Music could always be heard in our house when I was growing up. My father, who played piano by ear, was the only musician\u2014everyone else sung, most of the time in tune. I remember curling up on the couch with a blanket and listening to him playing. To my young ears, it all sounded magical and haunting. In retrospect, I believe it must have been tuneful; otherwise, it would have grated on the ear of even a four year old. By the time I was perhaps 5 or 6, the piano was gone, possibly to make room for other furniture? I didn\u2019t know. Nor did I think to ask my father how he learned to play the piano by ear and who had inspired and mentored him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In the late 1940s, we had a radio in the house which saw a lot of use. From the early morning news to a late-night show called \u201cBook at Bedtime,\u201d our radio was on. We listened to record request programs to radio sitcoms, broadcast dramas, and soaps; we listened a lot. It was on the radio show \u201cChildren\u2019s\u2019 Choice,\u201d or similar that I first heard Vernon Dalhart singing \u201cThe Runaway Train,\u201d an immediate hit with me. I would listen every week in the hope someone would have requested \u201cRunaway Train,\u201d and usually, the show\u2019s host did not disappoint.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
My Mother was very taken with ballads from around 1900 to the late 1930s. She would sing on her own or along with the radio when everyone except me was at work or school. My brothers became jazz fans in the late 1940s when they started buying 78 rpm records. Around that time, I inherited a Columbia brand windup gramophone and maybe a dozen 78 rpm records. The records must have at one time belonged to my brothers. Perhaps they had grown tired of these particular ones and gifted them to me? I don\u2019t know. All I do know is I ended up with them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
One, in particular, made a big impression on a pre-school music aficionado. It was \u201cThe Old Music Master\u201d by Hoagy Carmichael. I saw myself as \u201cthe little colored boy\u201d who stepped \u201cright out of nowhere\u201d to say, \u201cyou gotta jump it, Music Master, you gotta play that rhythm faster.\u201d Until I saw the written lyrics years later, I always thought Hoagy sung \u201clittle curly boy.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The B side of the record was Hoagy singing \u201cHong Kong Blues,\u201d a song with a haunting, oriental themed melody, overtly about opium addiction. I liked this song almost as much as \u201cMusic Master.\u201d No adults or near adults in the house ever said anything about the opioid connections, so I must assume they didn\u2019t know. It took several years for the meaning of the lyrics to click with me. I had guessed someone was jailed in Hong Kong for \u201ckicking old Budah\u2019s gong.\u201d Well before I reached my teens, I had strong suspicions there was a little more to \u201ckicking old Budah\u2019s gong\u201d than just \u201ckicking old Budah\u2019s gong.\u201d And \u201csweet opium won\u2019t let me fly away,\u201d was a dead giveaway, even to a six or seven-year-old.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I loved the gramophone because I didn\u2019t have to listen to the radio and wait, hoping someone had requested the song I wanted to hear. With the gramophone, I could play the same record over and over again to my heart\u2019s content. That is until my Mother either pleaded or sometimes ordered me to either stop or play something different. Of the dozen or so records in my somewhat eclectic, pre-school 78 rpm record collection, a few others remain in my memory. Albert Ammons \u201cBoogie Woogie Stomp,\u201d Rossini\u2019s \u201cWilliam Tell Overture,\u201d and trumpeter\/band-leader, Harry James, playing Rimski Korsakov\u2019s \u201cFlight of the Bumble Bee.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
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Music could always be heard in our house when I was growing up. My father, who played piano by ear, was the only musician\u2014everyone else sung, most of the time in tune. I remember curling up on the couch with … Continue reading