Big Band Bash

Hello everyone. This episode of Big Band Bash is a repeat of a show I produced in 2011 where we paid tribute to the men and women who lost their lives during the attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941. Also, I pay tribute to Major Glenn Miller who dissappeared in the plane he was flying in across the English Channel on December 15, 1944. I always like to remember those events as they were very significant in American History. A lot of things changed in the music industry because of these events so I hope you like the music as we pay tribute to those patriotic Americans.

This week we continue our look at the radio program Your Hit Parade with part five featuring music from the years of 1948 and 1949. This is from a 10 cd set and I have combined two cds for each program. With this show we come to the end of this great set of cds. I hope you hear some of your favorite songs as I explore the great music presented on Your Hit Parade.

This week we continue our look at the radio program Your Hit Parade with part four featuring music from the years of 1946 and 1947. This is from a 10 cd set and I have combined two cds for each program. I hope you hear some of your favorite songs as I explore the great music presented on Your Hit Parade.

This week we continue our look at the radio program Your Hit Parade with part three featuring music from the years of 1944 and 1945. This is from a 10 cd set and I have combined two cds for each program. I hope you hear some of your favorite songs as I explore the great music presented on Your Hit Parade.

This week we continue our look at the radio program Your Hit Parade with part two featuring music from the years of 1942 and 1943. This is from a 10 cd set and I have combined two cds for each program. I hope you hear some of your favorite songs as I explore the great music presented on Your Hit Parade.

On our program today we start part one of a five-part series on the radio program Your Hit Parade. Each Saturday evening the biggest song hits of the week were presented on Your Hit Parade. This is from a 10 cd set and I have combined two cds for each program. I hope you hear some of your favorite songs as I explore the great music presented on Your Hit Parade.

We continue this week with part two of a Reader's Digest records production called These Were Our Songs, The Late 1940's. This was a seven vinyl album set and rereleased as a four cd set. Featuring music from the years of 1946 - 1949. This is part two and I hope you enjoy the selections I have chosen.

Well I apologize but I ran into some family problems and was not able to finish part two of the Reader's Digest set I promised for this week. So to substitute I have chose a show I previously produced on the Late Gene Krupa. Gene passed away on October 16, 1974. I wanted to note his passing and to rediscover some of the great music he produced. I will try to be back with part two of The Late 1940's from reader's Digest next week.

This is another set I managed to get a copy of. It was produced by Reader's Digest records and called These Were Our Songs, The Late 1940's. This was a seven vinyl album set and rereleased as a four cd set. Featuring music from the years of 1946 - 1949. This is part one and I hope you enjoy the selections I have chosen. Next Week is Part Two.

From the patriotic show, The Victory Parade of Spotlight Bands, I am playing three radio remotes. The bands we will be listening to are Les Brown, Gene Krupa, and Charlie Spivak. The Les Brown show is from April 25, 1945. I hope you enjoy these shows broadcast during World War Two.

We continue this week with Part Two of a Reader's Digest collection called These Were Our Songs, The Late 1930's. This featues music from the years of 1936 -1939. This set was originally released as a seven vinyl lp set which was rereleased as a four CD set. I hope you enjoy the music from this Reader's Digest set.

I managed to get a copy of this set from Reader's Digest Records. It is called These Were Our Songs, The Late 1930's. This was a seven vinyl album set and rereleased as a four cd set. Featuring music from the years of 1936 - 1939. This is part one and I hope you enjoy the selections I have chosen. Next Week is Part Two.

September 21st is right around the beginning of Autumn. I thought I would do something different this week and celebrate the Autun time of the year with songs about September and Autumn. There were several songs with September in the title so I hope you enjoy this show as we begin the Autumn time of the year.

This week I am following up with Part 2 of the Time-Life series, The Swing Era, with the second half from the years of 1944-1945. I had so much fun tracking down the originals in this series. As I have done in previous shows from the Time-Life series I am playing the original recordings and following along with the playlist from this set. We'll be hearing from Harry James, Tommy Dorsey, Benny Goodman, Gene Krupa, Les Brown and more. There are a few more sets in this series and hopefully we will get to listen to them all. I hope you enjoy this volume in the series, The Swing Era.

This week we return to the Time-Life series, "The Swing Era", with the volume from the years of 1944-1945. These were still the war years but there were still some great recordings made. As I have done in previous shows from the Time-Life series I am playing the original recordings. We'll be hearing from Harry James, Tommy Dorsey, Benny Goodman, Gene Krupa, Les Brown and more. There are a few more sets in this series and hopefully we will get to listen to them all. I hope you enjoy this volume in the series, "The Swing Era".

This week on Big Band Bash I'll be taking a look at many of the vocal groups that sang with the big bands and on their own. There were several popular groups back then and we'll be hearing from The Andrews Sisters, The Ink Spots, The Mills Brothers, The King Sisters, and The Pied Pipers. In addition to recordings, I'll be giving a short history of each group many of which are quite interesting.

