1.
Gibson Les Paul
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The Gibson Les Paul is a solid body electric guitar that was first sold by the Gibson Guitar Corporation in 1952. The Les Paul was designed by Gibson president Ted McCarty, factory manager John Huis and their team, the Les Paul was originally offered with a gold finish and two P-90 pickups. In 1957, humbucking pickups were added, along with sunburst finishes in 1958, the sunburst 1958–1960 Les Paul – today one of the best-known electric guitar types in the world – was considered a failure, with low production and sales. For 1961, the Les Paul was redesigned into what is now known as the Gibson SG and this design continued as a separate guitar when the traditional single cutaway, carved top bodystyle was re-introduced in 1963. The Les Paul has been produced in countless versions and editions since. Along with Fenders Telecaster and Stratocaster, it was one of the first mass-produced electric solid-body guitars, Les Pauls have been used in many genres, including rock, country, pop, soul, rhythm and blues, blues, jazz, reggae, punk, and heavy metal. In 1950, the ancestors of Fender Telecaster were introduced to the musical market, in reaction to market demand, Gibson Guitar president Ted McCarty brought guitarist Les Paul into the company as a consultant. Les Paul was an innovator who had been experimenting with guitar design for years. He hand-built a solid-body prototype called The Log, often suggested as the first solid-body Spanish guitar ever built, in 1951, Paul, McCarty, and his team at the Gibson Guitar Corporation began work on what would eventually become the Les Paul Model. Early prototypes are very similar to the final version, the new Les Paul guitar was to be an expensive, well-made instrument in accordance with Gibsons reputation at the time. Although recollections differ regarding who contributed what to the Les Paul design, however, this reversal would have caused the guitar to become too heavy, and Pauls request was refused. Paul states that the original Custom should have had the maple cap, Les Pauls contributions to the guitar line bearing his name were more than cosmetic, but certainly included them. For example, Paul specified that the guitar be offered in a finish, not only for flashiness. The later-issue Les Paul models included flame maple and quilted maple tops, the 1952 Les Pauls featured two P-90 single coil pickups, and a one-piece, trapeze-style bridge/tailpiece with strings fitted under a steel stop-bar. The guitar made its debut when Paul used it onstage in June,1952. On July 24,1952, at a special musicians clinic at the Waldorf-Astoria hotel, it was previewed by prominent guitarists such as Tiger Haynes, George Barnes, Mundell Lowe, Tony Mottola, and Billy Mure. The clinic preceded the annual NAMM Show held at the New Yorker hotel starting July 27, a second Les Paul model was introduced in 1953. Called the Les Paul Custom, this guitar with gold-plated hardware was dubbed the Black Beauty
2.
Iridium Jazz Club
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The Iridium Jazz Club is a jazz club located on Broadway in New York City. The club hosts weekly performances by John Colianni, and also featured performances by Les Paul for nearly fifteen years. The club opened in January 1994 at its location, at 63rd Street and 8th Avenue. Unlike many of New York Citys jazz clubs, it has remained open to the present day, beginning in 1995 and continuing until his death at age 94, guitar legend Les Paul performed weekly at the club. According to New York magazine, the Iridium does its best to recreate the days of the 1920s and 1930s. List of jazz clubs The Irirdiums web site Iridium Jazz Club on Twitter
3.
Waukesha, Wisconsin
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Waukesha is a city in and the county seat of Waukesha County, Wisconsin. A suburb of Milwaukee, it is part of the Milwaukee metropolitan area and its population was 70,718 at the 2010 census. The city is adjacent to the Town of Waukesha, the area that Waukesha now encompasses was first settled by European-Americans in 1834, with Morris D. Cutler as its first settler. When the first settlers arrived, there was nothing but dense virgin forest, the settlers laid out farms, constructed roads, erected government buildings and established post routes. Waukesha was a New England settlement and these people were Yankee settlers, that is to say they were descended from the English Puritans who settled New England in the 1600s. They were part of a wave of New England farmers who headed west into what was then the wilds of the Northwest Territory during the early 1800s. Most of them arrived as a result of the completion of the Erie Canal as well as the end of the Black Hawk War. They brought with them many of their Yankee New England values, such as a passion for education and they were mostly members of the Congregationalist Church though some were Episcopalian. Due to the second Great Awakening some of them had converted to Methodism, Waukesha, like much of Wisconsin, would be culturally very continuous with early New England culture for most of its early history. By 1846, the area was incorporated as the village of Prairieville, on February 8,1847, the village changed its name to Waukesha, and in 1896, incorporated as a city. The first appointed mayor of the incorporated city of Waukesha was John Brehm. Wau-tsha was the leader of the tribe at the time of the first European settlement of the area. This is confirmed by accounts of Increase A. Lapham, an early settler, according to Lapham, the word for fox was pishtaka. Cutler also told visitors about Wau-tsha, who was described as tall and athletic, proud in his bearing, dignified, Waukesha was once known for its extremely clean and good-tasting spring water and was called a spa town. This earned the city the nicknames, Spring City, and, testimonials found in a Dunbar brochure of 1873 proclaimed the miraculous benefits. Wendt reports that by 1872, area newspapers carried accounts of a community ill equipped to handle its new popularity among the suffering multitudes. The semi-weekly Wisconsin of July 31,1872, reported that fully 500 visitors are quartered in hotels and scattered in private families here, seeking benefit from the marvelous waters. The healing waters were so valued that an attempt was made to build a pipeline between the city and Chicago so that they could be enjoyed by visitors to the 1893 Columbian Exposition
4.
White Plains, New York
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White Plains is a city in Westchester County, New York, United States. It is the county seat and commercial hub of Westchester, an affluent suburban county just north of New York City that is home to almost one million people, White Plains is located in south-central Westchester, with its downtown 25 miles north of Midtown Manhattan. As of 2013, the total population was estimated to be 57,866. According to the city government, the daytime population is estimated at 250,000. The city was ranked third in the top 10 places to live in New York for 2014, according to national online real estate brokerage Movoto. At the time of the Dutch settlement of Manhattan in the early 17th century, however, John Richbell of Mamaroneck claimed to have earlier title to much of the territory through his purchase of a far larger plot extending 20 miles inland, perhaps from a different tribe. The matter wasnt settled until 1721, when a Royal Patent for White Plains was granted by King George II, the unincorporated village remained part of the Town of Rye until 1788, when the town of White Plains was created. On July 9,1776, a copy of the Declaration of Independence was delivered to the New York Provincial Congress, the delegates quickly adopted a resolution approving the Declaration, thus declaring both the colonys independence and the formation of the State of New York. The Declaration itself was first publicly read from the steps of the courthouse on July 11, the Battle of White Plains took place primarily on Chatterton Hill, and the Bronx River. Howes forces had suffered 250 casualties, a loss, and he made no attempt to pursue the Continentals, whose casualties were about 125 dead. Three days after the battle Washington withdrew north of the village, but after several inconclusive skirmishes over the next week Howe withdrew on November 5, leaving White Plains to the Continentals. Although he was court-martialed and convicted for this action, he escaped punishment, the first United States Census, conducted in 1790, listed the White Plains population at 505, of whom 46 were slaves. By 1800, the population stood at 575 and in 1830,830, by 1870,26 years after the arrival of the New York Central Railroad, it had swollen to 2,630 and by 1890 to 4,508. In the decades that followed the count grew to 7,899 and 26,425, White Plains was incorporated as a village in 1866 and as a city in 1916. Early in the 20th century, White Plains downtown area developed into a dominant suburban shopping district and featured branch stores of many famous New York-based department and specialty stores. Some of these locations were the first large-scale suburban stores built in the United States. With the construction of the parkways and expressways in the 1940s and 1960s, with a city opening ceremony Macys launched a grand White Plains store on Main Street across from City Hall in 1949. As the mayor said at the time, this was a significant event in the life of White Plains, at the time of its construction, the Westchester One building was the largest office building between New York City and Albany, and east to Hartford
5.
Jazz
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Jazz is a music genre that originated amongst African Americans in New Orleans, United States, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and developed from roots in Blues and Ragtime. Since the 1920s jazz age, jazz has become recognized as a form of musical expression. Jazz is characterized by swing and blue notes, call and response vocals, polyrhythms, Jazz has roots in West African cultural and musical expression, and in African-American music traditions including blues and ragtime, as well as European military band music. Although the foundation of jazz is deeply rooted within the Black experience of the United States, different cultures have contributed their own experience, intellectuals around the world have hailed jazz as one of Americas original art forms. As jazz spread around the world, it drew on different national, regional, and local musical cultures, New Orleans jazz began in the early 1910s, combining earlier brass-band marches, French quadrilles, biguine, ragtime and blues with collective polyphonic improvisation. In the 1930s, heavily arranged dance-oriented swing big bands, Kansas City jazz, bebop emerged in the 1940s, shifting jazz from danceable popular music toward a more challenging musicians music which was played at faster tempos and used more chord-based improvisation. Cool jazz developed in the end of the 1940s, introducing calmer, smoother sounds and long, modal jazz developed in the late 1950s, using the mode, or musical scale, as the basis of musical structure and improvisation. Jazz-rock fusion appeared in the late 1960s and early 1970s, combining jazz improvisation with rock rhythms, electric instruments. In the early 1980s, a form of jazz fusion called smooth jazz became successful. Other styles and genres abound in the 2000s, such as Latin, the question of the origin of the word jazz has resulted in considerable research, and its history is well documented. It is believed to be related to jasm, a term dating back to 1860 meaning pep. The use of the word in a context was documented as early as 1915 in the Chicago Daily Tribune. Its first documented use in a context in New Orleans was in a November 14,1916 Times-Picayune article about jas bands. In an interview with NPR, musician Eubie Blake offered his recollections of the slang connotations of the term, saying, When Broadway picked it up. That was dirty, and if you knew what it was, the American Dialect Society named it the Word of the Twentieth Century. Jazz has proved to be difficult to define, since it encompasses such a wide range of music spanning a period of over 100 years. Attempts have been made to define jazz from the perspective of other musical traditions, in the opinion of Robert Christgau, most of us would say that inventing meaning while letting loose is the essence and promise of jazz. As Duke Ellington, one of jazzs most famous figures, said, although jazz is considered highly difficult to define, at least in part because it contains so many varied subgenres, improvisation is consistently regarded as being one of its key elements
6.
Country music
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Country music is a genre of United States popular music that originated in the southern United States in the 1920s. It takes its roots from the genre of United States, such as folk music. Blues modes have been used throughout its recorded history. The term country music is used today to many styles and subgenres. In 2009 country music was the most listened to rush hour radio genre during the evening commute, immigrants to the Southern Appalachian Mountains of North America brought the music and instruments of Europe and Africa along with them for nearly 300 years. Country music was introduced to the world as a Southern phenomenon, Bristol, Tennessee, has been formally recognized by the U. S. Congress as the Birthplace of Country Music, based on the historic Bristol recording sessions of 1927. Since 2014, the city has been home to the Birthplace of Country Music Museum, historians have also noted the influence of the less-known Johnson City sessions of 1928 and 1929, and the Knoxville sessions of 1929 and 1930. Prior to these, pioneer settlers, in the Great Smoky Mountains region, had developed a musical heritage. The first generation emerged in the early 1920s, with Atlantas music scene playing a role in launching countrys earliest recording artists. Okeh Records began issuing hillbilly music records by Fiddlin John Carson as early as 1923, followed by Columbia Records in 1924, many hillbilly musicians, such as Cliff Carlisle, recorded blues songs throughout the 1920s. The most important was the Grand Ole Opry, aired starting in 1925 by WSM in Nashville, during the 1930s and 1940s, cowboy songs, or Western music, which had been recorded since the 1920s, were popularized by films made in Hollywood. Bob Wills was another musician from the Lower Great Plains who had become very popular as the leader of a hot string band. His mix of country and jazz, which started out as dance hall music, Wills was one of the first country musicians known to have added an electric guitar to his band, in 1938. Country musicians began recording boogie in 1939, shortly after it had played at Carnegie Hall. Gospel music remained a component of country music. It became known as honky tonk, and had its roots in Western swing and the music of Mexico. By the early 1950s a blend of Western swing, country boogie, rockabilly was most popular with country fans in the 1950s, and 1956 could be called the year of rockabilly in country music. Beginning in the mid-1950s, and reaching its peak during the early 1960s, the late 1960s in American music produced a unique blend as a result of traditionalist backlash within separate genres
7.
