripts.cnn.com
- ^ Richard Severo (November 01, 2000). "Steve Allen, Comedian Who Pioneered Late-Night TV Talk Shows, Is Dead at 78". New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/2000/11/01/arts/steve-allen-comedian-who-pioneered-late-night-tv-talk-shows-is-dead-at-78.html.
External links[link]
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Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Steve Allen |
- Entertainer Steve Allen dead at 78
- Steve Allen tribute (Skeptical Inquirer January 2001)
- Steve Allen at FindAGrave.com
- Steve Allen Interview at Archive of American Television
- Steve Allen at the Internet Movie Database
- Steve Allen interview by Mike Wallace on The Mike Wallace Interview July 7, 1957
- FBI file on Steve Allen
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| Persondata | |
|---|---|
| Name | Allen, Stephen Valentine Patrick William |
| Alternative names | |
| Short description | American writer, comedian, musician |
| Date of birth | December 26, 1921 |
| Place of birth | New York City, New York, U.S. |
| Date of death | October 30, 2000 |
| Place of death | Los Angeles, California, U.S. |
http://wn.com/Steve_Allen
This page contains text from Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_Allen
This article is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License, which means that you can copy and modify it as long as the entire work (including additions) remains under this license.
This article is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License, which means that you can copy and modify it as long as the entire work (including additions) remains under this license.
| Frank Zappa | |
|---|---|
 Zappa performing in Ekeberghallen, Oslo, on January 16, 1977 |
|
| Background information | |
| Birth name | Frank Vincent Zappa |
| Born | (1940-12-21)December 21, 1940 Baltimore, Maryland, U.S. |
| Died | December 4, 1993(1993-12-04) (aged 52) Los Angeles, California, U.S. due to prostate cancer |
| Genres | Rock, experimental, jazz, classical |
| Occupations | Composer, musician, conductor, producer |
| Instruments | Vocals, guitar, bass, keyboards, synclavier, bicycle, drums |
| Years active | 1955–1993 |
| Labels | Verve, Bizarre, Straight, DiscReet, Zappa, Barking Pumpkin |
| Associated acts | The Mothers of Invention Captain Beefheart Steve Vai |
| Website | zappa.com |
| Notable instruments | |
Frank Vincent Zappa[1] (December 21, 1940 – December 4, 1993) was an American composer, singer-songwriter, electric guitarist, recording engineer, record producer and film director. In a career spanning more than 30 years, Zappa wrote rock, jazz, orchestral and musique concrète works. He also directed feature-length films and music videos, and designed album covers. Zappa produced almost all of the more than 60 albums he released with the band The Mothers of Invention and as a solo artist. While in his teens, he acquired a taste for percussion-based avant-garde composers such as Edgard Varèse and 1950s rhythm and blues music. He began writing classical music in high school, while at the same time playing drums in rhythm and blues bands; he later switched to electric guitar.
He was a self-taught composer and performer, and his diverse musical influences led him to create music that was often impossible to categorize. His 1966 debut album with The Mothers of Invention, Freak Out!, combined songs in conventional rock and roll format with collective improvisations and studio-generated sound collages. His later albums shared this eclectic and experimental approach, irrespective of whether the fundamental format was one of rock, jazz or classical. His lyrics—often humorously—reflected his iconoclastic view of established social and political processes, structures and movements. He was a strident critic of mainstream education and organized religion, and a forthright and passionate advocate for freedom of speech, self-education, political participation and the abolition of censorship.
Zappa was a highly productive and prolific artist and gained widespread critical acclaim. He had some commercial success, particularly in Europe, and for most of his career was able to work as an independent artist. He also remains a major influence on musicians and composers. Zappa was posthumously inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1995 and received the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 1997. Zappa was married to Kathryn J. "Kay" Sherman from 1960 to 1964. In 1967, he married Adelaide Gail Sloatman, with whom he remained until his death from prostate cancer in 1993. They had four children: Moon Unit, Dweezil, Ahmet Emuukha Rodan and Diva Thin Muffin Pigeen. Gail Zappa manages the businesses of her late husband under the name the Zappa Family Trust.
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Early life[link]
Frank Zappa was born in Baltimore, Maryland, on December 21, 1940. His mother, Rose Marie Colimore, was of Italian and French ancestry; his father, Francesco Vincente Zappa, was an immigrant from Partinico, Sicily, and was of Greek and Arab ancestry.[2] Zappa was the eldest of four children.[3] The family moved often because his father, a chemist and mathematician, worked in the defense industry. After a time in Florida in the 1940s, the family returned to Maryland, where Zappa's father worked at the Edgewood Arsenal chemical warfare facility of the Aberdeen Proving Ground. Due to their home's proximity to the arsenal, which stored mustard gas, gas masks were kept in the home.[4] This had a profound effect on Zappa, and references to germs, germ warfare and the defense industry occur throughout his work.[5]
Zappa was often sick as a child, suffering from asthma, earaches and sinus problems. A doctor treated his sinusitis by inserting a pellet of radium into each of Zappa's nostrils; little was known about the potential dangers of even small amounts of therapeutic radiation.[6] Nasal imagery and references appear in his music and lyrics, as well as in the collage album covers created by his long-time collaborator Cal Schenkel.
Many of Zappa's childhood diseases may have been due to exposure to mustard gas. His health worsened when he lived in Baltimore.[4][6] In 1952, his family relocated for reasons of health.[7] They moved, next, to Monterey, California, where his father taught metallurgy at the Naval Postgraduate School. They soon moved to Claremont, then to El Cajon, before finally settling in San Diego.[8]
Musical influences[link]
"Since I didn't have any kind of formal training, it didn't make any difference to me if I was listening to Lightnin' Slim, or a vocal group called the Jewels ... , or Webern, or Varèse, or Stravinsky. To me it was all good music."
—Frank Zappa, 1989[9]
Zappa joined his first band at Mission Bay High School in San Diego. He was the band's drummer.[10] About the same time his parents bought a phonograph, which allowed him to develop his interest in music, and to begin building his record collection.[11] R&B singles were early purchases, starting a large collection he kept for the rest of his life.[12] He was interested in sounds for their own sake, particularly the sounds of drums and other percussion instruments. By age 12, he had obtained a snare drum and began learning the basics of orchestral percussion.[10] Zappa's deep interest in modern classical music began[13] when he read a LOOK magazine article about the Sam Goody record store chain that lauded its ability to sell an LP as obscure as The Complete Works of Edgard Varèse, Volume One.[14] The article described Varèse's percussion composition Ionisation, produced by EMS Recordings, as "a weird jumble of drums and other unpleasant sounds". Zappa decided to seek out Varèse's music. After searching for over a year, Zappa found a copy (he noticed the LP because of the "mad scientist" looking photo of Varèse on the cover). Not having enough money with him, he persuaded the salesman to sell him the record at a discount.[14] Thus began his lifelong passion for Varèse's music and that of other modern classical composers.
"The things that were happening in 1955 were cosmic ... in terms of music history."
—Frank Zappa, 1969 Pop Chronicles interview.[15]
Zappa grew up influenced by avant-garde composers such as Varèse, Halim El-Dabh,[16] Igor Stravinsky, and Anton Webern, R&B and doo-wop groups (including the Medallions[15] and local pachuco groups), and modern jazz. His own heterogeneous ethnic background, and the diverse social and cultural mix in and around greater Los Angeles, were crucial in the formation of Zappa as a practitioner of underground music and of his later distrustful and openly critical attitude towards "mainstream" social, political and musical movements. He frequently lampooned musical fads like psychedelia, rock opera and disco.[17][18] Television also exerted a strong influence, as demonstrated by quotations from show themes and advertising jingles found in his later works.[19]
Youth and beginning of career (1955–1960)[link]
By 1956, the Zappa family had moved to Lancaster, a small aerospace and farming town in the Antelope Valley of the Mojave Desert close to Edwards Air Force Base, in northern Los Angeles County. Zappa's mother encouraged him in his musical interests. Although she disliked Varèse's music, she was indulgent enough to give her son a long distance call to the composer as a 15th birthday present.[14] Unfortunately, Varèse was in Europe at the time, so Zappa spoke to the composer's wife. He later received a letter from Varèse thanking him for his interest, and telling him about a composition he was working on called "Déserts". Living in the desert town of Lancaster, Zappa found this very exciting. Varèse invited him to visit if he ever came to New York. The meeting never took place (Varèse died in 1965), but Zappa framed the letter and kept it on display for the rest of his life.[13][20]
At Antelope Valley High School, Zappa met Don Vliet (who later expanded his name to Don Van Vliet and adopted the stage name Captain Beefheart). Zappa and Vliet became close friends, sharing an interest in R&B records and influencing each other musically throughout their careers.[21] Around the same time, Zappa started playing drums in a local band, The Blackouts.[17] The band was racially diverse, and included Euclid James "Motorhead" Sherwood who later became a member of The Mothers of Invention. Zappa's interest in the guitar grew, and in 1957 he was given his first guitar. Among his early influences were Johnny "Guitar" Watson, Howlin' Wolf and Clarence "Gatemouth" Brown.[22] (In the 1970s and '80s, he invited Watson to perform on several albums.) Zappa considered soloing as the equivalent of forming "air sculptures",[23] and developed an eclectic, innovative and highly personal style.
Zappa's interest in composing and arranging proliferated in his last high-school years. By his final year, he was writing, arranging and conducting avant-garde performance pieces for the school orchestra.[24] He graduated from Antelope Valley High School in 1958, and later acknowledged two of his music teachers on the sleeve of the 1966 album Freak Out![25] Due to his family's frequent moves, Zappa attended at least six different high schools, and as a student he was often bored and given to distracting the rest of the class with juvenile antics.[26] He left community college after one semester, and maintained thereafter a disdain for formal education, taking his children out of school at age 15 and refusing to pay for their college.[27]
Zappa left home in 1959, and moved into a small apartment in Echo Park, Los Angeles. After meeting Kathryn J. "Kay" Sherman during his short stay at Pomona College, they moved in together in Ontario, and were married December 28, 1960.[28] Zappa worked for a short period in advertising. His sojourn in the commercial world was brief, but gave him valuable insights into how it works.[29] Throughout his career, he took a keen interest in the visual presentation of his work, designing some of his album covers and directing his own films and videos.
Early 1960s: Studio Z[link]
Zappa attempted to earn a living as a musician and composer, and played different nightclub gigs, some with a new version of The Blackouts.[30] Financially more rewarding were Zappa's earliest professional recordings, two soundtracks for the low-budget films The World's Greatest Sinner (1962) and Run Home Slow (1965). The former score was commissioned by actor-producer Timothy Carey and recorded in 1961. It contains many themes that appeared on later Zappa records.[31] The latter soundtrack was recorded in 1963 after the film was completed, but it was commissioned by one of Zappa's former high school teachers in 1959 and Zappa may have worked on it before the film was shot.[32] Excerpts from the soundtrack can be heard on the posthumous album The Lost Episodes (1996).
During the early 1960s, Zappa wrote and produced songs for other local artists, often working with singer-songwriter Ray Collins and producer Paul Buff. Their "Memories of El Monte" was recorded by The Penguins, although only Cleve Duncan of the original group was featured.[33] Buff owned the small Pal Recording Studio in Cucamonga, which included a unique five-track tape recorder he had built. At that time, only a handful of the most sophisticated commercial studios had multi-track facilities; the industry standard for smaller studios was still mono or two-track.[34] Although none of the recordings from the period achieved major commercial success, Zappa earned enough money to allow him to stage a concert of his orchestral music in 1963 and to broadcast and record it.[35] He appeared on Steve Allen's syndicated late night show the same year, in which he played a bicycle as a musical instrument.[36] With Captain Beefheart, Zappa recorded some songs under the name of The Soots. They were rejected by Dot Records for having "no commercial potential", a verdict Zappa subsequently quoted on the sleeve of Freak Out![37]
In 1964, after his marriage started to break up, he moved into the Pal studio and began routinely working 12 hours or more per day recording and experimenting with overdubbing and audio tape manipulation. This set a work pattern that endured for most of his life.[38] Aided by his income from film composing, Zappa took over the studio from Paul Buff, who was now working with Art Laboe at Original Sound. It was renamed Studio Z.[39] Studio Z was rarely booked for recordings by other musicians. Instead, friends moved in, notably James "Motorhead" Sherwood.[40] Zappa started performing as guitarist with a power trio, The Muthers, in local bars in order to support himself.[41]
An article in the local press describing Zappa as "the Movie King of Cucamonga" prompted the local police to suspect that he was making pornographic films.[42] In March 1965, Zappa was approached by a vice squad undercover officer, and accepted an offer of $100 to produce a suggestive audio tape for an alleged stag party. Zappa and a female friend recorded a faked erotic episode. When Zappa was about to hand over the tape, he was arrested, and the police stripped the studio of all recorded material.[42] The press was tipped off beforehand, and next day's The Daily Report wrote that "Vice Squad investigators stilled the tape recorders of a free-swinging, a-go-go film and recording studio here Friday and arrested a self-styled movie producer".[43] Zappa was charged with "conspiracy to commit pornography".[44] This felony charge was reduced and he was sentenced to six months in jail on a misdemeanor, with all but ten days suspended.[45] His brief imprisonment left a permanent mark, and was key in the formation of his anti-authoritarian stance.[46] Zappa lost several recordings made at Studio Z in the process, as the police only returned 30 out of 80 hours of tape seized.[47] Eventually, he could no longer afford to pay the rent on the studio and was evicted.[48] Zappa managed to recover some of his possessions before the studio was torn down in 1966.[49]
Late 1960s: The Mothers of Invention[link]
In 1965, Zappa was approached by Ray Collins who asked him to take over as the guitarist in local R&B band The Soul Giants, following a fight between Collins and the group's original guitarist.[3] Zappa accepted, and soon he assumed leadership and the role as co-lead singer (even though he never considered himself a singer[50]). He convinced the other members that they should play his music to increase the chances of getting a record contract.[51] The band was renamed The Mothers, coincidentally on Mother's Day.[52] The group increased their bookings after beginning an association with manager Herb Cohen, while they gradually gained attention on the burgeoning Los Angeles underground music scene.[53] In early 1966, they were spotted by leading record producer Tom Wilson when playing "Trouble Every Day", a song about the Watts Riots.[54] Wilson had earned acclaim as the producer for singer-songwriter Bob Dylan and the folk-rock act Simon & Garfunkel, and was notable as one of the few African Americans working as a major label pop music producer at this time.
Wilson signed The Mothers to the Verve Records division of MGM Records, which had built up a strong reputation in the music industry for its releases of modern jazz recordings in the 1940s and 1950s, but was attempting to diversify into pop and rock audiences. Verve insisted that the band officially rename themselves because "Mother", in slang terminology, was short for "motherfucker" — a term that apart from its profane meanings can denote a skilled musician.[55] The label suggested the name "The Mothers Auxiliary", which prompted Zappa to come up with the name "The Mothers of Invention."
[edit] Debut album: Freak Out! (1966)
With Wilson credited as producer, The Mothers of Invention, augmented by a studio orchestra, recorded the groundbreaking Freak Out! (1966) which, preceded by Bob Dylan's Blonde on Blonde, was the second rock double album ever released. It mixed R&B, doo-wop, musique concrète,[56] and experimental sound collages that captured the "freak" subculture of Los Angeles at that time.[57] Although he was dissatisfied with the final product—in a late '60s radio interview (included in the posthumous MOFO Project/Object compilation) Zappa recounted that the side-long closing track "Return of the Son of Monster Magnet" was intended to be the basic track for a much more complex work which Verve did not allow him to complete—Freak Out immediately established Zappa as a radical new voice in rock music, providing an antidote to the "relentless consumer culture of America".[58] The sound was raw, but the arrangements were sophisticated. While recording in the studio, some of the additional session musicians were shocked that they were expected to read the notes on sheet music from charts with Zappa conducting them, since it was not standard when recording rock music.[59] The lyrics praised non-conformity, disparaged authorities, and had dadaist elements. Yet, there was a place for seemingly conventional love songs.[60] Most compositions are Zappa's, which set a precedent for the rest of his recording career. He had full control over the arrangements and musical decisions and did most overdubs. Wilson provided the industry clout and connections to get the group the financial resources needed.[61]
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The opening track on Freak Out!. The album has "consistently been voted as one of top 100 greatest albums ever made".[58]
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During the recording of Freak Out!, Zappa moved into a house in Laurel Canyon with friend Pamela Zarubica, who appeared on the album.[59] The house became a meeting (and living) place for many LA musicians and groupies of the time, despite Zappa's disapproval of their illicit drug use.[62] He labeled people on drugs "assholes in action", and he tried cannabis only a few times, but without any pleasure.[63] He was a regular tobacco smoker for most of his life, and strongly critical of anti-tobacco campaigns.[64] After a short promotional tour following the release of Freak Out!, Zappa met Adelaide Gail Sloatman. He fell in love within "a couple of minutes", and she moved into the house over the summer.[51] They married in 1967, had four children and remained together until Zappa's death.
Wilson nominally produced The Mothers' second album Absolutely Free (1967), which was recorded in November 1966, and later mixed in New York, although by this time Zappa was in de facto control of most facets of the production. It featured extended playing by The Mothers of Invention and focused on songs that defined Zappa's compositional style of introducing abrupt, rhythmical changes into songs that were built from diverse elements.[65] Examples are "Plastic People" and "Brown Shoes Don't Make It", which contained lyrics critical of the hypocrisy and conformity of American society, but also of the counterculture of the 1960s.[66] As Zappa put it, "[W]e're satirists, and we are out to satirize everything."[67] At the same time, Zappa had recorded material for a album of orchestral works to be released under his own name, Lumpy Gravy, released by Capitol Records in 1967. Due to contractual problems, the album was pulled. Zappa took the opportunity to radically restructure the contents, adding newly recorded, improvised dialogue. After the contractual problems were resolved, the album was reissued by Verve in 1968.[68] It is an "incredible ambitious musical project",[69] a "monument to John Cage",[70] which intertwines orchestral themes, spoken words and electronic noises through radical audio editing techniques.[71][72]
New York period (1966–1968)[link]
The Mothers of Invention played in New York in late 1966 and were offered a contract at the Garrick Theater during Easter 1967. This proved successful and Herb Cohen extended the booking, which eventually lasted half a year.[73] As a result, Zappa and his wife, along with The Mothers of Invention, moved to New York.[68] Their shows became a combination of improvised acts showcasing individual talents of the band as well as tight performances of Zappa's music. Everything was directed by Zappa's famous hand signals.[74] Guest performers and audience participation became a regular part of the Garrick Theater shows. One evening, Zappa managed to entice some U.S. Marines from the audience onto the stage, where they proceeded to dismember a big baby doll, having been told by Zappa to pretend that it was a "gook baby".[75]
Situated in New York, and only interrupted by the band's first European tour, The Mothers of Invention recorded the album widely regarded as the peak of the group's late 1960s work, We're Only in It for the Money (released 1968).[76] It was produced by Zappa, with Wilson credited as executive producer. From then on, Zappa produced all albums released by The Mothers of Invention and as a solo artist. We're Only in It for the Money featured some of the most creative audio editing and production yet heard in pop music, and the songs ruthlessly satirized the hippie and flower power phenomena.[77] The cover photo parodied that of The Beatles' Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band.[78] The cover art was provided by Cal Schenkel whom Zappa met in New York. This initiated a life-long collaboration in which Schenkel designed covers for numerous Zappa and Mothers albums.[79]
Reflecting Zappa's eclectic approach to music, the next album, Cruising with Ruben & the Jets (1968), was very different. It represented a collection of doo-wop songs; listeners and critics were not sure whether the album was a satire or a tribute.[80] Zappa has noted that the album was conceived in the way Stravinsky's compositions were in his neo-classical period: "If he could take the forms and clichés of the classical era and pervert them, why not do the same ... to doo-wop in the fifties?"[81] A theme from Stravinsky's The Rite of Spring is heard during one song.
In New York, Zappa increasingly used tape editing as a compositional tool.[82] A prime example is found on the double album Uncle Meat (1969),[83] where the track "King Kong" is edited from various studio and live performances. Zappa had begun regularly recording concerts,[84] and because of his insistence on precise tuning and timing, he was able to augment his studio productions with excerpts from live shows, and vice versa.[85] Later, he combined recordings of different compositions into new pieces, irrespective of the tempo or meter of the sources. He dubbed this process "xenochrony" (strange synchronizations[86]) — reflecting the Greek "xeno" (alien or strange) and "chrono" (time).[85] Zappa also evolved a compositional approach which he called "conceptual continuity," meaning that any project or album was part of a larger project. Everything was connected, and musical themes and lyrics reappeared in different form on later albums. Conceptual continuity clues are found throughout Zappa's entire œuvre.[19][82]
During the late 1960s, Zappa continued to develop the business sides of his career. He and Herb Cohen formed the Bizarre Records and Straight Records labels, distributed by Warner Bros. Records, as ventures to aid the funding of projects and to increase creative control. Zappa produced the double album Trout Mask Replica for Captain Beefheart, and releases by Alice Cooper, Wild Man Fischer, and The GTOs, as well as Lenny Bruce's last live performance.[87]
Disbanding the original Mothers of Invention (1969)[link]
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Zappa and The Mothers of Invention returned to Los Angeles in the summer of 1968, and the Zappas moved into a house on Laurel Canyon Boulevard, only to move again to one on Woodrow Wilson Drive in the autumn.[91] This was to be Zappa's home for the rest of his life. Despite being a success with fans in Europe, The Mothers of Invention were not faring well financially.[92] Their first records were vocally oriented, but Zappa wrote more instrumental jazz and classical oriented music for the band's concerts, which confused audiences. Zappa felt that audiences failed to appreciate his "electrical chamber music".[93][94]
In 1969 there were nine band members and Zappa was supporting the group himself from his publishing royalties whether they played or not.[92] 1969 was also the year Zappa, fed up with MGM's interference, left MGM Records for Warner Bros. Records' Reprise Records subsidiary where Zappa/Mothers recordings would bear the Bizarre Records imprint. In late 1969, Zappa broke up the band. He often cited the financial strain as the main reason,[95] but also commented on the band members' lack of sufficient effort.[96] Many band members were bitter about Zappa's decision, and some took it as a sign of Zappa's concern for perfection at the expense of human feeling.[94] Others were irritated by 'his autocratic ways',[61] exemplified by Zappa's never staying at the same hotel as the band members.[97] Several members would, however, play for Zappa in years to come. Remaining recordings with the band from this period were collected on Weasels Ripped My Flesh and Burnt Weeny Sandwich (both released in 1970).
After he disbanded The Mothers of Invention, Zappa released the acclaimed solo album Hot Rats (1969).[98][99] It features, for the first time on record, Zappa playing extended guitar solos and contains one of his most enduring compositions, "Peaches en Regalia", which reappeared several times on future recordings.[88] It was backed by jazz, blues and R&B session players including violinist Don "Sugarcane" Harris, drummers John Guerin and Paul Humphrey, multi-instrumentalist and previous member of Mothers of Invention Ian Underwood, and multi-instrumentalist Shuggie Otis on bass, along with a guest appearance by Captain Beefheart (providing vocals to the only non-instrumental track, "Willie the Pimp"). It became a popular album in England,[100] and had a major influence on the development of the jazz-rock fusion genre.[88][99]
1970s: From The Mothers to Zappa[link]
In 1970 Zappa met conductor Zubin Mehta. They arranged a May 1970 concert where Mehta conducted the Los Angeles Philharmonic augmented by a rock band. According to Zappa, the music was mostly written in motel rooms while on tour with The Mothers of Invention. Some of it was later featured in the movie 200 Motels.[100] Although the concert was a success, Zappa's experience working with a symphony orchestra was not a happy one.[81] His dissatisfaction became a recurring theme throughout his career; he often felt that the quality of performance of his material delivered by orchestras was not commensurate with the money he spent on orchestral concerts and recordings.[101]
Rebirth of The Mothers and filmmaking (1970)[link]
Later in 1970, Zappa formed a new version of The Mothers (from then on, he mostly dropped the "of Invention"). It included British drummer Aynsley Dunbar, jazz keyboardist George Duke, Ian Underwood, Jeff Simmons (bass, rhythm guitar), and three members of The Turtles: bass player Jim Pons, and singers Mark Volman and Howard Kaylan, who, due to persistent legal and contractual problems, adopted the stage name "The Phlorescent Leech and Eddie", or "Flo & Eddie".[102]
This version of The Mothers debuted on Zappa's next solo album Chunga's Revenge (1970),[103] which was followed by the double-album soundtrack to the movie 200 Motels (1971), featuring The Mothers, The Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Ringo Starr, Theodore Bikel, and Keith Moon. Co-directed by Zappa and Tony Palmer, it was filmed in a week at Pinewood Studios outside London.[104] Tensions between Zappa and several cast and crew members arose before and during shooting.[104] The film deals loosely with life on the road as a rock musician.[105] It was the first feature film photographed on videotape and transferred to 35 mm film, a process which allowed for novel visual effects.[106] It was released to mixed reviews.[107] The score relied extensively on orchestral music, and Zappa's dissatisfaction with the classical music world intensified when a concert, scheduled at the Royal Albert Hall after filming, was canceled because a representative of the venue found some of the lyrics obscene. In 1975, he lost a lawsuit against the Royal Albert Hall for breach of contract.[108]
After 200 Motels, the band went on tour, which resulted in two live albums, Fillmore East - June 1971 and Just Another Band From L.A.; the latter included the 20-minute track "Billy the Mountain", Zappa's satire on rock opera set in Southern California. This track was representative of the band's theatrical performances in which songs were used to build up sketches based on 200 Motels scenes as well as new situations often portraying the band members' sexual encounters on the road.[109][110]
Accident, attack and their aftermath (1971–1972)[link]
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In December 1971, there were two serious setbacks. While performing at Casino de Montreux in Switzerland, The Mothers' equipment was destroyed when a flare set off by an audience member started a fire that burned down the casino.[111] Immortalized in Deep Purple's song "Smoke on the Water", the event and immediate aftermath can be heard on the bootleg album Swiss Cheese/Fire, released legally as part of Zappa's Beat the Boots II compilation. After a week's break, The Mothers played at the Rainbow Theatre, London, with rented gear. During the encore, an audience member pushed Zappa off the stage and into the concrete-floored orchestra pit. The band thought Zappa had been killed—he had suffered serious fractures, head trauma and injuries to his back, leg, and neck, as well as a crushed larynx, which ultimately caused his voice to drop a third after healing.[111] This accident resulted in him using a wheelchair for an extended period, forcing him off the road for over half a year. Upon his return to the stage in September 1972, he was still wearing a leg brace, had a noticeable limp and could not stand for very long while on stage. Zappa noted that one leg healed "shorter than the other" (a reference later found in the lyrics of songs "Zomby Woof" and "Dancin' Fool"), resulting in chronic back pain.[111] Meanwhile, The Mothers were left in limbo and eventually formed the core of Flo and Eddie's band as they set out on their own.