We continue this week with Part two of my Big Band Revival. I got the ides from the many churches I see having revivals. I needed to get excited again about the great bands I fell in love with when I was a teenager discovering all these great bands. I am continuing with some of the many recordings I enjoyed and hope you like them too in part two of my Big Band Revival.

Every now and then I need to revive my love of the Big bands. This program and the next are ones where I have picked out some of the recordings that made me a life long fan of the Big Bands. I loved discovering the geat recordings of Benny and Tommy, The Duke and the Count, Artie and Jimmy to name just a few. I hope you enjoy some of the recordings I loved in a program I call My Big Band Revival.

This week I'm going to be playing the third and final record in this three record set that features many hits from the Bluebird record label. When I was a youngster my dad bought a three record set called The Big Bands. In it were songs that went along with a book by George T. Simon. Each record was devoted to a particular record label. The three labels were Decca, Columbia, and RCA Bluebird. It was a nice set with a lot of the hits from the big band era. I came across this set the other day and thought it would be great to hear all those great old songs again. We'll be hearing from Artie Shaw, Benny Goodman, Tommy Dorsey and many others. I hope you enjoy all the bands this week that were part of the Bluebird family.

I'm going to be playing the second record in this three record set that features many hits from the Columbia record label. When I was a youngster my dad bought a three record set called The Big Bands. In it were songs that went along with a book by George T. Simon. Each record was devoted to a particular record label. The three labels were Decca, Columbia, and RCA Bluebird. It was a nice set with a lot of the hits from the big band era. I came across this set the other day and thought it would be great to hear all those great old songs again. We'll be hearing from Harry James, Duke Ellington, Benny Goodman and many others. I hope you enjoy all the bands this week that were part of the Columbia family.

When I was a youngster my dad bought a three record set called The Big Bands. In it were songs that went along with a book by George T. Simon. Each record was devoted to a particular record label. The three labels were Decca, Columbia, and RCA Bluebird. It was a nice set with a lot of the hits from the big band era. I came across this set the other day and thought it would be great to hear all those great old songs again. This week we will be hearing many of the great bands that recorded for the Decca label. We'll be hearing from Jimmy Dorsey, Jimmie Lunceford, Bob Crosby, Casa Loma, Lionel Hampton and many others. I hope you enjoy all the bands this week that were part of the Decca family.

I'm back from vacation and have some new programs under way. Here is the first, spotlighting one of my favorite big bands. Will Bradley was a great trombonist who worked with several name orchestras when he was persuaded to start up his own orchestra in 1939. They had an exciting pianist in Freddie Slack and sperked an interest in boogie woogie with their hit Beat Me Daddy Eight To The Bar. I hope you enjoy this salute to a great big band leader and musician.

May 13th is the birthday of Woody Herman and if he were alive today that would have been his 100th birthday. We continue our celebration of his birthday with some of his hits from the 1940's. These are some of my favorite recordings from the Herman Herd, songs like Caldonia, Early Autumn, Four Brothers, Northwest Passage and more. Plus, in this episode I have a few segments from an interview that Woody gave in 1978. I hope you enjoy this salute to one of America's greatest big band leaders.

May 13th is the birthday of Woody Herman and if he were alive today that would have been his 100th birthday. To celebrate this milestone we will be playing some of his early recordings made between the years of 1939 and 1946 on the show today which is part one of two. I was fortunate enough to see the Herman band in person not once but twice. They were a very exciting band and I have been a fan every since I was in high school. I hope you enjoy this salute to one of America's greatest big band leaders.

I am continuing this week with part two of Classic Artie Shaw Bluebird and Victor Sessions which has selected cuts from the Mosaic Record Company's eight disc set of the same name. The sound quality is great and most of these songs are from Artie's classic years. All of the songs on the show are instrumentals as that was how Mosaic elected to produce the set. I hope you enjoy part 2 of The Classic Artie Shaw Bluebird and Victor Sessions.

In 2011 I bought two 8 disc sets from the Mosaic Record Company. The first was dedicated to the Columbia sides of Benny Goodman which I presented a show on a few weeks ago. The second is what our show today is about. This disc set featured the classic Bluebird recordings of Artie Shaw. For all the vocal fan listeners I have to apologize as this set only focus on the instrumentals. But what a collection of instrumentals. We start from the year of 1938 and Artie's great recording of Cole Porter's "Begin the Beguine" and continue from there. Many of the arrangements are by Artie himself or Jerry Gray. This is a great set that is, unfortunately, not for sale anymore. I hope you enjoy part 1 of The Classic Artie Shaw Bluebird and Victor Sessions.