Blues
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Blues is a genre and musical form originated by African Americans in the Deep South of the United States around the end of the 19th century. The genre developed from roots in African musical traditions, African-American work songs, spirituals, Blues incorporated spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts, chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads. Blue notes, usually thirds or fifths flattened in pitch, are also a part of the sound. Blues shuffles or walking bass reinforce the trance-like rhythm and form a repetitive effect known as the groove, Blues as a genre is also characterized by its lyrics, bass lines, and instrumentation. Early traditional blues verses consisted of a single line repeated four times, Early blues frequently took the form of a loose narrative, often relating the troubles experienced in African-American society. Many elements, such as the format and the use of blue notes. The origins of the blues are closely related to the religious music of the Afro-American community. The first appearance of the blues is often dated to after the ending of slavery and, later and it is associated with the newly acquired freedom of the former slaves. Chroniclers began to report about blues music at the dawn of the 20th century, the first publication of blues sheet music was in 1908. Blues has since evolved from unaccompanied vocal music and oral traditions of slaves into a variety of styles and subgenres. Blues subgenres include country blues, such as Delta blues and Piedmont blues, as well as urban blues styles such as Chicago blues, World War II marked the transition from acoustic to electric blues and the progressive opening of blues music to a wider audience, especially white listeners. In the 1960s and 1970s, a form called blues rock evolved. The term blues may have come from blue devils, meaning melancholy and sadness, the phrase blue devils may also have been derived from Britain in the 1600s, when the term referred to the intense visual hallucinations that can accompany severe alcohol withdrawal. As time went on, the phrase lost the reference to devils, by the 1800s in the United States, the term blues was associated with drinking alcohol, a meaning which survives in the phrase blue law, which prohibits the sale of alcohol on Sunday. Though the use of the phrase in African-American music may be older, it has been attested to in print since 1912, in lyrics the phrase is often used to describe a depressed mood. The lyrics of traditional blues verses probably often consisted of a single line repeated four times. Two of the first published songs, Dallas Blues and Saint Louis Blues, were 12-bar blues with the AAB lyric structure. Handy wrote that he adopted this convention to avoid the monotony of lines repeated three times, the lines are often sung following a pattern closer to rhythmic talk than to a melody
8.
Mary Ford
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Mary Ford was an American vocalist and guitarist, comprising half of the husband-and-wife musical team Les Paul and Mary Ford. Between 1950 and 1954, the couple had 16 top-ten hits, including How High the Moon and Vaya con Dios, in 1951 alone they sold six million records. With Paul, Ford became one of the practitioners of multi-tracking. Williams, Carol Jean Corona, Bruce Summers, Eva Wootten, Ford came from a musical family. Her parents left Missouri, travelling cross-country while singing gospel music and they eventually settled in southern California, where they were heard over KPPC-AM, Pasadenas first Christian radio station. Her sisters and brothers were all musicians, Esther, Carol, Fletcher, jazz organist Bruce, in 1939 Summers and Milly won a Pasadena talent contest judged by several Hollywood notables, including a very young Judy Garland. Hoping to have a career, Summers and Milly Watson lost interest in school, played truant frequently and eventually quit school. They were regulars on The Hollywood Barn Dance, a successful weekly CBS Radio program broadcast on Saturday nights, and hosted by Foy Willing and emceed by Cliffie Stone. In 1944, the Sunshine Girls trio appeared with Wakely in the PRC film Im from Arkansas, in 1945, when Eddie Dean introduced her to guitarist Les Paul, she was a popular western vocalist on KXLAs Dinner Bell Round-Up Time. The two began performing together in 1946, after Summers left the Sunshine Girls to work with Paul and his trio, she was replaced initially by Marilyn Myers Tuttle. After Tuttle left, Summers older sister, Eva, sang with Earler and Widener as the Three Rays on the Jimmy Wakely Show on CBS, Colleen Summers appeared on Gene Autrys Melody Ranch CBS radio program as a cast member and featured vocalist from July through early November 1946. In 1946-48, Summers was an actor in the drama portion of The All-Star Western Theatre. By 1947, Summers became romantically involved with Paul, whose first marriage to Virginia M. Webb was failing, as it could no longer endure the stresses and strains of his show-business career. In January 1948, while traveling on Route 66 through Oklahoma, after the accident, Summers identified herself to authorities as Iris Watson. Among Paul’s many injuries, his elbow was shattered. After Pauls wife Virginia took their two sons to Chicago, Summers moved in with Paul in his house on Carson Avenue, by the summer of 1949, Summers was performing under the stage name of Mary Ford. That same year, Les Paul divorced his wife and wed Mary Ford on December 29 in a private ceremony without much fanfare in Milwaukee. The couple had had three children, a baby born on November 26,1954, who died four days later, Mary Colleen Paul, whom they fostered from 1958 and these songs featured Ford harmonizing with herself, giving the vocals a novel sound
9.
Jazz guitarist
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Jazz guitarists are guitar players who play jazz using an approach to chords, melodies, and improvised solo lines which is called jazz guitar playing. The guitar has fulfilled the roles of accompanist and soloist in small and large ensembles, in the 1930s, before guitar amplifiers were widely used, it was difficult for jazz guitarists playing acoustic instruments to be heard over drums, piano, or horn sections. As a result, jazz guitarists tended to act as accompanists, after guitar amplifiers were developed in the 1930s, electric guitarists such as George Barnes and Charlie Christian were able to project their solo sound over a jazz ensemble. The history of guitar has been an integral part of the wide-ranging history of jazz. The early guitar players were the great singers who accompanied themselves on the guitar. By the 1930s, guitarists gained prominence in jazz and some were featured performers, such as Carl Kress. In Europe, Django Reinhardt, a Belgian gypsy jazz guitarist recorded with his Quintette du Hot Club de France, beginning in 1939, Charlie Christian played with big band bandleader Benny Goodman, and in the bebop era, Tal Farlow was notable for his virtuoso playing. In the 1960s, guitarists tended to play in groups, such as Jim Hall. Wes Montgomery was a self-taught guitarist who used his thumb rather than a plectrum to produce his unique sound in his late-1950s and 1960s hard bop recordings. Joe Pass pioneered solo guitar with chordal substitutions in his duos with Ella Fitzgerald, grant Green was known for his 1960s organ trio music. Fusion guitarists such as Larry Coryell, John McLaughlin, Pat Metheny, the banjo, because of its loud volume, was an early stringed accompaniment instrument in jazz in New Orleans and Dixieland music. Banjoists such as Johnny St. Cyr and Bud Scott also played guitar in bands of the 1910s-1920s. Early jazz guitarists included Eddie Lang, Nick Lucas, Lonnie Johnson, Eddie Lang recorded in 1927 with Bix Beiderbecke and Frank Trumbauers classic Singin the Blues and was a popular studio guitarist, recording with Bing Crosby and Ruth Etting. Lang is credited with having the guitar replace the banjo as a rhythm instrument, even as late as the early 1930s sophisticated jazz orchestras such as the Duke Ellington band still used a banjo to provide a rhythmic pulse. During the 1930s, though, guitarists gained prominence in jazz, langs versatility allowed him to record on popular as well as blues and jazz records. He recorded blues duets with Lonnie Johnson as Blind Willie Dunn, Johnson had played with Louis Armstrongs Hot Five. Carl Kress and Dick McDonough made early guitar duo recordings, Kress was featured with the Paul Whiteman Orchestra in 1926. Kress initially played banjo and four-string guitar, changing over to six-string guitar in the 1930s, Kress used an unorthodox tuning that he created for himself
10.
Luthier
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A luthier is someone who builds or repairs string instruments generally consisting of a neck and a sound box. The word luthier comes from the French word luth, which means lute, a luthier was originally a maker of lutes, but the term now includes makers of stringed instruments such as the violin or classical guitar. A luthier does not make harps or pianos, as these require different skills, the craft of making string instruments, or lutherie, is commonly divided into two main categories, makers of stringed instruments that are plucked or strummed, and those that are bowed. Since bowed instruments require a bow, the category includes a subtype known as a bow maker or archetier. Luthiers may also teach string-instrument making, either through apprenticeship or formal classroom instruction, Antonio Torres Jurado is credited with developing the form of classical guitar still in use today. Christian Frederick Martin of Germany developed a form evolved into the modern steel-string acoustic guitar. The American luthier Orville Gibson specialized in mandolins, and is credited with creating the archtop guitar, the important 20th-century American luthiers John DAngelico and Jimmy DAquisto made archtop guitars. Lloyd Loar worked briefly for the Gibson Guitar Corporation making mandolins and his designs for a family of arch top instruments are held in high esteem by todays luthiers, who seek to reproduce their sound. Concurrent with Fenders work, guitarist Les Paul independently developed an electric guitar. A company founded by luthier Friedrich Gretsch and continued by his son and grandson, Fred and Fred, Jr. originally made banjos, vintage guitars are often sought by collectors. Bowed instruments include, cello, crwth, double bass, erhu, fiddle, hudok, mouthbow, nyckelharpa, hurdy-gurdy, rabab, rebec, sarangi, viol, viola, viola da braccio, viola damore, the purported inventor of the violin is Andrea Amati. Amati was originally a maker, but turned to the new instrument form of violin in the mid-16th century. He was the progenitor of the famous Amati family of luthiers active in Cremona and his eldest was Antonio Amati, and the younger, Girolamo Amati. It is even possible Bartolomeo Cristofori, later inventor of the piano, gasparo da Salò of Brescia was another important early luthier of the violin family. About 80 of his instruments survive, and around 100 documents that relate to his work and he was also a double bass player and son and nephew of two violin players, Francesco and Agosti, respectively. Gasparo Duiffopruggar of Füssen, Germany, was incorrectly credited as the inventor of the violin. He was likely an important maker, but no documentation survives, da Salò made many instruments and exported to France and Spain, and probably to England. He had at least five apprentices, his son Francesco, a helper named Battista, Alexander of Marsiglia, Maggini inherited da Salòs business in Brescia
11.
Solid body
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The most well-known solid body instruments are the electric guitar and electric bass. These were instrumental in creating new genres of such as rock. Common woods used in the construction of solid body instruments are ash, alder, maple, mahogany, korina, spruce, rosewood, the first two make up the majority of solid body electric guitars. Solid body instruments have some of the features as acoustic string instruments. Like a typical string instrument they have a neck with tuners for the strings, a bridge, the fretboard is a piece of wood placed on the top surface of the neck, extending from the head to the body. The strings run above the fingerboard, some fingerboards have frets or bars which the strings are pressed against. This allows musicians to stop the string in the same place, ebony, rosewood and maple are commonly used to make the fingerboard. Some electric guitar necks do not have a piece of wood for the fingerboard surface. All the solid bodies have variations in length or, the length of the strings from the nut to the bridge. The action, or the height of the strings from the fingerboard, is adjustable on solid body instruments, most solid bodies have controls for volume and tone. Some have an electronic preamplifier with equalization for low, middle and these are used to shape the sound along with the aid of the main amplifier. Amplifiers allow solid body instruments to be heard at high volumes when desired, while noting this, it will be assumed that electric lap steels without sounding boards are solid-body instruments for the purposes of this article. The first commercially successful solid-body instrument was the Rickenbacker frying pan lap steel guitar, the first commercially successful solid-body electric guitar was the Fender Broadcaster in 1950. A trademark dispute with the Gretsch Corporation who marketed a line of Broadcaster drums led to a change to the current designation. Fender also produced a one pickup version called the Fender Esquire starting in 1950 and these were followed by the Gibson Les Paul in 1952. Solid Body Electric Guitars The solid body electric guitar is one of the most well-known solid body instruments, instrumental in rock, metal, blues, and country music, the electric guitar has been responsible for creating various sounds. There are some characteristics of solid body electric guitars. They typically have six strings although there are some seven- and eight-string models, most have at least a volume and tone control
12.
History of sound recording
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Experiments in capturing sound on a recording medium for preservation and reproduction began in earnest during the Industrial Revolution of the 1800s. The earliest practical recording technologies were entirely mechanical devices and these recorders typically used a large conical horn to collect and focus the physical air pressure of the sound waves produced by the human voice or musical instruments. By the end of the era, the disc had become the standard medium for sound recording. Contemporary with these developments, the industry was engaged in a frantic race to develop practical methods of recording synchronised sound for films. Early attempts — such as the landmark 1927 film The Jazz Singer – used pre-recorded discs which were played in synchronisation with the action on the screen, the most common form of electro-acoustic speaker the dynamic loudspeaker – which is effectively a dynamic microphone in reverse. This device typically consists of a flattened conical acoustic diaphragm suspended in a metal ring, the third wave of development in audio recording began in 1945, when the allied nations gained access to a new German invention - magnetic tape recording. The technology was invented in the 1930s, but remained restricted to Germany until the end of World War II, the fourth and current phase, the digital era, has seen the most rapid, dramatic and far-reaching series of changes in the history of audio recording. When played back through a converter, these audio samples are recombined to form a continuous flow of sound. The uploading and downloading of large volumes of digital files at high speed was facilitated by freeware file sharing technologies such as Napster. Although infringement remains a significant issue for copyright owners, the development of digital audio has had benefits for consumers. The Digital Audio File marked the end of one era in recording, a performer who recorded too strongly or not strongly enough would be moved away from or nearer to the mouth of the cone. The number and kind of instruments that could be recorded were limited, brass instruments, which recorded well, were often substituted for instruments such as cellos and bass fiddles, which did not. In some early recordings, a block of wood was used in place of the bass drum. In 1857, Édouard-Léon Scott de Martinville invented the phonautograph, the first device that could record sound waves as they passed through the air and it was intended only for visual study of the recording and could not play back the sound. The recording medium was a sheet of soot-coated paper wrapped around a cylinder carried on a threaded rod. An inventor from America soon eclipsed this idea, and it was not until 1887 that yet another inventor, Emile Berliner, actually photoengraved a phonautograph recording into metal and played it back. Scotts early recordings languished in French archives until 2008, when scholars keen to resurrect the sounds captured in these and other types of early experimental recordings tracked them down. Rather than using rough 19th century technology to create playable versions, they were scanned into a computer, brief excerpts from two French songs and a recitation in Italian, all recorded in 1860, are the most substantial results
13.