During 1971–1972 Zappa released two strongly jazz-oriented solo LPs, Waka/Jawaka and The Grand Wazoo, which were recorded during the forced layoff from concert touring, using floating line-ups of session players and Mothers alumni.[112] Musically, the albums were akin to Hot Rats.[113] Zappa began touring again in late 1972.[113] His first effort was a series of concerts in September 1972 with a 20-piece big band referred to as the Grand Wazoo. This was followed by a scaled-down version known as the Petit Wazoo that toured the U.S. for five weeks from October to December 1972.[114]
Top 10 album (1973–1975)[link]
Zappa then formed and toured with smaller groups that variously included Ian Underwood (reeds, keyboards), Ruth Underwood (vibes, marimba), Sal Marquez (trumpet, vocals), Napoleon Murphy Brock (sax, flute and vocals), Bruce Fowler (trombone), Tom Fowler (bass), Chester Thompson (drums), Ralph Humphrey (drums), George Duke (keyboards, vocals), and Jean-Luc Ponty (violin).
By 1973 the Bizarre and Straight labels were discontinued. In their place, Zappa and Cohen created DiscReet Records, also distributed by Warner Bros.[115] Zappa continued a high rate of production through the first half of the 1970s, including the solo album Apostrophe (') (1974), which reached a career-high No. 10 on the Billboard pop album charts[116] helped by the chart single "Don't Eat The Yellow Snow".[117] Other albums from the period are Over-Nite Sensation (1973), which contained several future concert favorites, such as "Dinah-Moe Humm" and "Montana", and the albums Roxy & Elsewhere (1974) and One Size Fits All (1975) which feature ever-changing versions of a band still called The Mothers, and are notable for the tight renditions of highly difficult jazz fusion songs in such pieces as "Inca Roads", "Echidna's Arf (Of You)" and "Be-Bop Tango (Of the Old Jazzmen's Church)".[118] A live recording from 1974, You Can't Do That on Stage Anymore, Vol. 2 (1988), captures "the full spirit and excellence of the 1973–75 band".[118] Zappa released Bongo Fury (1975), which featured live recordings from a tour the same year that reunited him with Captain Beefheart for a brief period.[119] They later became estranged for a period of years, but were in contact at the end of Zappa's life.[120]
Business breakups and touring (1976–1979)[link]
Zappa's relationship with long-time manager Herb Cohen ended in 1976. Zappa sued Cohen for skimming more than he was allocated from DiscReet Records, as well as for signing acts of which Zappa did not approve.[121] Cohen filed a lawsuit against Zappa in return, which froze the money Zappa and Cohen had gained from an out-of-court settlement with MGM over the rights of the early Mothers of Invention recordings. It also prevented Zappa having access to any of his previously recorded material during the trials. Zappa therefore took his personal master copies of the rock-oriented Zoot Allures (1976) directly to Warner Bros., thereby bypassing DiscReet.[122]
In the mid-1970s Zappa prepared material for Läther (pronounced "leather"), a four-LP project. Läther encapsulated all the aspects of Zappa's musical styles — rock tunes, orchestral works, complex instrumentals, and Zappa's own trademark distortion-drenched guitar solos. Wary of a quadruple-LP, Warner Bros. Records refused to release it.[123] Zappa managed to get an agreement with Phonogram, and test pressings were made targeted at a Halloween 1977 release, but Warner Bros. prevented the release by claiming rights over the material.[124] Zappa responded by appearing on the Pasadena, California radio station KROQ, allowing them to broadcast Läther and encouraging listeners to make their own tape recordings.[125] A lawsuit between Zappa and Warner Bros. followed, during which no Zappa material was released for more than a year. Eventually, Warner Bros. issued different versions of much of the Läther material in 1978 and 1979 as four individual albums (five full length LPs) with limited promotion.[126] The four individual albums were not included in the third Old Masters box set released in 1987.[127] When the music was first released on CD in 1991, Zappa chose to release the four individual albums. Läther was released posthumously in 1996.[128]
Although Zappa eventually gained the rights to all his material created under the MGM and Warner Bros. contracts,[129] the various lawsuits meant that for a period Zappa's only income came from touring, which he therefore did extensively in 1975–1977 with relatively small, mainly rock-oriented, bands.[124] Drummer Terry Bozzio became a regular band member, Napoleon Murphy Brock stayed on for a while, and original Mothers of Invention bassist Roy Estrada joined. Among other musicians were bassist Patrick O'Hearn, singer-guitarist Ray White and keyboardist Eddie Jobson. In December 1976, Zappa appeared as a featured musical guest on the NBC television show Saturday Night Live.[130][131] The performances included an impromptu musical collaboration with cast member John Belushi during the instrumental piece "The Purple Lagoon". Belushi appeared as his Samurai Futaba character playing the tenor sax with Zappa conducting.[132] Zappa's song, "I'm the Slime", was performed with a voice-over by SNL booth announcer Don Pardo, who also introduced "Peaches En Regalia" on the same airing.
Zappa's band at the time, with the additions of Ruth Underwood and a horn section (featuring Michael and Randy Brecker), performed during Christmas in New York, recordings of which appear on one of the albums Warner Bros. culled from the Läther project, Zappa in New York (1978). It mixes intense instrumentals such as "The Black Page" and humorous songs like "Titties and Beer".[133] The former composition, written originally for drum kit but later developed for larger bands, is notorious for its complexity in rhythmic structure and short, densely arranged passages.[134][135]
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One of Zappa's complex, percussion-based compositions featured on Zappa in New York.
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Zappa in New York featured a song about sex criminal Michael H. Kenyon, "The Illinois Enema Bandit", which featured Don Pardo providing the opening narrative in the song. Like many songs on the album, it contained numerous sexual references,[133] leading to many critics objecting and being offended by the content.[136] Zappa dismissed the criticism by noting that he was a journalist reporting on life as he saw it.[137] Predating his later fight against censorship, he remarked: "What do you make of a society that is so primitive that it clings to the belief that certain words in its language are so powerful that they could corrupt you the moment you hear them?"[50] The remaining albums released by Warner Bros. Records without Zappa's consent were Studio Tan in 1978 and Sleep Dirt in 1979, which contained complex suites of instrumentally-based tunes recorded between 1973 and 1976, and whose release was overlooked in the midst of the legal problems.[138] Also released by the label without the artist's consent was Orchestral Favorites in 1979, which featured recordings of a concert with orchestral music from 1975.
Zappa as an independent artist (1979)[link]
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The single became a hit in non-English speaking countries and helped Sheik Yerbouti become a best-seller.[139]
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Resolving the lawsuits successfully, Zappa ended the 1970s "stronger than ever",[140] by releasing two of his most successful albums in 1979: the best selling album of his career, Sheik Yerbouti,[141] and the "bona fide masterpiece",[140] Joe's Garage.[142] The double album Sheik Yerbouti was the first release on Zappa Records, and contained the Grammy-nominated single "Dancin' Fool", which reached No. 45 on the Billboard charts,[143] and "Jewish Princess", which received attention when a Jewish group, the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), attempted to prevent the song from receiving radio airplay due to its alleged anti-Semitic lyrics.[137] Zappa vehemently denied any anti-Semitic sentiments and dismissed the ADL as a "noisemaking organization that tries to apply pressure on people in order to manufacture a stereotype image of Jews that suits their idea of a good time".[144] The album's commercial success was attributable in part to "Bobby Brown". Due to its explicit lyrics about a young man's encounter with a "dyke by the name of Freddie", the song did not get airplay in the U.S., but it topped the charts in several European countries where English is not the primary language.[139] The triple LP Joe's Garage featured lead singer Ike Willis as the voice of the character "Joe" in a rock opera about the danger of political systems,[140] the suppression of freedom of speech and music — inspired in part by the Islamic revolution that had made music illegal within its jurisdiction at the time[145] — and about the "strange relationship Americans have with sex and sexual frankness".[140] The album contains rock songs like "Catholic Girls" (a riposte to the controversies of "Jewish Princess"),[146] "Lucille Has Messed My Mind Up", and the title track, as well as extended live-recorded guitar improvisations combined with a studio backup band dominated by drummer Vinnie Colaiuta (with whom Zappa had a particularly good musical rapport)[147] adopting the xenochrony process. The album contains one of Zappa's most famous guitar "signature pieces", "Watermelon in Easter Hay".[23][148]
On December 21, 1979, Zappa's movie Baby Snakes premiered in New York. The movie's tagline was "A movie about people who do stuff that is not normal".[149] The 2 hour and 40 minutes movie was based on footage from concerts in New York around Halloween 1977, with a band featuring keyboardist Tommy Mars and percussionist Ed Mann (who would both return on later tours) as well as guitarist Adrian Belew. It also contained several extraordinary sequences of clay animation by Bruce Bickford who had earlier provided animation sequences to Zappa for a 1974 TV special (which later become available on the video The Dub Room Special (1982)).[150] The movie did not do well in theatrical distribution,[151] but won the Premier Grand Prix at the First International Music Festival in Paris in 1981. The Zappa Family Trust released it on DVD, and it has been available since 2003.[150]
Zappa later expanded on his television appearances in a non-musical role. He was an actor or voice artist in episodes of Shelley Duvall's Faerie Tale Theatre,[152] Miami Vice[153] and The Ren and Stimpy Show.[152] A voice part in The Simpsons never materialized, to creator Matt Groening's disappointment (Groening was a neighbor of Zappa's, and a lifelong fan).[154]
1980s: Productive as ever[link]
In 1980, Zappa cut his ties with Mercury Records after the label refused to release his song "I Don't Wanna Get Drafted."[155] It was picked up by CBS Records and released on the Zappa label in North America and the CBS label internationally.[156] After spending most of 1980 on the road, Zappa released Tinsel Town Rebellion in 1981. It was the first release on his own Barking Pumpkin Records,[157] and it contains songs taken from a 1979 tour, one studio track and material from the 1980 tours. The album is a mixture of complicated instrumentals and Zappa's use of sprechstimme (speaking song or voice)—a compositional technique utilized by such composers as Arnold Schoenberg and Alban Berg — showcasing some of the most accomplished bands Zappa ever had (mostly featuring drummer Vinnie Colaiuta).[157] While some lyrics still raised controversy among critics, in the sense that some found them sexist,[158] the political and sociological satire in songs like the title track and "The Blue Light" have been described as a "hilarious critique of the willingness of the American people to believe anything".[159] The album is also notable for the presence of guitarist Steve Vai, who joined Zappa's touring band in the fall of 1980.[160]
The same year the double album You Are What You Is was released. Most of it was recorded in Zappa's brand new Utility Muffin Research Kitchen (UMRK) studios, which were located at his house,[85] thereby giving him complete freedom to work.[161] The album included one complex instrumental, "Theme from the 3rd Movement of Sinister Footwear", but focused mainly on rock songs with Zappa's sardonic social commentary—satirical lyrics targeted at teenagers, the media, and religious and political hypocrisy.[162] "Dumb All Over" is a tirade on religion, as is "Heavenly Bank Account", wherein Zappa rails against TV evangelists such as Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson for their purported influence on the U.S. administration as well as their use of religion as a means of raising money.[163] Songs like "Society Pages" and "I'm a Beautiful Guy" show Zappa's dismay with the Reagan era and its "obscene pursuit of wealth and happiness".[163]
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The title track on Shut Up 'N Play Yer Guitar features Zappa's guitar improvisations.
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In 1981, Zappa also released three instrumental albums, Shut Up 'N Play Yer Guitar, Shut Up 'N Play Yer Guitar Some More, and The Return of the Son of Shut Up 'N Play Yer Guitar, which were initially sold via mail order, but later released through the CBS label due to popular demand.[164] The albums focus exclusively on Frank Zappa as a guitar soloist, and the tracks are predominantly live recordings from 1979–1980; they highlight Zappa's improvisational skills with "beautiful performances from the backing group as well".[165] Another guitar-only album, Guitar, was released in 1988, and a third, Trance-Fusion, which Zappa completed shortly before his death, was released in 2006.
From hit single to classical performances[link]
In May 1982, Zappa released Ship Arriving Too Late to Save a Drowning Witch, which featured his biggest selling single ever, the Grammy Award-nominated song "Valley Girl" (topping out at No. 32 on the Billboard charts).[143] In her improvised lyrics to the song, Zappa's daughter Moon Unit satirized the vapid speech of teenage girls from the San Fernando Valley, which popularized many "Valspeak" expressions such as "gag me with a spoon," "fer sure, fer sure," "grody" (gross), and "barf out".[166] Most Americans who only knew Zappa from his few singles successes now thought of him as a person writing "novelty songs", even though the rest of the album contained highly challenging music.[167] Zappa was irritated by this[168] and never played the song live.[167]
In 1983, two different projects were released, beginning with The Man from Utopia, a rock-oriented work. The album is eclectic, featuring the vocal-led "Dangerous Kitchen" and "The Jazz Discharge Party Hats", both continuations of the sprechstimme excursions on Tinseltown Rebellion. The second album, London Symphony Orchestra, Vol. 1, contained orchestral Zappa compositions conducted by Kent Nagano and performed by the London Symphony Orchestra (LSO). A second record of these sessions, London Symphony Orchestra, Vol. 2 was released in 1987. The material was recorded under a tight schedule with Zappa providing all funding, helped by the commercial success of "Valley Girl".[169] Zappa was not satisfied with the LSO recordings. One reason is "Strictly Genteel", which was recorded after the trumpet section had been out for drinks on a break: the track took 40 edits to hide out-of-tune notes.[169] Conductor Nagano, who was pleased with the experience, noted that in "fairness to the orchestra, the music is humanly very, very difficult".[170] Some reviews noted that the recordings were the best representation of Zappa's orchestral work so far.[171] In 1984 Zappa teamed again with Nagano and the Berkeley Symphony for a live performance of A Zappa Affair with augmented orchestra, life-size puppets, and moving stage sets. Although critically acclaimed the work was a financial failure, and only performed twice. Zappa was invited by conference organizer Thomas Wells to be the keynote speaker at the American Society of University Composers at the Ohio State University. It was there Zappa delivered his famous "Bingo! There Goes Your Tenure" address,[172] and had two of his orchestra pieces, "Dupree's Paradise" and "Naval Aviation in Art?" performed by the Columbus Symphony and ProMusica Chamber Orchestra of Columbus.[173][174]
Synclavier[link]
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A Zappa composition for classical ensemble from Boulez Conducts Zappa: The Perfect Stranger.
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For the remainder of his career, much of Zappa's work was influenced by his use of the Synclavier as a compositional and performance tool. Even considering the complexity of the music he wrote, the Synclavier could realize anything he could dream up.[175] The Synclavier could be programmed to play almost anything conceivable, to perfection: "With the Synclavier, any group of imaginary instruments can be invited to play the most difficult passages ... with one-millisecond accuracy—every time".[175] Even though it essentially did away with the need for musicians,[176] Zappa viewed the Synclavier and real-life musicians as separate.[175] In 1984, he released four albums. Boulez Conducts Zappa: The Perfect Stranger, contains orchestral works commissioned and conducted by world-renowned conductor Pierre Boulez (who was listed as an influence on Freak Out!) and performed by his Ensemble InterContemporain, juxtaposed with premiere Synclavier pieces. Again, Zappa was not satisfied with the performances of his orchestral works as he found them under-rehearsed, but in the album liner notes he respectfully thanks Boulez's demands for precision.[177] The Synclavier pieces stood in contrast to the orchestral works, as the sounds were electronically generated and not, as became possible shortly thereafter, sampled.
The album Thing-Fish was an ambitious three-record set in the style of a Broadway play dealing with a dystopian "what-if" scenario involving feminism, homosexuality, manufacturing and distribution of the AIDS virus, and a eugenics program conducted by the United States government.[178] New vocals were combined with previously released tracks and new Synclavier music; "the work is an extraordinary example of bricolage".[179] Finally, in 1984, Zappa released Francesco Zappa, a Synclavier rendition of works by 18th century composer Francesco Zappa (no known relation), and Them or Us, a two-record set of heavily edited live and session pieces.
Senate testimony[link]
On September 19, 1985, Zappa testified before the United States Senate Commerce, Technology, and Transportation committee, attacking the Parents Music Resource Center or PMRC, a music organization co-founded by Tipper Gore, wife of then-senator Al Gore. The PMRC consisted of many wives of politicians, including the wives of five members of the committee, and was founded to address the issue of song lyrics with sexual or satanic content.[180] Zappa saw their activities as on a path towards censorship,[181] and called their proposal for voluntary labelling of records with explicit content "extortion" of the music industry.[182] In his prepared statement, he said:
The PMRC proposal is an ill-conceived piece of nonsense which fails to deliver any real benefits to children, infringes the civil liberties of people who are not children, and promises to keep the courts busy for years dealing with the interpretational and enforcemental problems inherent in the proposal's design. It is my understanding that, in law, First Amendment issues are decided with a preference for the least restrictive alternative. In this context, the PMRC's demands are the equivalent of treating dandruff by decapitation ... The establishment of a rating system, voluntary or otherwise, opens the door to an endless parade of moral quality control programs based on things certain Christians do not like. What if the next bunch of Washington wives demands a large yellow "J" on all material written or performed by Jews, in order to save helpless children from exposure to concealed Zionist doctrine?[183]
Zappa set excerpts from the PMRC hearings to Synclavier music in his composition "Porn Wars" on the 1985 album Frank Zappa Meets the Mothers of Prevention, and the full recording was released in 2010 as Congress Shall Make No Law.... Zappa is heard interacting with Senators Fritz Hollings, Slade Gorton, Al Gore (who claimed, at the hearing, to be a Zappa fan), and in an exchange with Florida Senator Paula Hawkins over what toys Zappa's children played with. Zappa expressed opinions on censorship when he appeared on CNN's Crossfire TV series and debated issues with Washington Times commentator John Lofton in 1986.[184] Zappa's passion for US politics was becoming a bigger part of his life. He had always encouraged his fans to register to vote on album covers, and throughout 1988 he had registration booths at his concerts.[185] He even considered running for President of the United States.[186]
Digital medium and last tour[link]
Around 1986, Zappa undertook a comprehensive re-release program of his earlier vinyl recordings.[187] He personally oversaw the remastering of all his 1960s, 1970s and early 1980s albums for the new digital compact disc medium.[188] Certain aspects of these re-issues were, however, criticized by some fans as being unfaithful to the original recordings.[189] Nearly twenty years before the advent of online music stores, Zappa had proposed to replace "phonographic record merchandising" of music by "direct digital-to-digital transfer" through phone or cable TV (with royalty payments and consumer billing automatically built into the accompanying software).[190] In 1989, Zappa considered his idea a "miserable flop".[190]
The album Jazz from Hell, released in 1986, earned Zappa his first Grammy Award in 1987 for Best Rock Instrumental Performance. Except for one live guitar solo (St. Etienne), the album exclusively featured compositions brought to life by the Synclavier. Although an instrumental album, containing no lyrics whatsoever, Meyer Music Markets sold Jazz from Hell featuring an "explicit lyrics" sticker—a warning label introduced by the Recording Industry Association of America in an agreement with the PMRC.[191]
Zappa's last tour in a rock and jazz band format took place in 1988 with a 12-piece group which had a repertoire of over 100 (mostly Zappa) compositions, but which split under acrimonious circumstances before the tour was completed.[192] The tour was documented on the albums Broadway the Hard Way (new material featuring songs with strong political emphasis), The Best Band You Never Heard in Your Life (Zappa "standards" and an eclectic collection of cover tunes, ranging from Maurice Ravel's Boléro to Led Zeppelin's "Stairway to Heaven"), and Make a Jazz Noise Here (mostly instrumental and avant-garde music). Parts are also found on You Can't Do That on Stage Anymore, volumes 4 and 6.
1990s: Classical music and death[link]
In early 1990, Zappa visited Czechoslovakia at the request of President Václav Havel, and was asked to serve as consultant for the government on trade, cultural matters and tourism. Havel was a lifelong fan of Zappa who had great influence in the avant-garde and underground scene in Central Europe in the 1970s and 1980s (a Czech rock group that was imprisoned in 1976 took its name from Zappa's 1968 song "Plastic People").[193] Zappa enthusiastically agreed and began meeting with corporate officials interested in investing in Czechoslovakia. Within a few weeks, however, the U.S. administration put pressure on the Czech government to withdraw the appointment. Havel made Zappa an unofficial cultural attaché instead.[194] Zappa also planned to develop an international consulting enterprise to facilitate trade between the former Eastern Bloc and Western businesses.[195] On June 24, 1991, Zappa took part at the concert "Adieu Soviet Army", organised in Prague, as the farewell to the last soldiers of Soviet Red Army, leaving Czechoslovakia (the Red Army had occupied Czechoslovakia since the Prague spring). This was probably Zappa's last rock appearance on stage and it is recorded on the album Adieu C. A. (Soviet Army).[196]
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One of Zappa's works for Synclavier on Civilization, Phaze III, cited as his "last great work."[197]
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Most of Zappa's projects came to a halt in 1990, when he was diagnosed with terminal prostate cancer. The disease had been developing unnoticed for ten years and was considered inoperable.[195] After his diagnosis, Zappa devoted most of his energy to modern orchestral and Synclavier works. Shortly before his death in 1993 he completed Civilization, Phaze III, a major Synclavier work which he had begun in the 1980s.[198][199]
In 1991, Zappa was chosen to be one of four featured composers at the Frankfurt Festival in 1992 (the others were John Cage, Karlheinz Stockhausen and Alexander Knaifel).[200] Zappa was approached by the German chamber ensemble, Ensemble Modern, which was interested in playing his music for the event. Although ill, Zappa invited them to Los Angeles for rehearsals of new compositions and new arrangements of older material.[201] In addition to being satisfied with the ensemble's performances of his music, Zappa also got along with the musicians, and the concerts in Germany and Austria were set up for the fall.[201] In September 1992, the concerts went ahead as scheduled, but Zappa could only appear at two in Frankfurt due to illness. At the first concert, he conducted the opening "Overture", and the final "G-Spot Tornado" as well as the theatrical "Food Gathering in Post-Industrial America, 1992" and "Welcome to the United States" (the remainder of the program was conducted by the ensemble's regular conductor Peter Rundel). Zappa received a 20-minute ovation.[202] It would become his last professional public appearance, as the cancer was spreading to such an extent that he was in too much pain to enjoy an event that he otherwise found "exhilarating".[202] Recordings from the concerts appeared on The Yellow Shark (1993), Zappa's last release during his lifetime, and some material from studio rehearsals appeared on the posthumous Everything Is Healing Nicely (1999).