This week I am going to continue with part two of the Mosaic box set, The Classic Columbia and Okeh Benny Goodman Orchestra Session 1939 -1957. These are many of the recordings that Benny made during those years and these are all instrumental recordings. Benny had some great vocalists during those years but Mosaic kept this set to just instrumentals. Some of the songs we'll be listening to include, Jersey Bounce, A String of Pearls, Birth of the Blues, I'll Get By, and many more. This set is no longer available and so I am happy to be able to present some of these great recordings. I hope you enjoy a look at some of the recordings by Benny and the orchestra.

This week we will be listening to selections from a Mosaic Record Company set that I have called the Classic Columbia and Okeh Benny Goodman Orchestra Sessions. This is part one of a show I did back in 2012 and repeated almost three years ago in 2019. These are all the instrumental recordings that Benny did for Columbia and the Okeh record label. Unfortunately the producers of this set omitted all the vocals. But there is some fantastic music by the Goodman band starting in 1939 when he switched to the Columbia label. If you are a Benny Goodman fan then I hope you enjoy these two programs.

This is part two of a program I did on Metronome Magazine. In the issue, there was a section devoted to record reviews. In part one, I started to play many of the records that they were reviewing. We continue with more record reviews from Metronome magazine from March of 1942. The cover featured a blue background and a great picture of Jimmy Dorsey. Many of these songs were not hits for the bands that recorded them but they were great recordings. I hope you enjoy the record reviews from the March 1942 issue of Metronome.

May 30, 1909 is the birthday of bandleader and clarinetist Benny Goodman. Instead of playing some of his hits which I've done in past programs, I would like to play two radio remotes. These were recorded Oct 23 and 27, 1937 when the Goodman orchestra was appearing at the Manhattan room of The Hotel Pennsylvania. Benny was the first bandleader that I started listening to when I was a senior in high school. It's because of his great playing and artistry that I became a life long fan of the big bands. Happy Birthday Benny.

When I was in high school, my dad knew of my interest in the big bands. While out at his job, he found someone that was getting rid of several issues of Metronome Magazine. I still have them and I thought it would be interesting to try to find as many of the record reviews as I could. The cover featured a blue background and a great picture of Jimmy Dorsey. Many of these songs were not hits for the bands that recorded them but they were great recordings. I hope you enjoy the record reviews from the March 1942 issue of Metronome.

This week I am continuing with part two of Big Band Remotes from World War 2 with two remotes from the Victory Parade of Spotlight Bands series. At the same time, however, I am having a birthday salute to a favorite bandleader of mine, the late Artie Shaw. Artie was born on May 23, 1910 and he also appeared on the Spotlight band program for five consecutive weeks in 1945. So to honor Artie I would like to play the first two programs in that series. The sound quality is very good and there are some exciting solos from trumpeter Roy Eldridge. I hope you enjoy this look back at some on location performances from the great Artie Shaw as we remember his birthday.

On this week's show I would like to honor a request. A listener asked for some big band remotes that took place during World War 2. Most of the remotes I have during that era are from the Victory Parade of Spotlight Bands program. I found four 15 miniute shows so on the program today we will be listening to the bands of Tommy Dorsey, Bob Chester, Benny Goodman, and Les Brown. Three of the shows are from 1943 and one is from 1944. I hope you enjoy this look back at some on location performances from four of America's top bands.

This week we will be listening to and learning about two bands that I've never recently covered before: Bob Chester and Teddy Powell. This is a rebroadcast of a show I produced back in 2012. Bob had a great band that was heavily influenced by Glenn Miller. Teddy's band had a great start in New York but had trouble sustaining that popularity outside of the Northeast. These are the original recordings by both bands.

This week we take a look back at the music and career of Glenn Gray and the Casa Loma Orchestra. As an orchestra they predated Benny Goodman and the start of the swing era. They had some excellent musicians and had a few big hits in the 30's and 40's. I'll be playing some of these numbers as we look back at the career of the Casa Loma Orchestra.

This is part two of the Time Life records set I started last week. These records were originally recorded in 1971 by Billy May and His Orchestra/Glen Gray's Casa Loma Orchestra. Those were recreations featuring many of the musicians who were on the original recordings. Today's program features the music from the set of 1938-1939. I have this box set and thought that instead of hearing the recreations that it would be interesting to listen to the originals. So I'm borrowing the playlist and presenting the original recordings. Included with the albums was a nice book which told about the swing era. The book from the 1938-1939 set featured an essay on Where Swing Came From.

This is another volume in Time Life records ambitious project called "The Swing Era". It was a ten volume set with three records included in each volume. Today we turn to the years of 1938-1939. The songs were rerecorded by the bands of Billy May and Glen Gray. I have this set and thought that instead of hearing the recreations that it would be interesting to listen to the originals. So I'm borrowing the playlist and presenting the original recordings. There are about 30 songs so I'm going to break it up into two parts. I hope you enjoy the music in this set.