Delay (audio effect)
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Delay is an audio effect and an effects unit which records an input signal to an audio storage medium, and then plays it back after a period of time. The delayed signal may either be played multiple times, or played back into the recording again. Delay effects range from an echo effect to a pronounced blending of previous sounds with new sounds. The first delay effects were achieved using tape loops improvised on reel-to-reel magnetic recording systems, by shortening or lengthening the loop of tape and adjusting the read and write heads, the nature of the delayed echo could be controlled. Audio engineers working in music quickly adapted similar techniques, to augment their use of plate reverb. In the late 1940s and early 1950s, several sound engineers began making devices for use in recording studios, guitarist and instrument designer Les Paul was an early pioneer in delay devices. A landmark device was the EchoSonic made by American Ray Butts and it is a portable guitar amplifier with a built-in tape echo, which became used widely in country music and especially in rock and roll. Tape echoes became commercially available in the 1950s, an echo machine is the early name for a sound processing device used with electronic instruments to repeat the sound and produce a simulated echo. The device was popular with guitarists and was used by Brian May, Jimmy Page, One example is the Echoplex which used a tape loop. The length of delay was adjusted by changing the distance between the record and playback heads. Another example is the Roland Space Echo with a record and multiple tape heads. The time between echo repeats was adjusted by varying the tape speed, the length or intensity of the echo effect was adjusted by changing the amount of echo signal was fed back into the pre-echo signal. Different effects could be created by combining the different playback heads, some models also included a spring reverb. Before the invention of audio technology, music employing a delayed echo had to be recorded in a naturally reverberant space, often an inconvenience for musicians. The presence of multiple taps made it possible to have delays at varying rhythmic intervals, many delay processors based on analog tape recording, such as Ray Butts EchoSonic, Mike Battles Echoplex, or the Roland Space Echo, used magnetic tape as their recording and playback medium. Electric motors guided a tape loop through a device with a variety of mechanisms allowing modification of the effects parameters, in the Space Echo, all of the heads are fixed, but the speed of the tape could be adjusted, changing the delay time. Thin magnetic tape was not entirely suited for operation, however. Several designs were made, the 1959 Ecco-Fonic had a spinning head, many were temperamental, such as the Vox Echomatic
14.
Phaser (effect)
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A phaser is an electronic sound processor used to filter a signal by creating a series of peaks and troughs in the frequency spectrum. The position of the peaks and troughs of the waveform being affected is typically modulated so that they vary over time, for this purpose, phasers usually include a low-frequency oscillator. The electronic phasing effect is created by splitting an audio signal into two paths, one path treats the signal with an all-pass filter, which preserves the amplitude of the original signal and alters the phase. The amount of change in phase depends on the frequency, when signals from the two paths are mixed, the frequencies that are out of phase will cancel each other out, creating the phasers characteristic notches. Changing the mix ratio changes the depth of the notches, the deepest notches occur when the mix ratio is 50%, the definition of phaser typically excludes such devices where the all-pass section is a delay line, such a device is called a flanger. Using a delay line creates a series of equally spaced notches. It is possible to cascade a delay line with another type of all-pass filter and this combines the unlimited number of notches from the flanger with the uneven spacing of the phaser. Traditional electronic phasers use a series of variable all-pass phase-shift networks which alter the phases of the different frequency components in the signal and these networks pass all frequencies at equal volume, introducing only phase change to the signal. Human ears are not very responsive to phase differences, but this creates audible interferences when mixed back with the dry signal, creating notches. The simplified structure of a phaser is shown below, The number of all-pass filters varies with different models. Digital phasers may offer up to 32 or even more and this determines the number of notches/peaks in the sound, affecting the general sound character. A phaser with n stages generally has n/2 notches in the spectrum, additionally, the output can be fed back to the input for a more intense effect, creating a resonant effect by emphasizing frequencies between notches. This involves feeding the output of the all-pass filter chain back to the input, as shown here, note that the peaks between the notches are sharper when theres feedback, giving a distinct sound. A stereo phaser is usually two identical phasers modulated by a signal, the output of the oscillators for the left. Most modern phasers are a part of a signal processor. Phasers are mostly found as plugins for sound editing software, as a part of a monolithic rackmount sound effect unit, phasing is a popular effect for electric guitar. The term was used to refer to the original tape flanging effect heard on many psychedelic records of the late 1960s. By the early 1970s, phasing was available as a portable guitar effect, in the late 1970s, Brian May used large amounts of phasing, in such songs as Sheer Heart Attack
15.
Multitrack recording
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Multitracking became possible in the mid-1950s when the idea of simultaneously recording different audio channels to separate discrete tracks on the same reel-to-reel tape was developed. Prior to the development of recording, all of the singers, band instrumentalists, and/or orchestra accompanists had to sing. Multitracking allowed the engineer to adjust the levels and tone of each individual track, as well, different electronic effects such as reverb could be applied to specific tracks, such as the lead vocals, while not being applied to other tracks where this effect would not be desirable. In the 1980s and 1990s, computers provided means by which sound recording and reproduction could be digitized, revolutionizing audio recording and distribution. Though magnetic tape has not been replaced as a recording medium. Even in the 2010s, with digital multitracking being the dominant technology, with the introduction of SMPTE timecode in the early 1970s, engineers began to use computers to perfectly synchronize separate audio and video playback, and or multiple audio tape machines. In this system, one track of each carried the timecode signal. Some large studios were able to link multiple 24-track machines together, an extreme example of this occurred in 1982, when the rock group Toto recorded Toto IV on three synchronized 24-track machines. This setup theoretically provided for up to 69 audio tracks, which is far more than necessary for most recording projects. For computer-based systems, the trend in the 2000s is towards unlimited numbers of tracks, although issues such as RAM memory. Moreover, on computer-based systems, the number of available recording tracks is limited by the number of sound card discrete analog or digital inputs. At any given point on the tape, any of the tracks on the device can be recording or playing back using sel-sync or Selective Synchronous recording. They might then record a version on track 4 while listening to the other tracks. All the tracks can then be played back in perfect synchrony and this can be repeated until all of the available tracks have been used, or in some cases, reused. During mix down a set of playback heads with higher fidelity are used. Before all tracks are filled, any number of existing tracks can be bounced into one or two tracks, and the original tracks erased, making room for more tracks to be reused for fresh recording. In 1963, The Beatles were using twin track for Please Please Me, the Beach Boys Pet Sounds also made innovative use of multitracking with 8-track machines of the day. Motown also began recording with 8-track machines in 1965 before moving to 16-track machines in mid-1969, a recording engineer can record only the section being worked on, without erasing any other section of that track
16.
Lick (music)
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In popular music genres such as rock or jazz music, a lick is a stock pattern or phrase consisting of a short series of notes that is used in solos and melodic lines and accompaniment. Licks in rock and roll are often used through a formula, in a jazz band, a lick may be performed during an improvised solo, either during an accompanied solo chorus or during an unaccompanied solo break. Jazz licks are usually original short phrases which can be altered so that they can be used over a songs changing harmonic progressions, a lick is different from the related concept of a riff in that riffs can also include repeated chord progressions. Licks are usually associated with single-note melodic lines rather than chord progressions, however, like riffs, licks can be used as the basis of an entire song. Single-line riffs or licks used as the basis of Western classical music pieces are called ostinatos, contemporary jazz writers also use riff- or lick-like ostinatos in modal music and Latin jazz. A lick can be a hook, if the lick meets the definition of a hook, a idea, a passage or phrase, that is believed to be appealing and make the song stand out. A lick may be incorporated into a fill, which is a short passage played in the pause between phrases of a melody, for musicians, learning a lick is usually a form of imitation. Imitating style is as important as learning the appropriate scale over a given chords, by imitating, musicians understand and analyze what others have done, which in turn allows them to build a vocabulary of their own
17.
Trill (music)
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The trill is a musical ornament consisting of a rapid alternation between two adjacent notes, usually a semitone or tone apart, which can be identified with the context of the trill. It is sometimes referred to by the German Triller, the Italian trillo, a cadential trill is a trill associated with a cadence. A trill provides rhythmic interest, melodic interest, and—through dissonance—harmonic interest, sometimes it is expected that the trill will end with a turn, or some other variation. Such variations are marked with a few appoggiaturas following the note that bears the trill indication. In most modern musical notation, a trill is indicated with the letters tr above the trilled note. This has sometimes been followed by a line, and sometimes, in the baroque and early classical periods. In those times the symbol was known as a chevron, the following two notations are equivalent, Both the tr and the wavy line are necessary for clarity when the trill is expected to be applied to more than one note. Also, when attached to a single notehead in one part that corresponds to smaller values in another part. The usual way of executing a trill, known as a trill, is to rapidly alternate between the note indicated and the note directly above it in the given scale. Listen to an example of a short passage ending on a trill, the first time, the passage ends in a trill, and the second, the passage does not. These examples are an approximation of how a trill might be executed, in many cases, the rate of the trill will not remain constant as indicated here, but will start slower and become more rapid. Whether a trill is played in this way or not is largely a matter of taste, the number of alternations between notes can vary according to the length of the note in question. Trills may also be played beginning on the note above the one indicated, additionally, a trill is often ended by playing the note below the one indicated followed by the note itself. In the baroque period, a number of signs indicating specific patterns with which a trill should be begun or ended were used, in the Klavierbüchlein für Wilhelm Friedemann Bach, Johann Sebastian Bach lists a number of these signs together with the correct way to interpret them. Unless one of these signs is indicated, the details of how to play the trill are up to the performer. Beyond the baroque era, specific signs for ornamentation are very rare, continuing through the time of Mozart, the default expectations for the interpretation of trills continued to be similar to those of the baroque. In music after the time of Mozart, the trill usually begins on the principal note, the trill is frequently found in classical music for all instruments, although it is more easily executed on some than others. For example, while it is easy to produce a trill on the flute
18.
Fingerboard
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The fingerboard is an important component of most stringed instruments. It is a thin, long strip of material, usually wood, the strings run over the fingerboard, between the nut and bridge. To play the instrument, a musician presses strings down to the fingerboard to change the vibrating length and this is called stopping the strings. Depending on the instrument and the style of music, the musician may pluck, on some instruments, notes can be sounded by the fretting hand alone, such as with hammer ons, an electric guitar technique. The word fingerboard in other languages sometimes occurs in musical directions, in particular, the direction sul tasto for bowed string instruments to play with the bow above the fingerboard. This reduces the prominence of upper harmonics, giving a more ethereal tone, a fingerboard may be fretted, having raised strips of hard material perpendicular to the strings, which the player presses the strings against to stop the strings. On modern guitars, frets are made of metal. Frets let the player stop the string consistently in the same place, as well, frets do not dampen string vibrations as much as fingers alone on an unfretted fingerboard. Frets may be fixed, as on a guitar or mandolin, or movable, fingerboards may also be unfretted, as they usually are on bowed instruments, where damping by the finger is of little consequence because of the sustained stimulation of the strings by the bow. Unfretted fingerboards allow a more control over subtle changes in pitch than fretted boards. Fingerboards may also be, though uncommon, a hybrid of these two, such a construction is seen on the sitar, where arched frets attach at the edges of a smooth fingerboard, unfrettable strings run inside the frets, while frettable ones run outside. A double dot or some other variation marks the 12th fret, variations on the standard dot shape can make a guitar more distinctive. Position markers are sometimes made luminescent to make more visible on stage. Position markers are sometimes repeated on the edge of the fingerboard for easy viewing. Over time, strings wear frets down, which can cause buzzing, fixing this occasionally requires replacing the frets—but more often they just need dressing. In fret dressing, a luthier levels and polishes the frets, stainless steel guitar frets may never need dressing, because of the density of the material. Not having frets carefully and properly aligned with the fingerboard can cause severe intonation issues, the ultimate way of determining the source of a buzz and detuning problem is to measure the levelness of the frets. A straightedge positioned on the neck in the lie of one of the strings should show nearly level frets, on bowed string instruments, the fingerboard is usually made of ebony, rosewood or other hardwood
19.