Frank Zappa died on Saturday, December 4, 1993 in his home with his wife and children. At a private ceremony the following day, Zappa was interred in an unmarked grave at the Westwood Village Memorial Park Cemetery in Westwood, Los Angeles,[203][204] next to the eventual (1996) grave of actor Lew Ayres.[205] On Monday, December 6 his family publicly announced that "Composer Frank Zappa left for his final tour just before 6:00 pm on Saturday".[206]
Legacy[link]
Acclaim and honors[link]
Frank Zappa was one of the first to try tearing down the barriers between rock, jazz, and classical music. In the late Sixties his Mothers of Invention would slip from Stravinsky's "Petroushka" into The Dovells' "Bristol Stomp" before breaking down into saxophone squeals inspired by Albert Ayler
The Rolling Stone Illustrated History of Rock & Roll
Zappa earned widespread critical acclaim in his lifetime and after his death. The Rolling Stone Album Guide (2004) writes: "Frank Zappa dabbled in virtually all kinds of music — and, whether guised as a satirical rocker, jazz-rock fusionist, guitar virtuoso, electronics wizard, or orchestral innovator, his eccentric genius was undeniable".[207] Even though his work drew inspiration from many different genres, Zappa was seen establishing a coherent and personal expression. In 1971, biographer David Walley noted that "The whole structure of his music is unified, not neatly divided by dates or time sequences and it is all building into a composite".[208] On commenting on Zappa's music, politics and philosophy, Barry Miles noted in 2004 that they cannot be separated: "It was all one; all part of his 'conceptual continuity'".[209]
Guitar Player devoted a special issue to Zappa in 1992, and asked on the cover "Is FZ America's Best Kept Musical Secret?" Editor Don Menn remarked that the issue was about "The most important composer to come out of modern popular music".[210] Among those contributing to the issue was composer and musicologist Nicolas Slonimsky, who conducted premiere performances of works of Ives and Varèse in the 1930s.[211] He became friends with Zappa in the 1980s,[212] and said "I admire everything Frank does, because he practically created the new musical millennium. He does beautiful, beautiful work ... It has been my luck to have lived to see the emergence of this totally new type of music."[213] Conductor Kent Nagano remarked in the same issue that "Frank is a genius. That's a word I don't use often ... In Frank's case it is not too strong ... He is extremely literate musically. I'm not sure if the general public knows that".[214] Pierre Boulez stated in Musician magazine's posthumous Zappa tribute article that Zappa "was an exceptional figure because he was part of the worlds of rock and classical music and that both types of his work would survive."[215] Many music scholars acknowledge Zappa as one of the most influential composers of his generation.[216][217][218] As an electric guitarist, he has become highly regarded.[219][220][221]
In 1994, jazz magazine Down Beat's critics poll placed Zappa in its Hall of Fame.[222] Zappa was posthumously inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1995. There, it was written that "Frank Zappa was rock and roll's sharpest musical mind and most astute social critic. He was the most prolific composer of his age, and he bridged genres — rock, jazz, classical, avant-garde and even novelty music — with masterful ease".[223] He received the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 1997.[224] In 2005, the U.S. National Recording Preservation Board included We're Only in It for the Money in the National Recording Registry as "Frank Zappa's inventive and iconoclastic album presents a unique political stance, both anti-conservative and anti-counterculture, and features a scathing satire on hippiedom and America's reactions to it".[225] The same year, Rolling Stone magazine ranked him at No. 71 on its list of the 100 Greatest Artists of All Time.[226] In 2011, he was ranked at No. 22 on the list of the 100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time by the same magazine.[227]
Artists influenced by Zappa[link]
A number of notable musicians, bands and orchestras from diverse genres have been influenced by Frank Zappa's music. Rock artists like Alice Cooper,[228] Primus,[229] Fee Waybill of The Tubes[230] all cite Zappa's influence, as do progressive rock artists like Henry Cow,[231] Trey Anastasio of Phish,[226] and John Frusciante.[232] Paul McCartney regarded Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band as The Beatles' Freak Out![233] Heavy rock and metal acts like Black Sabbath,[234] Mike Portnoy,[235] Warren DeMartini,[236] Steve Vai,[237] Strapping Young Lad,[238] System of a Down,[239] Clawfinger,[240] and Devin Townsend[241] acknowledge Zappa's inspiration. On the classical music scene, Tomas Ulrich,[242] Meridian Arts Ensemble,[243] Ensemble Ambrosius[244] and the Fireworks Ensemble[245] regularly perform Zappa's compositions and quote his influence. Contemporary jazz musicians and composers Bill Frisell[246] and John Zorn[247] are inspired by Zappa, as is funk legend George Clinton.[248] Other artists whose work is affected by Zappa include new age pianist George Winston,[249] electronic composer Bob Gluck,[250] parodist and novelty composer "Weird Al" Yankovic,[251] industrial music pioneer Genesis P-Orridge,[252] and noise music artist Masami Akita of Merzbow.[253]
References in arts and sciences[link]
Scientists from various fields have honored Zappa by naming new discoveries after him. In 1967, paleontologist Leo P. Plas, Jr. identified an extinct mollusc in Nevada and named it Amaurotoma zappa with the motivation that, "The specific name, zappa, honors Frank Zappa".[254] In the 1980s, biologist Ed Murdy named a genus of gobiid fishes of New Guinea Zappa, with a species named Zappa confluentus.[255] Biologist Ferdinando Boero named a Californian jellyfish Phialella zappai (1987), noting that he had "pleasure in naming this species after the modern music composer".[256] Belgian biologists Bosmans and Bosselaers discovered in the early 1980s a Cameroonese spider, which they in 1994 named Pachygnatha zappa because "the ventral side of the abdomen of the female of this species strikingly resembles the artist's legendary moustache".[257] A gene of the bacterium Proteus mirabilis that causes urinary tract infections was in 1995 named zapA by three biologists from Maryland. In their scientific article, they "especially thank the late Frank Zappa for inspiration and assistance with genetic nomenclature".[258] In the late 1990s, American paleontologists Marc Salak and Halard L. Lescinsky discovered a metazoan fossil, and named it Spygori zappania to honor "the late Frank Zappa ... whose mission paralleled that of the earliest paleontologists: to challenge conventional and traditional beliefs when such beliefs lacked roots in logic and reason".[259]
In 1994, lobbying efforts initiated by psychiatrist John Scialli led the International Astronomical Union's Minor Planet Center to name an asteroid in Zappa's honor: 3834 Zappafrank.[260] The asteroid was discovered in 1980 by Czechoslovakian astronomer Ladislav Brozek, and the citation for its naming says that "Zappa was an eclectic, self-trained artist and composer ... Before 1989 he was regarded as a symbol of democracy and freedom by many people in Czechoslovakia".[261]
In 1995, a bust of Zappa by sculptor Konstantinas Bogdanas was installed in the Lithuanian capital Vilnius. A replica was offered to the city of Baltimore in 2008, and on September 19, 2010 — the twenty-fifth anniversary of Zappa's testimony to the U.S. Senate — a ceremony dedicating the replica was held, with the bust installed at the Southeast Anchor Branch Library in Baltimore's Highlandtown. Speakers at the event included Gail Zappa and Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake[262][263] In 2002, a bronze bust was installed in German city Bad Doberan, since 1990 location of the Zappanale, an annual music festival celebrating Zappa.[264] At the initiative of musicians community ORWOhaus, the city of Berlin named a street in the Marzahn district "Frank-Zappa-Straße" in 2007.[265] The same year, Baltimore's mayor Sheila Dixon proclaimed August 9 as the city's official "Frank Zappa Day" citing Zappa's musical accomplishments as well as his defense of the First Amendment to the United States Constitution.[266]
Discography[link]
References[link]
- Day, Nancy (2001). Censorship: Or Freedom of Expression?. Minneapolis: Twenty-First Century Books, Lerner Publications. ISBN 0-8225-2628-X.
- Delville, Michel; Norris, Andrew (2005). Frank Zappa, Captain Beefheart and the Secret History of Maximalism. Oxford: Salt Publishing. ISBN 978-1-84471-059-1.
- DeCurtis, Anthony; Henke, James with Holly George-Warren, ed. (1992). The Rolling Stone Illustrated History of Rock & Roll. Jim Miller (Original Editor) (3rd ed.). New York: Random House. ISBN 0-679-73728-6.
- Gray, Michael (1984). Mother! Is the Story of Frank Zappa. London: Proteus Books. ISBN 0-86276-146-8.
- James, Billy (2000). Necessity Is ...: The Early Years of Frank Zappa & The Mothers of Invention. London: SAF Publishing Ltd.. ISBN 0-946719-51-9.
- Lowe, Kelly Fisher (2006). The Words and Music of Frank Zappa. Westport: Praeger Publishers. ISBN 0-275-98779-5.
- Martin, Bill (2002). Avant Rock: Experimental Music from the Beatles to Björk. Peru, Illinois: Open Court Publishing Company. ISBN 0-8126-9500-3.
- MacDonald, Ian (1994). Revolution in the head: The Beatles' Records and the Sixties. Fourth Estate Ltd.. ISBN 1-85702-099-5.
- Miles, Barry (2004). Frank Zappa. London: Atlantic Books. ISBN 1-84354-092-4.
- Slaven, Neil (2003). Electric Don Quixote: The Definitive Story of Frank Zappa. London: Omnibus Press. ISBN 0-7119-9436-6.
- Sparks, Michael (1982). Cocaine Fiends and Reefer Madness: An Illustrated History of Drugs in the Movies. New York: Cornwall Books. ISBN 0-8453-4504-4.
- Walley, David (1980). No Commercial Potential. The Saga of Frank Zappa. Then and Now. New York: E. P. Dutton. ISBN 0-525-93153-8.
- Watson, Ben (1996). Frank Zappa: The Negative Dialectics of Poodle Play. New York: St. Martin's Griffin. ISBN 0-312-14124-6.
- Watson, Ben (2005). Frank Zappa. The Complete Guide to His Music. London: Omnibus Press. ISBN 1-84449-865-4.
- Zappa, Frank with Occhiogrosso, Peter (1989). The Real Frank Zappa Book. New York: Poseidon Press. ISBN 0-671-63870-X.
- "Frank Zappa", The New Rolling Stone Encyclopedia of Rock & Roll, New York: Simon & Schuster Inc, 1993, ISBN 0-684-81044-1
Notes[link]
- ^ Until discovering his birth certificate as an adult, Zappa believed he had been christened "Francis", and he is credited as Francis on some of his early albums. His legal name was always "Frank", however, never "Francis." Cf. Zappa with Occhiogrosso, 1989, The Real Frank Zappa Book, p. 15.
- ^ Zappa with Occhiogrosso, 1989, The Real Frank Zappa Book, p. 15.
- ^ a b The New Rolling Stone Encyclopedia of Rock & Roll, 1993.
- ^ a b Zappa with Occhiogrosso, 1989, The Real Frank Zappa Book, pp. 20–23.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, pp. 8–9.
- ^ a b Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 10.
- ^ Zappa with Occhiogrosso, 1989, The Real Frank Zappa Book, p. 22.
- ^ Mendoza, Bart (November, 2005). "Counter Culture Coincidence". San Diego Troubadour. The San Diego Troubadour. http://www.sandiegotroubadour.com/content/features/fullcircle.aspx?issue=nov_2005. Retrieved September 11, 2010. [dead link]
- ^ Zappa with Occhiogrosso, 1989, The Real Frank Zappa Book, p. 34.
- ^ a b Zappa with Occhiogrosso, 1989, The Real Frank Zappa Book, p. 29.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 22.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 36.
- ^ a b Zappa, Frank (June 1971). "Edgard Varese: The Idol of My Youth". Stereo Review: 61–62..
- ^ a b c Zappa with Occhiogrosso, 1989, The Real Frank Zappa Book, pp. 30–33.
- ^ a b Show 14 – Big Rock Candy Mountain: Rock 'n' roll in the late fifties. [Part 4] : UNT Digital Library
- ^ Holmes, Thom (2008). "Early Synthesizers and Experimenters". Electronic and experimental music: technology, music, and culture (3rd ed.). Taylor & Francis. pp. 153–4. ISBN 0-415-95781-8. http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=hCthQ-bec-QC&pg=PA153. Retrieved 2011-06-04.
- ^ a b Watson, 1996, Frank Zappa: The Negative Dialectics of Poodle Play, p. 13.
- ^ Among his many musical satires are the 1967 songs "Flower Punk" (which parodies the song "Hey Joe") and "Who Needs The Peace Corps?", which are critiques of the late-Sixties commercialization of the hippie phenomenon.
- ^ a b For a comprehensive list of the appearance of parts of "old" compositions or quotes from others' music in Zappa's catalogue, see Albertos, Román García, FZ Musical Quotes, Information is Not Knowledge, globia.net/donlope, http://globalia.net/donlope/fz/quotes.html . Retrieved on January 21, 2008.
- ^ On several of his earlier albums, Zappa paid tribute to Varèse by quoting his: "The present-day composer refuses to die."
- ^ Slaven, 2003, Electric Don Quixote, pp. 29–30.
- ^ The Mike Douglas Show, NBC [TV Show], November 1976
- ^ a b The other signature pieces are "Zoot Allures" and "Black Napkins" from Zoot Allures. See Zappa, Dweezil (1996), Greetings music lovers, Dweezil here, Liner Notes, Frank Zappa Plays the Music of Frank Zappa: A Memorial Tribute
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 40.
- ^ Walley, 1980, No Commercial Potential, p. 23.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 48.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 345.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 58.
- ^ Zappa with Occhiogrosso, 1989, The Real Frank Zappa Book, p. 40.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 59.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 63.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 55.
- ^ Gray, 1984, Mother!, p. 29.
- ^ Zappa with Occhiogrosso, 1989, The Real Frank Zappa Book, p. 42.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 74.
- ^ Slaven, 1996, Electric Don Quixote, pp. 35–36.
- ^ Watson, 1996, Frank Zappa: The Negative Dialectics of Poodle Play, p. 27.
- ^ Zappa with Occhiogrosso, 1989, The Real Frank Zappa Book, p. 43.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, pp. 80–81.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa. pp. 82–83.
- ^ Watson, 1996, Frank Zappa: The Negative Dialectics of Poodle Play, p. 26.
- ^ a b Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 85.
- ^ Harp, Ted (March, 1965), "Vice Squad Raids Local Film Studio", The Daily Report (Ontario, California)
- ^ Zappa with Occhiogrosso, 1989, The Real Frank Zappa Book, p. 57.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, pp. 86–87.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. XV.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 87.
- ^ Slaven, 1996, Electric Don Quixote, p. 40.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, pp. 90–91.
- ^ a b Swenson, John (March 1980), Frank Zappa: America's Weirdest Rock Star Comes Clean, High Times
- ^ a b Zappa with Occhiogrosso, 1989, The Real Frank Zappa Book, pp. 65–66.
- ^ Slaven, 2003, Electric Don Quixote, p. 42.
- ^ Walley, 1980, No Commercial Potential, p. 58.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 103.
- ^ Interview with Frank Zappa, UMRK, Los Angeles, CA: BBC [TV Show], March 1993
- ^ Lowe, 2006, The Words and Music of Frank Zappa, p. 25.
- ^ Walley, 1980, No Commercial Potential, pp. 60–61.
- ^ a b Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 115.
- ^ a b Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 112.
- ^ Watson, 2005, Frank Zappa. The Complete Guide to His Music, pp. 10–11.
- ^ a b Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 123.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 122.
- ^ Loder, Kurt (1988), "Rolling Stone Interview", Rolling Stone
- ^ He considered such campaigns as yuppie inventions and noted that "Some people like garlic ... I like pepper, tobacco and coffee. That's my metabolism". Zappa with Occhiogrosso, 1989, The Real Frank Zappa Book, pp. 234–235.
- ^ Lowe, 2006, The Words and Music of Frank Zappa, p. 5.
- ^ Lowe, 2006, The Words and Music of Frank Zappa, pp. 38–43.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, pp. 135–138.
- ^ a b Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, pp. 140–141.
- ^ Lowe, 2006, The Words and Music of Frank Zappa, p. 56.
- ^ Walley, 1980, No Commercial Potential, p. 86.
- ^ Couture, François, Lumpy Gravy. Review, Allmusic.com, http://www.allmusic.com/album/r22630 . Retrieved on January 2, 2008; Lowe, 2006, The Words and Music of Frank Zappa, p. 56.
- ^ The initial orchestra-only recordings were released posthumously on the box set Lumpy Money (2009). See Dolan, Casey (December 8, 2008), "The Resurrection of Frank Zappa's Soul", LA Weekly (Village Voice Media), http://www.laweekly.com/2008-12-11/music/the-resurrection-of-frank-zappa-8217-s-soul/1 . Retrieved on February 2, 2009.
- ^ James, 2000, Necessity Is ... , pp. 62–69.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 147.
- ^ Zappa with Occhiogrosso, 1989, The Real Frank Zappa Book, p. 94.
- ^ Huey, Steve, We're Only in It for the Money. Review, Allmusic.com, http://www.allmusic.com/album/r22631 . Retrieved on January 2, 2008.
- ^ Watson, 2005, Frank Zappa. The Complete Guide to His Music, p. 15. Walley, 1980, No Commercial Potential, p. 90.
- ^ As the legal aspects of using the Sgt Pepper concept were unsettled, the album was released with the cover and back on the inside of the gatefold, while the actual cover and back were a picture of the group in a pose parodying the inside of the Beatles album. Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 151.
- ^ Watson, 1996, Frank Zappa: The Negative Dialectics of Poodle Play, p. 88.
- ^ Lowe, 2006, The Words and Music of Frank Zappa, p. 58.
- ^ a b Zappa with Occhiogrosso, 1989, The Real Frank Zappa Book, p. 88.
- ^ a b Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 160.
- ^ James, 2000, Necessity Is ..., p. 104.
- ^ In the process, he built up a vast archive of live recordings. In the late 1980s some of these recordings were collected for the 12-CD set You Can't Do That on Stage Anymore.
- ^ a b c Chris Michie (January 2003), We are The Mothers...and This Is What We Sound Like!, MixOnline.com, http://mixonline.com/recording/business/audio_mothers_sound/ . Retrieved on January 4, 2008.
- ^ Bob Marshall, "Interview with Frank Zappa," October 22, 1988.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, pp. 173–175.
- ^ a b c Lowe, 2006, The Words and Music of Frank Zappa, p. 74.
- ^ Couture, François. "Peaches en Regalia [Song Review"]. Allmusic. http://www.allmusic.com/song/t2677929. Retrieved April 11, 2010.
- ^ Notable covers include: Jon Poole, What's the Ugliest Part of Your Body?; Meridian Arts Ensemble, Prime Meridian; Dixie Dregs, California Screamin'; Dweezil Zappa, Go with What You Know; Phish, Vegas 96; The Roots, How I Got Over
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 178.
- ^ a b Walley, 1980, No Commercial Potential, p. 116.
- ^ Slaven, 2003, Electric Don Quixote, pp. 119–120.
- ^ a b Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, pp. 185–187.
- ^ Zappa with Occhiogrosso, 1989, The Real Frank Zappa Book, p. 107.
- ^ Slaven, 2003, Electric Don Quixote, p. 120.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 116.
- ^ Huey, Steve, Hot Rats. Review, Allmusic.com, http://www.allmusic.com/album/r22632 . Retrieved on January 2, 2008.
- ^ a b Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 194.
- ^ a b Zappa with Occhiogrosso, 1989, The Real Frank Zappa Book, p. 109.
- ^ Zappa with Occhiogrosso, 1989, The Real Frank Zappa Book, pp. 142–156.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 201.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 205.
- ^ a b Watson, 1996, Frank Zappa: The Negative Dialectics of Poodle Play, p. 183.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 207.
- ^ Starks, 1982, Cocaine Fiends and Reefer Madness, p. 153.
- ^ Lowe, 2006, The Words and Music of Frank Zappa, p. 94.
- ^ Zappa with Occhiogrosso, 1989, The Real Frank Zappa Book, pp. 119–137.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, pp. 203–204.
- ^ During the June 1971 Fillmore concerts Zappa was joined on stage by John Lennon and Yoko Ono. This performance was recorded, and Lennon released excerpts on his album Some Time In New York City in 1972. Zappa later released his version of excerpts from the concert on Playground Psychotics in 1992, including the jam track "Scumbag" and an extended avant-garde vocal piece by Ono (originally called "Au"), which Zappa renamed "A Small Eternity with Yoko Ono".
- ^ a b c Zappa with Occhiogrosso, 1989, The Real Frank Zappa Book, pp. 112–115.
- ^ Lowe, 2006, The Words and Music of Frank Zappa, p. 101.
- ^ a b Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, pp. 225–226.
- ^ Official recordings of these bands did not emerge until more than 30 years later on Wazoo (2007) and Imaginary Diseases (2006), respectively.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 231.
- ^ Frank Zappa > Charts and Awards > Billboard Albums, Allmusic.com, http://www.allmusic.com/artist/p74796 . Retrieved on January 3, 2008.
- ^ Huey, Steve, Apostrophe ('). Review, Allmusic.com, http://www.allmusic.com/album/r53148 . Retrieved on January 3, 2008.
- ^ a b Lowe, 2006, The Words and Music of Frank Zappa, pp. 114–122.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 248.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 372.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 250.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 253; pp. 258–259.
- ^ Lowe, 2006, The Words and Music of Frank Zappa, p. 131.
- ^ a b Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 261.
- ^ Slaven, 2003, Electric Don Quixote, p. 248.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 267.
- ^ Ruhlmann, W. (2011 [last update]). "The Old Masters Box 3 [PQRSTUVW] - Frank Zappa & the Mothers | AllMusic". allmusic.com. http://www.allmusic.com/album/r53145. Retrieved 21 July 2011.
- ^ It remains debated whether Zappa had conceived the material as a four-LP set from the beginning, or only when approaching Mercury-Phonogram; see, e.g., Watson, 2005, Frank Zappa. The Complete Guide to His Music, p. 49. In the liner notes to the 1996 release, however, Gail Zappa states that "As originally conceived by Frank, Läther was always a 4-record box set."
- ^ Watson, 2005, Frank Zappa. The Complete Guide to His Music, p. 49.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 262.
- ^ In 1978, Zappa served both as host and musical act on the show, and as an actor in various sketches.
- ^ Zappa, Frank, 1978, Zappa in New York, Liner Notes.
- ^ a b Lowe, 2006, The Words and Music of Frank Zappa, p. 132.
- ^ Clement, Brett (2004), "Little dots: A study of the melodies of the guitarist / composer Frank Zappa (pdf file)" (PDF), Master Thesis (The Florida State University, School of Music): pp. 25–48, http://etd.lib.fsu.edu/theses/available/etd-04122004-114345/unrestricted/zappathesis3.pdf . Retrieved on December 29, 2007.
- ^ Hemmings, Richard (2006), Ever wonder why your daughter looked so sad? Non-danceable beats: getting to grips with rhythmical unpredictability in Project/Object, richardhemmings.co.uk, http://www.richardhemmings.co.uk/001/research/zappology/saddaughter.html . Retrieved on July 24, 2008.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, pp. 261–262; Lowe, 2006, The Words and Music of Frank Zappa, p. 134.
- ^ a b Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 234.
- ^ Lowe, 2006, The Words and Music of Frank Zappa, p. 138.
- ^ a b Watson, 1996, Frank Zappa: The Negative Dialectics of Poodle Play, p. 351.
- ^ a b c d Lowe, 2006, The Words and Music of Frank Zappa, p. 140.
- ^ Groening, Matt; Menn, Don (1992), "The Mother of All Interviews. Act II: Matt Groening joins in on the scrutiny of the central decentralizer", in Menn, Don (ed.), Zappa! Guitar Player Presents, San Francisco, CA: Miller Freeman, p. 61, ISSN 1063-4533
- ^ Both albums made it onto the Billboard top 30. Frank Zappa > Charts & Awards > Billboard Albums, Allmusic.com, http://www.allmusic.com/artist/p74796 . Retrieved on January 6, 2008.
- ^ a b Frank Zappa > Charts & Awards > Billboard Singles, Allmusic.com, http://www.allmusic.com/artist/p74796 . Retrieved on January 6, 2008.
- ^ Peterson, Chris (November 1979), He's Only 38 and He Knows How to Nasty, Relix Magazine
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 277.
- ^ Watson, 2005, Frank Zappa. The Complete Guide to His Music, p. 59.
- ^ Zappa with Occhiogrosso, 1989, The Real Frank Zappa Book, p. 180.
- ^ Watson, 2005, Frank Zappa. The Complete Guide to His Music, p. 61.
- ^ Baby Snakes, 2003, DVD cover, Eagle Vision.
- ^ a b Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 282.
- ^ Sohmer, Adam (June 8, 2005), Baby Snakes – DVD, Big Picture Big Sound, http://www.bigpicturebigsound.com/article_501.shtml . Retrieved on January 7, 2008.
- ^ a b Frank Zappa, IMDb – The Internet Movie Database, http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0953261/ . Retrieved on July 30, 2008.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 343.
- ^ Eliscu, Jenny (November 8, 2002), "Homer and Me", Rolling Stone Magazine
- ^ "Times The New York - Google Books". Books.google.com. http://books.google.com/books?id=1_i5f3jhD9UC&pg=PA3054&dq=%22zappa+records%22+%2B+mercury+%2B+drafted&hl=en#v=onepage&q=%22zappa%20records%22%20%2B%20mercury%20%2B%20drafted&f=false. Retrieved 2012-04-30.
- ^ "Frank Zappa - I Don't Wanna Get Drafted! (Vinyl) at Discogs". Discogs.com. http://www.discogs.com/Frank-Zappa-I-Dont-Wanna-Get-Drafted/release/807608. Retrieved 2012-04-30.
- ^ a b Lowe, 2006, The Words and Music of Frank Zappa, p. 161.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 284.
- ^ Lowe, 2006, The Words and Music of Frank Zappa, p. 165.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 283.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 269.
- ^ Huey, Steve, You Are What You Is. Review, Allmusic.com, http://www.allmusic.com/album/r53163 . Retrieved on January 7, 2008.
- ^ a b Lowe, 2006, The Words and Music of Frank Zappa, pp. 169–175.
- ^ Zappa, Frank (November 1982), Absolutely Frank. First Steps in Odd Meters, Guitar Player Magazine, p. 116.
- ^ Swenson, John (November, 1981), Frank Zappa: Shut Up 'N Play Yer Guitar, Shut Up 'N Play Yer Guitar Some More, The Return of the Son of Shut Up 'N Play Yer Guitar, Guitar World
- ^ Huey, Steve, Valley Girl. Frank Zappa. Song Review, Allmusic.com, http://www.allmusic.com/song/t2677879 . Retrieved on January 7, 2008.
- ^ a b Lowe, 2006, The Words and Music of Frank Zappa, p. 178.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 304.
- ^ a b Zappa with Occhiogrosso, 1989, The Real Frank Zappa Book, pp. 146–156.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 315.
- ^ Ruhlmann, William, London Symphony Orchestra, Vol. 1. Review, Allmusic.com, http://www.allmusic.com/album/r53172 . Retrieved on January 7, 2008.
- ^ "Bingo! There Goes Your Tenure" by Frank Zappa, 1984
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 323.
- ^ Kelp, Larry (June 18, 1984), "Zappa Pokes Into The Fine Arts", The Oakland Tribune, http://www.afka.net/Articles/1984-06_Tribune.htm, retrieved July 5, 2009
- ^ a b c Zappa with Occhiogrosso, 1989, The Real Frank Zappa Book, pp. 172–173.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 319.
- ^ Watson, 2005, Frank Zappa. The Complete Guide to His Music, p. 73.
- ^ The musical was eventually produced for the stage in 2003. See Thing-Fish – The Return of Frank Zappa, The British Theatre Guide, http://www.britishtheatreguide.info/otherresources/interviews/Thing-Fish.htm . Retrieved on December 11, 2007.
- ^ Carr, Paul; Hand, Richard J. (2007), "Frank Zappa and musical theatre: ugly ugly o'phan Annie and really deep, intense, thought-provoking Broadway symbolism", Studies in Musical Theatre 1 (1): 44–51., DOI:10.1386/smt.1.1.41/1, http://www.atypon-link.com/INT/doi/abs/10.1386/smt.1.1.41_1?cookieSet=1&journalCode=smt Full article available by free login only. Retrieved on July 28, 2008.
- ^ Day, 2000, Censorship, p. 53.
- ^ Zappa with Occhiogrosso, 1989, The Real Frank Zappa Book, p. 267.
- ^ Zappa with Occhiogrosso, 1989, The Real Frank Zappa Book, p. 262.
- ^ Record Labeling. Hearing before the committee on commerce, science and transportation, U.S. Government printing office, September 19, 1985, http://www.joesapt.net/superlink/shrg99-529/p51.html . Retrieved on December 31, 2007.
- ^ Crossfire with Frank Zappa and John Lofton, CNN [TV Debate], March 1986, http://www.archive.org/details/FrankZappaOnCrossfire
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 348.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 365.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 340.
- ^ For a comprehensive comparison of vinyl of CD releases, see The Frank Zappa Album Versions Guide – Index, The Zappa Patio, www.lukpac.org/~handmade/patio, http://www.lukpac.org/~handmade/patio/vinylvscds/index.html . Retrieved on January 7, 2008.
