Woody Herman and Ozzie Nelson - two bands with two distinctive styles and both heard on late night remotes.
BIG BAND REMOTES
They existed from the 1920’s until local disc jockeys took over late night radio programming in the early 1950’s. They were heard by millions but ignored by the rating services because they were broadcast after peak listening hours and were invariably sustaining.
Yet the nightly dance band remote broadcasts from ballrooms, hotels and nightclubs around the country became a network staple from 11:00 p.m. ET until their affiliates signed off for the night.
It was a cozy arrangement - the bands got free exposure to promote their records and future appearances, the venues got inexpensive publicity and the networks got virtually free programming. (1) Dozens of the biggest names and lesser known regional bands played the 15 minute and half hour remote sets every week.
Remotes date back to 1922 when WJZ/Newark strung a Western Union line into the Hotel Pennsylvania’s Café Rouge in New York City for broadcasts by the Vincent Lopez orchestra. His greeting, “Lopez speaking,” soon became as familiar to listeners as his theme song, Nola.
That same year WDAF/Kansas City began nightly remotes from the Muehlebach Hotel with the jazz influenced Carleton Coons-Joe Sanders Nighthawks band. More stations, venues and bands discovered this new cooperative source of promotion during the roaring twenties - most notably WTAM/Cleveland and Guy Lombardo’s Royal Canadians in 1924 and Wayne King’s association with Chicago’s KYW and WGN a few years later.
As popularity of the big bands and radio grew in the 1930’s so did the remotes. For example, on a Friday night in May, 1939, CBS presented the bands of Cab Calloway, Ted Weems, Artie Shaw and Archie Bleyer. NBC had Guy Lombardo, Gene Krupa and Anson Weeks, and Blue broadcast Earl Hines, Blue Barron, Ace Brigode and Charlie Barnett. Not to be outdone, upstart Mutual did remotes that same night from Sammy Kaye, Dick Jurgens, Glen Gray, Skinnay Ennis, Phil Harris and Jack Teagarden. On top of the heavy Network Radio load, many independent stations also broadcast remotes from local venues.
As can be heard in the posts below, band remotes were not the epitome of Network Radio production excellence. Far from it, remotes were usually casual, ad-lib, one microphone affairs given to announcer errors, occasional sour notes and bad timing. And the clichéd, “Here’s (lovely or handsome) (singer's name) stepping to the microphone to ask the musical question,,,” isn’t that far from reality .
These posts represent the gamut of big band music - sweet to swing - in Network Radio’s Golden Age. Most have stories behind them. For example, the Ted Weems remote from 1937 features a 25 year old Perry Como just a few years before he became a star. It also contains a solo by virtuoso whistler Elmo Tanner.
Glenn Miller is still identified on his broadcast from 1938 as, “One of the nation’s leading exponents of the swing trombone and ace arranger.”
Rose Ann Stevens was Ozzie Nelson’s female vocalist in his 1940 remote from Chicago because his wife and singer, Harriet Hilliard, was only weeks away from delivering the couple’s second child, Eric, whom we all later knew as singer Rick Nelson.
Bandleader Russ Morgan was a song writer as well as a trombonist and singer. He had a way of inserting his own compositions into his broadcasts for royalty credit. The 1945 post below is no exception. His theme, Does Your Heart Beat For Me, plus You’re Nobody Til Somebody Loves You and So Long were all written by Morgan.
The Freddy Martin remote from 1946 features his 21 year old singer, Merv Griffin, who in later life was a nationally syndicated talk show host, the creator of game shows Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy and a real estate tycoon with a net worth of over a Billion dollars.
What happened when the announcer was late for the opening of one of these late night, "casual" broadcasts? Not much, the band simply began without him, as evidenced in this Mutual remote identified as Duke Ellington A from October, 1945. He did arrive at the end of Ellington's elongated theme song, but it sounded unusual. The way it should have sounded was heard several nights later in the broadcast identified as Duke Ellington B.
These posts plus those from Woody Herman, Count Basie, Dick Jurgens, Harry James and Stan Kenton provide examples of some of the best music and best forgotten gaffes from the era of late night dance band remotes.
So, whether you're inclined to roll back the rug, cut a rug or just be a latter day wallflower- we hope you enjoy them.
(1) Charges for airtime paid by the locatioons of remotes' depended on the size of the market and station. In most cases the fees did little more than cover the cost of the broadcast lines. Musicians' fees for remotes were under the jurisdiction of the AFM locals in the cities involved. In 1946, the remote fee per sideman was three dollars per broadcast payable to the union's relief fund. - as opposed to $14 for half-hour commercial programs payable to the musicians.
Copyright © 2015 Jim Ramsburg, Estero FL Email: tojimramsburg@gmail.com
They existed from the 1920’s until local disc jockeys took over late night radio programming in the early 1950’s. They were heard by millions but ignored by the rating services because they were broadcast after peak listening hours and were invariably sustaining.