Rock and Roll Hall of Fame
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The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum is a hall of fame and museum located on the shore of Lake Erie in downtown Cleveland, Ohio, United States. In 1986, Cleveland was chosen as the hall of fames permanent home.8 billion, the Foundation began inducting artists in 1986, but the Hall of Fame still had no home. The search committee considered several cities, including Philadelphia, Memphis, Detroit, Cincinnati, New York City, Cleveland was also one of the premier tour stops for most rock bands. Civic leaders in Cleveland pledged $65 million in money to fund the construction. A petition drive was signed by 600,000 fans favoring Cleveland over Memphis, on May 5,1986, the Hall of Fame Foundation chose Cleveland as the permanent home of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum. Sam Phillips of Sun Studios fame and many others were stunned and disappointed that it ended up in Cleveland, the hall of fame shouldve been in Memphis, certainly, wrote Peter Guralnick, author of an acclaimed two-volume Elvis Presley biography. Cleveland may also have chosen as the organizations site because the city offered the best financial package. As The Plain Dealer music critic Michael Norman noted, It was $65 million, Cleveland wanted it here and put up the money. During early discussions on where to build the Hall of Fame and Museum, ultimately, the chosen location was along East Ninth Street in downtown Cleveland by Lake Erie, east of Cleveland Stadium. Initial CEO Dr. Larry R. Thompson facilitated I. M. Pei in designs for the site, Pei came up with the idea of a tower with a glass pyramid protruding from it. The museum tower was planned to stand 200 ft high. The buildings base is approximately 150,000 square feet, the groundbreaking ceremony took place on June 7,1993. Pete Townshend, Chuck Berry, Billy Joel, Sam Phillips, Ruth Brown, Sam Moore of Sam and Dave, Carl Gardner of the Coasters and Dave Pirner of Soul Asylum all appeared at the groundbreaking. The museum was dedicated on September 1,1995, with the ribbon being cut by an ensemble that included Yoko Ono and Little Richard, among others, the following night an all-star concert was held at the stadium. It featured Chuck Berry, Bob Dylan, Al Green, Jerry Lee Lewis, Aretha Franklin, Bruce Springsteen, Iggy Pop, John Fogerty, John Mellencamp, and many others. In addition to the Hall of Fame inductees, the documents the entire history of rock and roll. Hall of Fame inductees are honored in an exhibit located in a wing that juts out over Lake Erie. Since 1986, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame has selected new inductees, the formal induction ceremony has been held in New York City 25 times, twice in Los Angeles, and four times in the Hall of Fames home in Cleveland
20.
Sam Phillips
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He was a producer, label owner, and talent scout throughout the 1940s and 1950s. He was the founder of both Sun Studio and Sun Records in Memphis, Tennessee, through Sun, Phillips discovered such recording talent as Howlin Wolf, Carl Perkins, Jerry Lee Lewis, and Johnny Cash. The height of his success culminated in his launching of Elvis Presleys career in 1954 and he is also associated with several other noteworthy rhythm and blues, country, and rock and roll musicians of the period. Phillips sold Sun in 1969 to Shelby Singleton and he was an early investor in the Holiday Inn chain of hotels. He also advocated racial equality and helped break down barriers in the music industry. Phillips was the youngest of eight children, born on a farm near Florence, Alabama, to tenant farmers, Madge Ella. As a child, he picked cotton in the fields with his parents alongside black laborers, the experience of hearing workers singing in the fields left a big impression on the young Phillips. Traveling through Memphis with his family in 1939 on the way to see a preacher in Dallas, he slipped off to look at Beale Street, I just fell totally in love, he later recalled. Phillips attended the former Coffee High School in Florence and he conducted the school band and had ambitions to be a criminal defense attorney. However, his father was bankrupted by the Great Depression and died in 1941, forcing Phillips to leave school to look after his mother. To support the family Phillips worked in a store and then a funeral parlor. In the 1940s, Phillips worked as a DJ and radio engineer for Muscle Shoals radio station WLAY, according to Phillips, this radio stations open format would later inspire his work in Memphis. Beginning in 1945, he worked for four years as an announcer, on January 3,1950, Phillips opened the Memphis Recording Service at 706 Union Avenue in Memphis, Tennessee. The Memphis Recording Service let amateurs perform, which drew performers such as B. B. King, Junior Parker, Phillips then would sell their performances to larger record labels. In addition to performances, Phillips recorded events such as weddings and funerals. The Memphis Recording Service also served as the studio for Phillipss own label, Phillips combined different styles of music. He was interested in the blues and said, The blues, it got people—black and white—to think about life, how difficult and they would sing about it, they would pray about it, they would preach about it. This is how they relieved the burden of what existed day in, the recording was released on the Chess/Checker record label in Chicago, in 1951
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Alan Freed
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Albert James Alan Freed, also known as Moondog, was an American disc jockey. He became internationally known for promoting the mix of blues, country and his career was destroyed by the payola scandal that hit the broadcasting industry in the early 1960s. Freed was born to a Russian-Jewish immigrant father, Charles S. Freed, in 1933, Freeds family moved to Salem, Ohio where Freed attended Salem High School, graduating in 1940. While Freed was in school, he formed a band called the Sultans of Swing in which he played the trombone. Freeds initial ambition was to be a bandleader, however, an ear infection put an end to this dream, while attending the Ohio State University, Freed became interested in radio. Freed served in the Army during World War II and worked as a DJ on Armed Forces Radio. Soon after World War II, Freed landed broadcasting jobs at radio stations, including WKST, WKBN, and WAKR. Freed enjoyed listening to new styles because he liked the rhythms. Freed appeared in motion pictures as himself. All have contributed greatly to the big beat, in 1945 Alan Freed joined WAKR and became a local favorite, playing hot jazz and pop recordings. The radio editor for the Akron Beacon Journal followed Freed and his Request Review nightly program of dance, in the late 1940s, while working at WAKR in Akron, Ohio, Freed met Cleveland record store owner Leo Mintz. Record Rendezvous was one of Clevelands largest record stores, who had begun selling rhythm, Mintz told Freed that he had noticed increased interest in the records at his store, and encouraged him to play them on the radio. In 1951, Freed moved to Cleveland and, in April 1951, Freed peppered his speech with hipster language and with a rhythm and blues record called Moondog as his theme song, broadcast R&B hits into the night. Mintz proposed buying airtime on Cleveland radio station WJW to be devoted entirely to R&B recordings, on July 11,1951, Freed started playing rhythm and blues records on WJW. Freed called his show The Moondog House and billed himself as The King of the Moondoggers and he had been inspired by an offbeat instrumental called Moondog Symphony that had been recorded by New York street musician Louis T. Hardin, aka Moondog. Freed adopted the record as his shows theme music and his on-air manner was energetic, in contrast to many contemporary radio presenters of traditional pop music, who tended to sound more subdued and low-key in manner. He addressed his listeners as if they were all part of a kingdom of hipsters. He also began popularizing the phrase rock and roll to describe the music he played, later that year, Freed promoted dances and concerts featuring the music he was playing on the radio
22.
Valentin Blatz Brewing Company
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The Valentin Blatz Brewing Company was an American brewery based in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. It produced Blatz Beer from 1851 until 1959, when the label was sold to Pabst Brewing Company, Blatz beer is currently produced by the Miller Brewing Company of Milwaukee, under contract for Pabst Brewing Company. Johann Braun opened City Brewery in 1846, Valentin Blatz established a brewery next door in 1850 and merged both breweries upon Brauns death in 1852. The brewery produced Milwaukees first individually bottled beer in 1874 and it incorporated as the Valentin Blatz Brewing Company in 1889, and by the 1900s was the citys third-largest brewer. During Prohibition, Blatz produced non-alcoholic beverages, from 1920 to 1933, in 1933, Blatz was issued U-Permit № WIS-U-712, granting permission to resume brewing beer. In 1958, Pabst Brewing Company, then the nations tenth largest brewer, acquired Blatz, in 1959, the federal government brought an action charging that the acquisition violated Section 7 of the Clayton Act as amended by the Celler-Kefauver Anti-Merger amendment. The sale was voided in 1959 and Blatz closed that same year, in 1960, the assets of Blatz, including its labels, were sold to Pabst. In 1969, Blatz was acquired from Pabst by the G. Heileman Brewing Company, Heileman, in turn, was acquired by the Stroh Brewery Company in 1996. On 8 February 1999, prior to its dissolution in 2000, by 2007, Blatz was once again part of Pabst. The Blatz beer label currently is produced by the Miller Brewing Company of Milwaukee, the Blatz Brewery Complex and Valentin Blatz Brewing Company Office Building in downtown Milwaukee are listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The brewing company’s office building has been converted into condominiums, the former Blatz bottling facility is now the Campus Center Building for the Milwaukee School of Engineering. The office building has been converted into the schools Alumni Partnership Center, two famous Blatz/Milwaukee beer marketing slogans were Blatz—Milwaukee’s Finest Beer and Blatz—Milwaukee’s Favorite Premium Beer. In later years, the brewery described its product as “Draft Brewed Blatz. ”The most famous jingle from the 1950s to early 1970s had the words, Kegs, Cans, or Bottles, all taste the same. The three best is one beer - Blatz is the name, playing on the fact that many other beers had a different taste when bottled and canned from how they tasted fresh from the keg. In the 1980s, Blatz was marketed directly against Pabst Blue Ribbon in the working class market, official website The Blatz Condos Blatz Market & Liquor, located in the Blatz Brewery Building Unofficial company history Blatz Online Fan Site
23.
Stutz Motor Company
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The Stutz Motor Company was an American producer of luxury cars based in Indianapolis, Indiana, USA. Production began in 1911 and continued until 1935, the brand reappeared in 1968 under the aegis of Stutz Motor Car of America, Inc. and with a newly defined modern retro-look. Although the company is active today, actual sales of factory produced vehicles ceased in 1995. Throughout its history, Stutz was known as a producer of fast cars and luxury cars for the rich, the company was founded as the Ideal Motor Car Company in Indianapolis in 1911. Ideal entered a car in the Indianapolis 500 that year and placed 11th, earning it the slogan, the next year, the founder, Harry C. Stutz, renamed the company Stutz Motor Company and began selling high-performance roadsters like the famous Stutz Bearcat, the Bearcat featured a brawny four-cylinder T-head engine with four valves per cylinder, one of the earliest multi-valve engines. Stutz has also credited with the development of the underslung chassis. Stutz White Squadron race team won the 1913 and 1915 championships, in 1922, three Stutz investors, one of whom was Charles M. Schwab, gained control of the company. The new owners brought in Frederick Ewan Moskowics, formerly of Daimler-Motoren-Gesellschaft, Marmon, Moskowics quickly refocused the company as a developer of safety cars, a recurring theme in the auto industry. In the case of Stutz, the car featured safety glass, a low center of gravity for better handling, one notable advance was the 1931 DOHC 32-valve in-line 8 called the DV32. This was during the so-called cylinders race of the early 1930s, in 1927, a Stutz set a world record for speed, averaging 68 mph for 24 hours. Also in 1927, Stutz won the AAA Championship winning every race, in 1929, three Stutzes, with bodies designed by Gordon Buehrig, built by Weymanns U. S. Production ended in 1935 after 35,000 cars had been manufactured, the former Indianapolis factory is today known as the Stutz Business Center and is home to more than eighty artists, sculptors, photographers, designers, architects, and craftsmen. Virgil Exner had more luck with the Stutz name, in August 1968, New York banker James ODonnell raised funds and incorporated Stutz Motor Car of America. A prototype of Exners Stutz Blackhawk was produced by Ghia, all these cars used General Motors running gear, featuring perimeter-type chassis frames, automatic transmission, power steering and power brakes with discs at the front. They were lavishly furnished, with all possible luxury features such as windows, air conditioning, central locking, electric seats. On the sedans there was typically a console for beverages in the rear seat and this incarnation of Stutz had some reasonable success selling newly designed Blackhawks, Bearcats, Royale Limousines, IV Portes, and Victorias. Elvis Presley bought the first Blackhawk in 1971, and later purchased a further three, frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Evel Knievel, Barry White and Sammy Davis, Jr. all owned Stutz cars
24.
Name change
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Name change generally refers to the legal act by a person of adopting a new name different from their name at birth, marriage or adoption. The procedures and ease of a name change vary between jurisdictions, in general, common law jurisdictions have loose procedures for a name change while civil law jurisdictions are more restrictive. A pseudonym is a name that differs from the original or true name and it is generally adopted to conceal a persons identity, but can also be done for personal, social or ideological reasons. Several federal court rulings have set precedents regarding both court decreed name changes and common law name changes, usually a person can adopt any name desired for any reason. As of 2009,46 states allow a person legally to change names by usage alone, with no paperwork, but a court order may be required for many institutions to officially accept the change. It is necessary to plead that the change is not for a fraudulent or other illegal purpose. Applicants may be required to give an explanation for wanting to change their names. A fee is payable, and the applicant may be required to post legal notices in newspapers to announce the name change. Generally the judge has limited judicial discretion to grant or deny a change of name, usually if the name change is for fraudulent. In 2004, a Missouri man succeeded in changing his name to They, the Minnesota Supreme Court ruled that a name change to 1069 could be denied, but that Ten Sixty-Nine was acceptable, the North Dakota Supreme Court had denied the same request several years before. Some examples of typically allowed reasons for name changes in the U. S. include, returning to the use of a prior surname upon divorce. Simplification or improved familiarity of spelling or pronunciation and this allows them the opportunity to adopt more Americanized names. During the naturalization interview, a petition for a change is prepared to be forwarded to a federal court. Applicants certify that they are not seeking a change of name for any unlawful purpose such as the avoidance of debt or evasion of law enforcement, such a name change would become final if within their jurisdiction, once a federal court naturalizes an applicant. To maintain an identity, it is desirable to obtain a formal order so there is continuity of personal records. The open and notorious use of a name is often sufficient to allow one to use an assumed name, in some jurisdictions, a trade name distinct from ones legal name can be registered with a county clerk, secretary of state, or other similar government authority. Persons who wish to publish materials and notted with them may publish under pseudonyms, a common law name is a legal name. In most states a statutory method, while quick and definitive, only supplements the common law method, although a person may sue under a common law name
25.