- ^ For example, new drum and bass parts were used on the 1960s albums We're Only in It for the Money and Cruising with Ruben & the Jets. See Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 327.
- ^ a b Zappa with Occhiogrosso, 1989, The Real Frank Zappa Book, pp. 337–339.
- ^ Nuzum, Eric (2001), Parental Advisory: Music Censorship in America, HarperCollins, pp. 39, 255, ISBN 0-688-16772-1
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, pp. 346–350.
- ^ Mitchell, Tony (May, 1992), "Mixing Pop and Politics: Rock Music in Czechoslovakia before and after the Velvet Revolution", Popular Music. A Changing Europe (Cambridge University Press) 11: 187–203
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, pp. 357–361.
- ^ a b Ouellette, Dan (August 1993), Frank Zappa, Pulse! Magazine, pp. 48–56.
- ^ "Pražský Výběr at the Knitting Factory". http://new-york.czechcentres.cz/program/event-details/prazsky-vyber-at-the-knitting-factory1/.
- ^ Watson, 2005, Frank Zappa. The Complete Guide to His Music, p. 100.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, pp. 374–375.
- ^ It brought him a posthumous Grammy Award (with Gail Zappa) for Best Recording Package – Boxed in 1994. GRAMMY Winners, GRAMMY.com, http://www.grammy.com/nominees/search . Retrieved on August 18, 2008.
- ^ Menn, Don, ed. (1992), "Andreas Mölich-Zebhauser — Preparing the Ensemble Modern for the Frankfurt Festival", Zappa! Guitar Player Presents, San Francisco, CA: Miller Freeman, pp. 12–13, ISSN 1063-4533
- ^ a b Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 369.
- ^ a b Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 371.
- ^ Watson, 2005, Frank Zappa. The Complete Guide to His Music, p. 552.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, pp. 379–380.
- ^ Frank Zappa (1940–1993) – Find A Grave Memorial
- ^ Slaven, 2003, Electric Don Quixote, p. 320.
- ^ Brackett, Nathan; Hoard, Christian, eds. (2004), The New Rolling Stone Album Guide: Completely Revised and Updated 4th Edition, New York, NY: Fireside, p. 903, ISBN 0-7432-0169-8
- ^ Walley, 1980, No Commercial Potential, p. 3.
- ^ Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 383.
- ^ Menn, Don (1992), "From the Editor", in Menn, Don, Zappa! Guitar Player Presents, San Francisco, CA: Miller Freeman, p. 3, ISSN 1063-4533
- ^ Kozinn, Allan (December 27, 1996), "Nicolas Slonimsky, Author of Widely Used Reference Works on Music, Dies at 101", The New York Times, http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C04E6D61539F934A15751C1A963958260&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=all . Retrieved on August 17, 2008.
- ^ In December 1981, the then 87 year old Slonimsky made a guest appearance on piano at a Zappa concert. Miles, 2004, Frank Zappa, p. 295–296.
- ^ Menn, Don, ed. (1992), "Nicolas Slonimsky — The Century's Preeminent Lexicographer Nails Zappa Down", Zappa! Guitar Player Presents, San Francisco, CA: Miller Freeman, pp. 6–7, ISSN 1063-4533
- ^ Menn, Don, ed. (1992), "Kent Nagano — Premiering Zappa with the London Symphony Orchestra", Zappa! Guitar Player Presents, San Francisco, CA: Miller Freeman, pp. 8–11, ISSN 1063-4533
- ^ Isler, Scott (February, 1994), Frank Zappa, Musician Magazine
- ^ Ashby, Arved (1999), "Frank Zappa and the Anti-Fetishist Orchestra", The Musical Quarterly (Oxford University Press) 83 (4): 557–606, DOI:10.1093/mq/83.4.557
- ^ Grier, James (2001), "The Mothers of Invention and "Uncle Meat": Alienation, Anachronism and a Double Variation", Acta Musicologica (International Musicological Society) 73 (1): 77–95, DOI:10.2307/932810, JSTOR 932810
- ^ Cotter, Jim (2002), "Frank Zappa (1940–1993)", in Sitsky, Larry, Music of the Twentieth-century Avant-garde. A Biocritical Sourcebook, Westfort, CT: Greenwood Publishing Group, p. 597, ISBN 0-313-29689-8
- ^ He is ranked 45th in "The 100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time", Rolling Stone, August 27, 2003
- ^ He is ranked 51st in The 100 Wildest Guitar Heroes, Classic Rock Magazine, April 2007
- ^ He is ranked 39th in Gibson.com Top 50 Guitarists of All Time, May 25, 2010, http://www.gibson.com/en-us/Lifestyle/Features/Top-50-Guitarists-525/ . Retrieved on June 27, 2010.
- ^ 1994 Down Beat Critics Poll, Down Beat Magazine, http://www.downbeat.com/default.asp?sect=stories&subsect=story_detail&sid=720 . Retrieved on August 12, 2008.
- ^ Frank Zappa, The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum, Inc., http://rockhall.com/inductees/frank-zappa . Retrieved on August 14, 2008.
- ^ Lifetime achievement award, GRAMMY.org, http://www.grammy.org/recording-academy/awards/lifetime-awards . Retrieved on February 14, 2012.
- ^ The National Recording Registry 2005, National Recording Preservation Board, The Library of Congress, May 24, 2005, http://www.loc.gov/rr/record/nrpb/registry/nrpb-2005reg.html . Retrieved on August 18, 2008.
- ^ a b "The Immortals", Rolling Stone Magazine, Issue 972
- ^ "45 Frank Zappa". Rolling Stone. http://www.rollingstone.com/music/lists/100-greatest-guitarists-of-all-time-19691231/frank-zappa-19691231. Retrieved June 4, 2011.
- ^ Quigley, Mike (September 1969), Interview with Alice Cooper, Poppin, Issue #5
- ^ Elfman, Doug (October 15, 2003), "Primus plays Hard Rock", Las Vegas Review-Journal, http://www.reviewjournal.com/lvrj_home/2003/Oct-15-Wed-2003/news/22374264.html . Retrieved on March 14, 2009.
- ^ Randall, David (2004), Get Ready to ROCK! Interview with singer and frontman of American rock band The Tubes, Fee Waybill, getreadytorock.com, http://www.getreadytorock.com/10questions/fee_waybill.htm . Retrieved on August 13, 2008.
- ^ Boisen, Myles, allmusic ((( Henry Cow > Biography ))), allmusic.com, http://www.allmusic.com/artist/p4475 . Retrieved on August 13, 2008.
- ^ Cleveland, Barry (September 2006), Exclusive Outtakes from GP's Interview with John Frusciante!, Guitar Player, http://www.eqmag.com/article/exclusive-outtakes-from/sep-06/23282 . Retrieved on August 12, 2008.
- ^ MacDonald, 1994, Revolution in the Head, p. 171.
- ^ Black Sabbath Online: Tony Iommi & Geezer Butler Interview, black-sabbath.com, May 1994, http://www.black-sabbath.com/interviews/tonygeez_0594.html . Retrieved on August 12, 2008.
- ^ about mike, mikeportnoy.com, http://www.mikeportnoy.com/aboutmike/bio.aspx . Retrieved on April 22, 2009.
- ^ Menn, Don, ed. (1992), "Warren De Martini—Ratt Guitarist Turns Zappa Stylist", Zappa! Guitar Player Presents, San Francisco, CA: Miller Freeman, p. 14, ISSN 1063-4533
- ^ Vai.com > All About Steve > Vaiography, Vai.com, http://www.vai.com/vaiography/ . Retrieved on August 12, 2008.
- ^ SOS, Mike (August 2005). "Interview: Strapping Young Lad: An extreme metal all-star squad". In Music We Trust. http://www.inmusicwetrust.com/articles/71h16.html. Retrieved January 31, 2008.
- ^ Sinclair, Tom (May 16, 2005), "Mezmerize (2005): System of a Down", Entertainment Weekly, http://www.ew.com/ew/article/0,,1060789,00.html . Retrieved on June 28, 2010.
- ^ The official Pages, clawfinger.net, http://www.clawfinger.net/main.php?band . Retrieved on August 12, 2008.
- ^ SOS, Mike, INTERVIEW: Strapping Young Lad, inmusicwetrust.com, http://www.inmusicwetrust.com/articles/71h16.html . Retrieved on December 18, 2010.
- ^ Tomas Ulrich at All about Jazz, All About Jazz, http://www.allaboutjazz.com/php/musician.php?id=15347 Retrieved on November 13, 2008.
- ^ Meridian Arts Ensemble – About Us, meridianartsensemble.com, http://www.meridianartsensemble.com/about.htm . Retrieved on August 12, 2008.
- ^ Academic Zappa: Seriously Taken Musical Study of Frank Zappa's Music — At Last, ensembleambrosius.com, http://www.ensembleambrosius.com/node/2 . Retrieved December 17, 2010.
- ^ About fireworks, fireworksensemble.org, http://fireworksensemble.org/about/ . Retrieved on August 25, 2008.
- ^ Bill Frisell Biography, Songline/Tonefield Productions, http://www.songtone.com/artists/Frisell/default.html . Retrieved on August 12, 2008.
- ^ Cook, Richard; Morton, Brian (2004), The Penguin Guide To Jazz On CD, Seventh Edition, London: Penguin Books, p. 1721, ISBN 0-14-101416-4
- ^ Bush, John, allmusic ((( George Clinton > Biography ))), allmusic.com, http://www.allmusic.com/artist/p65136 . Retrieved on August 13, 2008.
- ^ George Winston Biography, georgewinston.com, http://www.georgewinston.com/us/biography . Retrieved on June 27, 2010.
- ^ gluckbio.html, electricsongs.com, http://www.electricsongs.com/gluckbio.html . Retrieved on September 1, 2008.
- ^ "Weird Al" Yankovic: Frequently Asked Questions, weirdal.com, http://www.weirdal.com/faq.htm . Retrieved on August 12, 2008.
- ^ Reynolds, Simon (2005). Rip It Up and Start Again: Postpunk 1978–1984, p. 255.
- ^ Martin, 2002, Avant Rock, p. 160.
- ^ Plas, Jr., Leo P. (March, 1972), "Upper Wolfcampian (?) Mollusca from the Arrow Canyon Range, Clark County, Nevada", Journal of Paleontology (SEPM Society for Sedimentary Geology) 46: 249–260.
- ^ Murdy, E. O. (1989), A Taxonomic Revision and Cladistic Analysis of the Oxudercine Gobies (Gobiidae: Oxudercinae), Records of the Australian Museum, ISBN 0-7305-6374-X
- ^ Boero, Ferdinando (April, 1987), "Life cycles of Phialella zappai n. sp., Phialella fragilis and Phialella sp. (Cnidaria, Leptomedusae, Phialellidae) from central California", Journal of Natural History (Taylor & Francis Groups) 21 (2): 465–480, DOI:10.1080/00222938700771131
- ^ Bosmans, Robert; Bosselaers, Jan (October 1995), "Spiders of the genera Pachygnatha, Dyschiriognatha and Glenognatha (Araneae, Tetragnathidae), with a revision of the Afrotropical species", Zoologica Scripta (The Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters) 23 (4): 325–352, DOI:10.1111/j.1463-6409.1994.tb00392.x
- ^ Wassif, Christopher; Cheek, Diana; Belas, Robert (October 1995), "Molecular Analysis of a Metalloprotease from Proteus mirabilis", Journal of Bacteriology (American Society for Microbiology) 177 (20): 5790–8, PMC 177400, PMID 7592325
- ^ Salak, Marc; Lescinsky, Halard L. (July, 1999), "Spygoria zappania New Genus and Species, a Cloudina-like Biohermal Metazoan from the Lower Cambrian of Central Nevada", Journal of Paleontology (Paleontological Society) 73: 571–576.
- ^ Seachrist, Lisa (August 12, 1994), "Random Samples", Science. New Series (American Association for the Advancement of Science) 265: 870–871.
- ^ (3834) Zappafrank, IAU: Minor Planet Center (Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory), http://www.minorplanetcenter.net/iau/special/rocknroll/0003834.html . Retrieved on August 15, 2008.
- ^ The Baltimore Sun (September 16, 2010), Zappa comes home, The Baltimore Sun, http://articles.baltimoresun.com/2010-09-16/entertainment/bs-ae-zappa-cover-0917-20100916_1_gail-zappa-southeast-anchor-library-lithuania . Dweezil and Zappa Plays Zappa played a free three-hour show to a crowd estimated at more than 3,000. Retrieved on September 19, 2010.
- ^ The Baltimore Sun (September 16, 2010), Zappa-looza: A full guide to the weekend's events, The Baltimore Sun, http://articles.baltimoresun.com/2010-09-16/news/bs-ae-zappa-rail-0917-2-20100916_1_southeast-anchor-library-zappa-plays-zappa-zappa-related . Retrieved on September 19, 2010.
- ^ Zappanale – Startseite, zappanale.de, http://zappanale.de/ . Retrieved on August 14, 2008.
- ^ The Associated Press (July 30, 2007), "Berlin Names Street After Frank Zappa", The Washington Post, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/07/30/AR2007073000690.html . Retrieved on August 15, 2008.
- ^ Zappa.com > What's New in Baltimore?, zappa.com, http://www.zappa.com/whatsnew/news/baltimore.html . Retrieved on August 15, 2008.
External links[link]
Media related to Frank Zappa at Wikimedia Commons 
Quotations related to Frank Zappa at Wikiquote
- The official Frank Zappa website
- Appearances on C-SPAN
- Frank Zappa at the Internet Movie Database
- Works by or about Frank Zappa in libraries (WorldCat catalog)
- Frank Zappa collected news and commentary at The Guardian
- Frank Zappa collected news and commentary at The New York Times
- Frank Zappa at the Notable Names Database
- Frank Zappa interviewed on the Pop Chronicles (1969).
| Persondata | |
|---|---|
| Name | Zappa, Frank |
| Alternative names | Zappa, Frank Vincent |
| Short description | Composer, musician, bandleader, conductor, record producer |
| Date of birth | 1940-12-21 |
| Place of birth | Baltimore, Maryland, United States |
| Date of death | 1993-12-04 |
| Place of death | Los Angeles, California, United States |
http://wn.com/Frank_Zappa
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This article is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License, which means that you can copy and modify it as long as the entire work (including additions) remains under this license.
| Walter Cronkite | |
|---|---|
 Cronkite in 2004 |
|
| Born | Walter Leland Cronkite, Jr. (1916-11-04)November 4, 1916[1] Saint Joseph, Missouri, U.S |
| Died | July 17, 2009(2009-07-17) (aged 92) New York, New York, U.S. |
| Cause of death | Cerebrovascular disease |
| Residence | Kansas City, Missouri, US, New York City, New York, US |
| Nationality | American |
| Other names | Old Ironpants, Uncle Walter, King of the anchormen |
| Citizenship | United States |
| Alma mater | University of Texas at Austin |
| Occupation | Television and radio broadcaster, news anchor |
| Years active | 1935–2009 |
| Notable credit(s) | CBS Evening News |
| Home town | Kansas City, Missouri, US |
| Religion | Episcopalian |
| Spouse | Mary Elizabeth "Betsy" Maxwell (m. 1940–2005) «start: (1940)–end+1: (2006)»"Marriage: Mary Elizabeth "Betsy" Maxwell to Walter Cronkite" Location: (linkback:http://en-wiki.pop.wn.com/index.php/Walter_Cronkite), her death |
| Children | Nancy Elizabeth Cronkite (b. 1948) Kathy Cronkite (b. 1950) Walter Cronkite III ("Chip") |
| Family | 4 Grandchildren, Deborah Rush (In-Law) |
Walter Leland Cronkite, Jr. (November 4, 1916 – July 17, 2009)[2][3][4] was an American broadcast journalist, best known as anchorman for the CBS Evening News for 19 years (1962–81). During the heyday of CBS News in the 1960s and 1970s, he was often cited as "the most trusted man in America" after being so named in an opinion poll.[5][6][7] Although he reported many events from 1937 to 1981, including bombing in World War II, the Nuremberg trials, combat in the Vietnam War,[8] Watergate, the Iran Hostage Crisis, and the murders of President John F. Kennedy, civil rights pioneer Martin Luther King, Jr., and The Beatles musician John Lennon, he was known for extensive TV coverage of the U.S. space program, from Project Mercury to the Moon landings to the Space Shuttle. He was the only non-NASA recipient of a Moon-rock award. Cronkite is well known for his departing catchphrase "And that's the way it is," followed by the date on which the appearance is aired.
Contents |
Early life[link]
Cronkite was born in Saint Joseph, Missouri, the son of Helen Lena (née Fritsche, August 1892 - November 1993), and Dr. Walter Leland Cronkite (September 1893 - May 1973), a dentist.[9][10][11] He had remote Dutch ancestry on his father's side, the family surname originally being Krankheyt.[12]
Cronkite lived in Kansas City, Missouri, until he was ten, when his family moved to Houston, Texas.[10] He attended junior high school at Lanier Junior High School (now Lanier Middle School) and high school at San Jacinto High School, where he edited the high school newspaper.[1] He was a member of the Boy Scouts. He attended college at the University of Texas at Austin (UT), entering in the Fall term of 1933,[13] where he worked on the Daily Texan and became a member of the Nu chapter of the Chi Phi Fraternity.[1][14] He also was a member of the Houston chapter of DeMolay, a Masonic fraternal organization for boys.[citation needed] While attending UT, Cronkite had his first taste of performance, appearing in a play with fellow students Eli Wallach and Ann Sheridan.[citation needed]
Religion[link]
Cronkite's family was Protestant and changed their denomination three times while he was a child.[citation needed]Cronkite joined the Episcopal church as a youth, explaining in a 1994 interview: "I got into a Boy Scout troop that met in an Episcopal church. The church had a wonderful minister who was also the scoutmaster. And I suppose you can say he proselytized me. At any rate, I was much involved with the church, and became Episcopalian - and an acolyte. Later, when I worked for a paper in Houston, I was church editor for a while. The Episcopal House of Bishops met in Houston one year, and I became intrigued by the leaders of the church — fascinated by their discussions and their erudition."[citation needed]
Cronkite has also for many years been the recorded voice of the owl at the "Cremation of Care" ritual at Bohemian Grove.[15]
Career[link]
He dropped out of college in his junior year, in the Fall term of 1935,[13] after starting a series of newspaper reporting jobs covering news and sports.[3] He entered broadcasting as a radio announcer for WKY in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. In 1936, he met his future wife, Mary Elizabeth Maxwell (known by her nickname "Betsy"), while working as the sports announcer for KCMO (AM) in Kansas City, Missouri.[3][10] His broadcast name was "Walter Wilcox".[16] He would explain later that radio stations at the time did not want people to use their real names for fear of taking their listeners with them if they left.[citation needed] In Kansas City, he joined the United Press in 1937.[3] He became one of the top American reporters in World War II, covering battles in North Africa and Europe.[10] He was one of eight journalists selected by the United States Army Air Forces to fly bombing raids over Germany in a B-17 Flying Fortress part of group called the Writing 69th.[17] He also landed in a glider with the 101st Airborne in Operation Market-Garden and covered the Battle of the Bulge. After the war, he covered the Nuremberg trials and served as the United Press main reporter in Moscow for two years.[citation needed]
Early years at CBS[link]
In 1950, Cronkite joined CBS News in its young and growing television division, recruited by Edward R. Murrow, who had previously tried to hire Cronkite from UP during the war. Cronkite began working at WTOP-TV, the CBS affiliate in Washington, D.C.. He originally served as anchor of the network's 15-minute late-Sunday-evening newscast Up To the Minute, which followed What's My Line? at 11:00pm ET from 1951 through 1962.
Although it is widely reported that the term "anchor" was coined to describe Cronkite's role at both the Democratic and Republican National Conventions, marking the first nationally televised convention coverage, other news presenters bore the title before him.[5] Cronkite anchored the network's coverage of the 1952 presidential election as well as later conventions. In 1964 he was temporarily replaced by the team of Robert Trout and Roger Mudd; this proved to be a mistake, and Cronkite returned to the anchor chair for future political conventions.[citation needed]
From 1953 to 1957, Cronkite hosted the CBS program You Are There, which reenacted historical events, using the format of a news report.[9] His famous last line for these programs was: "What sort of day was it? A day like all days, filled with those events that alter and illuminate our times ... and you were there." In 1971, the show was revived and redesigned to attract an audience of teenagers and young adults on Saturday mornings. He also hosted The Twentieth Century, a documentary series about important historical events of the century comprised almost exclusively of newsreel footage and interviews. It became a long-running hit (it was renamed The 21st Century in 1967). Cronkite also hosted It's News to Me, a game show based on news events.[18]
Another of his network assignments was The Morning Show, CBS' short-lived challenge to NBC's Today in 1954.[3] His on-air duties included interviewing guests and chatting with a lion puppet named Charlemane about the news.[19] He considered this discourse with a puppet as "one of the highlights" of the show. He added, "A puppet can render opinions on people and things that a human commentator would not feel free to utter. I was and I am proud of it."[20] Cronkite also angered the R. J. Reynolds Tobacco Company, the show's sponsor, by grammatically correcting its advertising slogan. Instead of saying "Winston tastes good like a cigarette should" verbatim, he substituted "as" for "like."[18]
He was the lead broadcaster of the network's coverage of the 1960 Winter Olympics, the first-ever time such an event was televised in the United States. He replaced Jim McKay, who had suffered a mental breakdown.[21]
The CBS Evening News[link]
On April 16, 1962, Cronkite succeeded Douglas Edwards as anchorman of the CBS Evening News (initially Walter Cronkite with the News), a job in which he became an American icon.[10] The program expanded from 15 to 30 minutes on September 2, 1963, making Cronkite the anchor of American network television's first nightly half-hour news program.[citation needed]
During the early part of his tenure anchoring the CBS Evening News, Cronkite competed against NBC's anchor team of Chet Huntley and David Brinkley, who anchored the Huntley-Brinkley Report. For most of the 1960s, the Huntley-Brinkley Report had more viewers than Cronkite's broadcast. This began to change in the late 1960s, as RCA made a corporate decision not to fund NBC News at the levels CBS funded CBS News. Consequently, CBS News acquired a reputation for greater accuracy and depth in its broadcast journalism. This reputation meshed nicely with Cronkite's wire service experience, and in 1967 the CBS Evening News began to surpass The Huntley-Brinkley Report in viewership during the summer months.[citation needed]
In 1969, during the Apollo 11 (with co-host and former astronaut Wally Schirra) and Apollo 13 moon missions, Cronkite received the best ratings and made CBS the most-watched television network for the missions.[1] In 1970, when Huntley retired, the CBS Evening News finally dominated the American TV news viewing audience. Although NBC finally settled on the skilled and well-respected broadcast journalist John Chancellor, Cronkite proved to be more popular and continued to be top-rated until his retirement in 1981.[10]
One of Cronkite's trademarks was ending the CBS Evening News with the phrase "...And that's the way it is," followed by the date.[9] Keeping to standards of objective journalism, he omitted this phrase on nights when he ended the newscast with opinion or commentary.[10] Beginning with January 16, 1980, Day 50 of the Iran hostage crisis, Cronkite added the length of the hostages' captivity to the show's closing to remind the audience of the unresolved situation, ending only on Day 444, January 20, 1981.[22][23]
Historic moments as anchor[link]
Kennedy assassination[link]
 |
This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (March 2010) |
File:Cronkitejfkdeath.gif
Cronkite announcing the death of President Kennedy on November 22, 1963
Cronkite is vividly remembered by many Americans for breaking the news of the death of President John F. Kennedy on Friday, November 22, 1963. Cronkite had been standing at the United Press International wire machine in the CBS newsroom as the bulletin of the President's shooting broke and he clamored to get on the air to break the news. However, since the cameras and lights of the time period required time to set and warm up, a camera was not available for Cronkite to use and the network would be forced to improvise in order to report the story.[24]
While the news was breaking, CBS was approximately ten minutes into its live broadcast of the soap opera As the World Turns (ATWT), which had begun at the very minute of the shooting. A "CBS News Bulletin" bumper slide abruptly broke in to the broadcast at 1:40 pm EST. Over the slide, Cronkite began reading what was the first of three audio-only bulletins that were filed in the next twenty minutes:[25]
| “ | Here is a bulletin from CBS News. In Dallas, Texas, three shots were fired at President Kennedy's motorcade in downtown Dallas. The first reports say that President Kennedy has been seriously wounded by this shooting.[26] | ” |
A second bulletin arrived as Cronkite was reading the first one, which detailed the severity of President Kennedy's wounds:
| “ | More details just arrived. These details about the same as previously...President Kennedy shot today just as his motorcade left downtown Dallas. Mrs. Kennedy jumped up and grabbed Mr. Kennedy, she called "Oh no!," the motorcade sped on. United Press [International] says that the wounds for President Kennedy perhaps could be fatal. Repeating, a bulletin from CBS News: President Kennedy has been shot by a would-be assassin in Dallas, Texas. Stay tuned to CBS News for further details.[26] | ” |
Just before the bulletin cut out, a CBS News staffer was heard saying "Connally too," apparently having just heard the news that Texas Governor John Connally had also been shot while riding in the Presidential limousine with his wife Nellie and Mr. and Mrs. Kennedy.
CBS then rejoined the telecast of ATWT during a commercial break. A commercial for Instant Nescafe coffee and a sponsor bumper (for Best Foods) for the first half of the show that had just completed were then aired, followed by a bumper for the scheduled episode of Route 66 to air that night and a twenty-second station identification break for the CBS affiliates. Just as ATWT was set to return from break, with show announcer Dan McCullough set to announce the sponsor of the second half of the program (Carnation), CBS News broke in with the bumper slide a second time. This bulletin saw Cronkite report in greater detail about the assassination attempt on the President, while also breaking the news of Governor Connally's shooting.
| “ | Here is a bulletin from CBS News. Further details on an assassination attempt against President Kennedy in Dallas, Texas. President Kennedy was shot as he drove from Dallas Airport to downtown Dallas; Governor Connally of Texas, in the car with him, was also shot. It is reported that three bullets rang out. A Secret Service man has been...was heard to shout from the car, "He's dead." Whether he referred to President Kennedy or not is not yet known. The President, cradled in the arms of his wife Mrs. Kennedy, was carried to an ambulance and the car rushed to Parkland Hospital outside Dallas, the President was taken to an emergency room in the hospital. Other White House officials were in doubt in the corridors of the hospital as to the condition of President Kennedy. Repeating this bulletin: President Kennedy shot while driving in an open car from the airport in Dallas, Texas, to downtown Dallas.[26] | ” |
Cronkite then recapped the events as they had happened: that the President and Governor Connally had been shot and were in the emergency room at Parkland Hospital, and no one knew their condition as yet. He then reminded the viewers that CBS News would continue to provide updates as more information came in.