Hello everyone. This week is a continuation of the two part series I started last week on the Dorsey brothers. This was a show I produces several years ago and am rebroadcasting. There are many of your favorite Dorsey hits and the Puzzler is back. I am in the process of producing some new shows and hope to start presenting them next week. Until then, thank you for your continued listening and support.

This week I have gone back into the collection and pulled out two shows that I did on Tommy and Jimmy Dorsey. There is a lot a good music in these shows. We'll being this week with a look at Jimmy and follow next week with Tommy. I would like to dedicate these two shows to the memory of my mother, Evelyn Earlene Miller. I hope you enjoy the music.

Welcome to the second part of our Glenn Miller birthday celebration. March 01, 1904 is the birthday of the late Glenn Miller and to celebrate I've picked out some recordings that ia a mixture of his songs. These are all live recordings and in addition we'll be listening to a radio remote recorded on May 17, 1939 at the Glen Island Casino. This is a great program of Glenn Miller music.

March 01, 1904 is the birthday of the late Glenn Miller. Join me on this program as we celebrate his birthday. I've picked out some recordings that are very pretty mixed with some of his hits. In addition we'll be listening to a radio remote recorded on March 26, 1939 at Frank Dailey's Meadowbrook Ballroom. This is a great program of Glenn Miller music.

We conclude our celebration of Black History Month this week with a look at the big band of Jimmie Lunceford. Jimmie Lunceford's band differed from other great bands of the time because it was better known for its ensemble than for its solo work. Additionally, he was known for using a two-beat rhythm, called the Lunceford two-beat, as opposed to the standard four-beat rhythm. We'll be playing many of the Lunceford band's many hits. I hope you enjoy this sampler of the many great African-American Bands from the swing era

We wind up our celebration of Black History Month with some more assorted artists. The performers today are ones that I didn't get to on the previous shows. Some of the artists on the show today include Charlie Christian, John Kirby, Russell Procope, Buster Bailey, Charlie Shavers, Louis Armstrong, The Ink Spots, Benny Moten, and Chu Berry. I hope you enjoy this sampler of the many great African-American Bands from the swing era.

We continue our celebration of Black History Month this week with more assorted bands and vocalists. Some of the artists on the show today include Ella Fitzgerald, Earl Fatha Hines, Duke Ellington, Ivy Anderson, Roy Eldridge, Louis Jordan, Lionel Hampton, Jimmy Rushing, and Helen Humes. I hope you enjoy this sampler of the many great African-American Bands from the swing era.

We start our celebration of Black History Month this week. Rather than focus on any one band or bandleader I have put together a sampler of bands. We start with the band of Fletcher Henderson. Other bands heard today will be Andy Kirk, Benny Carter, Cab Calloway, Chick Webb, Count Basie, and Erskine Hawkins. I hope you enjoy this sampler of the many great African-American Bands from the swing era.

January 16th 1938 is the date of the Benny Goodman concert at Carnegie Hall. This was the first concert given in the respectable concert venue by a swing band. We are very fortunate that the concert was recorded. Since the recording date was during the infancy of recording, the sound quality is not as good as today's recordings. The concert was originally issued in a two-LP gatefold album in 1950, the nearly forgotten documentation of this historic event quickly became Columbia's best-selling jazz release, a distinction it was to hold for decades to come. Although rumored among collectors for decades, the public had no way of knowing that two big band numbers had been excised from the commercial release and all subsequent reissues. The original concert was over two hours so I have picked some selected cuts from that night.

Hello everyone. I have to correct myself. There were four parts to this series. So, this week we are going to conclude the series from the Reader's Digest Set, Memories of the Swing Era. Back in the 1960's and 70's Reader's Digest used to put out vinyl album sets on different topics. My parents had a couple in their record collection and we have some at the radio staion where I work. I was lucky to come across this set as it has a wide variety of bands in it. I tried to put together a varied show full of your favorite bands. So join me as we bring back Memories of the Swing Era with this great multi-album set from Reader's Digest Records.

Hello everyone. This is part two of a program I did on the great bandleader, Les Brown. Les passed away January 4, 2001. Since we just passed the anniversary of his death I would like to play a program that I produced two years ago and feature those great les Brown recordings. I have included in the show snippets of an interview that Les gave in 1990 to Chris Neilsen. Chris is no longer with us but when he was alive he hosted a program called One Night Stand. These are some of Les' early recordings and some of his most popular.

As we return from the holidays, I want to feature the big band of Les Brown. Les passed away January 4, 2001. Since we just passed the anniversary of his death I would like to play a program that I produced two years ago and feature those great les Brown recordings. I have included in the show snippets of an interview that Les gave in 1990 to Chris Neilsen. Chris is no longer with us but when he was alive he hosted a program called One Night Stand. These are some of Les' early recordings and some of his most popular.