Roadhouse (facility)
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A roadhouse, stopping house or coaching inn is a commercial establishment typically built on or near a major road or highway that services passing travellers. The words meaning varies slightly by country, in Western Canada the equivalent facility was historically called a stopping house. A local inn or restaurant, the roadhouse or road house commonly serves meals, especially in the evenings, has a bar serving beer or hard liquor and features music, dancing, most roadhouses are located along highways or roads in rural areas or on the outskirts of towns. Early roadhouses provided lodging for travelers but, with the advent of faster means of transport than walking, horseback riding, or horse-drawn carriages, roadhouses have a slightly disreputable image, similar to honky tonks. This type of roadhouse has been portrayed in such as The Wild One, Easy Rider. Remains of a roadhouse can be seen south of Carmacks. In Australia a roadhouse is a station in a rural area. A roadhouse sells fuel and provides maintenance and repairs for cars, roadhouses usually also serve as truck stops, providing space for parking of semi-trailer trucks and buses, as well as catering to travellers in private cars. In remote areas such as the Nullarbor Plain, a roadhouse also offers motel-style accommodation, in Britain, wayside lodgings of this type were called coaching inns. As in other countries, were originally a place along the road for people travelling on foot or by horse to stay at night, however, many coaching inns, especially those in rural counties, have kept their accommodation to become bed & breakfasts or country hotels. With the advent of travel by motor car in the 1920s and 1930s. They were large establishments offering meals, refreshment and accommodation to motorists, the largest pubs boasted facilities such as tennis courts and swimming pools. Their popularity ended with the outbreak of the Second World War when recreational road travel became impossible, post houses were established in major towns and along principal highways. Roadhouse Blues, a song by The Doors Road House, a 1989 movie about a bouncer, rest area Charging station Fast food restaurant Black Rapids Roadhouse, an old Alaskan roadhouse List of public house topics Rikas Landing Roadhouse Service station
26.
Phonograph
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The phonograph is a device invented in 1877 for the mechanical recording and reproduction of sound. In its later forms it is called a gramophone. To recreate the sound, the surface is rotated while a playback stylus traces the groove and is therefore vibrated by it. In later electric phonographs, the motions of the stylus are converted into an electrical signal by a transducer. The phonograph was invented in 1877 by Thomas Edison, while other inventors had produced devices that could record sounds, Edisons phonograph was the first to be able to reproduce the recorded sound. His phonograph originally recorded sound onto a sheet wrapped around a rotating cylinder. A stylus responding to sound vibrations produced an up and down or hill-and-dale groove in the foil, in the 1890s, Emile Berliner initiated the transition from phonograph cylinders to flat discs with a spiral groove running from the periphery to near the center. Later improvements through the years included modifications to the turntable and its system, the stylus or needle. The disc phonograph record was the dominant audio recording format throughout most of the 20th century, from the mid-1980s on, phonograph use on a standard record player declined sharply because of the rise of the cassette tape, compact disc and other digital recording formats. Records are still a favorite format for some audiophiles and DJs, vinyl records are still used by some DJs and musicians in their concert performances. Musicians continue to release their recordings on vinyl records, the original recordings of musicians are sometimes re-issued on vinyl. Usage of terminology is not uniform across the English-speaking world, in more modern usage, the playback device is often called a turntable, record player, or record changer. When used in conjunction with a mixer as part of a DJ setup, the term phonograph was derived from the Greek words φωνή and γραφή. The similar related terms gramophone and graphophone have similar root meanings, the roots were already familiar from existing 19th-century words such as photograph, telegraph, and telephone. In British English, gramophone may refer to any sound-reproducing machine using disc records, the term phonograph was usually restricted to machines that used cylinder records. Gramophone generally referred to a wind-up machine, after the introduction of the softer vinyl records, 33 1⁄3-rpm LPs and 45-rpm single or two-song records, and EPs, the common name became record player or turntable. Often the home record player was part of a system that included a radio and, later, from about 1960, such a system began to be described as a hi-fi or a stereo. In American English, phonograph, properly specific to machines made by Edison, was used in a generic sense as early as the 1890s to include cylinder-playing machines made by others
27.
St. Louis
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St. Louis is an independent city and major U. S. port in the state of Missouri, built along the western bank of the Mississippi River, on the border with Illinois. Prior to European settlement, the area was a regional center of Native American Mississippian culture. The city of St. Louis was founded in 1764 by French fur traders Pierre Laclède and Auguste Chouteau, in 1764, following Frances defeat in the Seven Years War, the area was ceded to Spain and retroceded back to France in 1800. In 1803, the United States acquired the territory as part of the Louisiana Purchase, during the 19th century, St. Louis developed as a major port on the Mississippi River. In the 1870 Census, St. Louis was ranked as the 4th-largest city in the United States and it separated from St. Louis County in 1877, becoming an independent city and limiting its own political boundaries. In 1904, it hosted the Louisiana Purchase Exposition and the Summer Olympics, the economy of metro St. Louis relies on service, manufacturing, trade, transportation of goods, and tourism. This city has become known for its growing medical, pharmaceutical. St. Louis has 2 professional sports teams, the St. Louis Cardinals of Major League Baseball, the city is commonly identified with the 630-foot tall Gateway Arch in Downtown St. Louis. The area that would become St. Louis was a center of the Native American Mississippian culture and their major regional center was at Cahokia Mounds, active from 900 AD to 1500 AD. Due to numerous major earthworks within St. Louis boundaries, the city was nicknamed as the Mound City and these mounds were mostly demolished during the citys development. Historic Native American tribes in the area included the Siouan-speaking Osage people, whose territory extended west, European exploration of the area was first recorded in 1673, when French explorers Louis Jolliet and Jacques Marquette traveled through the Mississippi River valley. Five years later, La Salle claimed the region for France as part of La Louisiane. The earliest European settlements in the area were built in Illinois Country on the east side of the Mississippi River during the 1690s and early 1700s at Cahokia, Kaskaskia, migrants from the French villages on the opposite side of the Mississippi River founded Ste. In early 1764, after France lost the 7 Years War, Pierre Laclède, the early French families built the citys economy on the fur trade with the Osage, as well as with more distant tribes along the Missouri River. The Chouteau brothers gained a monopoly from Spain on the fur trade with Santa Fe, French colonists used African slaves as domestic servants and workers in the city. In 1780 during the American Revolutionary War, St. Louis was attacked by British forces, mostly Native American allies, the founding of St. Louis began in 1763. Pierre Laclede led an expedition to set up a fur-trading post farther up the Mississippi River, before then, Laclede had been a very successful merchant. For this reason, he and his trading partner Gilbert Antoine de St. Maxent were offered monopolies for six years of the fur trading in that area
28.
KMOX
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KMOX is an AM radio station broadcasting from St. Louis, Missouri. It is a 50, 000-watt clear channel station, which permits its nighttime signal to be heard in most of the central U. S. and into Mexico. KMOX operates as NewsRadio 1120 and refers to itself as The Voice of St. Louis, KMOX is affiliated with the CBS Radio Network and licensed to a CBS Corporation subsidiary, CBS Radio. KMOXs transmitter is located in Pontoon Beach, Illinois, the KMOX studio is located at 1220 Olive Street in the Park Pacific Building at Olive Street and Tucker Boulevard. CBS Radio also has studios and offices there for its two other St. Louis radio stations, KYKY and 102.5 KEZK-FM, for many years, KMOX broadcast using C-QUAM AM stereo, but stereo transmissions ended in the spring of 2000. The station now broadcasts an HD Radio signal, the Federal Communications Commission requires a digital license for HD broadcasting. KMOX, along with WSDZ, are responsible for the activation of the Greater St. Louis Emergency Alert System for hazardous weather, disaster declarations, KMOX was started in the early days of broadcasting by a group of businessmen incorporated as The Voice of St. Louis Inc. According to the official website, the KMOX call letters were assigned by the Federal Radio Commission. The stations owners had hoped to be assigned KVSL, for Voice of St. Louis, the owners also applied for KMO, but those call letters had been in use by KMO in Tacoma since 1922. KMOX signed on December 24,1925, the X was added because the starting date was Christmas Eve, or Xmas eve. Although a local legend states the call letters mean Kirkwood, Missouri On Xmas, in 1927, the station gave prominent coverage to the Charles Lindbergh flight across the Atlantic, in his plane, The Spirit of St. Louis. That same year, KMOX became one of the first 16 stations in the CBS network, two years later CBS bought KMOX, and began the process of getting approval to build a 50, 000-watt transmitter tower. When completed, it gave the station a signal that could be heard as far away as New Zealand. Its signal has been picked up in Scotland and South Africa, in 1933, KMOX covered the first post-Prohibition case of Budweiser beer leaving the Anheuser-Busch St. Louis brewery for the White House, a story carried nationally by CBS. During the 1930s and 1940s, KMOX was one of several St. Louis stations broadcasting Cardinals, KMOX lost broadcasting rights in 1948 when a new Cardinals radio network was formed by the team, but by the 1950s, it became the flagship station of that network. During the 1950s, the slogan was k-mocks, pronouncing the way the stations call letters are spelled. In 1955 Robert Hyland Jr became KMOXs general manager, a role he held for forty years. On February 29 of that year, Jack Buck hosted the first At Your Service program and that program, like the sports talk programs that soon followed, pioneered a format for radio heavily dependent on interviews, guest appearances, and calls from listeners
29.
WBBM (AM)
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WBBM,780 AM, is an all-news radio station located in Chicago, Illinois, United States. The station is owned by the CBS Radio division of CBS Corporation, the stations studios are located in the combined CBS Radio facility at Two Prudential Plaza in the Loop neighborhood, and its transmitter is located in Itasca. WBBM is a Class A station which broadcasts on a clear-channel AM frequency, at night, it covers much of the eastern half of North America, but is strongest in the Midwest. WBBM is an owned and operated station of the CBS Radio Network, since August 1,2011, much of WBBMs programming has been simulcast over sister station WCFS-FM. WBBMs format is available both in AM and FM with HD Radio, the station traces its history to 1911, when Leslie and Ralph Atlass, owners of the Mallory Battery Company of Lincoln, Illinois began an amateur spark station. In 1924, it received a license under its current call letters. In later years, a meaning, We Broadcast Better Music, was created. It originally operated at 1330 kHz, the Atlasses sold their battery company in 1924 to devote their full attention to WBBM, and moved the station to Chicago that same year. Two years later, it moved to 770 kHz, the station began its long association with CBS in 1928, when it joined the network as a charter affiliate. CBS liked what it saw in the station, and bought a controlling interest in 1929, Leslie Atlass remained station manager with a 33 percent interest. CBS bought the stock in 1933. As part of the deal, Atlass became vice president of CBS Central Division while remaining station manager of WBBM – positions he continued to hold until his retirement in 1959. A series of power increases over the years culminated in its current transmitter power output of 50,000 watts in 1935. It moved to 780 kHz in 1941, the station operated from studios at various locations in Chicago until 1956. That year, WBBM began operating from an arena on North McClurg Court with the rest of CBS Chicago operations. The station maintained a MOR/Personality-based format until 1964, when it became a news/talk station, WBBM adopted its current all-news format in 1968. The station has been the station of the Chicago Bears since 2000. For many years, WBBM has been in a battle with rival news/talk/sports station WGN for the position of the #1 radio station in the Chicago market
30.
