The Chamber Music Society of Lower Basin Street

Last updated
Chamberlower.jpg

The Chamber Music Society of Lower Basin Street is a musical variety radio program which began on the Blue Network on February 11, 1940. [1] [2]

Contents

The program was created and hosted by NBC staff announcer Gene Hamilton, as a tongue-in-cheek satire of highbrow symphonic broadcasts hosted by Milton Cross. Instead of Cross's dignified commentary introducing each orchestral selection, "Dr. Gino Hamilton" would introduce a traditional hot-jazz (dixieland) melody, peppering his remarks with slang.

The music was performed by two house bands. Henry Levine, a former member of the Original Dixieland Jazz Band, led an eight-member dixieland combo; Paul Laval (later Lavalle, to avoid confusion with the French wartime traitor Paul Laval) [3] led a 10-piece woodwind ensemble, with arrangements employing oboe, bassoon, and French horn. Each broadcast featured a vocalist: Dinah Shore was discovered on the Basin Street program; she was succeeded in turn by New York-based vocalists Diane Courtney, Dodie O'Neill, Dixie Mason, Linda Keene, Loulie Jean Norman, and Lena Horne.

Gene Hamilton invited guest artists to appear on Lower Basin Street, including Benny Goodman, Count Basie, W. C. Handy, Bobby Hackett, Lead Belly, Lionel Hampton, Jelly Roll Morton, Sidney Bechet, and Alec Templeton, among other famous names in the jazz world. Many leading musicians were fans of the show, and kept in touch with Hamilton by telephone to arrange guest shots.

The Chamber Music Society of Lower Basin Street began as a sustaining (unsponsored) half-hour feature on NBC's Sunday-afternoon schedule (4:30 p.m. Eastern time). So many listeners wrote to the network expressing approval -- and asking to see the show in person -- that in October 1940 NBC gave Lower Basin Street an unsponsored, Monday-evening slot in its primetime schedule. Fans protested vigorously when the network sometimes pre-empted the program and even announced plans to cancel it. As Variety commented: "NBC has twice decided to fold the series, but each time has continued it in response to listener agitation." [4] Hamilton mentioned this off-again, on-again status on the air: "Greetings, music lovers, and if we've been canceled again and you're not hearing this, please don't tell us." [5] Hamilton was forced to leave the program in late 1941, when NBC reassigned him to its production department. He was replaced as host by announcer Jack ("Dr. Giacomo") McCarthy and then by the very man the series was burlesquing, Milton Cross.

As a sideline to the radio show, maestro Paul Lavalle brought a Chamber Music Society of Lower Basin Street stage revue to the Roxy theater in New York City, with radio host Milton Cross as master of ceremonies, beginning on February 3, 1943. [6] Publicity photos for the engagement showed the orchestra members in period costumes and wearing powdered wigs.

After two years of running as a sustaining show, Lower Basin Street found a sponsor: the Andrew Jergens Company, manufacturer of health and beauty aids. With a budget enhanced by Jergens, the program could now afford more "name" guest stars. The format drifted away from Hamilton's original, intimate concept of hot-jazz jam sessions. Henry Levine's dixieland band was dismissed, and Paul Lavalle now fronted a big band. The show became a loud, brassy jamboree staged for large crowds. The Jergens advertising agency Lennen & Mitchell kept tampering with the format, and the program took a sharp nosedive. As Billboard reported during the show's last weeks: "It is said that the show, which has had several format changes in the past year, is a dead duck. The show had a high Hooper [rating] as a sustainer, but failed to come thru once it went commercial and the basic idea, hot jazz and sophisticated comedy, was junked. Many program men say that if the show had been left as it was, a lively session of hot jazz, it would have stayed up with the leaders." [7] The show left the air in October 1944.

Revivals

On March 13, 1950, series creator Gene Hamilton returned to radio, this time for the ABC network, with a new show, Dr. Gino's Musicale. Variety reviewed the audition recording and found it to be "a direct throwback" to Lower Basin Street, with "virtually the same format, the same beat, and the same musical director [Henry Levine]." [8] NBC objected, on the grounds of possible plagiarism, but Hamilton asserted his claim as the format's originator. So much time had elapsed since Lower Basin Street's debut that NBC's legal staff wasn't sure who owned what, [9] and finally settled with Hamilton. Dixieland music had become a nationwide craze in 1950, [10] and NBC returned The Chamber Music Society of Lower Basin Street to its schedule on June 8 of that year, with "Dr. Gino Hamilton" returning to the microphone and "Dr. Henry Levine" back on the bandstand. The series aired as a summer replacement for Judy Canova's program. [11]

NBC looked to its established radio properties for possible conversion to television series, and The Chamber Music Society of Lower Basin Street was on the list. To gauge public interest, Lower Basin Street was revived as a Saturday-night radio series on April 12, 1952, as an "information and education" program sponsored by the U. S. Army Reserve. Henry Levine's dixieland band returned with a new vocalist, Martha Lou Harp, and a new host, 23-year-old nightclub comedian Orson Bean. Bean caught the spirit of the series immediately, and read the script in the bemused tones of a stuffy college professor. The show's original scriptwriter, Welbourne "Web" Kelley, was back with the show's trademark wisecracks and puns. (Questioning the inclusion of a saxophone in an arrangement, Dr. Bean muttered, "Is sax necessary?") Bean was fond of unscripted asides, and instead of "Bravo!" Bean would invoke "the Viennese expression, Hoch, hoch! Vom himmel hoch! ("High, high from the sky!")". NBC staff announcer Wayne Howell, in the same spirit, introduced the host as "Boston's half-baked Bean." The show's "intermission commentaries" at the halfway point were also retained for the 1952 series, with "Dr. Wayne Howell" assisting when needed.