This week we pay a birthday salute to Martha Tilton who was born on November 14th, 1915. After singing with the quartet Three Hits and a Miss, she joined the Myer Alexander Chorus on Benny Goodman's radio show, Camel Caravan. Goodman hired Tilton as a vocalist with his band in August 1937. She was with Goodman in January 1938, when the band performed at Carnegie Hall. She continued to appear as Goodman's star vocalist until the end of 1939. The program today has many of her recordings with the Goodman band and some released under her own name. I hope you enjoy this birthday salute to the late Martha Tilton.

Hello everyone. This week we are going to conclude the series from the Reader's Digest Set, Memories of the Swing Era. Back in the 1960's and 70's Reader's Digest used to put out vinyl album sets on different topics. My parents had a couple in their record collection and we have some at the radio staion where I work. I was lucky to come across this set as it has a wide variety of bands in it. I tried to put together a varied show full of your favorite bands. So join me as we bring back Memories of the Swing Era with this great multi-album set from Reader's Digest Records.

Hello. This week we are going to continue with more selections from the Reader's Digest Set, Memories of the Swing Era. I tried to put together a varied show full of your favorite bands. So join me as we bring back Memories of the Swing Era with this great multi-album set from Reader's Digest Records.

I recently came across a set of records in a Box Set from Reader's Digest Records called Memories of the Swing Era. There were several compilation sets from Reader's Digest that were released and I am fortunate to have this one. So for the next few weeks, I have gone through and selected many of the recordings from this set to make three different shows. I tried to pick a wide enough variety of selections so that maybe you will hear your favorite bands. I hope you remember some of your favorite Memories of the Swing Era in this set from Reader's Digest Records.

This week I am returning to a program I produced a few years ago. It was a program to honor a listener's request. It had been awhile since I featured the singing of Anita O'Day so I put together this program of some of her early big band recordings. She achieved her first fame with the Gene Krupa orchestra and then went on to sing with Stan Kenton. Most of the recordings on the show today are those great sides she recorded with the Krupa band. I hope you enjoy this look at one of the greatest big band vocalists, the late Anita O'Day.

Born on November 2, 1908, this trumpeter, despite the brevity of his career and his all-too-short life, remains one of the most compelling trumpet players in the history of music. Do you know who it is? If I said his initials were BB and his first name was not Bix then you would say I was speaking of the great Bunny Berigan. Today we pay a birthday salute to one of the most exciting trumpet players in Big Band history. We'll start with a couple numbers by Benny Goodman and then a couple by Tommy Dorsey. All of these have great solos by Bunny. Then we'll play some of the sides he recorded with his own band. I hope you enjoy this look at the music and career of the late Bunny Berigan.

Greetings everyone. This week we conclude this series with part four of a potpourri show as I go through my collection by first names. I have quite a collection of bands so I hope you enjoy this assortment of bands and songs on the final part of 64 Assorted Songs.

Well hello everyone. This week we continue with part three of a potpourri show as I go through my collection by first names. I have quite a collection of bands so I hope you enjoy this assortment of bands and songs on part three of 64 Assorted Songs.

Well hello everyone. This week we continue with part two of a potpourri show as I go through my collection by first names. I have quite a collection of bands so I hope you enjoy this assortment of bands and songs on part two of 64 Assorted Songs.

Hello everyone. While going through my collection of big bands on my computer I have them stored in folders starting with their first name then last name. I have done shows where I play artists in alphabetical order starting with their last names but not their first. I went through the collection and had enough songs by the bandleaders to make four complete shows. So this will be a potpourri of bands starting alphabetically by their first names. I hope you enjoy the selections.

This week I am going to conlude the Jerry Atkins Collection series with a couple of albums each by Buddy Bregman, Stan Kenton and Gene Krupa. Jerry was the man responsible for starting my career on public radio in Texarkana, Texas. It was while I was working at KTXK that our station manager asked me if I thought I could produce a big band show to air at 10:00pm Saturday eveings. I have been producing shows since 2006. Jerry passed away in 2010 and we are fortunate to have his extensive record collection at the station. I will continue to go through the many albums as time is available and play some more of these great albums from my friend, Jerry Atkins and his wonderful record collection.

Hello everyone. This is part two of a series I call the Jerry Atkins Collection. Jerry had a show on Saturdays on the radio station I work at called The Enjoyment of Jazz. He played recordings from his massive record collection and entertained us with stories of his meetings and befriending many of the jazz masters. Sadly, Jerry passed away in 2010. His son, who is also a great jazz musician, donated many of the albums and cds in his father's collection to our station. Jerry collected albums by lots of jazz musicians but he liked the more modern big bands. This week I have pulled out several of the Woody Herman albums in the collection. I have digitized them and cleaned up the ticks and pops and background noise as best I could. So as I pay a small tribute to my friend I hope you enjoy this set of recordings from the Jerry Atkins Collection.