WLS (AM)
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WLS is a commercial AM radio station licensed to Chicago, Illinois. WLS is a Class A station broadcasting on the frequency of 890 kHz with 50,000 watts of power using C-QUAM AM Stereo. The stations daytime groundwave service contour covers portions of five states while at night its signal routinely reaches 38 states via skywave. The stations programming is available to listeners in the Chicago metropolitan area with an HD Radio receiver via a simulcast on the HD2 subchannel of sister station WLS-FM. Despite different owners and affiliations,89 WLS, ABC owned-and-operated ABC7 Chicago, WLS has a talk radio format, with its weekday programming consisting of local hosts and nationally syndicated shows such as Rush Limbaugh, Mark Levin, Red Eye Radio and First Light. Limbaugh is syndicated by Premiere Networks and the rest are from Westwood One, local hosts include Big John Howell and veteran Chicago radio personality Steve Dahl hosts afternoons. Weekends feature programs on money, real estate, auto repair, syndicated weekend shows include Kim Komando, Bob Brinker, John Batchelor, Ric Edelman and Larry Kudlow. WLS carried Notre Dame Fighting Irish football and basketball games through the 2015-16 season, since 2016, WLS has been the flagship station of the Chicago White Sox baseball team and the Chicago Bulls basketball team. In the 1920s, Sears, Roebuck and Company was a retail and mail order company. To get farmers and people in communities to buy radio sets from its catalogs, Sears bought time on radio stations. Just before the permanent station was ready, Sears began broadcasts on March 21,1924 as WBBX with noon programs using the WMAQ studios, Sears broadcast test transmissions from its own permanent studios on April 9,10 and 11,1924, using the call sign WES. On April 12,1924, the station commenced officially, using the call letters WLS, Sears originally operated its station at its Chicago headquarters on Chicagos West Side where the companys mail order business was located. Sears then moved the WLS studios into the Sherman House hotel in downtown Chicago, Sears opened the station in 1924 as a service to farmers and subsequently sold it to the Prairie Farmer magazine in 1928. The station moved to the Prairie Farmer Building on West Washington in Chicago, for a few months after ABCs 1960 purchase of it and the format change, the bright new sound that began in May 1960 was broadcast from the Prairie Farmer Building. WLS didnt make the move to downtown Michigan Avenues Stone Container Building, located at 360 North Michigan Avenue, thirty years later, it would move once more, to its present location at 190 North State in downtown Chicago. It was the scene of the National Barn Dance, which featured Gene Autry, Pat Buttram, and George Gobel, the station also experimented successfully in many forms of news broadcasting, including weather and crop reports. Its most famous news broadcast was the report of the Hindenburg disaster by Herbert Morrison. Morrison and engineer Charles Nehlsen had been sent to New Jersey by WLS to cover the arrival of the Hindenburg for delayed broadcast and their recordings aired the next day on May 7,1937, the first time that recordings of a news event were ever broadcast
31.
Art Tatum
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Arthur Art Tatum, Jr. was an American jazz pianist. Tatum is widely acknowledged as the greatest jazz pianist of all time and he was hailed for the technical proficiency of his performances, which set a new standard for jazz piano virtuosity. Critic Scott Yanow wrote, Tatums quick reflexes and boundless imagination kept his improvisations filled with ideas that put him way ahead of his contemporaries. For a musician of such stature, there is little published information available about Tatums life, only one full-length biography has been published, Too Marvelous for Words, by James Lester. Lester interviewed many of Tatums contemporaries for the book and drew from many articles published about him, Tatum was born in Toledo, Ohio. His father, Arthur Tatum, Sr. was a guitarist and an elder at Grace Presbyterian Church and he had two siblings, Karl and Arlene. From infancy he suffered from cataracts which left him blind in one eye, a number of surgical procedures improved his eye condition to a degree but some of the benefits were reversed when he was assaulted in 1930. A child with perfect pitch, Tatum learned to play by ear, in a Voice of America interview, he denied the widespread rumor that he learned to play by copying piano roll recordings made by two pianists. He developed a very fast playing style, without losing accuracy, as a child he was also very sensitive to the pianos intonation and insisted it be tuned often. While playing piano was the most obvious application of his mental and physical skills, in 1925, Tatum moved to the Columbus School for the Blind, where he studied music and learned braille. He subsequently studied piano with Overton G. Rainey at either the Jefferson School or the Toledo School of Music, Rainey, who was also visually impaired, probably taught Tatum in the classical tradition, as Rainey did not improvise and discouraged his students from playing jazz. In 1927, Tatum began playing on Toledo radio station WSPD as Arthur Tatum, Toledos Blind Pianist, during interludes in Ellen Kays shopping chat program, by the age of 19, Tatum was playing at the local Waiters and Bellmens Club. In 1931, vocalist Adelaide Hall commenced a tour that lasted almost two years, during which she discovered Tatum in Toledo and employed him as one of her stage pianists. In 1932, Hall returned to New York with Tatum and introduced him to Harlem on stage at the Lafayette Theatre, in August 1932, she made four recordings using Tatum as one of her pianists including the songs Strange As It Seems and You Gave Me Everything But Love. Tatum drew inspiration from the pianists James P. Johnson and Fats Waller, who exemplified the stride piano style, Tatum identified Waller as his main influence, but according to pianist Teddy Wilson and saxophonist Eddie Barefield, Art Tatums favorite jazz piano player was Earl Hines. He used to buy all of Earls records and would improvise on them, hed play the record but hed improvise over what Earl was doing. Course, when you heard Art play you didnt hear nothing of anybody, but he got his ideas from Earls style of playing – but Earl never knew that. A major event in his rise to success was his appearance at a cutting contest in 1933 at Morgans bar in New York City that included Waller, Johnson
32.
Django Reinhardt
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He was the first and most significant jazz talent to emerge from Europe. Benny Goodman asked him to travel with his band, which he never did and he died suddenly of a stroke at age 43. With violinist Stéphane Grappelli, Reinhardt formed the Paris-based Quintette du Hot Club de France in 1934, Reinhardts most popular compositions have become jazz standards, including Minor Swing, Daphne, Belleville, Djangology, Swing 42, and Nuages. According to jazz guitarist Frank Vignola, nearly every major popular-music guitarist in the world has influenced by Django, including Paul McCartney, Keith Richards. Over the last few decades, annual Django festivals have been held throughout Europe and the U. S. in February 2017, the Berlin International Film Festival held the world premiere of the French film, Django. Reinhardt was born on 23 January 1910 in Liberchies, Pont-à-Celles, Belgium and his father was Jean Eugene Weiss, but domiciled in Paris with his wife, he went by Jean-Baptiste Reinhardt, his wifes surname, to avoid French military conscription. His mother, Laurence Reinhardt, was a dancer, the birth certificate refers to Jean Reinhart, son of Jean Baptiste Reinhart, artist, and Laurence Reinhart, housewife, domiciled in Paris. Reinhardts nickname, Django, is Romani for I awake, Reinhardt spent most of his youth in Romani encampments close to Paris, where he started playing the violin, banjo, and guitar. He became adept at stealing chickens, which was viewed as a skill by the Romani. His family made cane furniture for a living, several members of the family were keen amateur musicians. Reinhardt was attracted to music at an age, first playing the violin. At the age of 12 he received a banjo-guitar as a gift and he quickly learned to play, mimicking the fingerings of musicians he watched. Reinhardt was able to make a living playing music by the time he was 15 and he received little formal education and acquired the rudiments of literacy only in adult life. At the age of 17 Reinhardt married Florine Bella Mayer, a girl from the same gypsy settlement, the following year he recorded for the first time. On these recordings, made in 1928, Reinhardt plays the banjo accompanying the accordionists Maurice Alexander, Jean Vaissade and Victor Marceau, and his name was now drawing international attention, such as from British bandleader Jack Hylton, who came to France just to hear him play. He offered him a job on the spot, and Reinhardt accepted. Before he had a chance to start with the band, however, he nearly lost his life when the caravan he and his wife made artificial flowers from extremely flammable celluloid. They caught fire, engulfing the wagon in flames almost immediately, Django dragged himself and his wife through the fire to safety, but suffered extensive burns all over his left hand and other areas
33.
World War II
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World War II, also known as the Second World War, was a global war that lasted from 1939 to 1945, although related conflicts began earlier. It involved the vast majority of the worlds countries—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing alliances, the Allies and the Axis. It was the most widespread war in history, and directly involved more than 100 million people from over 30 countries. Marked by mass deaths of civilians, including the Holocaust and the bombing of industrial and population centres. These made World War II the deadliest conflict in human history, from late 1939 to early 1941, in a series of campaigns and treaties, Germany conquered or controlled much of continental Europe, and formed the Axis alliance with Italy and Japan. Under the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact of August 1939, Germany and the Soviet Union partitioned and annexed territories of their European neighbours, Poland, Finland, Romania and the Baltic states. In December 1941, Japan attacked the United States and European colonies in the Pacific Ocean, and quickly conquered much of the Western Pacific. The Axis advance halted in 1942 when Japan lost the critical Battle of Midway, near Hawaii, in 1944, the Western Allies invaded German-occupied France, while the Soviet Union regained all of its territorial losses and invaded Germany and its allies. During 1944 and 1945 the Japanese suffered major reverses in mainland Asia in South Central China and Burma, while the Allies crippled the Japanese Navy, thus ended the war in Asia, cementing the total victory of the Allies. World War II altered the political alignment and social structure of the world, the United Nations was established to foster international co-operation and prevent future conflicts. The victorious great powers—the United States, the Soviet Union, China, the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union and the United States emerged as rival superpowers, setting the stage for the Cold War, which lasted for the next 46 years. Meanwhile, the influence of European great powers waned, while the decolonisation of Asia, most countries whose industries had been damaged moved towards economic recovery. Political integration, especially in Europe, emerged as an effort to end pre-war enmities, the start of the war in Europe is generally held to be 1 September 1939, beginning with the German invasion of Poland, Britain and France declared war on Germany two days later. The dates for the beginning of war in the Pacific include the start of the Second Sino-Japanese War on 7 July 1937, or even the Japanese invasion of Manchuria on 19 September 1931. Others follow the British historian A. J. P. Taylor, who held that the Sino-Japanese War and war in Europe and its colonies occurred simultaneously and this article uses the conventional dating. Other starting dates sometimes used for World War II include the Italian invasion of Abyssinia on 3 October 1935. The British historian Antony Beevor views the beginning of World War II as the Battles of Khalkhin Gol fought between Japan and the forces of Mongolia and the Soviet Union from May to September 1939, the exact date of the wars end is also not universally agreed upon. It was generally accepted at the time that the war ended with the armistice of 14 August 1945, rather than the formal surrender of Japan
34.
Selmer guitar
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The Selmer Guitar is an unusual acoustic guitar best known as the favored instrument of Django Reinhardt. It was produced by Selmer, a French manufacturer, from 1932 to about 1952, in 1932 Selmer partnered with the Italian guitarist and luthier Mario Maccaferri to produce a line of acoustic guitars based on Maccaferris unorthodox design. Although Maccaferris association with Selmer ended in 1934, the continued to make several models of this guitar until 1952. The guitar was closely associated with famed jazz guitarist Django Reinhardt, the strings pass over a moveable bridge and are gathered at the tail, as on a mandolin. Two mustache markers are fixed to the soundboard to help position the movable bridge, the top of the guitar is gently arched or domed—a feature achieved by bending a flat piece of wood rather than by the violin-style carving used in archtop guitars. The top is rather thin, at about 2 mm. It has a wide fretboard and a snake-shaped, slotted headstock. The back and top are both ladder-braced, which was the norm for French and Italian steel-string guitars of the time, other models can be more conventional in appearance and construction, with the Modèle Classique, for example, essentially being a standard fan-braced, flat-top classical guitar. The scale, at 640 mm, and fretting of the guitars was very similar to other contemporary guitars. Many of these guitars, produced during 1932 and 1933, were sold to the UK market via Selmers London showroom, Maccaferri designed the original guitars and oversaw their manufacture, but his involvement with Selmer ended after 18 months. Over the next few years, the design evolved without his input and, by 1936 and it was officially called the Modèle Jazz, but also known as the Petite Bouche or Oval Hole. These later guitars have revised internal bracing and a scale length of 670 mm. The vast bulk of guitars produced after the Maccaferri period were sold in Selmers native France, modern exponents of the style often amplify their instruments in concert, but may still play acoustically in small venues and jam sessions. Gypsy jazz players usually couple the guitar with light, silver-plated, copper-wound Argentine strings made by Savarez, today, the Selmer guitar is almost completely associated with Django Reinhardt and the gypsy jazz school of his followers. From the 1930s through to the 1950s, however, Selmers were used by all types of performer in France, the first Selmers sold to the UK market were used in the standard dance band context and were associated with performers such as Len Figgis and Al Bowlly. In France, the Selmer was the top professional guitar for many years, leading players ranged from Henri Crolla to Sacha Distel. More recently, the style of guitar has been associated with Enrico Macias, most of these other instruments featured Macaferris distinctive D-shaped soundhole and many contained the resonator. Production of all but the Modèle Jazz had ended by the mid-1930s, Selmer did not make large numbers of guitars, and the company stopped production altogether by 1952, so playable original Selmers are rare and command high prices
35.
