Beauty is in the Eyes (of the Listener)

Harry Waren: All-time favorite written for Dick Powell to serenade Olivia De Havilland within a boat on a lake! “You must have been a beautiful baby” has been successfully revived more than once over the years. This was the first hit that Harry co-wrote with Johnny Mercer which is by far the highlight of the film “Hard To Get.”

Bing Crosby : Meanwhile, record executive Jack Kapp, using Bing’s loyalty to him as a come-on, found backing to start his own company, Decca, which saved the then moribund industry by lowering the price of records. (does it ring a bell?).

National Endowment for the Arts : By the early 1950s, Camero was a featured soloist with the Stan Kenton Orchestra, with whom he toured the U.S. playing three congas (at a time when other congueros were playing only one) in addition to a cowbell and guiro (a fluted gourd played with strokes from a stick).

Cortijo Y Su Combo@MySpace.com : Cortijo learned how to make the timbas from them; the barrel drums which he used to entice a young Ismael Rivera to join his descargas at the beach. For the next three decades, these close friends lived a life in which whatever they experienced as individuals, was lived by them both, as one: fame, alcohol and drug addiction and even jail.

Hard Bop : Admired by the modernists at Minton’s no less than by the swing-styled players of his own generation on 52nd Street, Don Byas was celebrated as a tireless, original and influential saxophonist. His solo on Basie’s “Harvard Blues” had created a stir in 1941 and he followed it with a remarkable series of recordings for small labels. In his romantic approach to “Laura,” he had something of a hit.

Russell Windle@Amazon.com : Triste means “sad” in Portugese, and sad I am that Antonio Carlos Jobim is no longer with us. This two CD set featuring the songs of Jobim performed by Gal Costa is probably the greatest tribute to Jobim I have heard and it has been my pleasure to own.

Lucho Gatica : Lucho’s personal life has been as intense as his professional life. “With a sweetheart in every port” he was considered a playboy during the first part of his career, but in 1960 Lucho made headlines when he married beauty queen-actress Mapita Cortes who had represented Puerto Rico in the 1957 Miss Universe Pageant.

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