CBS then decided to return to ATWT, which was now midway through its second segment. The cast had continued to perform live while Cronkite's bulletins broke into the broadcast, unaware of the unfolding events in Dallas (the episode, while being broadcast live in the Eastern and Central time zones, was also being recorded for play in the Mountain and Pacific time zones due to their being two and three hours behind the East Coast; after the episode was completed the cast was informed of what happened). ATWT then took another scheduled commercial break. The segment before the break would be the last anyone would see of a CBS program - or any network's programming, for that matter- until Tuesday, November 26.
In the middle of a Friskies pet food commercial, the "CBS News Bulletin" bumper slide broke in for the third time. Once again, Cronkite filed an audio-only report:
| “ | Here is a bulletin from CBS News...President Kennedy has been the victim of an assassin's bullet in Dallas, Texas. It is not known as yet whether the President survived the attack against him. | ” |
This particular bulletin went into even more detail than the other two, as for the first time Cronkite detailed where the shooting victims were wounded (Kennedy had been shot in the head, Connally in the chest). At the conclusion of the bulletin, Cronkite told viewers to stay tuned for further details, perhaps implying that the network would be returning to regular programming. However, Cronkite remained on the air for the next ten minutes, continuing to read bulletins as they were handed to him, followed by recapping the events as they were known and interspersing the new information he had received where appropriate. He also brought up recent instances of assassination attempts against sitting Presidents (including the murder of Mayor of Chicago Anton Cermak in a botched assassination attempt on then-President-elect Franklin Roosevelt), as well as a recent attack on United Nations ambassador Adlai Stevenson in Dallas, which had resulted in extra security measures being taken for Kennedy's visit to the city. He also received word that Congressman Albert Thomas of Texas had been told that for the moment the President and Governor were still alive, which was the first report that gave any indication of their condition.
By 2:00 EST, Cronkite was informed that the camera was ready, and he told the viewers over the air that CBS would be taking a station identification break so that affiliates could join the network. Within twenty seconds, all the CBS affiliates (with the exception of KRLD in Dallas, which was covering the tragedy locally) joined the network's coverage. Cronkite appeared on-air in shirt and tie but without his suit coat, given the urgent nature of the story, and opened with this:
| “ | This is Walter Cronkite in our newsroom...[27] There has been an attempt, as perhaps you know now, on the life of President Kennedy. He was wounded in an automobile driving from Dallas Airport into downtown Dallas, along with Governor Connally of Texas. They have been taken to Parkland Hospital there, where their condition is as yet unknown. We have not been told of their condition at Dallas. In a downtown hotel room, a group [a Dallas Trade Mart meeting] had been gathered to hear President Kennedy and was awaiting his arrival. Let's switch down there now where Eddie Barker of KRLD is on the air.[26] | ” |
However, the connection was not available at the time and the camera stayed trained on Cronkite in the newsroom. After a few seconds, Cronkite started speaking again, but shortly after he had begun, the broadcast abruptly cut into the meeting, where Barker, KRLD's news director, was reporting (a director could be heard on-air saying "Okay, go ahead. Switch it" while Cronkite was talking). Just before the feed switched to the Dallas Trade Mart meeting, Cronkite informed the viewers that the members of the Trade Mart had just been informed of the President's shooting and that Congressman Jim Wright was telling reporters that both the President and Governor were alive, but both were in serious condition.
The feed then switched to Dallas, with Barker reporting about the incident and the meeting that was to take place. A few minutes after they switched, Barker was told by a fellow reporter, Dick Wheeler, at the meeting that Kennedy was in very critical condition. The scene returned to Cronkite shortly after that, who relayed some more information, but returned to Dallas as a prayer was being said for Kennedy. After the prayer was said, Barker said that there was an unofficial report circulating that President Kennedy had in fact died from his wounds.
After several minutes, Cronkite reported that the President had been given blood transfusions and two priests had been called into the room. He also played an audio report by KRLD's Jim Underwood, recounting that someone had been arrested in the assassination attempt at the Texas School Book Depository. After Underwood's report, Cronkite was told that KRLD was reporting that the President was dead, which had been heard in Barker's previous report. The coverage went back to Dallas, where Barker reiterated his previous report- that there was an unconfirmed statement that Kennedy was dead, but the source, a doctor at Parkland Hospital who said this to Barker directly, "would normally be a good one." Approximately three minutes later, Barker declared the assassination to be confirmed, although neither the Associated nor the United Presses had done so. Barker retracted the statement moments later, saying that there was no absolute confirmation. Shortly thereafter CBS stopped showing KRLD's coverage and returned to its own coverage of the incident, and as he had been doing Cronkite reported the events as they were known. At 2:27 EST, Cronkite reported that Father Oscar Huber, one of the priests called into the room, had administered the Last Rites to the President, but as far as anyone knew the President was still alive and no official source had confirmed the reports from Barker.
Within ten seconds of that report, word reached Cronkite of another report that had been given by Dallas-based correspondent Dan Rather to CBS Radio. At 2:22 EST, while CBS' news coverage was still focused at the Dallas Trade Mart, Rather called executive Mort Dank and said, in regards to Kennedy's condition, "I think he's dead." While this was not an official confirmation of the death of the President, which had yet to be relayed, CBS radio newscaster Allan Jackson was handed a sheet of paper saying that Kennedy was in fact dead and reported as if the incident was officially confirmed. Five minutes later, after some debate over whether or not to mention it, Cronkite relayed the following information to the viewing audience:
| “ | We just have a report from our correspondent Dan Rather in Dallas, that he has confirmed President Kennedy is dead. | ” |
Since Rather's report, as he had delivered it, only theorized that the President was dead, and no word to that effect had come from any wire service, Cronkite stressed that the report was not an official confirmation of the President's death and continued to report on the incident as if the President was still alive, relaying that Father Huber, who had told reporters on the scene that he had to pull back a sheet covering Kennedy's body to perform the Last Rites on him, didn't believe that the President was dead at the time he entered the room.
Less than two minutes later, Cronkite received a report that the two priests who were with Kennedy were now saying that he was dead, and declared that that was as close to official as they could get. However, he continued to stress that there was no official confirmation from the hospital of Kennedy's death, although through the tone of his voice Cronkite seemed to resign himself to that being the most likely outcome. Cronkite continued to await official word from Parkland Hospital while recapping the events, including receiving word that government sources were now saying that the President was dead. (It should be noted that the same report reached all three major networks, but only ABC took it as official word of the assassination.) After briefly speaking about what Kennedy had done earlier that day, Cronkite noted that it was now apparent that the President was dead (even though the official bulletin had, of course, not arrived yet), saying that his plane from Fort Worth "flew him to his rendezvous with death, apparently, in Dallas, Texas."
Immediately after that, at approximately 2:38 p.m. EST, Cronkite was remarking on the increased security presence in Dallas for the President's visit for fear of protests, again bringing up the assault on Adlai Stevenson. While he was speaking, one of two news editors who had been standing by the newsroom's two wire machines pulled a bulletin from the Associated Press machine and began walking toward Cronkite's desk with it.
| “ | At the airport in Dallas, the uh..., and throughout the streets of Dallas, the Dallas Police have been augmented by some 400 policemen called in on their day off because there were some fears and concerns in Dallas that, uh...that there might be demonstrations, at least, that could embarrass the President. Because it was only on October 24 that our ambassador of the United Nations, Adlai Stevenson, was assaulted in Dallas leaving a dinner meeting there... | ” |
Just as he had said that, the editor handed Cronkite the bulletin. Cronkite stopped speaking, put on his eyeglasses, looked over the bulletin sheet for a moment, took off his glasses, and made the official announcement:
| “ | From Dallas, Texas, the flash, apparently official: (reading AP flash) "President Kennedy died at 1 p.m. Central Standard Time." (glancing up at clock) 2 o'clock Eastern Standard Time, some 38 minutes ago.[28] | ” |
After making that announcement, Cronkite paused briefly, put his glasses back on, and swallowed hard to maintain his composure. With noticeable emotion in his voice he intoned the next sentence of the news report:[28]
| “ | Vice President Johnson (clears throat) has left the hospital in Dallas, but we do not know to where he has proceeded; presumably he will be taking the oath of office shortly and become the 36th President of the United States.[28] | ” |
With emotion still in his voice and eyes watering, Cronkite once again recapped the events after collecting himself, incorporating some wire photos of the visit and explaining the significance of the pictures now that Kennedy was dead. After that, Cronkite reminded the viewers one final time that it had now been confirmed that the President was dead, that Vice President Johnson was now the President and was to be sworn in (which had occurred just as Cronkite received the bulletin confirming the President's death), that Governor Connally's condition was still unknown but many reports said that he was still alive, and that there was no report of whether the assassin had been captured (despite the earlier reports of arrests at the Texas School Book Depository). He then tossed coverage of the events to colleague Charles Collingwood and left the newsroom.
Less than 45 minutes later, at about 3:30 PM EST, Cronkite returned to the anchor position, this time in his jacket, to replace Collingwood. The highlights of new details included the swearing-in ceremony of the new President, Lyndon B. Johnson, the arrest of the accused assassin, Lee Harvey Oswald, and the first new bits of news from Dallas, during which time his reports were interspersed with new information from Dan Rather and Eddie Barker at KRLD's studio. After Cronkite left the anchor desk again he was replaced by Collingwood; Cronkite's next appearance came nearly two hours later, when he took over for Harry Reasoner at the desk so he could anchor The CBS Evening News as scheduled.
Two days later, at 2:33 PM EST on November 24, Cronkite broke into CBS's coverage of the memorial services in Washington to inform the viewers of the death of Oswald, who had been shot earlier that day (the news that Reasoner had broken into the funeral coverage to report only seconds after the incident):
| “ | From our CBS newsroom in New York, a bulletin: Lee Harvey Oswald, the man who Dallas police say killed President Kennedy, himself is dead. He was cut down by a single bullet an hour and fifteen minutes before he died in Parkland Hospital in a room just ten feet from that room where President Kennedy died. He was being taken from the Dallas City Jail to the Dallas County Jail but in the basement of the Dallas City Jail, before he left that building, he was shot. The man Dallas police seized at the scene and are holding has been identified as Jack Rubenstein, known in Dallas as Jack Ruby, a man who years ago moved to Dallas from Chicago and was operating two nightclubs, and well-known nightclubs, in Dallas. He is fifty-two years old, balding, with black hair. He is being held by the Dallas police, who say they will charge him with the murder of Lee Harvey Oswald. Now back to Washington. | ” |
The following day, on the day of Kennedy's funeral, as he was concluding the CBS Evening News, Cronkite provided the following commentary about the events of the last four dark days:
| “ | It is said that the human mind has a greater capacity for remembering the pleasant than the unpleasant. But today was a day that will live in memory and in grief. Only history can write the importance of this day: Were these dark days the harbingers of even blacker ones to come, or like the black before the dawn shall they lead to some still as yet indiscernible sunrise of understanding among men, that violent words, no matter what their origin or motivation, can lead only to violent deeds? This is the larger question that will be answered, in part, in the manner that a shaken civilization seeks the answers to the immediate question: Who, and most importantly what, was Lee Harvey Oswald? The world’s doubts must be put to rest. Tonight there will be few Americans who will go to bed without carrying with them the sense that somehow they have failed. If in the search of our conscience we find a new dedication to the American concepts that brook no political, sectional, religious or racial divisions, then maybe it may yet be possible to say that John Fitzgerald Kennedy did not die in vain. That’s the way it is, Monday, November 25, 1963. This is Walter Cronkite, good night.[26] | ” |
Referring to his coverage of Kennedy's assassination, in a 2006 TV interview with Nick Clooney, Cronkite recalled:
"I choked up, I really had a little trouble...my eyes got a little wet...[what Kennedy had represented] was just all lost to us. Fortunately, I grabbed hold before I was actually [crying]."[29]
In a 2003 CBS special commemorating the 40th anniversary of the assassination, Cronkite said that he was standing at the United Press wire machine when the bulletin broke and was clamoring to get on the air as fast as was possible. Recalling his reaction upon having the death confirmed to him, he said:
| “ | And when you finally had to say it's official, the President is dead...pretty tough words in a situation like that. And they were, um, hard to come by.[30] | ” |
Vietnam War[link]
In mid-February 1968, on the urging of his executive producer Ernest Leiser, Cronkite and Leiser journeyed to Vietnam to cover the aftermath of the Tet Offensive. They were invited to dine with General Creighton Abrams, the current commander of all forces in Vietnam, whom Cronkite knew from World War II. According to Leiser, Abrams told Cronkite, "we cannot win this Goddamned war, and we ought to find a dignified way out."[31]
Upon return, Cronkite and Leiser wrote separate editorial reports based on that trip. Cronkite, an excellent writer, preferred Leiser's text over his own.[31] On February 27, 1968, Cronkite closed "Report from Vietnam: Who, What, When, Where, Why?" with that editorial report:[32]
We have been too often disappointed by the optimism of the American leaders, both in Vietnam and Washington, to have faith any longer in the silver linings they find in the darkest clouds. They may be right, that Hanoi's winter-spring offensive has been forced by the Communist realization that they could not win the longer war of attrition, and that the Communists hope that any success in the offensive will improve their position for eventual negotiations. It would improve their position, and it would also require our realization, that we should have had all along, that any negotiations must be that -- negotiations, not the dictation of peace terms. For it seems now more certain than ever that the bloody experience of Vietnam is to end in a stalemate. This summer's almost certain standoff will either end in real give-and-take negotiations or terrible escalation; and for every means we have to escalate, the enemy can match us, and that applies to invasion of the North, the use of nuclear weapons, or the mere commitment of one hundred, or two hundred, or three hundred thousand more American troops to the battle. And with each escalation, the world comes closer to the brink of cosmic disaster. To say that we are closer to victory today is to believe, in the face of the evidence, the optimists who have been wrong in the past. To suggest we are on the edge of defeat is to yield to unreasonable pessimism. To say that we are mired in stalemate seems the only realistic, yet unsatisfactory, conclusion. On the off chance that military and political analysts are right, in the next few months we must test the enemy's intentions, in case this is indeed his last big gasp before negotiations. But it is increasingly clear to this reporter that the only rational way out then will be to negotiate, not as victors, but as an honorable people who lived up to their pledge to defend democracy, and did the best they could.[33]
Following Cronkite's editorial report, President Lyndon Johnson is reported to have said, "If I've lost Cronkite, I've lost Middle America."[8][34] This account has been questioned in a recent publication on journalistic accuracy.[35] Several weeks later, Johnson announced he would not seek reelection.
During the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago, Cronkite was anchoring the CBS network coverage as violence and protests occurred outside the convention, as well as scuffles inside the convention hall. When Dan Rather was punched to the floor (on camera) by security personnel, Cronkite commented, "I think we've got a bunch of thugs here, Dan."
Other historic events[link]
The first publicly transmitted, live trans-Atlantic program, was broadcast via the Telstar satellite on July 23, 1962 at 3:00 p.m. EDT, and Cronkite was one of the main presenters in this multinational broadcast.[36][37] The broadcast was made possible in Europe by Eurovision and in North America by NBC, CBS, ABC, and the CBC.[36] The first public broadcast featured CBS's Cronkite and NBC's Chet Huntley in New York, and the BBC's Richard Dimbleby in Brussels.[36] Cronkite was in the New York studio at Rockefeller Plaza as the first pictures to be transmitted and received were the Statue of Liberty in New York and the Eiffel Tower in Paris.[36] The first segment included a televised major league baseball game between the Philadelphia Phillies and the Chicago Cubs at Wrigley Field.[36] From there, the video switched first to Washington, D.C.; then to Cape Canaveral, Florida; then to Quebec City, Quebec, and finally to Stratford, Ontario.[36] The Washington segment included a press conference with President Kennedy, talking about the price of the American dollar, which was causing concern in Europe.[36] This broadcast inaugurated live, intercontinental news coverage, which was perfected later in the sixties with Early Bird and other Intelsat satellites.
General of the Army Dwight D. Eisenhower returned to his former Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force (SHAEF) headquarters for an interview by Cronkite on the CBS News Special Report D-Day + 20, telecast on June 6, 1964.[citation needed]
Cronkite is also remembered for his coverage of the United States space program, and at times was visibly enthusiastic, rubbing his hands together on camera with a smile and uttering, "Whew...boy" on July 20, 1969, when the Apollo 11 lunar landing mission put the first men on the Moon. Cronkite later criticized himself for being at a loss for journalistic words at that moment.[citation needed]
According to the 2006 PBS documentary on Cronkite, there was "nothing new" in his reports on the Watergate affair;[8] however, Cronkite brought together a wide range of reporting, and his credibility and status is credited by many with pushing the Watergate story to the forefront with the American public, ultimately resulting in the resignation of President Richard M. Nixon on August 9, 1974.[1] Cronkite had anchored the CBS coverage of Nixon's address, announcing his impending resignation, the night before.[citation needed]
Cronkite also was one of the first to receive word of former President Lyndon B. Johnson's death, receiving the information during the January 22, 1973, broadcast of the CBS Evening News.[38] While a videotaped report by Peter Kalischer about the apparently successful Vietnam war peace talks was being shown to the nation, Johnson's press secretary Tom Johnson (no relative of Lyndon Johnson) telephoned Cronkite to inform him of Johnson's death. CBS cut abruptly from the report at 6:38 p.m. Eastern Standard Time to Cronkite, who was still speaking to Johnson on the phone. After being made aware he was again on camera, Cronkite held up a finger to let the crew and audience know he was still gathering information. After he allowed Johnson to finish his sentence and informed Johnson he was back on the air and that he needed to hold the call for a second, Cronkite turned to the camera and began to speak:
| “ | I'm talking to Tom Johnson, the press secretary for Lyndon Johnson, who has reported that the thirty-sixth President of the United States died this afternoon in a...ambulance plane on the way to San Antonio, where he was taken after being stricken at his ranch- the LBJ Ranch, in Johnson City, Texas. He was stricken at 3:40 PM, Central Standard Time, 4:40...Eastern Standard Time. Three agents who were at the scene, who are permanently attached to the ranch to protect the President, uh, went to his immediate aid, gave him all emergency aid they could, put him in a plane, I suppose, Tom, one of the President's own planes? *pauses to wait for response* Colonel George McGranahan, who was the man who proclaimed the President dead upon arrival at Brook Army General Hospital, at San Antonio. *pauses again* And Mrs. Johnson was notified of the events at her office in Austin and flew immediately to San Antonio and Tom Johnson, no relation to President Johnson, the President's news secretary, has told me that from Austin. | ” |
[39] During the final ten minutes of that broadcast, Cronkite reported on the death, giving a retrospective on the life of nation's 36th president, and announced that CBS would air a special on Lyndon Johnson later that evening. This story was re-told on a 2007 CBS-TV special honoring Cronkite's 90th birthday. Tom Johnson later became president of CNN.[citation needed]
NBC-TV's Garrick Utley, anchoring NBC Nightly News that evening, also interrupted his newscast in order to break the story, doing so about three minutes after Cronkite on CBS. ABC, however, did not cover the story at all, since, at the time, that network fed its evening newscast to local stations at 6 p.m. Eastern Time, even though many affiliates tape-delayed the broadcast to air at 6:30 or 7:00 p.m.
In December 1963, Cronkite introduced The Beatles to the United States by airing a four-minute story on band on the CBS Evening News.[40]
Retirement[link]
On February 14, 1980, Cronkite announced that he intended to retire from the CBS Evening News; at the time, CBS had a policy of mandatory retirement by age 65.[41] Although sometimes compared to a father figure or an uncle figure, in an interview about his retirement he described himself as being more like a "comfortable old shoe" to his audience. His last day in the anchor chair at the CBS Evening News was on March 6, 1981; he was succeeded the following Monday by Dan Rather.[42]
Cronkite's farewell statement:[43]
| “ | This is my last broadcast as the anchorman of The CBS Evening News; for me, it's a moment for which I long have planned, but which, nevertheless, comes with some sadness. For almost two decades, after all, we've been meeting like this in the evenings, and I'll miss that. But those who have made anything of this departure, I'm afraid have made too much. This is but a transition, a passing of the baton. A great broadcaster and gentleman, Doug Edwards, preceded me in this job, and another, Dan Rather, will follow.[1] And anyway, the person who sits here is but the most conspicuous member of a superb team of journalists; writers, reporters, editors, producers, and none of that will change. Furthermore, I'm not even going away! I'll be back from time to time with special news reports and documentaries, and, beginning in June, every week, with our science program, Universe.[9] Old anchormen, you see, don't fade away; they just keep coming back for more. And that's the way it is: Friday, March 6, 1981. I'll be away on assignment, and Dan Rather will be sitting in here for the next few years. Good night.[44] | ” |
Other activities[link]
Reporting[link]
As he had promised on his last show as anchor in 1981, Cronkite continued to broadcast occasionally as a special correspondent for CBS, CNN, and NPR into the 21st century; one such occasion was Cronkite anchoring the second space flight by John Glenn in 1998 as he had Glenn's first in 1962. In 1983, he reported on the British General Election for the ITV current affairs series World In Action, interviewing, among many others, the victorious Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher.[45] Cronkite hosted the annual Vienna New Year's Concert on PBS from 1985 to 2008, succeeded by Julie Andrews in 2009.[46] For many years, until 2002, he was also the host of the annual Kennedy Center Honors.
In 1998, Cronkite hosted the 90-minute documentary, Silicon Valley: A 100 Year Renaissance, produced by the Santa Clara Valley Historical Association. The film documented Silicon Valley's rise from the origin of Stanford University to the current high-technology powerhouse. The documentary was broadcast on PBS throughout the United States and in 26 countries. Prior to 2004, he could also be seen in the opening movie 'Back to Neverland' shown in the Walt Disney World attraction, The Magic of Disney Animation, interviewing Robin Williams as if he is still on the CBS News channel, ending his on-camera time with his famous catchphrase. In the featurette, Cronkite describes the steps taken in the creation of an animated film, while Robin Williams becomes an animated character (and even becomes Walter Cronkite, impersonating his voice). He also was shown inviting Disney guests and tourists to the Disney Classics Theater.
On May 21, 1999, Walter Cronkite participated in a panel discussion on Integrity in the Media with Ben Bradlee and Mike McCurry at the Connecticut Forum in Hartford, Connecticut. Cronkite provided a particularly funny anecdote about taking a picture from a house in Houston, Texas where a newsworthy event occurred and being praised for getting a unique photograph, only to find out later that the city desk had provided him with the wrong address.[47]
Voice-overs[link]
Cronkite narrated the IMAX film about the Space Shuttle, The Dream is Alive, released in 1985. From May 26, 1986 to August 15, 1994, he was the narrator's voice in the EPCOT Center attraction, Spaceship Earth, at Walt Disney World. He provided the pivotal voice of Captain Neweyes in the 1993 animated film We're Back: A Dinosaur's Story, delivering his trademark line at the end. In 1995, he made an appearance on Broadway, providing the voice of the titular book in the 1995 revival of How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying.[citation needed]
Cronkite was a finalist for NASA's Journalist in Space program, which mirrored the Teacher in Space Project, an opportunity that was suspended after the Challenger disaster in 1986. He recorded voice-overs for the 1995 film Apollo 13, modifying the script he was given to make it more "Cronkitian." In 2002, Cronkite was the voice of Benjamin Franklin in all 40 episodes of the educational television cartoon Liberty's Kids, which included a news segment ending with "And that's the way it is on...[a historic date]." His distinctive voice provided the narration for the television ads of the University of Texas at Austin, his alma mater, with its 'We're Texas' ad campaign.[48]
Cronkite voiced Tim's grandpa in the BrainPOP episode about aging.[49]
He held amateur radio operator license KB2GSD and narrated a 2003 American Radio Relay League documentary explaining amateur radio's role in disaster relief. Unusually, Cronkite was a Novice-class licensee—the entry level license—for his entire, and long, tenure in the hobby.[citation needed]
On February 15, 2005, he went into the studio at CBS to record narration for WCC Chatham Radio, a documentary about Guglielmo Marconi and his Chatham station, which became the busiest ship-to-shore wireless station in North America from 1914 to 1994. The documentary was directed by Christopher Seufert of Mooncusser Films and premiered at the Chatham Marconi Maritime Center[50] in April 2005. In 2006, Cronkite hosted the World War One Living History Project, a program honoring America's final handful of veterans from the First World War. The program was created by Treehouse Productions and aired on NPR on November 11, 2006. In May 2009, Legacy of War, produced by PBS, was released. Cronkite chronicles, over archive footage, the events following World War II that resulted in America's rise as the dominant world power.[51]
Prior to his death, "Uncle Walter" hosted a number of TV specials and was featured in interviews about the times and events that occurred during his career as America's "most trusted" man.[8][52] In July 2006, the 90-minute documentary Walter Cronkite: Witness to History aired on PBS. The special was narrated by Katie Couric, who assumed the CBS Evening News anchor chair in September 2006. Cronkite provided the voiceover introduction to Couric's CBS Evening News, which began on September 5, 2006. Cronkite's voiceover was notably not used on introducing the broadcast reporting his funeral - no voiceover was used on this occasion.[citation needed]
TV and movie appearances[link]
Cronkite made a cameo appearance on The Mary Tyler Moore Show, in which he met with Lou Grant in his office. Ted Baxter, who at first tried to convince Cronkite that he (Baxter) was as good a newsman as Eric Sevareid, pleaded with Cronkite to hire him for the network news, at least to give sport scores, and gave an example: "The North Stars 3, the Kings Oh!" Cronkite turned to Lou and said, "I'm gonna get you for this!" Cronkite later said that he was disappointed that his scene was filmed in one take, since he had hoped to sit down and chat with the cast.