Chet Atkins
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Chester Burton Chet Atkins known as Mr. He was primarily known as a guitarist and he also played the mandolin, fiddle, banjo, and ukulele. Atkins signature picking style was inspired by Merle Travis, other major guitar influences were Django Reinhardt, George Barnes, Les Paul, and, later, Jerry Reed. His distinctive picking style and musicianship brought him admirers inside and outside the country scene, among many honors, Atkins received 14 Grammy Awards and the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. He also received nine Country Music Association awards for Instrumentalist of the Year and he was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum, and the Musicians Hall of Fame and Museum. Atkins was born on June 20,1924, in Luttrell, Tennessee and his parents divorced when he was six, after which he was raised by his mother. He was the youngest of three boys and a girl and he started out on the ukulele, later moving on to the fiddle, but traded his brother Lowell an old pistol and some chores for a guitar when he was nine. He stated in his 1974 autobiography, We were so poor, forced to relocate to Fortson, Georgia, outside of Columbus, to live with his father because of a critical asthma condition, Atkins was a sensitive youth who made music his obsession. Because of his illness, he was forced to sleep in a chair to breathe comfortably. On those nights, he played his guitar until he fell asleep holding it, while living in Fortson, he attended the historic Mountain Hill School. He returned in the 1990s to play a series of charity concerts to save the school from demolition, Atkins became an accomplished guitarist while he was in high school. He used the restroom in the school to practice, because it gave better acoustics and his first guitar had a nail for a nut and was so bowed that only the first few frets could be used. He later purchased an electric guitar and amp, but he had to travel many miles to find an electrical outlet. Later in life, he gave himself the honorary degree CGP. In 2011, his daughter Merle Atkins Russell bestowed the CGP degree on his longtime sideman Paul Yandell and she then declared no more CGPs would be allowed by the Atkins estate. His half-brother Jim was a successful guitarist who worked with the Les Paul Trio in New York, Atkins did not have a strong style of his own until 1939, when he heard Merle Travis picking over WLW radio. This early influence dramatically shaped his unique playing style, whereas Traviss right hand used his index finger for the melody and thumb for bass notes, Atkins expanded his right-hand style to include picking with his first three fingers, with the thumb on bass. Chet Atkins was a ham radio general class licensee, formerly using the call sign WA4CZD, he obtained the vanity call sign W4CGP in 1998 to include the CGP designation
36.
Gibson
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Gibson Brands, Inc. is an American manufacturer of guitars and other instruments, now based in Nashville, Tennessee. The company was known as Gibson Guitar Corp. and renamed Gibson Brands. Orville Gibson founded the company in 1902 as The Gibson Mandolin-Guitar Mfg. Co. Ltd. in Kalamazoo, Gibson invented archtop guitars by constructing the same type of carved, arched tops used on violins. By the 1930s, the company was also making flattop acoustic guitars, as well as one of the first commercially available hollow-body electric guitars, Gibson sells guitars under a variety of brand names and builds one of the worlds most iconic guitars, the Gibson Les Paul. Many Gibson instruments are highly collectible, Gibson was at the forefront of innovation in acoustic guitars, especially in the big band era of the 1930s, the Gibson Super 400 was widely imitated. In 1952, Gibson introduced its first solid-body electric guitar, the Les Paul which became its most popular guitar to date— designed by Ted McCarty, Gibson was owned by the Norlin corporation from 1969 to 1986. In 1986, the company was acquired by its present owners, Gibson is a privately held corporation owned by its chief executive officer Henry Juszkiewicz and its president David H. Berryman. Orville Gibson patented a single-piece mandolin design in 1898 that was more durable than other mandolins, Orville Gibson began to sell his instruments in 1894 out of a one-room workshop in Kalamazoo Michigan. In 1902 Gibson Mandolin-Guitar Mfg. Co, Ltd. was incorporated to market the instruments, initially, the company produced only Orville Gibsons original designs. Orville died in 1918 of endocarditis, the following year the company hired designer Lloyd Loar to create newer instruments. Loar designed the flagship L-5 archtop guitar and the Gibson F5 mandolin that was introduced in 1922, in 1936 Gibson introduced their first Electric Spanish model, the ES-150 followed by other electric instruments like steel guitars, banjos and mandolins. During World War II, instrument manufacturing at Gibson slowed due to shortages of wood and metal, between 1942-1945, Gibson employed women to manufacture guitars. Women produced nearly 25,000 guitars during World War II yet Gibson denied ever building instruments over this period, Gibson folklore has also claimed its guitars were made by seasoned craftsmen who were too old for war. In 1944 Gibson was purchased by Chicago Musical Instruments, the ES-175 was introduced in 1949. Gibson hired Ted McCarty in 1948, who became President in 1950, the Les Paul was offered in Custom, Standard, Special, and Junior models. In the mid-50s, the Thinline series was produced, which included a line of thinner guitars like the Byrdland, the first Byrdlands were slim, custom built, L-5 models for guitarists Billy Byrd and Hank Garland. Later, a neck was added. Other models such as the ES-350T and the ES-225T were introduced as less costly alternatives, in 1958, Gibson introduced the ES-335T model
37.
Queens
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Queens is the easternmost and largest in area of the five boroughs of New York City. Coterminous with Queens County since 1899, the borough of Queens is the second-largest in population, with a census-estimated 2,339,150 residents in 2015, approximately 48% of them foreign-born. Queens County also is the second-most populous county in the U. S. state of New York, behind the borough of Brooklyn. Queens is the fourth-most densely populated county among New York Citys boroughs, if each of New York Citys boroughs were an independent city, Queens also would be the nations fourth most populous city, after Los Angeles, Chicago, and Brooklyn. Queens is the most ethnically diverse area in the world. Queens was established in 1683 as one of the original 12 counties of New York and it was named after the Portuguese Princess Catherine of Braganza, Queen of England, Scotland, and Ireland. It became a borough of New York City in 1898, and from 1683 until 1899, Queens has the most diversified economy of the five boroughs of New York City It is home to JFK International Airport and LaGuardia Airport. These airports are among the busiest in the world, causing the airspace above Queens to be the most congested in the country, attractions in Queens include Flushing Meadows Park, Citi Field, the US Open tennis tournament, Kaufman Astoria Studios, Silvercup Studios, and Aqueduct Racetrack. European colonization brought Dutch and English settlers, as a part of the New Netherland colony, First settlements occurred in 1635 followed by early colonizations at Maspeth in 1642, and Vlissingen in 1643. Other early settlements included Newtown and Jamaica, however, these towns were mostly inhabited by English settlers from New England via eastern Long Island subject to Dutch law. After the capture of the colony by the English and its renaming as New York in 1664, the Flushing Remonstrance signed by colonists in 1657 is considered a precursor to the United States Constitutions provision on freedom of religion in the Bill of Rights. The signers protested the Dutch colonial authorities persecution of Quakers in what is today the borough of Queens, originally, Queens County included the adjacent area now comprising Nassau County. It was a county of New York State, one of twelve created on November 1,1683. The county was named after Catherine of Braganza, since she was queen of England at the time, the county was founded alongside Kings County, and Richmond County. On October 7,1691, all counties in the Colony of New York were redefined, Queens gained North Brother Island, South Brother Island, and Huletts Island. On December 3,1768, Queens gained other islands in Long Island Sound that were not already assigned to a county, Queens played a minor role in the American Revolution, as compared to Brooklyn, where the Battle of Long Island was largely fought. Queens, like the rest of Long Island, remained under British occupation after the Battle of Long Island in 1776 and was occupied throughout most of the rest of the Revolutionary War. Under the Quartering Act, British soldiers used, as barracks, even though many local people were against unannounced quartering, sentiment throughout the county remained in favor of the British crown
38.
Pickup (music technology)
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The signal from a pickup can also be recorded directly, using a DI box or broadcast on the radio or television. Most electric guitars and electric basses use magnetic pickups, acoustic guitars, upright basses and fiddles often use a piezoelectric pickup. A magnetic pickup consists of a permanent magnet with a core of such as alnico or ferrite. The pickup is most often mounted on the body of the instrument, Magnetic pickups used with string basses can be attached to the bridge. The permanent magnet creates a field, the motion of the vibrating steel strings disturbs the field, changing magnetic flux. The pickup is then connected with a cable to an amplifier which amplifies the signal to a sufficient magnitude of power to drive a loudspeaker. A pickup can also be connected to recording equipment via a patch cable, there may also be an internal preamplifier device mounted in an acoustic guitar or in an external box. When a preamp is used in way, it is between the pickup and cable and can significantly reduce the equivalent impedance of the pickup coil. The output voltage of magnetic pickups varies between 100 mV rms to over 1 V rms for some of the higher output types, some high-output pickups achieve this by employing very strong magnets, thus creating more flux and thereby more output. This can be detrimental to the sound because the magnets pull on the strings can cause problems with intonation as well as damp the strings. Other high-output pickups have more turns of wire to increase the voltage generated by the strings movement, however, this also increases the pickups output resistance/impedance, which can affect high frequencies if the pickup is not isolated by a buffer amplifier or a DI unit. The turns of wire in proximity to each other have an equivalent self-capacitance that and this resonance can accentuate certain frequencies, giving the pickup a characteristic tonal quality. The more turns of wire in the winding, the higher the output voltage, the inductive source impedance inherent in this type of transducer makes it less linear than other forms of pickups, such as piezo-electric or optical. The tonal quality produced by this nonlinearity is, however, subject to taste, the external load usually consists of resistance and capacitance between the hot lead and shield in the guitar cable. The electric cable also has a capacitance, which can be a significant portion of the overall system capacitance and this arrangement of passive components forms a resistively-damped second-order low-pass filter. Single coil pickups act like an antenna and are prone to pick up mains hum along with the musical signal. Mains hum consists of a signal at a nominal 50 or 60 Hz, depending on local alternating current frequency. The changing magnetic flux caused by the mains current links with the windings of the pickup, the pickups also are sensitive to the electromagnetic field from nearby cathode ray tubes in video monitors or televisions
39.