Jerry Atkins was a well known musician, jazz historian, and record collector who lived in Texarkana, Texas until his passing in 2010. His record collection was huge and was donated to the the radio station where I work and produce Big Band Bash. Since most of these albums have not been purchased by the station, I have been digitizing some of them. It is amazing how well the software cleans up ticks and pops and eliminates surface noise from the records. I have decided to present four shows from the many albums that Jerry had. Part one features several albums by Les Brown, Part two will be Woody Herman, Parts three and four will be assorted bands. I hope you enjoy the music from the many record albums in the Jerry Atkins Collection.

Hello everyone. On this week's show I am going to wrap up Songs of the 1920's. We'll conclude the alphabet and then I'll present some odds and ends. This was a fun series to research and present. The 1920's was a time for great music from some of the best composers in America.

This week continues our look at the songs composed in the 1920s. We start with the letter N and go down to the Letter T. The puzzler is back this week so I hope you have your thinking caps on. Next week we'll conclude our series with the last part of the alphabet along with some odds and ends. I hope you enjoy the music from the big bands as they play the Songs of the 1920s.

Welcome back to this four part series on songs of the 1920s. Today we cover songs from that decade that begin with the letter "E" and go all the way down to "M". I broke my rule for this series by playing two songs on the show recorded by Artie Shaw. I had already recorded the introductions when I discovered I did this but I am sure you won't mind because it is one of his best sides. I hope you enjoy this look back at some of the many hit songs from the 1920s. As usual the puzzle is back so get your thinking caps on.

This was a repeat of a show from a few years ago. The 1920s were a decade filled with original songs by some of the leading composers of the era. I found a list of many of the popular songs composed in the 1920s and thought it would be fun to listen to those songs as recorded by the big bands of the thirties and forties. Each show for the next four weeks is filled with all of those great songs composed in the 1920s. I did have one rule for myself. In order to make it interesting I only chose one big band per episode. That way one band would not monopolize the show. So get ready to back to the 1920's during the month of August on Big Band Bash.

This week I feature the two Kays, Sammy Kaye and Kay Kyser. Kay Kyser led a very successful swing orchestra although he didn't play an instrument. Sammy Kaye on the other hand, was a clarinetist and saxophonist but didn't play with his band. Both had unusual attractions: Kyser had "The College of Musical Knowledge" and Sammy had, "So You Want To Lead A Band?".

Harry James had a very popular band during the war years. The set of recordings I will be playng from this week are live recordings from the years of 1943 through 1953. Helen Forrest is featured on several of the selections but mostly it is the Music Makers who stand out. I hope you enjoy this set of live recordings by Harry James and His Orchestra.

This week we are going to continue listening to the many theme songs used by the big bands. Theme songs were usually the first song played by a band when they were appearing or broadcasting live. It let the audience know whose band they were listening to. I tried to find all the original recordings of the bands. I hope you enjoy this look at the Big Band's theme songs.

This week I am going to start a three part look at the theme songs of the big bands. Each band had a song or a theme with which they would open and close their performances. I tried to find all the original recordings of the bands. I hope you enjoy this look at the Big Band's theme songs.

This week we pay a tribute to the late arranger and tenor saxophonist Bill Holman. Bill got his start as a saxophonist in the Stan Kenton orchestra and then proved to be a great arranger as well. He went on to write arrangements for many bands and artists. He passed away at the age of 94. So I hope you enjoy this tribute to the late Bill Holman.

Hello as we celebrate the Fourth of July this week.I tried to find as many Patriotic songs from the Big Band Era as I could. I hope you will help me celebrate this special holiday as we listen to some patriotic music.

As I am back from vacation, I am going to try and catch up with the podcasts. We continue this week with a program I did a few years ago on the Summer season of the year. I am looking at songs that have the words summer, june, July or Hot or anything that deals with summer. I hope you enjoy this Big Band salute to summer.

Summer is a special time of year. It means many different things to people all over the world. Today's program is a look at the many different songs of Summer recorded by the Big Bands. I have included the word Summer in the title and also the months of June, July and August and a few with the word hot. I hope you enjoy this program of assorted songs about the Summer season.

Hello everyone. We lost a very special vocalist this past March. Steve Lawrence passed away at the age of 88. He had been ill with Alzheimer's Disease for the last few years. I usually play big bands and vocalists associated with the Big Bands but Steve came up during the last years of the Big band era so I wanted to do a tribute to this great vocalist. Most of the songs on the show today are from the Great American Songbook. We will also learn about his career as I pay a tribute to the late, great vocalist Steve Lawrence.

Hello and welcome to another program of Big Band Remotes as we remember the many men and women who took part in the invasion of France called D-Day. Today we feature Les Brown, Bob Chester, Jan Savitt and Gene Krupa. These bands all appeared on a show called the Victory Parade of Spotlight Bands. This show was sponsored by Coca Cola. I hope you enjoy this repeat of a show I produced a few years ago.