Yet the nightly dance band remote broadcasts from ballrooms, hotels and nightclubs around the country became a network staple from 11:00 p.m. ET until their affiliates signed off for the night.
It was a cozy arrangement - the bands got free exposure to promote their records and future appearances, the venues got inexpensive publicity and the networks got virtually free programming. (1) Dozens of the biggest names and lesser known regional bands played the 15 minute and half hour remote sets every week.
Remotes date back to 1922 when WJZ/Newark strung a Western Union line into the Hotel Pennsylvania’s Café Rouge in New York City for broadcasts by the Vincent Lopez orchestra. His greeting, “Lopez speaking,” soon became as familiar to listeners as his theme song, Nola.
That same year WDAF/Kansas City began nightly remotes from the Muehlebach Hotel with the jazz influenced Carleton Coons-Joe Sanders Nighthawks band. More stations, venues and bands discovered this new cooperative source of promotion during the roaring twenties - most notably WTAM/Cleveland and Guy Lombardo’s Royal Canadians in 1924 and Wayne King’s association with Chicago’s KYW and WGN a few years later.
As popularity of the big bands and radio grew in the 1930’s so did the remotes. For example, on a Friday night in May, 1939, CBS presented the bands of Cab Calloway, Ted Weems, Artie Shaw and Archie Bleyer. NBC had Guy Lombardo, Gene Krupa and Anson Weeks, and Blue broadcast Earl Hines, Blue Barron, Ace Brigode and Charlie Barnett. Not to be outdone, upstart Mutual did remotes that same night from Sammy Kaye, Dick Jurgens, Glen Gray, Skinnay Ennis, Phil Harris and Jack Teagarden. On top of the heavy Network Radio load, many independent stations also broadcast remotes from local venues.
As can be heard in the posts below, band remotes were not the epitome of Network Radio production excellence. Far from it, remotes were usually casual, ad-lib, one microphone affairs given to announcer errors, occasional sour notes and bad timing. And the clichéd, “Here’s (lovely or handsome) (singer's name) stepping to the microphone to ask the musical question,,,” isn’t that far from reality .
These posts represent the gamut of big band music - sweet to swing - in Network Radio’s Golden Age. Most have stories behind them. For example, the Ted Weems remote from 1937 features a 25 year old Perry Como just a few years before he became a star. It also contains a solo by virtuoso whistler Elmo Tanner.
Glenn Miller is still identified on his broadcast from 1938 as, “One of the nation’s leading exponents of the swing trombone and ace arranger.”
Rose Ann Stevens was Ozzie Nelson’s female vocalist in his 1940 remote from Chicago because his wife and singer, Harriet Hilliard, was only weeks away from delivering the couple’s second child, Eric, whom we all later knew as singer Rick Nelson.
Bandleader Russ Morgan was a song writer as well as a trombonist and singer. He had a way of inserting his own compositions into his broadcasts for royalty credit. The 1945 post below is no exception. His theme, Does Your Heart Beat For Me, plus You’re Nobody Til Somebody Loves You and So Long were all written by Morgan.
The Freddy Martin remote from 1946 features his 21 year old singer, Merv Griffin, who in later life was a nationally syndicated talk show host, the creator of game shows Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy and a real estate tycoon with a net worth of over a Billion dollars.
What happened when the announcer was late for the opening of one of these late night, "casual" broadcasts? Not much, the band simply began without him, as evidenced in this Mutual remote identified as Duke Ellington A from October, 1945. He did arrive at the end of Ellington's elongated theme song, but it sounded unusual. The way it should have sounded was heard several nights later in the broadcast identified as Duke Ellington B.
These posts plus those from Woody Herman, Count Basie, Dick Jurgens, Harry James and Stan Kenton provide examples of some of the best music and best forgotten gaffes from the era of late night dance band remotes.
So, whether you're inclined to roll back the rug, cut a rug or just be a latter day wallflower- we hope you enjoy them.
(1) Charges for airtime paid by the locatioons of remotes' depended on the size of the market and station. In most cases the fees did little more than cover the cost of the broadcast lines. Musicians' fees for remotes were under the jurisdiction of the AFM locals in the cities involved. In 1946, the remote fee per sideman was three dollars per broadcast payable to the union's relief fund. - as opposed to $14 for half-hour commercial programs payable to the musicians.
Copyright © 2015 Jim Ramsburg, Estero FL Email: tojimramsburg@gmail.com
| ted_weems_feb_1937.mp3 |
| glenn_miller__dec_1938.mp3 |
| woody_herman_jan_1940.mp3 |
| ozzie_nelson_1940.mp3 |
| harry_james_1944.mp3 |
| russ_morgan_jan_1945.mp3 |
| count_basie_jan_45.mp3 |
| stan_kenton_nov_1945.mp3 |
| freddy_martin_1946.mp3 |
| dick_jurgens_aug_1950.mp3 |
| ellington_a__10-7-45.mp3 |
| ellington__b__10-11-45.mp3 |