The series did well enough for NBC to mount a live-TV special on June 15 -- 5:30 on Sunday afternoon -- with Bean, Levine, Harp, guest commentator Arthur Treacher, hot bagpiper Ross Gorman, and dancers Milton Kanen and Gene Myers. [12] No kinescope recordings of the show are known to survive, and the special was not picked up as a series. The Lower Basin Street franchise came to an end.

In 1953 Gene Hamilton, the originator of the show, returned to NBC with his own hot-jazz radio program, Dr. Gino, airing on Saturday afternoons.

Recordings and films

Beginning in November 1940, RCA Victor recorded albums of 78-rpm discs featuring The Chamber Music Society of Lower Basin Street. The liner notes were furnished by Welbourne Kelley, who wrote the radio series. Each disc in the album would begin with "Dr. Gino" Hamilton introducing the selection, played by one of the two Lower Basin Street bands. The other side of the disc featured the other band. RCA re-released these records as late as the 1960s, emphasizing vocalists Dinah Shore or Lena Horne and deleting the commentaries.

The only surviving visual records of The Chamber Music Society of Lower Basin Street are four three-minute films produced for the Soundies film jukeboxes in 1941. All feature the Henry Levine "Dixieland Jazz Band," with vocals by Linda Keene in three of them. [13]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Original Dixieland Jass Band</span> American jazz band

The Original Dixieland Jass Band (ODJB) was a Dixieland jazz band that made the first jazz recordings in early 1917. Their "Livery Stable Blues" became the first jazz record ever issued. The group composed and recorded many jazz standards, the most famous being "Tiger Rag". In late 1917, the spelling of the band's name was changed to Original Dixieland Jazz Band.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sidney Bechet</span> American jazz musician (1897–1959)

Sidney Joseph Bechet was an American jazz saxophonist, clarinetist, and composer. He was one of the first important soloists in jazz, and first recorded several months before trumpeter Louis Armstrong. His erratic temperament hampered his career, and not until the late 1940s did he earn wide acclaim. Bechet spent much of his later life in France.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Kid Ory</span> American jazz trombonist

Edward "Kid" Ory was an American jazz composer, trombonist and bandleader. One of the early users of the glissando technique, he helped establish it as a central element of New Orleans jazz.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Les Brown (bandleader)</span> American bandleader

Lester Raymond Brown was an American jazz musician who led the big band Les Brown and His Band of Renown for over six decades from 1938 to 2000.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nick LaRocca</span> Musical artist

Dominic James "Nick" LaRocca, was an American early jazz cornetist and trumpeter and the leader of the Original Dixieland Jass Band, who is credited by some as being "the father of modern jazz". He is the composer of one of the most recorded jazz classics of all-time, "Tiger Rag". He was part of what is generally regarded as the first recorded jazz band, a band which recorded and released the first jazz recording, "Livery Stable Blues" in 1917.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tom Brown (trombonist)</span> New Orleans dixieland jazz trombonist (1888–1958)

Tom P. Brown, sometimes known by the nickname Red Brown, was an American dixieland jazz trombonist. He also played string bass professionally.

The music of Louisiana can be divided into three general regions: rural south Louisiana, home to Creole Zydeco and Old French, New Orleans, and north Louisiana. The region in and around Greater New Orleans has a unique musical heritage tied to Dixieland jazz, blues, and Afro-Caribbean rhythms. The music of the northern portion of the state starting at Baton Rouge and reaching Shreveport has similarities to that of the rest of the US South.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Eddie Condon</span> American jazz musician (1905–1973)

Albert Edwin Condon was an American jazz banjoist, guitarist, and bandleader. A leading figure in Chicago jazz, he also played piano and sang. He also owned a self-named night club in New York City.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dinah Shore</span> American singer and actress (1916–1994)

Dinah Shore was an American singer, actress, television personality, and the chart-topping female vocalist of the 1940s. She rose to prominence as a recording artist during the Big Band era. She achieved even greater success a decade later in television, mainly as the host of a series of variety programs for the Chevrolet automobile company.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Orson Bean</span> American actor (1928–2020)