In honor of the 80th anniversary of D-Day, I have pulled out a show I produced about ten years ago that has three remotes from World War Two. Two are from the Victory Parade of Spotlight Bands program. Big Bands always seemed to perform better in front of an audience. The solos are more exciting and the tempos are a little quicker. I hope you hear some of exciting sounds from these live performances.

May 13th is the birthday of Woody Herman and if he were alive today that would have been his 111th birthday. We continue our celebration of his birthday with some of his hits from the 1940's. These are some of my favorite recordings from the Herman Herd, songs like Caldonia, Early Autumn, Four Brothers, Northwest Passage and more. Plus, in this episode I have a few segments from an interview that Woody gave in 1978. I hope you enjoy this salute to one of America's greatest big band leaders.

May 13th is the birthday of Woody Herman and if he were alive today that would have been his 111th birthday. To celebrate this milestone we will be playing some of his early recordings made between the years of 1939 and 1946 on the show today which is part one of two. I was fortunate enough to see the Herman band in person not once but twice. They were a very exciting band and I have been a fan every since I was in high school. I hope you enjoy this salute to one of America's greatest big band leaders.

This week I am continuing with part two of Big Band Remotes from World War 2 with two remotes from the Victory Parade of Spotlight Bands series. At the same time, however, I am having a birthday salute to a favorite bandleader of mine, the late Artie Shaw. Artie was born on May 23, 1910 and he also appeared on the Spotlight band program for five consecutive weeks in 1945. So to honor Artie I would like to play the first two programs in that series. The sound quality is very good and there are some exciting solos from trumpeter Roy Eldridge. I hope you enjoy this look back at some on location performances from the great Artie Shaw as we remember his birthday..

On this week's show I would like to honor a request. A listener asked for some big band remotes that took place during World War 2. Most of the remotes I have during that era are from the Victory Parade of Spotlight Bands program. I found four 15 minute shows so on the program today we will be listening to the bands of Tommy Dorsey, Bob Chester, Benny Goodman, and Les Brown. Three of the shows are from 1943 and one is from 1944. I hope you enjoy this look back at some on location performances from four of America's top bands.

Lionel Hampton was born on April 20, 1908 in Louisville, Kentucky. I first discovered the great playing of Lionel when he was a member of the Benny Goodman Quartet. Join me as we celebrate the birthday of this true jazz master. I have lots of different recordings that Lionel is featured on as well as a look at his career. So get ready to tap your feet as we listen to and celebrate the amazing vibraphonist, Lionel Hampton.

Duke Ellington was born on April 29, 1899 so to remember his birthday and to listen to some of his amazing music, I am repeating this show from 2013. There is lots of Ellington originals in this show as well as some information on his amazing life. I hope you will join me in celebrating the birthday of one of music's greatest composers, Duke Ellington.

Steven Spielberg and Tom Hanks have produced their third series about World War Two called Masters of the Air. It is a nine part series about the pilots who flew the B-17 Bombers into Germany during WW2. There are several big band songs played throughout the series so I researched what songs were played and put together this show. There were only a couple of songs that I did not have so I don't think you'll mind my substitutions. I hope you enjoy the songs from the nine part series called Masters of the Air.

Copilot is the name of an artificial intelligence engine that is now included in Microsoft's Edge web browser. I posed this question to Copilot: could it pick out 16 songs from the 1930's and 1940's that were representative of the big bands of that era. After a couple minutes had gone by, Copilot displayed this list. It is a very interesting list and I had most of the songs in my collection and if I didn't have the version Copilot suggested I substituted one that I did have. Also, the little blurbs about the songs that I read were generated by Copilot. I think this is going to be a very useful tool for content creators going into the future. The puzzler is back this week so I hope you enjoy these selections from an artificial intelligence engine name Copilot.

Well, hello everyone and welcome to part four of our Glenn Miller Birthday salute. On today's show, as on the other three parts, we will be looking at the Band of the Allied Training Command. I have two radio remotes from the I Sustain the Wings series. That was a show of most patriotic music by the Army Air Force Orchestra. So I hope you will sit back and relax and listen to Glenn announce the numbers as we honor one of the most popular bandleaders of all time.

Hello and welcome to this week's Big Band Bash. We are continuing our Glenn Miller Birthday Salute with a look at the Army Air Force Orchestra. Today's show features a live broadcast by that orchestra with Glenn doing the announcing. It is a great broadcast and is sure to stir up some patriotic feelings. Glenn was born on March 01, 1904 and it is his bands and orchestra we think of when we had so many of our soldiers fighting in World War Two. I hope you enjoy this broadcast of the Allied Expeditionary Forces Orchestra directed by Major Glenn Miller.

Hello everyone. I am a little late with this week's program. This week I am going to continue with our birthday salute to the late Glenn Miller. This is part two of a four part series I produced back in 2022. To celebrate Glenn's birthday that year I decided to put together a look at his Army Air Force Orchestra. The recordings come from a four disc set that I have in my collection. We will be learning about that great organization and their importance towards the war effort and listening to those great Miller recordings. Happy Birthday Glenn!