In the late 1980s and again in the 1990s, Cronkite appeared on the news-oriented situation comedy Murphy Brown as himself. Both episodes were written by the Emmy-award winning team of Tom Seeley and Norm Gunzenhauser. In 1995, he narrated the World Liberty Concert held in the Netherlands.
Cronkite appeared briefly in the 2005 dramatic documentary The American Ruling Class written by Lewis Lapham, Thirteen Days, reporting on the Cuban missile crisis and provided the opening synopsis of the American Space Program leading to the events in Apollo 13 for the Ron Howard film of the same name.
Political activism[link]
Cronkite wrote a syndicated opinion column for King Features Syndicate. In 2005 and 2006, he contributed to The Huffington Post.[53] Cronkite was the chairman of The Interfaith Alliance.[54] In 2006, he presented the Walter Cronkite Faith and Freedom Award to actor and activist George Clooney on behalf of his organization at its[55] annual dinner in New York.
Cronkite was a vocal advocate for free airtime for political candidates.[8] He worked with the Alliance for Better Campaigns[8] and Common Cause,[9] for instance, on an unsuccessful lobbying effort to have an amendment added to the McCain-Feingold-Shays-Meehan Campaign Finance Reform Act of 2001 that would have required TV broadcast companies to provide free airtime to candidates. Cronkite criticized the present system of campaign finance which allows elections to "be purchased" by special interests, and he noted that all the European democracies "provide their candidates with extensive free airtime."[56] "In fact," Cronkite pointed out, "of all the major nations worldwide that profess to have democracies, only seven — just seven — do not offer free airtime"[56] This put the United States on a list with Ecuador, Honduras, Malaysia, Taiwan, Tanzania, Trinidad and Tobago. Cronkite concluded that "The failure to give free airtime for our political campaigns endangers our democracy."[56] During the elections held in 2000, the amount spent by candidates in the major TV markets approached $1 billion. "What our campaign asks is that the television industry yield just a tiny percentage of that windfall, less than 1 percent, to fund free airtime."[57]
He was a member of the Constitution Project's bipartisan Liberty and Security Committee.[58][59] He also supported the nonprofit world hunger organization Heifer International.
In 1998, he supported President Bill Clinton during Clinton's impeachment trial. He was also a proponent of limited world government on the American federalist model, writing fund-raising letters for the World Federalist Association (now Citizens for Global Solutions). In accepting the 1999 Norman Cousins Global Governance Award at the ceremony at the United Nations, Cronkite said:[60]
- "It seems to many of us that if we are to avoid the eventual catastrophic world conflict we must strengthen the United Nations as a first step toward a world government patterned after our own government with a legislature, executive and judiciary, and police to enforce its international laws and keep the peace. To do that, of course, we Americans will have to yield up some of our sovereignty. That would be a bitter pill. It would take a lot of courage, a lot of faith in the new order. But the American colonies did it once and brought forth one of the most nearly perfect unions the world has ever seen."[61]
Cronkite contrasted his support for accountable global government with the opposition to it by politically active Christian fundamentalists in the United States:[62]
- "Even as with the American rejection of the League of Nations, our failure to live up to our obligations to the United Nations is led by a handful of willful senators who choose to pursue their narrow, selfish political objectives at the cost of our nation’s conscience.They pander to and are supported by the Christian Coalition and the rest of the religious right wing. Their leader, Pat Robertson, has written that we should have a world government but only when the messiah arrives. Any attempt to achieve world order before that time must be the work of the Devil! Well join me… I'm glad to sit here at the right hand of Satan."[63]
In 2003, Cronkite, who owned property on Martha's Vineyard,[52] became involved in a long-running debate over his opposition to the construction of a wind farm in that area. In his column, he repeatedly condemned President George W. Bush and the 2003 invasion of Iraq. Cronkite appeared in the 2004 Robert Greenwald film Outfoxed, where he offered commentary on what he said were unethical and overtly political practices at the Fox News Channel. Cronkite remarked that when Fox News was founded by Rupert Murdoch, "it was intended to be a conservative organization — beyond that; a far-right-wing organization". In January 2006, during a press conference to promote the PBS documentary about his career, Cronkite said that he felt the same way about America's presence in Iraq as he had about their presence in Vietnam in 1968 and that he felt America should recall its troops.[64]
Cronkite spoke out against the War on Drugs in support of the Drug Policy Alliance, writing a fundraising letter and appearing in advertisements on behalf of the DPA.[65] In the letter, Cronkite wrote: "Today, our nation is fighting two wars: one abroad and one at home. While the war in Iraq is in the headlines, the other war is still being fought on our own streets. Its casualties are the wasted lives of our own citizens. I am speaking of the war on drugs. And I cannot help but wonder how many more lives, and how much more money, will be wasted before another Robert McNamara admits what is plain for all to see: the war on drugs is a failure."[65]
Personal life[link]
Cronkite was married for nearly sixty-five years to Mary Elizabeth 'Betsy' Maxwell Cronkite (January 25, 1916 - March 15, 2005),[66] from March 30, 1940 until her death from cancer.[67] They had three children: Nancy Cronkite, Mary Kathleen (Kathy) Cronkite, and Walter Leland (Chip) Cronkite III (who is married to actress Deborah Rush);[2][52] and four grandchildren: Will Ikard, John Ikard, Peter Cronkite, and Walter Cronkite IV. Peter and Walter are alumni of St. Bernard's School.[68] Peter Cronkite is currently attending Horace Mann School. Walter attends Hamilton College, having graduated from the same school.
In late 2005 Cronkite began dating opera singer Joanna Simon, Carly Simon's older sister. Of their relationship Cronkite stated in an interview for the New York Post in January 2006: "We are keeping company, as the old phrase used to be."[69]
Cronkite was an avid sailor and a member of the United States Coast Guard Auxiliary, with the honorary rank of commodore.[70][71] Throughout the 1950s, he was an aspiring sports car racer, even racing in the 1959 12 Hours of Sebring.[72]
Cronkite was reported to be a fan of the game Diplomacy, which was John F. Kennedy's and Henry Kissinger's favorite game.[73]
Death[link]
In late June 2009, Cronkite was reported to be terminally ill.[74] He died on July 17, 2009, at his home in New York City, at the age of 92. He is believed to have died from cerebrovascular disease.[75] Cronkite's funeral took place on July 23, 2009 at St. Bartholomew's Church in midtown Manhattan, New York City.[76] At his funeral, his friends noted his love of music, including, recently, drumming.[71] He was cremated and his remains buried next to his wife, Betsy, in the family plot at a cemetery in Kansas City.
Legacy[link]
Public credibility and trustfulness[link]
For many years, until a decade after he left his post as anchor,[77] Cronkite was considered one of the most trusted figures in the United States.[52] For most of his 19 years as anchor, he was the "predominant news voice in America."[77] Affectionately known as "Uncle Walter," he covered many of the important news events of the era so effectively that his image and voice are closely associated with the Cuban missile crisis, the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, the Vietnam War, the Apollo 11 Moon landing, and the Watergate scandal.[1][4] USA Today wrote that "few TV figures have ever had as much power as Cronkite did at his height."[77] Enjoying the cult of personality surrounding Cronkite in those years, CBS allowed some good-natured fun-poking at its star anchorman in some episodes of the network's popular situation comedy All in the Family, during which the lead character Archie Bunker would sometimes complain about the newsman, calling him "Pinko Cronkite."
Cronkite trained himself to speak at a rate of 124 words per minute in his newscasts, so that viewers could clearly understand him.[78] In contrast, Americans average about 165 words per minute, and fast, difficult-to-understand talkers speak close to 200 words per minute.[79]
Awards and honors[link]
In 1968, the faculty of the E. W. Scripps School of Journalism at Ohio University voted to award Cronkite the Carr Van Anda Award "for enduring contributions to journalism."[80] In 1970, Cronkite received a "Freedom of the Press" George Polk Award.[1][9]
In 1972, in recognition of his career, Princeton University's American Whig-Cliosophic Society awarded Cronkite the James Madison Award for Distinguished Public Service.[81]
In 1981, the year he retired, Jimmy Carter awarded Cronkite the Presidential Medal of Freedom.[1][9] In 1985, Cronkite was honoured with the induction into the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences Hall of Fame.[9] In 1995, he received the Ischia International Journalism Award.[82] In 1999, Cronkite received the Rotary National Award for Space Achievement's Corona Award in recognition of a lifetime of achievement in space exploration.[83] He was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2003.[84] On March 1, 2006, Cronkite became the first non-astronaut to receive NASA's Ambassador of Exploration Award.[14][85] Among Cronkite's numerous awards were four Peabody awards for excellence in broadcasting.[9]
Cronkite School at Arizona State University[link]
A few years after Cronkite retired, Tom Chauncey, an owner of KTSP-TV, the then-CBS affiliate in Phoenix, contacted Cronkite, an old friend, and asked him if he would be willing to have the journalism school at Arizona State University named after him. Cronkite immediately agreed.[8][86] The ASU program acquired status and respect from its namesake.
Cronkite was not just a namesake, but he also took the time to interact with the students and staff of the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication.[1][87] Cronkite made the trip to Arizona annually to present the Walter Cronkite Award for Excellence in Journalism to a leader in the field of media.
"The values that Mr. Cronkite embodies – excellence, integrity, accuracy, fairness, objectivity – we try to instill in our students each and every day. There is no better role model for our faculty or our students." said Dean Christopher Callahan.[86]
The school, with approximately 1,200 majors, is widely regarded as one of the top journalism schools in the country. It is housed in a new facility in downtown Phoenix that is equipped with 14 digital newsrooms and computer labs, two TV studios, 280 digital student work stations, the Cronkite Theater, the First Amendment Forum, and new technology. The school's students regularly finish at the top of national collegiate journalism competitions, such as the Hearst Journalism Awards program and the Society of Professional Journalists Mark of Excellence Awards. In 2009, students won the Robert F. Kennedy Award for college print reporting.
In 2008, The state-of-the-art journalism education complex in the heart of ASU's Downtown Phoenix campus was also built in his honor. The Walter Cronkite Regents Chair in Communication seats the Texas College of Communications dean.[1]
Walter Cronkite Papers[link]
The Walter Cronkite papers are preserved at the curatorial Dolph Briscoe Center for American History at the University of Texas at Austin.[1] Occupying 293 linear feet (almost 90 metres) of shelf space, the papers document Cronkite's journalism career. Amongst the collected material are Cronkite's early beginnings while he still lived in Houston. They encompass his coverage of World War II as a United Press International correspondent, where he cemented his reputation by taking on hazardous overseas assignments.[8] During this time he also covered the Nuremberg war crimes trial serving as the chief of the United Press bureau in Moscow. The main content of the papers documents Cronkite's career with CBS News between 1950 and 1981.
The Cronkite Papers assemble a variety of interviews with U.S. presidents from Herbert Hoover to Harry Truman and Ronald Reagan.[1] President Lyndon Johnson requested a special interview with Cronkite while he was broadcasting live on CBS.
Between 1990 and 1993 Don Carleton, executive director for the Center for American History, assisted Cronkite[88] as he compiled an oral history to write his autobiography, A Reporter's Life, which was published in 1996.[10] The taped memoirs became an integral part of an eight-part television series Cronkite Remembers, which was shown on the Discovery Channel.[89]
As a newsman, Cronkite devoted his attention to the early days of the space program, and the "space race" between the United States and the Soviet Union. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration honoured Cronkite on February 28, 2006. Michael Coats, director of NASA's Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center in Houston, presented Cronkite with the Ambassador of Exploration Award. Cronkite was the first non-astronaut thus honoured.[90]
NASA presented Cronkite with a moon rock sample from the early Apollo expeditions spanning 1969 to 1972.[91] Cronkite passed on the Moon rock to Bill Powers, president of the University of Texas at Austin, and it became part of the collection at the Dolph Briscoe Center for American History.[52] Carleton said at this occasion, "We are deeply honored by Walter Cronkite’s decision to entrust this prestigious award to the Center for American History. The Center already serves as the proud steward of his professional and personal papers, which include his coverage of the space program for CBS News. It is especially fitting that the archive documenting Walter's distinguished career should also include one of the Moon rocks that the heroic astronauts of the Apollo program brought to Earth."[89][92]
References[link]
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- ^ a b Stelter, Brian (July 17, 2009). "Walter Cronkite, Iconic Anchorman Dies". Media Coder. http://mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/07/17/walter-cronkite-iconic-anchorman-dies/. Retrieved 2009-07-17.
- ^ a b c d e "CBS Legend Walter Cronkite Dies "Most Trusted Man in America" Passes Away in New York at 92". CBS News. July 17, 2009. http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/07/17/eveningnews/main5170556.shtml. Retrieved 2009-07-17.
- ^ a b Ryan, Joal (July 17, 2009). "News Legend Walter Cronkite Dead at 92". e online. http://www.eonline.com/uberblog/b134779_news_legend_walter_cronkite_dead_92.html. Retrieved 2009-07-17.
- ^ a b Ben Zimmer (31 July 2009) (audio/transcript). Too Good to Check. Interview with Bob Garfield. On the Media. NPR. http://www.onthemedia.org/transcripts/2009/07/31/07. Retrieved 2009-08-02.
- ^ "CBS at 75 Timeline — The 1950s". http://www.cbs.com/specials/cbs_75/timeline/1950.shtml. Retrieved April 26, 2006.
- ^ Cook, Jeff Scott (1989). The elements of speechwriting and public speaking. Macmillan. p. 171. ISBN 0-02-527791-X.
- ^ a b c d e f g h Winfrey, Lee; Schaffer, Michael D. (July 17, 2009). "Walter Cronkite dies". Philadelphia Inquirer. http://www.philly.com/philly/news/20090717_Walter_Cronkite_dies.html?viewAll=y. Retrieved 2009-07-18. [dead link]
- ^ a b c d e f g h i "Former CBS News Anchor Walter Cronkite Dies". WorldNow and Sarkes Tarzian, Inc.. KTVN Channel 2. July 17, 2009. http://www.ktvn.com/Global/story.asp?S=10747545&nav=menu549_2_8. Retrieved 2009-07-18.
- ^ a b c d e f g h Barnhart, Aaron (July 17, 2009). "Broadcast icon Walter Cronkite dies". Kansas City Star. http://www.kansascity.com/news/breaking_news/story/1331432.html. Retrieved 2009-07-17. [dead link]
- ^ "Walter Cronkite Biography (1916-2009)". Film Reference. http://www.filmreference.com/film/31/Walter-Cronkite.html. Retrieved 2009-07-17.
- ^ "Bilyea, Belyea, Bulyea, Boulier". http://www.bilyea.net/. Retrieved 2009-07-17.
- ^ a b Carleton, Don, "Cronkite's Texas: A Q&A with Walter Cronkite", Know, University of Texas at Austin, Dec. 4, 2009
- ^ a b George, Patrick (January 9, 2009). "Cronkite honored by NASA, entrusts moon rock award to UT World-renowned journalist covered space program through lunar landing". Daily Texan. http://www.dailytexanonline.com/media/paper410/news/2006/03/01/TopStories/Cronkite.Honored.By.Nasa.Entrusts.Moon.Rock.Award.To.Ut-1642287.shtml. Retrieved 2009-07-17. [dead link]
- ^ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bohemian_Grove#Cremation_of_Care
- ^ Fenster, Bob (2005). The Duh Awards: In This Stupid World, We Take the Prize. Andrews McMeel Publishing. p. 176. ISBN 0-7407-5021-6.
- ^ Auster, Albert (2008). "Cronkite, Walter U.S. Broadcast Journalist". The Museum of Broadcast Communications (MBC). http://www.museum.tv/archives/etv/C/htmlC/cronkitewal/cronkitewal.htm. Retrieved 2009-07-20.
- ^ a b Martin, Douglas (17 July 2009). "Walter Cronkite, 92, Dies; Trusted Voice of TV". The New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/18/us/18cronkite.html?_r=1&ref=obituaries%20Martin,%20Douglas. Retrieved 2009-08-02.
- ^ Walter "Cronkite with Charlemane the Lion on CBS' The Morning Show (photograph)". CBS News. 23 June 2006. http://www.cbsnews.com/elements/2003/06/23/in_depth_showbiz/photoessay559943_1_9_photo.shtml?tag=page Walter. Retrieved 2009-08-02.
- ^ Zurawik, David (Saturday, 18 July 2009). "Walter Cronkite, America's original anchorman, dies at age 92". The Baltimore Sun. http://www.baltimoresun.com/entertainment/bal-ae.cronkite18jul18,0,5259242.story. Retrieved 2009-08-02.
- ^ Sandomir, Richard (Sunday, 19 July 2009). "Amid Blizzard, Cronkite Helped Make Sports History". The New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/19/sports/19sandomir.html?ref=sports. Retrieved 2009-08-02.
- ^ CBS News Transcripts, January 16, 1980.
- ^ Goodman, Ellen (1980-06-17). "And That's the Way It Is -- Or Is It?". Washington Post. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/05/14/AR2009051403597.html. Retrieved 2009-07-18.
- ^ Daniel, Douglass K. (2007) (digitised online by Google Books online). Harry Reasoner: a life in the news. University of Texas Press. pp. 87, 88. ISBN 978-0-292-71477-9, 0292714777. http://books.google.com/books?id=jGbyuBwKrDMC&pg=PA88&lpg=PA88&dq=harry+reasoner+lunch+cronkite&source=bl&ots=bc0uCYgTJq&sig=a_usMFvyeg_XxLS-1EbzJ4ytQDk&hl=en&ei=ZzGzS4mbBouTkAXv08WjBA&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CAYQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=harry%20reasoner%20lunch%20cronkite&f=false.
- ^ Morrow, Robert D. (1993) (digitised online by Google Books online). First Hand Knowledge: How I Participated in the CIA-Mafia Murder of President Kennedy. SP Books. ISBN 1-56171-274-4, 9781561712748. http://books.google.ca/books?id=XqUo36sZLSsC&pg=PA241&lpg=PA241&dq=%22Lee+Harvey+Oswald,+%22+walter+cronkite&source=bl&ots=6PWRlMIEH9&sig=Fvj5bKCFM1c4Ptebg9LnuQ24lWE&hl=en&ei=n91jSqrQCszrlAeA_e39BQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=5.
- ^ a b c d e "Cronkite broadcasts: Moon landing, JFK death". MSNBC. July 17, 2009. http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/31972354/ns/entertainment-television. Retrieved 2010-10-06.
- ^ Part of Cronkite's opening statement was cut off and it is unclear specifically what he said following the introduction.
- ^ a b c Granich, Steve (July 17, 2009). "Walter Cronkite: 1916-2009 "…And That’s the Way It Is."". WBBM 780. http://www.wbbm780.com/Walter-Cronkite--1916-2009/4826528. Retrieved 2009-07-19. [dead link]
- ^ "‘Walter was more than just an anchor. He was family’ Obama pays tribute after death of TV legend CronkiteBy Alan Taylor". Sunday Herald. 2009. http://www.sundayherald.com/news/heraldnews/display.var.2520785.0.walter_was_more_than_just_an_anchor_he_was_family.php. Retrieved 2009-07-18.
- ^ "Remembering Walter Cronkite That's the Way it Was: The World of Politics, News and Entertainment Remember a Broadcasting Legend and American Icon". CBS News. July 19, 2009. http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/07/19/broadcasts/main5173249_page2.shtml. Retrieved 2009-07-18.
- ^ a b Fromson, Murray (July 21, 2009). "And Thats The Way It Was". Huffington Post. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/murray-fromson/and-thats-the-way-it-was_b_242398.html. Retrieved 2009-12-04.
- ^ "Who, What, When, Where, Why: Report from Vietnam by Walter Cronkite,". CBS Evening News. 1968-02-27.
- ^ Moore, Frazier (July 18, 2009). "Cronkite, who defined the role of anchor, dies at 92". The Associated Press. News Observer. http://www.newsobserver.com/nation_world/story/1612251.html. Retrieved 2009-07-17. [dead link]
- ^ Wicker, Tom (January 26, 1997). "Broadcast News". New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/books/97/01/26/reviews/970126.26wickert.html. Retrieved 2009-05-01.
- ^ Campbell, W. Joseph (2010). Getting It Wrong : Ten of the Greatest Misreported Stories in American Journalism. University of California Press. ISBN 978-0-520-26209-6, 9780520255661.
- ^ a b c d e f g Walter Cronkite (2009-07-18). "From The Archives: Cronkite, Live Via Satellite". NPR. http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=106775666. Retrieved 2009-07-23.
- ^ Walter Cronkite (2002-07-23). "The Day the World Got Smaller". NPR All Things Considered (full audio segment). http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1147148. Retrieved 2009-07-23.
- ^ "Vanderbilt Television News Archive". CBS Evening News for Monday, Jan 22, 1973. Vanderbilt University Television News Archive. Jan 22, 1973. http://tvnews.vanderbilt.edu/program.pl?ID=225387. Retrieved 2009-07-18.
- ^ "CBS News January 22, 1973". YouTube. 2009. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zcA9yJBWnnE. Retrieved 2009-07-18. Cronkite's announcement of Lyndon Johnson's death at YouTube.
- ^ Martin Lewis (2009-07-19). "Tweet The Beatles! How Walter Cronkite Sent The Beatles Viral... in 1963!". The Huffington Post. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/martin-lewis/tweet-the-beatles-how-wal_b_239202.html. Retrieved 2010-06-07.
- ^ Walter Cronkite at museum.tv.
- ^ Murray, Michael D. (1999). Encyclopedia of television news (illustrated ed.). Greenwood Publishing Group,. p. 35. http://books.google.ca/books?id=J3fhcUnCC1AC&pg=PA35&lpg=PA35&dq=early+part+of+his+tenure+anchoring+the+CBS+Evening+News&source=bl&ots=tXiMNvF2IT&sig=M6MqBIlBUBWbd_rQnDyqwC-Qi2A&hl=en&ei=NeRjStr8HcHVlAfg_uz9BQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=9.
- ^ Cronkite's farewell statement at YouTube.
- ^ Shelley, Dan (July 18, 2009). "Commentary: Cronkite & The CBS Broadcast Center Legendary Newsman's Aura Permeates Every Inch Of Building". Digital Media, WCBS-TV & wcbstv.com. WCBSTV. http://wcbstv.com/local/Walter.Cronkite.CBS.2.1090918.html. Retrieved 2009-07-18. [dead link]
- ^ "TV Interview for Granada World in Action". Margaret Thatcher Foundation. 2009. http://www.margaretthatcher.org/speeches/displaydocument.asp?docid=105092. Retrieved 2009-07-20.
- ^ "From Vienna: The New Year's Celebration 2009". Educational Broadcasting Corporation. December 9, 2008. http://www.pbs.org/wnet/gperf/episodes/from-vienna-the-new-years-celebration-2009/introduction/430/. Retrieved 2009-07-18.
- ^ "YouTube - Walter Cronkite and Ben Bradlee". YouTube. 2009. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zxASv4CymUY. Retrieved 2009-07-20.
- ^ "Giving to UT: Philanthropy at the University of Texas". Office of the Vice President for Development. University of Texas. 1997—2009. http://www.utexas.edu/supportut/campaign/index.html. Retrieved 2009-07-20.
- ^ http://www.brainpop.com/health/geneticsgrowthanddevelopment/aging/
- ^ "Chatham Marconi Maritime Center2008 Chatham Marconi Maritime Center". Chatham Marconi Maritime Center. 2008. http://www.chathammarconi.org/. Retrieved 2009-07-20.
- ^ "Legacy of War - Legacy of War Spoilers, Episode Guides, Message Board". TV Guide. http://www.tvguide.com/tvshows/legacy-war/297302. Retrieved 2009-07-18.
- ^ a b c d e Stolp, Katherine (June 20, 2009). "Walter Cronkite Seriously Ill". CBS 42. Keyetv. http://www.keyetv.com/content/news/topnews/story/Walter-Cronkite-Seriously-Ill/-o9BIN121kCkGeoOXTTRZw.cspx. Retrieved 2009-07-17. [dead link]
- ^ "Walter Cronkite". Huffington Post. July 20, 2009. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/walter-cronkite. Retrieved 2009-07-20.
- ^ Home page, The Interfaith Alliance.
- ^ "9th Annual Walter Cronkite Faith & Freedom Award Gala". The Interfaith Alliance.. November 1, 2006. Archived from the original on 2007-04-15. http://web.archive.org/web/20070415042752/http://www.interfaithalliance.org/site/pp.asp?c=8dJIIWMCE&b=937809. Retrieved 2009-07-20. (archived from the original on 2007-04-15).
- ^ a b c Cronkite, Walter (4 November 02). "Free the Air Waves!". Citizens Union Foundation.. Gotham Gazette. http://www.gothamgazette.com/iotw/campaign2002/.
- ^ Free the Air Waves! by Walter Cronkite, 4 November 2002.
- ^ "The Constitution Project: Bipartisan Committee Denounces Illegal Spying Program". Common Dreams.org. 1997-2009. http://www.commondreams.org/news2007/0725-01.htm. Retrieved 2009-07-20.
- ^ Patch, Justin (June 8, 2009). "Apollo 11 moon rock named for Cronkite on display at UT Texas Memorial Museum.". Daily Texan. http://www.dailytexanonline.com/media/storage/paper410/news/2006/06/08/University/Apollo.11.Moon.Rock.Named.For.Cronkite.On.Display.At.Ut.Texas.Memorial.Museum-2043064.shtml. Retrieved 2009-07-20. [dead link]
- ^ The First Priority of Humankind..., Walter Cronkite Speech to the United Nations, October 1999. {archived from < the original on 2007-10-11).
- ^ Cabrera, Luis (digitised online by Google Books online). Political theory of global justice. Routledge Taylor and Francis Group. p. 166. http://books.google.ca/books?id=8BFPFuta9jUC&pg=PA166&lpg=PA166&dq=%22that+if+we+are+to+avoid+the+eventual+catastrophic+world+%22&source=bl&ots=THIVIpI9D3&sig=etiGOqb4-T59PXJous1YbnmI0zY&hl=en&ei=88tjSsSlCqGStgfC_cUB&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=5. Originally quoted for this book in Walter Cronkite. "The Case for Democratic World Government." Earth Island Journal. Vol. 15, no. 2. Summer 2000. p. 45.