Epiphone
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Epiphone is an American musical instrument manufacturer founded by Anastasios Stathopoulos, currently based in Nashville, Tennessee. In 1957 Epiphone, Inc. of New York was purchased by CMI and given the name Epiphone, Inc. of Kalamazoo, CMI took great measures to keep Gibson and Epiphone separate in different buildings each with its own management team. Epiphone is owned by Gibson Guitar Corporation and was Gibsons main rival in the market prior to its acquisition in 1957. Their professional archtops, including the Emperor, Deluxe, Broadway and Triumph, aside from guitars, Epiphone also made upright basses, banjos, and other stringed instruments. However, the weakness in the aftermath of World War II allowed Gibsons parent, CMI. The name Epiphone is a combination of proprietor Epaminondas Stathopoulos nickname Epi, Epiphone began in 1873, in Smyrna, Ottoman Empire, where Greek founder Anastasios Stathopoulos made his own fiddles and lutes. Stathopoulo moved to the United States in 1903 and continued to make his original instruments, as well as mandolins, from Long Island City in Queens, Anastasios died in 1915, and his son, Epaminondas, took over. After two years, the became known as The House Of Stathopoulo. Just after the end of World War I, the company started to make banjos, the company produced its recording line of banjos in 1924 and, four years later, took on the name of the Epiphone Banjo Company. It produced its first guitars in 1928, after Epi died in 1943, control of the company went to his brothers, Orphie and Frixo. In 1951, a four-month-long strike forced a relocation of Epiphone from New York City to Philadelphia, in 1957 the company was acquired by CMI who also owned Gibson, Lowrey, Selmer and others, Gibson. After Epiphone became a subsidiary of Norlin, many of its instruments were later patterned after the more expensive Gibson versions, however, Epiphone also maintains its own line of archtop guitars and basses. As of January,2013, Epiphone makes the following guitars and this outfit was an amplifier, case and lap steel guitar stand all rolled into one unit and was supplied by a suitcase manufacturer of the time. Gibson produced Epiphone amplifiers in the 1960s and these were basically copies or variations of Gibson and Fender amplifiers. They used a design, and some had reverb and tremolo. Gibson decided to launch a new line of Epiphone amplifiers in 2005 with many different models, including the So Cal, Blues Custom, the Valve Hot Rod and Valve Senior were released in 2009. The Valve Hot Rod is a 5 watt amp like the Valve Junior, the Valve Senior offers 20 watts of power, with a full equalizer, gain, volume, reverb, and presence control. As of 2012, Epiphone has ceased production of their line of amplifiers with the exception of the Player and Performance Pack practice amplifiers and these Amplifiers are under the Epiphone Electar moniker
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Audio feedback
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Audio feedback is a special kind of positive feedback which occurs when a sound loop exists between an audio input and an audio output. In this example, a received by the microphone is amplified and passed out of the loudspeaker. The sound from the loudspeaker can then be received by the microphone again, amplified further, for small PA systems the sound is readily recognized as a loud squeal or screech. Feedback is almost always considered undesirable when it occurs with a singers or public speakers microphone at an event using a reinforcement system or PA system. The sound of guitar feedback is considered to be desirable musical effect in metal music, hardcore punk. Jimi Hendrix was an innovator in the use of guitar feedback in his guitar solos to create unique sound effects not possible with more traditional playing techniques. The principles of audio feedback were first discovered by Danish scientist Søren Absalon Larsen, if the small signal gain is greater than 1 for some frequency then the system will start to oscillate at that frequency because noise at that frequency will be amplified. Sound will be produced without anyone actually playing, the sound level will increase until the output starts clipping, reducing the loop gain to exactly unity. This is the principle upon which electronic oscillators are based, although in case the feedback loop is purely electronic. Early academic work on acoustical feedback was done by Dr. C. Paul Boner, Boner reasoned that when feedback happened, it did so at one precise frequency. He also reasoned that it could be stopped by inserting a very narrow notch filter at that frequency in the signal chain. He worked with Gifford White, founder of White Instruments to hand craft notch filters for specific feedback frequencies in specific rooms, Boner was responsible for establishing basic theories of acoustic feedback, room-ring modes, and room-sound system equalizing techniques. To maximize gain before feedback, the amount of energy that is fed back to the microphones must be reduced as much as is practical. As well, microphones should not be positioned in front of speakers, additionally, the loudspeakers and microphones should have non-uniform directivity and should stay out of the maximum sensitivity of each other, ideally at a direction of cancellation. Public address speakers often achieve directivity in the mid and treble region via horn systems, sometimes the woofers have a cardioid characteristic. This allows independent control of the pressure levels for the audience. If monitors are oriented at 180 degrees to the microphones that are their sources, almost all microphones for sound reinforcement are directional. Almost always, the frequency responses of sound reinforcement systems is not ideally flat
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Rickenbacker
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Rickenbacker International Corporation, also known as Rickenbacker, is an electric string instrument manufacturer based in Santa Ana, California. In 1932, the became the worlds first to produce electric guitars and eventually produced a range of electric guitars. The company was founded in 1931 as the Ro-Pat-In Corporation by Adolph Rickenbacher and these instruments had been designed by Beauchamp, assisted at the National String Instrument Corporation by Paul Barth and Harry Watson. They chose the brand name Rickenbacher, though early examples bear the brand name Electro, nicknamed frying pans because of their long necks and circular bodies, the instruments were the first solid-bodied electric guitars, though they were a lap-steel type. They had a pickup with a steel cover that arched over the strings. By the time production ceased in 1939, several thousand frying pans had been produced, Electro String also sold amplifiers to go with their electric guitars. A Los Angeles radio manufacturer named Van Nest designed the first Electro String production-model amplifier, shortly thereafter, design engineer Ralph Robertson further developed the amplifiers, and by the 1940s at least four different Rickenbacker models were made available. Lansing of the Lansing Manufacturing Company designed the speaker in the Rickenbacker professional model, during the early 1940s, Rickenbacker amps were sometimes repaired by Leo Fender, whose repair shop evolved into the Fender Electric Instrument Manufacturing Company. Their next collaboration involved experiments with mounting three conical-shaped aluminum resonators into the body of the guitar beneath the bridge and these efforts produced an instrument which so pleased Beauchamp that he told Dopyera that they should go into business to manufacture them. After further refinements, Dopyera applied for a patent on the so-called tri-cone guitar on April 9,1927, thereafter, Dopyera and his brothers began to make the tri-cone guitars in their Los Angeles shop, calling the new guitars Nationals. Adolph Rickenbacher was born in Basel, Switzerland in 1887 and emigrated to the United States to live with relatives after the death of his parents, sometime after moving to Los Angeles in 1918, he changed his surname to Rickenbacker. In 1925, Rickenbacker and two formed the Rickenbacker Manufacturing Company and incorporated it in 1927. Adolph became a shareholder in National and, with the assistance of his Rickenbacker Manufacturing Company, patent infringement disagreements between National and Dobro led to a lawsuit in 1929 with Dobro suing National for $2,000,000 in damages. By the late twenties, the idea for electrified string instruments had been around for some time, George Beauchamp had himself been experimenting with electric amplification as early as 1925, but his early efforts involving microphones did not produce the effects he desired. Along the way Beauchamp also built a one-string test guitar made out of a 2X4 piece of lumber and it was nicknamed the frying pan because of its shape, though Rickenbacker liked to call it the pancake. The final design Beauchamp and Barth developed was an electric pickup consisting of a pair of horseshoe-shaped magnets that enclosed the pickup coil and these instruments constitute the origin of the electric guitar by virtue of their string-driven electro-magnetic pick-ups. In 1933 the Ro-Pat-In companys name was changed to Electro String Instrument Corporation, in 1934 the name of Rickenbacher was added in honor of the companys principal partner, Adolph Rickenbacker. Both models had been experimental, produced as early as 1932, the Electro-Spanish Ken Roberts Model was subject to a limited production of forty-six
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United States Army
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The United States Armed Forces are the federal armed forces of the United States. They consist of the Army, Marine Corps, Navy, Air Force, from the time of its inception, the military played a decisive role in the history of the United States. A sense of unity and identity was forged as a result of victory in the First Barbary War. Even so, the Founders were suspicious of a permanent military force and it played an important role in the American Civil War, where leading generals on both sides were picked from members of the United States military. Not until the outbreak of World War II did a standing army become officially established. The National Security Act of 1947, adopted following World War II and during the Cold Wars onset, the U. S. military is one of the largest militaries in terms of number of personnel. It draws its personnel from a pool of paid volunteers. As of 2016, the United States spends about $580.3 billion annually to fund its military forces, put together, the United States constitutes roughly 40 percent of the worlds military expenditures. For the period 2010–14, the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute found that the United States was the worlds largest exporter of major arms, the United States was also the worlds eighth largest importer of major weapons for the same period. The history of the U. S. military dates to 1775 and these forces demobilized in 1784 after the Treaty of Paris ended the War for Independence. All three services trace their origins to the founding of the Continental Army, the Continental Navy, the United States President is the U. S. militarys commander-in-chief. Rising tensions at various times with Britain and France and the ensuing Quasi-War and War of 1812 quickened the development of the U. S. Navy, the reserve branches formed a military strategic reserve during the Cold War, to be called into service in case of war. Time magazines Mark Thompson has suggested that with the War on Terror, Command over the armed forces is established in the United States Constitution. The sole power of command is vested in the President by Article II as Commander-in-Chief, the Constitution also allows for the creation of executive Departments headed principal officers whose opinion the President can require. This allowance in the Constitution formed the basis for creation of the Department of Defense in 1947 by the National Security Act, the Defense Department is headed by the Secretary of Defense, who is a civilian and member of the Cabinet. The Defense Secretary is second in the chain of command, just below the President. Together, the President and the Secretary of Defense comprise the National Command Authority, to coordinate military strategy with political affairs, the President has a National Security Council headed by the National Security Advisor. The collective body has only power to the President
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American Forces Network
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The American Forces Network is the brand name used by the United States Armed Forces Radio and Television Service for its entertainment and command internal information networks worldwide. AFN broadcasts popular American radio and television programs from the major U. S. networks and it is sometimes referred to as the Armed Forces Network. AFRTS, American Forces Network and AFN are registered trademarks of the U. S. Department of Defense and it is based at Fort George G. Meade in Maryland. The American Forces Network is the arm of the American Forces Radio and Television Service. AFN falls under the control of the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Public Affairs. Editorial control is by the Department of Defense, whereas the British Forces Broadcasting Service, for example, is independent of the Ministry of Defence, AFN employs military broadcasters as well as Department of Defense civilians and contractors. Service personnel hold broadcasting occupational specialties for their military branch, since 1997, all of AFNs military personnel receive primary training at the Defense Information School at Fort George G. Meade in Maryland. Before 1997, DINFOS was located at Fort Benjamin Harrison in Indianapolis, in 1997, Fort Benjamin Harrison was largely closed as a function of the 1991 Base Closure and Realignment Commission. Additional/Advanced training is available at Fort George G. Meade. In the 1960s, DINFOS was located at Fort Slocum, NY on an island just off the harbor at New Rochelle. At its peak in 1965, the Army Chaplain school was located here. In 1963 this campus operated in a university setting with a military environment. The Army ran the Information School although training was offered to members of all military branches, Radio types took a rather severe audition written by CBS for their network announcers. Those who survived the audition became Broadcast Specialists with a 703 MOS, some of AFNs broadcasters have previous commercial broadcasting experience before enlisting in the military, but it is not a prerequisite for enlistment in the military as a broadcaster. During their training, the broadcasters are taught to use state-of-the-art audio, AFN management is located at DMA headquarters at Fort Meade. Day-to-day AFN broadcast operations are conducted at the AFN Broadcast Center/Defense Media Center in Riverside, California, from all global radio. The American Forces Network can trace its origins to May 26,1942, a television service was first introduced in 1954 with a pilot station at Limestone Air Force Base, Maine. In 1954, the mission of AFRS was officially recognized
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Bing Crosby
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Harry Lillis Bing Crosby, Jr. was an American singer and actor. The first multimedia star, from 1931 to 1954 Crosby was a leader in sales, radio ratings. His early career coincided with technical recording innovations such as the microphone and this allowed him to develop a laid-back, intimate singing style that influenced many of the popular male singers who followed him, including Perry Como, Frank Sinatra, Dick Haymes, and Dean Martin. Also in 1948, the Music Digest estimated that Crosby recordings filled more than half of the 80,000 weekly hours allocated to recorded radio music, in 1963, Crosby received the first Grammy Global Achievement Award. He is one of only 33 people to have three stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, in the categories of motion pictures, radio, Crosby influenced the development of the postwar recording industry. He became the first performer to pre-record his radio shows and master his commercial recordings onto magnetic tape. In addition to his work with early tape recording, he helped to finance the development of videotape, bought television stations, bred racehorses, Crosby died at the age of 74 on October 14,1977, from a sudden heart attack in Alcobendas, Spain. Crosby was born on May 2,1903 in Tacoma, Washington, in 1906, Crosbys family moved to Spokane, and in 1913, Crosbys father built a house at 508 E. Sharp Avenue. The house now sits on the campus of Crosbys alma mater Gonzaga University and he was the fourth of seven children, brothers Larry, Everett, Ted, and Bob, and two sisters, Catherine and Mary Rose. His parents were Harry Lowe Crosby, Sr. a bookkeeper, Crosbys mother was a second generation Irish-American. In 1910, seven-year-old Harry Crosby Jr. was forever renamed, the Sunday edition of the Spokesman-Review published a feature called The Bingville Bugle. Written by humorist Newton Newkirk, The Bingville Bugle was a parody of a hillbilly newsletter filled with gossipy tidbits, minstrel quips, creative spelling, and mock ads. A neighbor, 15-year-old Valentine Hobart, shared Crosbys enthusiasm for The Bugle, and noting Crosbys laugh, took a liking to him, eventually, the last vowel was dropped and the nickname stuck. Crosby later described Jolsons delivery as electric, Crosby graduated from Gonzaga High School in 1920 and enrolled at Gonzaga University. He attended Gonzaga for three years, but did not earn a bachelors degree, as a freshman, he played on the universitys baseball team. The university granted him a doctorate in 1937. In 1923, Crosby was invited to join a new band composed of school students a few years younger than himself. Al Rinker, Miles Rinker, James Heaton, Claire Pritchard and Robert Pritchard, along with drummer Crosby, formed the Musicaladers, the group performed on Spokane radio station KHQ, but disbanded after two years
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The Andrews Sisters
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The Andrews Sisters were an American close harmony singing group of the swing and boogie-woogie eras. The group consisted of three sisters, contralto LaVerne Sophia, soprano Maxene Angelyn, and mezzo-soprano Patricia Marie Patty, throughout their long career, the sisters sold well over 75 million records. Their 1941 hit Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy can be considered an example of rhythm. The Andrews Sisters harmonies and songs are still today, and have been covered by entertainers such as Bette Midler, Christina Aguilera, Pentatonix. The group was inducted into the Vocal Group Hall of Fame in 1998, writing for Bloomberg, Mark Schoifet said the sisters became the most popular female vocal group of the first half of the 20th century. They are still widely acclaimed today for their famous close harmonies, the sisters were born to Peter Andreos and Olga, their father was Greek and their mother Norwegian-American of the Lutheran faith. Following the collapse of their fathers Minneapolis restaurant, the sisters went on the road to support the family and they started their career as imitators of an earlier successful singing group, the Boswell Sisters who were popular in the 1930s. They followed this success with a string of best-selling records over the two years and they became a household name by the 1940s. Instrumental to the success over the years were their parents, their orchestra leader and musical arranger, Vic Schoen, and Jack and David Kapp. During World War II they entertained the Allied forces extensively in America, Africa and Italy, visiting Army, Navy, Marine and Coast Guard bases, war zones, hospitals, and munitions factories. They encouraged U. S. citizens to war bonds with their rendition of Irving Berlins song Any Bonds Today. While touring, they often treated three random servicemen to dinner when they were dining out. I. An ad in the 1951 Radio Annual showed photos of the Andrews as children, as singers, and as old women in the then-future year of 1975, sadly. In the 1950s, Patty Andrews decided to break away from the act to be a soloist and she had married the trios pianist, Walter Weschler, who then became the groups manager and demanded more money for Patty. Patty attributed the breakup to the deaths of their parents, We had been nearly all our lives. Then in one year our dream world ended and our mother died and then our father. All three of us were upset, and we were at each others throats all the time, in 1951, they recorded The Windmill Song which is an adaptation of the French song Maître Pierre written in 1948 by Henri Betti and Jacques Plante. The English lyrics were written by Mitchell Parish, the Andrews Sisters formally broke up in 1953
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