Doris Day

Artist: Doris Day

LP: By the Light of the Silvery Moon [10" EP]

Song: "Be My Little Baby Bumble Bee"

[ listen ]

Song: "King Chanticleer"

[ listen ]

Happy 100th Birthday to Doris Day! If you're like me, you always hoped someone would lure Doris out of retirement (her last movie was released in 1968) to star in one last comedy...or maybe even to star in one of those horror movies featuring a formerly-super-famous actress! (I bet Doris was good with an axe well into her 70s and 80s.) Anyway, it seems appropriate that Doris and her centennial birthday have brought me out of retirement here on the blog. 

This year I revived my tradition of bringing a Doris Day birthday cake to work...but now, working at USPS with 40 or 50 colleagues, I had to supply a much larger cake than I've ever had to before. Sadly, of those 40 or 50 at work, only about 5 of them had ever even HEARD of Doris Day before, with one colleague actually even able to reference something about not eating the daisies. But if someone has to drag these youngsters, many of them raised outside the USA, kicking and screaming into mid-20th-century America, then I'm happy to be assigned the role. 

In addition to the Doris Day shrine in the break-room, the cake was accompanied by a Doris Day playlist I'd put together on my phone the night before. I couldn't figure out how to photograph my phone with the playlist on the table by the cake, since I also needed my phone to take the photos. (I bet somebody younger and more tech-savvy could've shown me how to do it.) Anyway, in spite of nobody having heard of her, and in spite of somebody pausing my Doris Day playlist every time I left the break-room, the cake was a hit with the USPS crew and it was gone by the end of the day!

[ Doris Day: April 3, 1922 — May 13, 2019 ]

Doris Day

Artist: Doris Day

LP: Love Me Or Leave Me

Song: "Stay On the Right Side, Sister"

[ listen ]

Song: "Love Me Or Leave Me"

[ listen ]

I loved Doris Day...but she left me anyway. If Doris hadn't died in the spring of 2019 (or anytime thereafter), she would be celebrating her 99th birthday today! Is anyone else taken aback by the fact that James Cagney's ham-fisted turn in "Love Me Or Leave Me" was nominated for a Best Actor Oscar in 1955, whereas Doris' moving and highly dramatic performance as singer Ruth Etting was ignored? It's preposterous! Happy Birthday, Doris Day. You deserve the gold.

[ Doris Day: April 3, 1922 — May 13, 2019 ]

Kathy Barr

 Artist: Kathy Barr

LP: Follow Me

Song: "Bye Bye Blackbird"

[ listen ]

Song: "I Know He's Mine"

[ listen ]

Introducing Kathy Barr...and a fond farewell to this lovely volcano of tenderness while we're at it. This is one of my favorite kinds of records to find—one where the liner notes wax on effusively about what an incredible new discovery is being presenting to the public...but nowadays the name of their sensational new superstar is completely unfamiliar to just about anybody at all. 

 

Often, as is the case here with Kathy Barr, the record is very good, or excellent even, and there seems to be no reason besides dumb bad luck and a fickle American public that the singer didn't skyrocket to the stars alongside famous others of their time. This 1957 LP is the only solo recording by Ms. Barr from the 1950s; she did appear again with Giorgio Tozzi the following year to present highlights from THE DESERT SONG, and then popped out one more solo LP in 1964 before leaving her music career behind to focus on raising a family. Kathy Barr died in 2008 in Hollywood... Florida. She was 79 years old.

 

[ Kathy Barr: June 4, 1929 — June 21, 2008 ]

José Melis

 

Artist: José Melis and His Orchestra

LP: Christmas With Melis

Song: "Jingle Bells"

[ listen ]

Song: "God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen"

[ listen ]

Song: "The Story of Christmas"

[ listen ] 

So here's a Christmas question for ya, or even a Christmas conundrum, if you will: When someone places themselves under the mistletoe during the holiday season, do they become fair game for kissing? For anyone? Like me, for example? Especially nowadays, with the "Me too!" movement and everything, we all need to proceed with an extra level of caution when dealing with the mistletoe situation, don't you think? 