- ^ "Who says "I’m glad to sit here at the right hand of Satan"?". Wolfpangloss.wordpress.com. September 6, 2007. http://wolfpangloss.wordpress.com/2007/09/06/who-says-im-glad-to-sit-here-at-the-right-hand-of-satan/?referer=sphere_related_content/. Retrieved 2009-07-18.
- ^ RenewAmerica staff (May 24, 2005). "A speech by Walter Cronkite -- United Nations, national sovereignty and the future of the world". Upon receiving the Norman Cousins Global Governance Award, on October 19, 1999, at the UN Delegates Dining Room in New York City. Renew America. http://www.renewamerica.com/article/050525. Retrieved 2009-07-18.
- ^ "SFGate.com - Cronkite: Time for U.S. to Leave Iraq". The San Francisco Chronicle. http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2006/01/15/entertainment/e154744S99.DTL&feed=rss.news. Retrieved April 26, 2006. [dead link]
- ^ a b Cronkite, Walter (2006). "Why I Support DPA, and So Should You". Drug Policy Alliance. http://www.drugpolicy.org/library/cronkite022306.cfm. Retrieved 2009-07-17.
- ^ "Social Security Death Index". Ancestry.com. 2009. http://ssdi.rootsweb.ancestry.com. Retrieved 2009-07-20. [].
- ^ Legendary TV news anchor Walter Cronkite dies
- ^ Rogers, Daniel T.. "Daniel T. Rogers(b. 1943) - all my relatives - pafg3081 ...". Genealogical Family Tree. Daniel T. Rogers. http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~dantrogers/pafg2331.htm#46598. Retrieved 2009-07-30.
- ^ "UPI.com - Widower Walter Cronkite Is 'Dating'". http://www.upi.com/Entertainment_News/2006/01/18/Widower-Walter-Cronkite-is-dating/UPI-30411137636171/. Retrieved June 25, 2009.
- ^ "USCG: Frequently Asked Questions". Walter Cronkite. U.S. Department of Homeland Security. 2008-07-22. http://www.uscg.mil/history/faqs/waltercronkite.asp. Retrieved 2009-07-20.
- ^ a b "Friends Recall Walter Cronkite’s Private Side ", Brian Stelter, New York Times, July 23, 2009.
- ^ Garrett, Jerry (July 20, 2009). "Walter Cronkite, the Race Car Driver - Wheels Blog - NYTimes.com". New York Times. http://wheels.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/07/20/walter-cronikite-the-racecar-driver/. Retrieved 2009-07-20.
- ^ McClellan, Joseph. "Lying and Cheating by the Rules," Washington Post, June 2, 1986.
- ^ Huff, Richard (July 19, 2009). "Reports on CBX Newsman Walter Cronkite's failing health 'overstated'". New York Daily News. http://www.nydailynews.com/entertainment/tv/2009/06/19/2009-06-19_walter_.html. Retrieved 2009-07-20.
- ^ "Former CBS News anchor Walter Cronkite dies". Associated Press. MSNBC. July 19, 2009. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/30988078/ns/entertainment-television/?GT1=43001. Retrieved 2009-07-20.
- ^ Loved ones, colleagues honor Walter Cronkite
- ^ a b c Bianco, Robert (2009-07-17). "Cronkite's passing: A death in everyone's family". USA Today. http://www.usatoday.com/life/people/2009-07-17-cronkite-appreciation_N.htm. Retrieved 2009-07-18.
- ^ David Hinckley (2009-07-18). "Walter Cronkite remains gold standard for journalists". New York Daily News. http://www.nydailynews.com/entertainment/tv/2009/07/18/2009-07-18_he_remains_the_gold_standard_among_all.html. Retrieved 2009-07-18.
- ^ Statement from audiologist Ray Hull, Ph.D., ray.hull@wichita.edu, quoted in "Home Make-Over: How to design an efficient listening environment" by Alyssa Banotai, ADVANCE For Speech-Language Pathologists and Audiologists (April 16, 2007), p. 8.
- ^ E.W. Scripps School of Journalism.
- ^ http://archives-trim.un.org/webdrawer/rec/552938/view/Item-in-KAA%20Schoolsuniversities%202002%20-%20oct.%20-%20dec..PDF
- ^ "Premio Ischia Roll of Honour". http://www.premioischia.it/Albo-d-oro?lang=en. Retrieved 2011-05-09.
- ^ Marianne Dyson (March 12, 1999). "1999 Corona Award Recipient". http://rnasa.org/1999files/corona1999.html. Retrieved 2011-04-19.
- ^ "Book of Members, 1780-2010: Chapter C". American Academy of Arts and Sciences. http://www.amacad.org/publications/BookofMembers/ChapterC.pdf. Retrieved 22 April 2011.
- ^ "Newsman Walter Cronkite to be honored by NASA for his coverage of America's space program". The Dolph Briscoe Center for American History. University of Texas at Austin. 2008. http://www.cah.utexas.edu/news/press_release.php?press=presscronkpr. Retrieved 2009-07-17.
- ^ a b "Walter Cronkite and ASU". Walter Cronkite and ASU. ASU. http://cronkite.asu.edu/walter/index.php. Retrieved 2009-07-18.
- ^ "Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication". Walter Cronkite Biography. ASU Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication. http://cronkite.asu.edu/walter/waltercronkite.php. Retrieved 2009-07-17.
- ^ "In Memoriam: Walter Cronkite, 1916-2009", Center for American History. Retrieved 2009-07-31.
- ^ a b "News Media History - Walter Cronkite The Walter Cronkite Papers". The Dolph Briscoe Center for American History. University of Texas at Austin. 2006-2008. http://www.cah.utexas.edu/collections/news_media_cronkite.php. Retrieved 2009-07-18.
- ^ "Walter Cronkite on Apollo 11 Moon Landing". The Inspiration Room. http://theinspirationroom.com/daily/2009/walter-cronkite-on-apollo-11-moon-landing/. Retrieved 2009-07-18.
- ^ "NASA Honors Veteran Journalist Walter Cronkite". NASA. 2006-02-28. http://www.nasa.gov/vision/space/features/cronkite_ambassador_of_exploration.html. Retrieved 2009-07-18.
- ^ "Newsman Walter Cronkite to be honored by NASA". University of Texas at Austin: Office of Public Affairs. Infinite Now. 2006-02-03. http://hypography.com/forums/science-news/5635-newsman-walter-cronkite-to-honored-nasa.html. Retrieved 2009-07-18.
Further reading[link]
- Cronkite, Walter (1996). A Reporter's Life. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. ISBN 0-394-57879-1.
External links[link]
- Cronkite: Eyewitness to a Century - Exhibit at The Lyndon Baines Johnson Library and Museum
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- Remembering Walter Cronkite - slideshow by Life Magazine
- Martha's Vineyard (1986): The Vineyard Voice television talk show interview of Walter Cronkite by host, William Waterway Marks
- AP Obituary in the New York Times
- Walter Cronkite, Iconic Anchor, Is Dead, The New York Times, July 17, 2009
- RIP Walter Cronkite
- Walter Cronkite - Daily Telegraph obituary
- Celebrating Cronkite while Ignoring what he did by Glenn Greenwald, Salon Magazine
- Cronkite's 1968 Dissent on Vietnam Helped Save Thousands of Lives by Greg Mitchell
- Anchorman Was Critical of Media Consolidation, Wars in Vietnam and Iraq by Democracy Now!
- Web ZIne from the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism at Arizona State University
- Walter Cronkite at Find a Grave
- Walter Cronkite School of Journalism at Arizona State University
- The Walter Cronkite Papers, the University of Texas at Austin
- Walter Cronkite at the Internet Movie Database
- Cronkite's personal blog
- Walter Cronkite Archive of American Television Interview
- Booknotes interview with Cronkite on A Reporter's Life, June 29, 1997.
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| Persondata | |
|---|---|
| Name | Cronkite, Walter Leland, Jr. |
| Alternative names | |
| Short description | Television journalist |
| Date of birth | November 4, 1916 |
| Place of birth | St. Joseph, Missouri, United States |
| Date of death | July 17, 2009 |
| Place of death | New York City, United States |
http://wn.com/Walter_Cronkite
This page contains text from Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walter_Cronkite
This article is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License, which means that you can copy and modify it as long as the entire work (including additions) remains under this license.
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| Bee Gees | |
|---|---|
 The Bee Gees performing on Dutch television in 1968. From left to right: Barry, Robin, and Maurice Gibb |
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| Background information | |
| Genres | Pop, pop rock, disco, blue-eyed soul, soft rock |
| Years active | 1958–2003 2009–2012 |
| Labels | RSO, Warner Bros., Festival, Polydor, Atco |
| Website | www.beegees.com |
| Past members | |
| Barry Gibb Robin Gibb Maurice Gibb Colin Petersen Vince Melouney Geoff Bridgford Alan Kendall Dennis Bryon Blue Weaver |
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The Bee Gees were a musical group founded in 1958. The group's line-up consisted of brothers Barry, Robin, and Maurice Gibb. The trio were successful for most of their decades of recording music, but they had two distinct periods of exceptional success: as a pop act in the late 1960s/early 1970s, and as prominent performers of the disco music era in the late 1970s.
The group sang three-part tight harmonies that were instantly recognisable; Robin's clear vibrato lead was a hallmark of their earlier hits, while Barry's R&B falsetto became their signature sound during the late 1970s and 1980s. The brothers wrote all of their own hits, as well as writing and producing several major hits for other artists.
Born in the Isle of Man to English parents, the Gibb brothers lived their first few years in Chorlton, Manchester, England, then moved in the late 1950s to Redcliffe, Queensland, Australia, where they began their musical careers.[1] After achieving their first chart success in Australia with "Spicks and Specks" (their 12th single), they returned to the United Kingdom in January 1967 where producer Robert Stigwood began promoting them to a worldwide audience.
It has been estimated that the Bee Gees' career record sales total more than 220 million,[2] ranking them among the best-selling music artists of all time. They were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1997;[3] the presenter of the award to "Britain's first family of harmony" was Brian Wilson, historical leader of the Beach Boys, a "family act" also featuring three harmonising brothers.[4] The Bee Gees' Hall of Fame citation says "Only Elvis Presley, The Beatles, Michael Jackson, Garth Brooks and Paul McCartney have outsold the Bee Gees".[3]
Following Maurice's sudden death in January 2003, Barry and Robin Gibb retired the group's name after 45 years of activity. In 2009, however, Robin announced that he and Barry had agreed that the Bee Gees would re-form and perform again.[5] Robin died in May 2012 after a prolonged bout of cancer.[6]
Contents |
History[link]
Early years[link]
Barry Gibb (b. 1946) and fraternal twin brothers Robin (1949–2012) and Maurice Gibb (1949–2003) were born on the Isle of Man, but the family returned to father Hugh Gibb's home town of Chorlton-cum-Hardy, Manchester, England where they went to Oswald Road Primary School, in the early 1950s where the boys began to sing in harmony. The story is told that they were going to lip sync to a record in the local Gaumont cinema (as other children had done on previous weeks) and as they were running to the theatre, the heavy 78-RPM record broke. The brothers had to sing live and received such a positive response from the audience that they decided to pursue a singing career.[7]
In 1958 the Gibb family, including infant brother, Andy (1958–1988), emigrated to Redcliffe in Queensland, Australia. The young brothers began performing where they could to raise pocket money. First called the Rattlesnakes, later Wee Johnny Hayes & the Bluecats, they were introduced to radio DJ Bill Gates by racetrack promoter Bill Goode (who saw them perform at Brisbane's Speedway Circuit). Gates renamed them the "Bee Gees" after his and Goode's initials – thus the name was not specifically a reference to "Brothers Gibb", despite popular belief.[8]
By 1960 the Bee Gees were featured on television shows. In the next few years they began working regularly at resorts on the Queensland coast. For his songwriting, Barry sparked the interest of Australian star Col Joye, who helped them get a record deal with Festival Records subsidiary, Leedon Records, in 1963 under the name "Bee Gees." The three released two or three singles a year, while Barry supplied additional songs to other Australian artists. From 1963 to 1966 the Gibb family lived at 171 Bunnerong Road, Maroubra in Sydney.[9]
A minor hit in 1965, "Wine and Women", led to the group's first LP The Bee Gees Sing and Play 14 Barry Gibb Songs. By 1966 Festival was, however, on the verge of dropping them from the Leedon roster because of their perceived lack of commercial success. It was at this time that they met American-born songwriter, producer and entrepreneur, Nat Kipner, who had just been appointed A&R manager of a new independent label, Spin Records. Kipner briefly took over as the group's manager and successfully negotiated their transfer to Spin in exchange for Festival being granted the Australian distribution rights to the group's recordings.[citation needed]
Through Kipner the Bee Gees met engineer-producer, Ossie Byrne. He produced (or co-produced with Kipner) many of the earlier Spin recordings, most of which were cut at his own small self-built St Clair Studio in the Sydney suburb of Hurstville. Byrne gave the Gibb brothers virtually unlimited access to St Clair Studio over a period of several months in mid-1966. The group later acknowledged that this enabled them to greatly improve their skills as recording artists. During this productive time they recorded a large batch of original material—including the song that would become their first major hit, "Spicks and Specks" (on which Byrne played the trumpet coda) – as well as cover versions of current hits by overseas acts such as The Beatles. They regularly collaborated with other local musicians, including members of beat band Steve & The Board, led by Steve Kipner, Nat's teenage son.
Frustrated by their lack of success, the Gibbs decided to return to England in late 1966. Ossie Byrne travelled with them, and Colin Petersen, who eventually became the group's drummer, followed soon after. While at sea in January 1967, they learned that "Spicks and Specks" had been awarded Best Single of the Year by Go-Set, Australia's most popular and influential music newspaper.
Late 1960s: first international fame[link]
Before their departure from Australia to England, Hugh Gibb sent demos to Brian Epstein who managed The Beatles and was director of NEMS, a British music store and promoter. Brian Epstein had passed the demo tapes to Robert Stigwood, who had recently joined NEMS. After an audition with Stigwood in February 1967, the Bee Gees were signed to a five-year contract whereby Polydor Records would be their record label in the United Kingdom and ATCO Records would be the United States distributor. Work quickly began on the group's first international album, and Robert Stigwood launched a promotional campaign to coincide with its release.
Stigwood proclaimed that the Bee Gees were "The Most Significant New Talent Of 1967" and thus began the immediate comparison to The Beatles.[10] Their second British single (their first UK 45 rpm issued was "Spicks and Specks"), "New York Mining Disaster 1941", was issued to radio stations with a blank white label listing only the song title. Some DJs immediately assumed this was a new single by The Beatles and started playing the song in heavy rotation. This helped the song climb into the Top 20 in both the United Kingdom and the United States. No such chicanery was needed to boost the Bee Gees' second single, "To Love Somebody", into the US Top 20. Originally written for Otis Redding, "To Love Somebody" was a soulful ballad sung by Barry, which has since become a pop standard covered by hundreds of artists including Gram Parsons, Rod Stewart, Bonnie Tyler, Janis Joplin, The Animals, Nina Simone, Jimmy Somerville and Michael Bolton. Another single, "Holiday", was released in the United States, peaking at No. 16. The parent album, Bee Gees 1st (their first internationally), peaked at No. 7 in the United States and No. 8 in the United Kingdom.
Following the success of Bee Gees 1st, the band (which now consisted of Barry on rhythm guitar, Maurice on bass, Vince Melouney on lead guitar and Colin Petersen on drums),.[10] began work on the act's second album. Released in late 1967, Horizontal repeated the success of their first album, featuring the No. 1 UK single "Massachusetts" (a No. 11 US hit), and the No. 7 UK single "World". The sound of the album Horizontal had a more "rock" sound than their previous release, though ballads like "And The Sun Will Shine" and "Really And Sincerely" were also prominent. The Horizontal album reached No. 12 in the US, and No. 16 in the UK promoting the record, the Bee Gees made their first appearances in America, playing live concerts and television shows such as The Ed Sullivan Show and Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In. Two more singles followed in early 1968, the ballad "Words" (No. 15 US, No. 8 UK) and the double A-sided single "Jumbo" b/w "The Singer Sang His Song". "Jumbo" was the Bee Gees' least successful single to date only reaching No. 57 in the US, and No. 25 in the UK. The Bee Gees felt that "The Singer Sang His Song" was the stronger of the two sides, an opinion shared by listeners in the Netherlands, who made it a No. 3 hit. Further Bee Gees chart singles followed: "I've Gotta Get a Message to You" (No. 8 US, No. 1 UK) and "I Started A Joke" (No. 6 US), both culled from the band's third album Idea. Idea was another Top 20 album in the US (No. 17) and the UK (No. 4). Following the tour and TV special to promote the album, Vince Melouney left the group, feeling that he wanted to play more of a blues style music than the Gibbs were writing. Melouney did achieve one feat while with the Bee Gees—his composition "Such A Shame" (from Idea) is the only song on any Bee Gees album not written by a Gibb brother.
By 1969, the cracks began to show within the group. Robin began to feel that Stigwood had been favouring Barry as the frontman. Their next album, which was to have been a concept album called Masterpeace, evolved into the double-album Odessa. Most rock critics felt this was the best Bee Gees album of the '60s, with its progressive rock feel on the title track, the country-flavoured "Marley Purt Drive" and "Give Your Best", and signature ballads such as "Melody Fair" and "First of May"; the last of which became the only single from the album, and was a minor hit. Feeling that the flipside, "Lamplight" should have been the A-side, Robin quit the group in mid-1969 and launched a solo career. Robin Gibb saw brief success in Europe with the No. 2 hit "Saved By The Bell" and the album Robin's Reign. Barry and Maurice continued as the Bee Gees, even recruiting their sister Lesley to appear with them on stage.
The first of many Bee Gees compilations, Best of Bee Gees was released, featuring the non-LP single "Words" plus the Australian hit "Spicks and Specks" The CD release replaces "Spicks and Specks" with another non-LP single "Tomorrow Tomorrow", because Polydor could no longer secure the rights to the Australian track. "Tomorrow Tomorrow" was a moderate hit in the UK reaching No. 23, but stalled at No. 54 in the US. The compilation reached the Top Ten in both the US and the UK.
While Robin was off on his own, Barry, Maurice, and Colin continued on as the Bee Gees, recording their next album, Cucumber Castle. There was also a TV special filmed to accompany the album, which aired on the BBC in 1971. Colin Petersen played drums on the tracks recorded for the album, but was fired from the group after filming began and his parts were edited out of the final cut of the film. After Colin was fired, Australian drummer Geoff Bridgford was recruited to complete the recording of songs for Cucumber Castle. The leadoff single, "Don't Forget to Remember" was a big hit in the UK reaching No. 2, but a disappointment in the US, only reaching No. 73. The next 2 singles, "I.O.I.O." and "If I Only Had My Mind on Something Else" barely scraped the charts, and following the release of the album, Barry and Maurice parted ways. It seemed that the Bee Gees were finished. Barry recorded a solo album which never saw official release, though "I'll Kiss Your Memory" was released as a single, without much interest. Meanwhile, Maurice released the single "Railroad", and starred in the West End musical Sing A Rude Song.
Early 1970s[link]
File:Bee Gees' wordmark logo (1975-1981).gif
Bee Gees' wordmark logo (1975-1981)
The three brothers reunited in the later part of 1970 penning a series of songs about heartache and loneliness. During this period they became a four piece band joined again by Australian drummer Geoff Bridgford who after playing on the 2 Years On album and Trafalgar album became the last non-Gibb brother to be a member of the Bee Gees. Although they had lost traction on the British charts, the Bee Gees hit No. 3 in America with "Lonely Days" (from the reunion LP 2 Years On) and had their first US No. 1 with "How Can You Mend a Broken Heart" (from Trafalgar). The trio's talents were included in the soundtrack for the 1971 film Melody as they performed several songs for the title. In 1972, they hit No. 16 in America with the single "My World" and "Run To Me" from the LP To Whom It May Concern; the latter also returned them to the British top ten for the first time in three years.
By 1973, however, the Bee Gees were in a rut. The album, Life in a Tin Can, released on RSO Records and its lead-off single, "Saw a New Morning," sold poorly with the single peaking at No. 94. This was followed by an unreleased album (known as A Kick in the Head Is Worth Eight in the Pants). A second compilation album, Best of Bee Gees, Volume 2 was released in 1973, though it did not repeat the success of Volume 1.
On the advice of Ahmet Ertegün, head of their US label Atlantic Records, Stigwood arranged for the group to record with famed soul music producer Arif Mardin. The resulting LP, Mr. Natural, included fewer ballads and foreshadowed the R&B direction of the rest of their career. But when it too failed to attract much interest, Mardin encouraged them to work with the soul music style.
The brothers attempted to assemble a live stage band that could replicate their studio sound. Lead guitarist Alan Kendall had come on board in 1971, but did not have much to do until Mr. Natural. For that album, they added drummer Dennis Bryon, and they later added ex-Strawbs keyboard player Blue Weaver, completing the late 1970s "Bee Gees band". Maurice, who had previously performed on piano, guitar, organ, mellotron, and bass guitar, as well as exotica like mandolin and Moog synthesiser, now confined himself to bass onstage.
At Eric Clapton's suggestion, the brothers relocated to Miami, Florida, early in 1975 to record. After starting off with ballads, they eventually heeded the urging of Mardin and Stigwood and crafted more rhythmic disco songs, including their second US No. 1, "Jive Talkin'", along with US No. 7 "Nights on Broadway." The band liked the resulting new sound, and this time the public agreed, sending the LP Main Course up the charts. This was their second album to have two US top-10 singles since 1968's Idea. Main Course also became their first charting R&B album. Mardin was unable to work with the group afterwards, but the Bee Gees enlisted Albhy Galuten and Karl Richardson who had worked with Mardin during the Main Course sessions. This production team would carry the Bee Gees through the rest of the 1970s.
The next album, Children of the World, was drenched in Barry's newfound falsetto and Weaver's synthesiser disco licks. Led off by the single "You Should Be Dancing," it pushed the Bee Gees to a level of stardom they had not previously achieved in the US, though their new R&B/disco sound was not as popular with some die hard fans from the 1960s. The Bee Gees' band was now closer to a rock act, with rhythm guitar and real drums behind the falsetto.
[edit] Late 1970s: Saturday Night Fever
Following a successful live album, Here at Last... Bee Gees... Live, the Bee Gees agreed with Stigwood to participate in the creation of the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack. It would be the turning point of their career. The cultural impact of both the film and the soundtrack was seismic, not only in the United States, but in the rest of the world as well, bringing the nascent disco scene mainstream.
The band's involvement in the film did not begin until post-production. As John Travolta asserted, "The Bee Gees weren't even involved in the movie in the beginning ... I was dancing to Stevie Wonder and Boz Scaggs."[11] Producer Robert Stigwood commissioned the Bee Gees to create the songs for the film. The brothers wrote the songs "virtually in a single weekend" at France's Château d'Hérouville studio.[11] Barry Gibb remembered the reaction when Stigwood and music supervisor Bill Oakes arrived and listened to the demos:
| “ | They flipped out and said these will be great. We still had no concept of the movie, except some kind of rough script that they'd brought with them ... You've got to remember, we were fairly dead in the water at that point, 1975, somewhere in that zone–- the Bee Gees' sound was basically tired. We needed something new. We hadn't had a hit record in about three years. So we felt, Oh Jeez, that's it. That's our life span, like most groups in the late 60s. So, we had to find something. We didn't know what was going to happen.[11] | ” |
Bill Oakes, who supervised the soundtrack, asserts that Saturday Night Fever did not begin the disco craze; rather, it prolonged it: "Disco had run its course. These days, Fever is credited with kicking off the whole disco thing–-it really didn't. Truth is, it breathed new life into a genre that was actually dying."[11]
Three Bee Gees singles ("How Deep Is Your Love", "Stayin' Alive", and "Night Fever") reached No. 1 in the United States and many countries around the world, launching the most popular period of the disco era. They also penned the song "If I Can't Have You" which became a No. 1 hit for Yvonne Elliman, while the Bee Gees' own version was the B-Side of "Stayin' Alive." Such was the popularity of Saturday Night Fever that two different versions of the song "More Than a Woman" received airplay, one by the Bee Gees, which was relegated to album track, and another by Tavares, which was the hit. The Gibb sound was inescapable. During an eight-month period beginning in the Christmas season of 1977, six songs written by the brothers held the No. 1 position on the US charts for 25 of 32 consecutive weeks—three of their own releases, two for brother Andy Gibb, and the Yvonne Elliman single.
Fueled by the movie's success, the soundtrack broke multiple industry records, becoming the highest-selling album in recording history to that point. With more than 40 million copies sold, Saturday Night Fever is among music's top five best selling soundtrack albums. It is currently calculated as the 4th highest-selling album worldwide.[12]
During this era, Barry and Robin also wrote "Emotion" for an old friend, Australian vocalist Samantha Sang, who made it a Top Ten hit (the Bee Gees sang backing vocals). Barry also wrote the title song to the movie version of the Broadway musical Grease for Frankie Valli to perform, which went to No. 1. During this period, the Bee Gees' younger brother Andy followed his older siblings into a music career, and enjoyed considerable success. Produced by Barry, Andy Gibb's first three singles all topped the US charts. In March 1978, the Bee Gees held the top 2 positions on the US Charts with "Night Fever" and "Stayin' Alive", the first time this had happened since The Beatles. On the US Billboard Hot 100 chart for 25 March 1978, five songs written by the Gibbs were in the US top ten at the same time: "Night Fever", "Stayin' Alive", "If I Can't Have You", "Emotion" and "Love is Thicker Than Water". Such chart dominance hadn't been seen since April 1964, when The Beatles had all five of the top five American singles. Barry Gibb became the only songwriter to have four consecutive number one hits in the US breaking the John Lennon and Paul McCartney 1964 record. These songs were "Stayin' Alive", "Love Is Thicker Than Water", "Night Fever", "If I Can't Have You".
The Bee Gees also co-starred with Peter Frampton in the movie Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (1978) loosely inspired by the classic 1967 album by The Beatles. The film had been heavily promoted prior to release, and was expected to enjoy great commercial success. However, the disjointed film was savaged by the movie critics, and ignored by the public. Though some of its tracks charted, the soundtrack too was a high-profile flop. The single "Oh! Darling", credited to Robin Gibb, reached No. 15 in the US. Previously, the Bee Gees had recorded three Beatles covers—"Golden Slumbers/Carry That Weight", "She Came in Through the Bathroom Window" and "Sun King" – for the transitory musical documentary All This and World War II.