Orson Bean was an American film, television, and stage actor. He was a game show and talk show host and a "mainstay of Los Angeles’ small theater scene." He appeared frequently on several televised game shows from the 1960s through the 1980s and was a longtime panelist on the television game show To Tell the Truth. "A storyteller par excellence", he was a favorite of Johnny Carson, appearing on The Tonight Show more than 200 times.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bob Crosby</span> American singer and bandleader (1913–1993)

George Robert Crosby was an American jazz singer and bandleader, best known for his group the Bob-Cats, which formed around 1935. The Bob-Cats were a New Orleans Dixieland-style jazz octet. He was the younger brother of famed singer and actor Bing Crosby. On TV, Bob Crosby guest-starred in The Gisele MacKenzie Show. He was also a regular cast member of The Jack Benny Program, on both radio and television, taking over the role of bandleader after Phil Harris' departure. Crosby hosted his own afternoon TV variety show on CBS, The Bob Crosby Show (1953–1957). Crosby received two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, for television and radio.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bass saxophone</span> Wind instrument

The bass saxophone is one of the lowest-pitched members of the saxophone family—larger and lower than the more common baritone saxophone. It was likely the first type of saxophone built by Adolphe Sax, as first observed by Berlioz in 1842. It is a transposing instrument pitched in B♭, an octave below the tenor saxophone and a perfect fourth below the baritone saxophone. A bass saxophone in C, intended for orchestral use, was included in Adolphe Sax's patent, but few known examples were built. The bass saxophone is not a commonly used instrument, but it is heard on some 1920s jazz recordings, in free jazz, in saxophone choirs and sextets, and occasionally in concert bands and rock music.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tiger Rag</span> 1917 jazz standard

"Tiger Rag" is a jazz standard that was recorded and copyrighted by the Original Dixieland Jass Band in 1917. It is one of the most recorded jazz compositions. In 2003, the 1918 recording of "Tiger Rag" was entered into the U.S. Library of Congress National Recording Registry.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Milton Cross</span> American radio announcer

Milton John Cross was an American radio announcer famous for his work on the NBC and ABC radio networks.

Wayne Howell Chappelle was a voice-over announcer for the NBC television and radio networks from 1947 through 1986. He was born in Lexington, Kentucky, and became one member of a core group of New York-based announcers including Don Pardo, Bill Wendell, Jerry Damon, Arthur Gary, Vic Roby, Mel Brandt, Gene Hamilton, and Howard Reig who handled not only introducing and closing programs, but also teasers and promotions for the network's shows.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Paul Lavalle</span>

Paul Lavalle was an American conductor, composer, arranger and performer on clarinet and saxophone.

An overview of the evolution of Jazz music in Germany reveals that the development of jazz in Germany and its public notice differ from the "motherland" of jazz, the US, in several respects.

The Cities Service Concerts were musical broadcasts which had a long three-decade run on radio from 1925 to 1956, encompassing a variety of vocalists and musicians sponsored by Cities Service.

Dixieland jazz, also referred to as traditional jazz, hot jazz, or simply Dixieland, is a style of jazz based on the music that developed in New Orleans at the start of the 20th century. The 1917 recordings by the Original Dixieland Jass Band, fostered awareness of this new style of music.

Gene Hamilton was an announcer in the era of old-time radio. He had a 46-year career with NBC. An article in a contemporary magazine, Radio Guide, said Hamilton "has a splendid bass voice and one of the best of the group."

References

  1. ↑ Dunning, John (1998). On the Air: The Encyclopedia of Old-Time Radio (Revised ed.). New York, NY: Oxford University Press. pp. 146–148. ISBN   978-0-19-507678-3 . Retrieved 15 August 2019.
  2. ↑ "RadioEchoes.com". www.radioechoes.com.
  3. ↑ Bob Musel of United Press International, "Toscanini Gives His Praise to Saxophonist", Oct. 4, 1942.
  4. ↑ Variety, 'Basin Street' May Fold, Twice Saved by Protests of Vociferous Loyalists," Feb. 11, 1942, p. 24.
  5. ↑ The Chamber Music Society of Lower Basin Street, NBC Radio broadcast of June 23, 1941.
  6. ↑ New York Herald Tribune, Feb. 2, 1943, p. 12.
  7. ↑ Billboard, "Basin St. Life Said to Be Cut Just 8 Weeks," Sept. 9, 1944, p. 5.
  8. ↑ Variety, March 15, 1950, p. 34.
  9. ↑ Billboard, "Off Key Note Jams 'Dr. Gino'," March 25, 1950, p. 7.
  10. ↑ Billboard, "Mills [Music] Resurrects Dixieland Tunes," Mar. 18, 1950, p. 15.
  11. ↑ "Basin Street Back after Six Years". Mt. Vernon Register-News. Illinois, Mt. Vernon. Associated Press. June 22, 1950. p. 22.
  12. ↑ NBC-TV press release, "'C.M.S.O.L.B.S.' on Television -- Watch It!", June 6, 1952.
  13. ↑ Scott MacGillivray and Ted Okuda, The Soundies Book: A Revised and Expanded Guide, iUniverse, 2007. ISBN   978-0595679690.

Listen to

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.