Greetings everyone. March first is the birthday of the late Glenn Miller. To celebrate his birthday, I am running a repeat of a four part series looking at Glenn's Army Air Force Orchestra. This comes from a four record set that i have in my collection. There is a lot of great songs in this set and I hope you enjoy the music. I apologize for being late. The radio statio where I work and produce Big Band Bash is under going some maintenance. I should be back on schedule next week. Happy Birthday Glenn!

This past week we observed a leap day, February 29th. Born on February 29, 1904 was Jimmy Dorsey. To observe his birthday and pay tribute, I went through my cds and came across two that were recorded in the years of 1939 and 1940. There are some nice recordings in this set. I wanted to do something different rather than play all his hits which I have done on other programs. So we will learn about the career of the late Jimmy Dorsey and listen to music that he recorded in 1939 and 1940.

We wind up our celebration of Black History Month with a look at some of the many vocalists recording during the big band era. Some of the singers on the show today include Ella Fitzgerald, Billie Holiday, Billy Eckstein, Helen Humes and many more. I hope you enjoy this selection of the many talented African-American vocalists as we conclude Black History Month.

Duke Ellington's band and music holds an important place among my musical heroes. I have been collecting records and cds by Ellington for many years. So I have decided to include him in our list of bands as we continue our celebration of Black History Month. I have narrowed our focus on Duke to the years of 1940 through 1941. This was a very productive period for Ellington and I am sure to play some of your favorites by the Duke. I hope you enjoy this focus on the late Duke Ellington as we continue Black History Month.

We start our celebration of Black History Month with a look at the big band of Earl Fatha Hines. Earl was a very influential pianist in whose big band he had players such as Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker. Count Basie called him the greatest pianist in the world. He made a lot of recordings with small groups but we are going to focus in on his big band. I hope you enjoy this look at the career and big band of the great Earl Hines.

Well, this is week four and the last in the series The Complete RCA Victor Recordings of Artie Shaw. These recordings were made in the years of 1944 and 1945 when Artie was living in California after his discharge from the US Navy. After these recordings were made, Artie signed with the MusicCraft label and never recorder for RCA again. There are some great recordings here as Artie liked to make recordings out of the Great American Songbook. I hope you enjoyed this series and will tune in again for more music of the fabulous big bands.

Benny Goodman's orchestra was the first big band that I ever listened to. But I kept reading about his rival, Artie Shaw. So I bought a vinyl two record set called This is Artie Shaw. Well, I was just knocked out with those 1938 recordings. Today we will continue with part three of the Complete RCA Bluebird Recordings of Artie Shaw. We are now in Volume 5 which includes the period shortly before the start of World War II. Artie was in California during this time and was including a string section with his orchestra which gave the recordings a different sound. I hope you enjoy this set as we will be winding up this series next week.

Benny Goodman's orchestra was the first big band that I ever listened to. But I kept reading about his rival, Artie Shaw. So I bought a vinyl two record set called This is Artie Shaw. Well I was just knocked out with those 1938 recordings. Today we will continue with part two of the Complete RCA Bluebird Recordings of Artie Shaw. Some of the songs we will hear inclue Out of Nowhere, Day In, Day Out, Stardust, Summit Ridge Drive and others. We will also continue with our biography of Artie Shaw. These are some of the best big band songs from that era. I hope you enjoy Part Two of the Complete RCA Victor Recordings of Artie Shaw.

Benny Goodman's orchestra was the first big band that I ever listened to. But I kept reading about his rival, Artie Shaw. So I bought a vinyl two record set called This is Artie Shaw. Well I was just knocked out with those 1938 recordings. When RCA started it's Complete Bluebird reissues, I bought them from a record store that wasn't having much success selling them. They put them in the cutout bin and I snatched them up. On the program today we will start at the beginning of Artie's Bluebird recordings and make it into volume two. We will also learn about his career as we start part one of this four part series. I hope you enjoy Part One of the Complete RCA Victor Recordings of Artie Shaw.

Hello everyone. This week concludes our salute to the late Tommy Dorsey. We will be looking at his career and music from about 1939 to 1956 when he passed away. We will be listening to a lot of the Sinatra - Dorsey classics from that era. He really didn't have many hits after 1946 when many bandleaders disbanded, the result of effects from World War 2. So I hope you enjoy this tribute to the late Tommy Dorsey.

Hello everyone. November 19, 1905 is the birthday of the late bandleader and trombonist Tommy Dorsey. He also passed away on November 26, 1956. Since both these date occur in the month of November, I though I would like to revisit the music and career of the Sentimental Gentleman of Swing, Tommy Dorsey. I decided to play many of the classic Dorsey hits so I hope some of your favorites are on today's show which will conclude next week. We will also take a look at his amazing career so I hope you enjoy part one of my Tommy Dorsey salute.