The Bee Gees' follow-up to Saturday Night Fever was the Spirits Having Flown album. It yielded three more No. 1 hits: "Too Much Heaven", "Tragedy", and "Love You Inside Out." This gave the act six consecutive No. 1 singles in America within a year and a half (a record surpassed only by Whitney Houston). "Too Much Heaven" ended up as the Bee Gees' musical contribution to the Music for UNICEF Concert at the United Nations General Assembly in January 1979, a benefit organised by the Bee Gees, Robert Stigwood, and David Frost for UNICEF that was broadcast worldwide. The brothers donated the royalties from the song to the charity. Up to 2007, this song has earned over $11 million for UNICEF. During the summer of 1979, the Bee Gees embarked on their largest concert tour covering the US and Canada. The Spirits Having Flown tour capitalised on Bee Gees fever that was sweeping the nation, with sold out concerts in 38 cities. The Bee Gees produced a video for the title track of "Too Much Heaven" directed by Miami-based film-maker, Martin Pitts and produced by Charles Allen. With this video, Pitts and Allen began a long association with the brothers.
The Bee Gees even had a country hit in 1979 with "Rest Your Love On Me", the flip side of their pop hit "Too Much Heaven", which made Top 40 on the country charts. In 1981, Conway Twitty's version of "Rest Your Love On Me" topped the country charts.
The Bee Gees' overwhelming success rose and fell with the disco bubble. By the end of 1979, disco was rapidly declining in popularity, and the backlash against disco put the Bee Gees' American career in a tailspin. Radio stations around America began promoting "Bee Gee Free Weekends". Following their remarkable run from 1975 to 1979, the act would have only one more top ten single in the US, and that would not come until 1989. The Bee Gees' international popularity sustained somewhat less damage. Barry Gibb considered the success of the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack both a blessing and a curse:
| “ | Fever was No. 1 every week ... It wasn't just like a hit album. It was No. 1 every single week for 25 weeks. It was just an amazing, crazy, extraordinary time. I remember not being able to answer the phone, and I remember people climbing over my walls. I was quite grateful when it stopped. It was too unreal. In the long run, your life is better if it's not like that on a constant basis. Nice though it was.[11] | ” |
1980s[link]
Robin and Barry Gibb released various solo albums in the 1980s but only with sporadic and moderate chart success. The brothers had continuing success behind the scenes, however, writing and producing for several artists. In 1980 Barry Gibb worked with Barbra Streisand on her album Guilty. He co-produced and wrote or co-wrote all nine of the album's tracks (four of them written with Robin and the title track with both Robin and Maurice). Barry also appeared on the album's cover with Streisand, and duetted with her on two tracks. The album reached No.1 in both the US and the UK, as did the single "Woman in Love" (written by Barry and Robin), becoming Streisand's most successful single and album to date.
In 1981 the Bee Gees released the album Living Eyes, their last release on RSO. This album was the first CD ever played in public, when it was played to viewers of the BBC show Tomorrow's World.[13] With the disco backlash still running strong, the album failed to make the UK or US Top 40. Two singles from the album fared little better – "He's a Liar" reached No. 30 in the US and "Living Eyes" reached No. 45, breaking the Bee Gees' Top 40 streak which started in 1975 with "Jive Talkin'".
In 1982 Dionne Warwick enjoyed a UK No.2 and US Adult Contemporary No. 1 with her comeback single, "Heartbreaker", taken from her album of the same name written largely by the Bee Gees and co-produced by Barry Gibb. The album reached No.3 in the UK and the Top 30 in the US where it was certified Gold.
A year later Dolly Parton and Kenny Rogers recorded the Bee Gees-penned track "Islands in the Stream", which became a US No. 1 hit and Top 10 in the UK. Rogers' 1983 album, Eyes That See In The Dark, was written entirely by the Bee Gees and co-produced by Barry. The album was a Top 10 hit in the US and was certified Double Platinum.
The Bee Gees had greater success with the soundtrack to Staying Alive in 1983, the sequel to Saturday Night Fever. The soundtrack was certified platinum in the US, and included their Top 30 hit "The Woman in You".
Also in 1983 the band were sued by Chicago songwriter Ronald Selle, who claimed that the brothers stole melodic material from one of his songs, "Let It End", and used it in "How Deep Is Your Love". At first, the Bee Gees lost the case; one juror said that a factor in the jury's decision was the Gibbs' failure to introduce expert testimony rebutting the plaintiff's expert testimony that it was "impossible" for the two songs to have been written independently. However, the verdict was overturned a few months later.
In 1985 Diana Ross released the album Eaten Alive, written by the Bee Gees, with the title track co-written with Michael Jackson (who also performed on the track). The album was again co-produced by Barry Gibb and the single "Chain Reaction" gave Ross a UK and Australian No.1 hit.
The Bee Gees released the album E.S.P. in 1987, which sold over 3 million copies. It was their first album in six years, and their first for Warner Bros. Records. The single "You Win Again" went to No. 1 in numerous countries, including the UK,[14] and made the Bee Gees the first group to score a UK No. 1 hit in each of three decades: the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s.[15] The single was a disappointment in the US, charting at No. 75, and the Bee Gees voiced their frustration over American radio stations not playing their new European hit single, an omission which the group felt led to poor sales of their current album in the States.
On 10 March 1988, younger brother Andy died, aged 30, as a result of myocarditis, an inflammation of the heart muscle due to a recent viral infection. His brothers acknowledge that Andy's past drug and alcohol use probably made his heart more susceptible to this illness. Just before Andy's death, it had been decided by the group that Andy would join them, which would have made the group a four-piece group. The Bee Gees' following album, One (1989), featured a song dedicated to Andy, "Wish You Were Here". The album also contained their first US top ten hit (No. 7) in a decade, "One". After the album's release, they embarked on their first world tour in ten years.
1990s[link]
In 1990, Polydor Records issued the box set Tales from the Brothers Gibb: A History in Song, which contained all of the group's singles (except 1981's "Living Eyes"), rare B-sides, unreleased tracks, solo material, and live performances. Many songs received new stereo mixes by Bill Inglot with some songs making their CD debut. At the time of its release, Tales was one of the first box sets issued in the music business and it was considered an honour for a group to have one. In the UK, Polydor issued a single disc hits collection from Tales called The Very Best of the Bee Gees, which contained their biggest UK hits. The album became one of their best selling albums in that country, eventually being certified Triple Platinum.
Following their next album, High Civilization (1991), which contained the UK top five hit "Secret Love", the Bee Gees went on a European tour. After the tour, Barry Gibb began to battle a serious back problem, which required surgery. In addition, he also suffered from arthritis, and at one point, it was so severe that it was doubtful that he would be able to play guitar for much longer. Also in the early 1990s, Maurice Gibb finally sought treatment for his alcoholism, which he had battled for many years, with the help of Alcoholics Anonymous.
In 1993, the group returned to the Polydor label, and released the album Size Isn't Everything, which contained the UK top five hit "For Whom the Bell Tolls". Success still eluded them in the US, however, as the first single released, "Paying the Price of Love" only managed to reach No. 74 on the Billboard Hot 100 while the parent album stalled at No. 153.
In 1997, they released the album Still Waters, which sold over four million copies, and reached No.2 in the UK (their highest album chart position there since 1979) and No.11 in the US. The album's first single, "Alone", gave them another UK Top 5 hit and a top 30 hit in the US. Still Waters would be the band's most successful US release of their post-RSO era.
At the 1997 BRIT Awards held in Earls Court, London on 24 February, the Bee Gees received the award for Outstanding Contribution to Music.[16] On 14 November 1997, the Bee Gees performed a live concert in Las Vegas called One Night Only. The show included a performance of "Our Love (Don't Throw It All Away)" synchronised with a vocal by their deceased brother Andy and a cameo appearance by Celine Dion singing "Immortality". The CD of the performance sold over 5 million copies. The "One Night Only" name grew out of the band's declaration that, due to Barry's health issues, the Las Vegas show was to be the final live performance of their career. After the immensely positive audience response to the Vegas concert, Barry decided to continue despite the pain, and the concert expanded into their last full-blown world tour of "One Night Only" concerts.[17] The tour included playing to 56,000 people at London's Wembley Stadium on 5 September 1998 and concluded in the newly built Olympic Stadium in Sydney, Australia on 27 March 1999 to 72,000 people.[17]
In 1998, the group's soundtrack for Saturday Night Fever was incorporated into a stage production produced first in the West End and then on Broadway. They wrote three new songs for the adaptation. Also in 1998 the brothers recorded Ellan Vannin for Isle of Man charities. Known as the unofficial national anthem of the Isle of Man, the brothers performed the song during their world tour to reflect their pride in the place of their birth.[18]
The Bee Gees closed the decade with what turned out to be their last full-sized concert, known as BG2K, on 31 December 1999.
2000–08: Maurice's death and hiatus[link]
In 2001, the group released what turned out to be their final album of new material as a group, This Is Where I Came In. The album was another success, reaching the Top 10 in the UK (being certified Gold), and the Top 20 in the US. The title track was also a UK Top 20 hit single. The album gave each member of the group a chance to write in his own way, as well as composing songs together. For example, Maurice's compositions and leads are the "Man in the Middle" and "Walking on Air," while Robin contributed "Déjà Vu," "Promise the Earth," and "Embrace," and Barry contributed "Loose Talk Costs Lives," "Technicolour Dreams", and "Voice in the Wilderness". The other songs are collaborative in writing and vocals. They performed many tracks from This Is Where I Came In, plus many of their biggest hits, on the live televised concert series Live by Request, shown on the A&E Network. The last concert of the Bee Gees as a trio was at the Love and Hope Ball in 2002.
Maurice, who had been the musical director of the Bee Gees during their final years as a group, died unexpectedly on 12 January 2003 at the age of 53 from a heart attack, while awaiting emergency surgery to repair a strangulated intestine.[19] Initially, his surviving brothers announced that they intended to carry on the name "Bee Gees" in his memory. But as time passed they decided to retire the group name, leaving it to represent the three brothers together.[20]
The same week that Maurice died, Robin's solo album Magnet was released. On 23 February 2003, the Bee Gees received the Grammy Legend Award. Barry and Robin accepted as well as Maurice's son, Adam, in a tearful ceremony.
Although there was talk of a memorial concert featuring both surviving brothers and invited guests,[21] nothing materialised. Barry and Robin continued to work independently, and both released recordings with other artists, occasionally coming together to perform at special events.
In late 2004, Robin embarked on a solo tour of Germany, Russia and Asia. During January 2005, Barry, Robin and several legendary rock artists recorded "Grief Never Grows Old," the official tsunami relief record for the Disasters Emergency Committee. Later that year, Barry reunited with Barbra Streisand for her top-selling album Guilty Pleasures, released as Guilty Too in the UK as a sequel album to the previous Guilty. Robin continued touring in Europe. Also in 2004, Barry recorded his song "I Cannot Give You My Love" with Cliff Richard, which became a UK top 20 hit single.[22]
In February 2006, Barry and Robin reunited on stage for a Miami charity concert to benefit the Diabetes Research Institute. It was their first public performance together since the death of brother Maurice. Barry and Robin also played at the 30th annual Prince's Trust Concert in the UK on 20 May 2006.
In October 2008, Robin performed a couple of songs in London as part of the BBC Electric Proms Saturday Night Fever performance. This involved various other performers and the BBC Concert Orchestra and was screened on the BBC and BBC interactive services.
2009–12: Return to performing and Robin's death[link]
On 1 September 2009, Barry's 63rd birthday, he, in an interview with Easy Mix radio host Tim Roxborough, mentioned on the subject of future tours that "they will be back"; but in an agreement with Warner/Rhino they would not make an announcement at that time.[23][24] On 7 September 2009, Robin Gibb disclosed to Jonathan Agnew that he had been in touch with Barry Gibb and that they had agreed that the Bee Gees would re-form and "perform again".[25]
Barry and Robin performed on the BBC's Strictly Come Dancing on 31 October 2009[26] and appeared on ABC-TV's Dancing with the Stars on 17 November 2009.[27] On 15 March 2010, Barry and Robin inducted the Swedish group ABBA into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.[28] On 26 May 2010, the two made a surprise appearance on the ninth season finale of American Idol.
In October 2010, Robin Gibb was interviewed by the Daily Mail, and confirmed that the story of the Bee Gees is to be made into a Hollywood movie by Steven Spielberg. The Oscar-winning director believes the group's journey from unknowns in Manchester to worldwide fame will prove box-office gold. Robin told the Daily Mail: "The movie is going to be done by some very important people. It will be our life story. Barry and I will be involved in the technical side". One of the challenges for Spielberg will be replicating the brothers' distinctive three-part harmonies and Barry's falsetto voice. Robin said: "I'd like our original recordings to be used because it's very hard to emulate them."[29]
On 13 February 2012, Robin joined British military trio The Soldiers for the Coming Home charity concert at the London Palladium, in support of injured servicemen. It was his first public appearance for almost five months, and his final.
On 20 November 2011 it was announced that Robin Gibb, at 61 years old, was diagnosed with liver cancer, a condition he became aware of several months earlier. He had become noticeably thinner in previous months and had to cancel several appearances due to issues with severe abdominal pain.[30] On 14 April 2012, it was reported that Gibb had contracted pneumonia[31] in a Chelsea hospital and was in a coma.[32] Gibb came out of his coma on 20 April 2012.[33] He died on 20 May 2012.[34] With Robin's death, Barry became the last surviving Gibb brother.
Songwriting success[link]
The Bee Gees have sold in excess of 200 million records worldwide.[35] At one point in 1978, the Gibb brothers were responsible for writing and/or performing nine of the songs in the Billboard Hot 100.[36] In all, the Gibbs placed 13 singles onto the Hot 100 in 1978, with 12 making the Top 40. The Gibb brothers are fellows of the British Academy of Songwriters, Composers and Authors (BASCA).[37]
At least 2,500 artists have recorded their songs.[38] Their most popular composition is "How Deep Is Your Love", with 400 versions by other artists in existence.[39] Among the artists who have covered their songs are Ardijah, Michael Bolton, Boyzone, Eric Clapton, Billy Corgan, Destiny's Child, Faith No More, Feist, The Flaming Lips, Al Green, Jinusean, Elton John, Tom Jones, Janis Joplin, Lulu, Elvis Presley, Nina Simone, Percy Sledge, Robert Smith, Take That, and John Frusciante (who has covered "How Deep Is Your Love" during Red Hot Chili Peppers concerts). The band's music has also been sampled by dozens of hip hop artists.
Songs written by the Gibbs, but largely better known through versions by other artists, include:
- "Ain't Nothing Gonna Keep Me From You" by Teri DeSario
- "Buried Treasure" by Kenny Rogers (backing vocals The Gatlin Brothers)
- "Chain Reaction" by Diana Ross
- "Come on Over" by Olivia Newton-John
- "Emotion" by Samantha Sang
- "Gilbert Green" by Gerry Marsden
- "Grease" by Frankie Valli
- "Guilty" and "Woman in Love" by Barbra Streisand
- "Heartbreaker" & "All the Love in the World" by Dionne Warwick
- "Hold On to My Love" by Jimmy Ruffin
- "I Will Be There" by Tina Turner
- "If I Can't Have You" by Yvonne Elliman
- "Immortality" by Celine Dion
- "Islands in the Stream" by Kenny Rogers and Dolly Parton
- "Morning of My Life" by Abi and Esther Ofarim
- "Only One Woman" by The Marbles
- "Rest Your Love on Me" by Conway Twitty
- "Sacred Trust" by One True Voice
- "Warm Ride" by Graham Bonnet
The Bee Gees' major non-UK/US breakthrough hit "Spicks and Specks"—a 1966 chart success in Australia (top five) and New Zealand (number one), and in Holland (top five) in 1967—was covered by British rock-pop band Status Quo for their 1968 debut album. And Al Green's 1972 non-single cover of the Bee Gees' massive 1971 North American number one "How Can You Mend a Broken Heart" enjoys a certainly critical and popular following, particularly in the UK.
Awards and recognition[link]
Inductions[link]
- 1979 Hollywood Walk of Fame
- 1994 Songwriters Hall of Fame
- 1995 Florida's Artists Hall of Fame
- 1997 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame
- 1997 ARIA (Australian Recording Industry Association) Hall of Fame
- 2001 Vocal Group Hall of Fame
- 2004 Dance Music Hall of Fame
- 2005 London's Walk of Fame
Grammy Awards[link]
- 1978 Best Pop Vocal Performance By A Group – "How Deep Is Your Love"
- 1979 Best Pop Vocal Performance By A Duo Or Group – "Saturday Night Fever"
- 1979 Best Arrangement Of Voices – "Stayin' Alive"
- 1979 Album Of The Year – "Saturday Night Fever"
- 1979 Producer Of The Year – "Saturday Night Fever"
- 1981 Best Pop Performance By A Duo Or Group With Vocal – "Guilty" (Barry Gibb with Barbra Streisand)
- 2000 Lifetime Achievement Award
- 2003 Legend Award
- 2004 Hall Of Fame Award – "Saturday Night Fever"
World Music Awards[link]
- 1997 Legend Award
American Music Awards[link]
- 1979 Favorite Pop / Rock Band, Duo Or Group
- 1979 Favorite Soul / R&B Album – "Saturday Night Fever"
- 1980 Favorite Pop / Rock Band, Duo Or Group
- 1980 Favorite Pop / Rock Album – "Spirits Having Flown"
- 1997 International Artist Award
BRIT Awards[link]
BMI Awards[link]
- On 15 May 2007, the Bee Gees were named BMI Icons at the 55th annual BMI Pop Awards. Collectively, Barry, Maurice and Robin Gibb have earned 109 BMI Pop, Country and Latin Awards.[40]
Commemorative stamps[link]
In October 1999 the Isle of Man Post Office unveiled a set of 6 stamps honouring their native sons' music. The official launch took place at the London Palladium where the stage show of Saturday Night Fever was playing. A similar launch was held in New York shortly after to coincide with the show opening across the Atlantic. The songs depicted on the stamps are "Massachusetts", "Words", "I've Gotta Get A Message To You", "Night Fever", "Stayin' Alive" and "Immortality".
Civic honours[link]
In 1978, following the success of Saturday Night Fever, and the single "Night Fever" in particular, Reubin Askew, the Governor of the US state of Florida, named the Bee Gees honorary citizens of the state, since they resided in Miami at the time.[41]
All three brothers (including Maurice, posthumously) were appointed Commanders in the Order of the British Empire in December 2001 with the ceremony taking place at Buckingham Palace on 27 May 2004.[42][43]
On 10 July 2009, the Isle of Man's capital bestowed the Freedom of the Borough of Douglas honour on Barry and Robin, as well as posthumously on Maurice.[44] On 20 November 2009, Douglas Borough Council released a limited edition commemorative DVD to mark their naming as Freemen of the Borough.[45]
Discography[link]
Main article: Bee Gees discography
Studio albums[link]
| Year | Title | US Chart |
UK Chart |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1965 | The Bee Gees Sing and Play 14 Barry Gibb Songs | — | — |
| 1966 | Spicks and Specks | — | — |
| 1967 | Bee Gees 1st | 7 | 8 |
| 1968 | Horizontal | 12 | 16 |
| 1968 | Idea | 17 | 4 |
| 1969 | Odessa | 20 | 10 |
| 1970 | Cucumber Castle | 94 | 57 |
| 1970 | 2 Years On | 32 | — |
| 1971 | Trafalgar | 34 | — |
| 1972 | To Whom It May Concern | 35 | — |
| 1973 | Life in a Tin Can | 69 | — |
| 1974 | Mr. Natural | 198 | — |
| 1975 | Main Course | 14 | — |
| 1976 | Children of the World | 8 | — |
| 1979 | Spirits Having Flown | 1 | 1 |
| 1981 | Living Eyes | 41 | 73 |
| 1987 | E·S·P | 96 | 5 |
| 1989 | One | 68 | 29 |
| 1991 | High Civilization | — | 24 |
| 1993 | Size Isn't Everything | 153 | 23 |
| 1997 | Still Waters | 11 | 2 |
| 2001 | This Is Where I Came In | 16 | 6 |
Live albums[link]
| Year | Title | US Chart |
UK Chart |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1977 | Here at Last... Bee Gees... Live | 8 | — |
| 1998 | One Night Only | 72 | 4 |
Soundtrack releases[link]
| Year | Title | US Chart |
UK Chart |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1977 | Saturday Night Fever | 1 | 1 |
| 1978 | Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band | 5 | 38 |
| 1983 | Staying Alive | 6 | 14 |
Catalogue reissue[link]
The Gibbs recently gained ownership rights to their back catalogue, and set up a new distribution arrangement with Warner/Rhino/Reprise Records where they have since reissued digitally remastered versions of Saturday Night Fever, their later Bee Gees Greatest album, and a new boxed set: The Studio Albums: 1967–1968.
Additionally, more recent titles such as Still Waters and This Is Where I Came In were among the first batch of re-releases. The band's three Warner Bros. releases, E. S. P., One and High Civilisation were also made available on iTunes for the first time since the albums went out of print in North America in the mid-90s.
According to Robin Gibb's website, three more reissues were planned for the 2008 holiday season: Best of Bee Gees, Best of Bee Gees, Volume 2 and Love Songs. The double album Odessa was released on 13 January 2009 in a special 3-disc deluxe edition complete with the original red velvet cover with remastered stereo and mono versions of the album as well as alternate versions and unreleased tracks.
Since the remastered release of Odessa, Rhino has stopped reissuing original Bee Gees albums and there has not been any announcement as to when the remaining albums will be remastered.
Limited edition[link]
Ellan Vannin was recorded in 1997 as a 1,000 quantity limited edition single for Isle of Man charities. The song was featured in the Bee Gees World Tour and on ITV's "An Evening With ..." but to date has not been released generally. The single was subsequently also available as part of the 1999 Bee Gees Stamp issue.
50th anniversary collections[link]
In conjunction with the 50th anniversary of the Bee Gees (when they started calling themselves "Bee Gees" in 1959), Rhino Records have released two new collections. Mythology is a four-disc collection highlighting each brother, including Andy, with tracks personally selected by Barry, Robin, Maurice's wife Yvonne (with his children Adam and Samantha), and Andy's daughter Peta. Maurice's disc contains two unreleased tracks called "Angel Of Mercy" and "The Bridge". Andy's disc contains the unreleased track "Arrow Through The Heart". Mythology also features a scrapbook of family photos, many never-before published, along with tributes from artists such as George Martin, Brian Wilson, Elton John, Graham Nash and the band's longtime manager Robert Stigwood.
The second collection, The Ultimate Bee Gees, is a more modest two-disc 40-track collection highlighting their biggest hits and includes a bonus DVD of unreleased videos, previously unreleased television appearances, live performances, and promo videos. Each disc is themed, with the first disc being the more upbeat songs called "A Night Out" and the second disc being more ballad-focused called "A Night In".[46]
Band instrumentalists[link]
Barry Gibb played rhythm guitar.
During the early 1970s, Robin Gibb played piano and violin occasionally, but most of the time he only sang. Although he kept on playing strings and keyboards privately, he had not played any instrument on stage since mid-'70s.
Maurice Gibb played bass guitar, rhythm and lead guitar, piano, organ, harpsichord, electric piano, mellotron, and electronic keyboards, synthesisers and drum tracks. From 1966 to 1972 he played multiple instruments on many records. During the late 1970s he played mainly bass guitar. From about 1986 onward he usually played keyboards and guitars. Maurice was credited by the brothers as being the most technologically savvy member of the band, and had built his own home studio. The bootleg CD ESP Demos allegedly includes rough versions of tracks from the album of the same name that were recorded at that studio.[citation needed]
These musicians were considered members of the band:[citation needed]
- Colin Petersen – drums (1967–1969)
- Vince Melouney – lead guitar (1967–1968)
- Geoff Bridgford – drums (1969–1972)
- Alan Kendall – lead guitar (1971–1980, 1987–2001)
- Dennis Bryon – drums (1974–1980)
- Blue Weaver – keyboards (1975–1980)
Filmography[link]
- 1969: Cucumber Castle
- 1978: Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band
- 1979: The Bee Gees Special
- 1990: One For All Tour
- 1997: Keppel Road
- 1998: One Night Only
- 2001: This Is Where I Came In
- 2002: Live By Request
- 2010: In Our Own Time
References[link]
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- ^ Walker, Tim (12 May 2008). "Jive talkin': Why Robin Gibb wants more respect for the Bee Gees". The Independent (London). http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/music/features/jive-talkin-why-robin-gibb-wants-more-respect-for-the-bee-gees-826116.html. Retrieved 26 October 2008.
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- ^ "The Beach Boys". Reason to Rock. http://www.reasontorock.com/artists/beach_boys.html. Retrieved 25 October 2010.
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- ^ "Robin Gibb, Bee Gees Co-Founder, Dead at 62". 20 May 2012. http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/robin-gibb-bee-gees-co-founder-dead-at-62-20120520.
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- ^ "Official Charts Company – Cliff Richard". Theofficialcharts.com. http://www.theofficialcharts.com/artist/_/cliff%20richard/. Retrieved 21 May 2012.
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- ^ Robertson, Peter (17 October 2010). "The Story of The Bee Gees coming to Hollywood". Daily Mail (UK). http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-1321253/From-ET-Bee-Gees-Steven-Spielberg-turn-Gibb-life-story-movie.html?ito=feeds-newsxml#ixzz12bGPmgjG. Retrieved 18 October 2010.
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External links[link]
 |
Book: Bee Gees |
| Wikipedia books are collections of articles that can be downloaded or ordered in print. | |
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Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Bee Gees |
- Bee Gees – official website
- Barry Gibb – official website
- Robin Gibb – official website
- Bee Gees at Rolling Stone
- Bee Gees at Allmusic
- Bee Gees' Vocal Group Hall of Fame webpage
- Bee Gees at bmi.com
- Robin Gibb sadly passes away after losing his battle with cancer
- Bee Gees interviewed on the Pop Chronicles (1969).
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