According to the LP liner notes (included below), José Melis has a wife and two kids...yet there he is on the front of my LP, gazing forth with provocative bespectacled bedroom eyes from underneath the mistletoe. Rrrrrroooowww! 

Agh-hem. Anyway. José Melis was the musical director on "The Tonight Show" from 1957 to 1962, when it was hosted by his good friend Jack Paar. (Unfortnuately, Paar was openly hostile and disrespectful to the LGBTQ community in the 1960s and '70s. No mistletoe kisses for him!)

[ Jack Parr, Hugh Downs, & José Melis on "Jack Parr Tonight Show" in 1960 ]

According to Wikipedia, part of Melis' regular routine on shows with Paar was "the telephone game," where he would "improvise a musical number based on the last four digits of an audience member's telephone number." I love this. I wonder what José would have made of "3214!"

"Christmas With Melis," released in 1958, is a popular holiday favorite in my humble Ballard apartment each year. For a little more information about the spectacularly talented Mr. Melis, you can read his 2005 New York Times obituary here.

[ José Melis: February 27, 1920 — April 7, 2005 ]

Ernest Tubb's Texas Troubadours

 Artist: Ernest Tubb's Texas Troubadours

LP: Country Dance Time

Song: "Detour"

[ listen ]

Song: "Leon's Guitar Boogie"

[ listen ]

I'm back. Here are a couple of tunes from this Ernest Tubb (with his Texas Troubadours) record I picked up at Fat Cat Records for just $.99 the other day. I'm willing to guess this record once belonged to someone with the initials "JHN." (John Henry Nashville? Jeb Henry Nistlethwhite? Who knows!) A lot has happened over the past four months while I haven't been posting. I wonder what some of the titles would be if Ernest Tubb and His Texas Troubadours were still around to write an LP full of songs about everything that's going on right now.

[ Ernest Tubb's Texas Troubadours ]

Olga Guillot

Artist: Olga Guillot

LP: La Mejor Voz Cancioonera de Cuba

Song: "Vivir De Los Recuerdos"

[ listen ]

Song: "Sin Mi"

[ listen ]

Song: "Estamos En Paz"

  [ listen ]  
 

I'm not 100% sure, but I think "I-Tunes" is the alternate title of this 1950s Olga Guillot LP, on which the lovely and talented Cuban songstress is accompanied by the Orchestra Hermanos Castro. 

As a music critic, the previous owner of this record sure was a tough nut to crack, finding just one five-star song in the bunch. As you can see, they somehow managed to enjoy one other track enough to assign it a three-star rating, but all of Olga's other tunes earned only one lone star apiece. To be honest, I can't tell the difference. I've included "Vivir De Los Recuerdos," the five-star number, here, along with two of my favorite one-star Olga Guillot songs. See what you think. 

Born in Santiago de Cuba in the autumn of 1922, Olga traveled to Mexico in 1948 and hit the big time there with her recording of "Mienteme" a few years later. She went on to travel the world, once performing in Cannes with the legendary Edith Piaf. In 1964, Guillot became the first Latin artist ever to sing at New York's Carnegie Hall. You can read more about Olga Guillot on Wikipedia here, and LP liner notes in Spanish and English are included below.

 [ Olga Guillot: October 9, 1922 — July 12, 2010 ]

Doris Day

Artist: Doris Day w/ Jack Smith

LP: 7" single

Song: "Cuddle Up a Little Closer"
[ listen ]

I think what Doris and Jack mean is that if you're like 9 or 10 feet away, cuddle up until you're only six feet away to create the greatest possible amount of intimacy while still maintaining adequate social distancing. Oy vey. A global pandemic. 

The only good thing about Doris Day passing away last May and not being around to turn 98 today is that, if she WERE still alive, I'd constantly be worrying that this goddamn virus was gonna' get her. She's too dignified for that. Happy Birthday, Doris Day. I miss you.

[ Doris Day: April 3, 1922 — May 13, 2019 ]