Multiple-camera setup
The multiple-camera setup, multiple-camera mode of production, multi-camera or multicam is a method of filmmaking and video production. Several cameras—either film or professional video cameras—are employed on the set and record or broadcast a scene, it is contrasted with single-camera setup, which uses one camera. The two outer cameras shoot close-up shots or "crosses" of the two most active characters on the set at any given time, while the central camera or cameras shoot a wider master shot to capture the overall action and establish the geography of the room. In this way, multiple shots are obtained in a single take without having to start and stop the action; this is more efficient for programs that are to be shown a short time after being shot as it reduces the time spent in film or video editing. It is a virtual necessity for regular, high-output shows like daily soap operas. Apart from saving editing time, scenes may be shot far more as there is no need for re-lighting and the set-up of alternative camera angles for the scene to be shot again from the different angle.
It reduces the complexity of tracking continuity issues that crop up when the scene is reshot from the different angles. It is an essential part of live television. Drawbacks include a less optimized lighting which needs to provide a compromise for all camera angles and less flexibility in putting the necessary equipment on scene, such as microphone booms and lighting rigs; these can be efficiently hidden from just one camera but can be more complicated to set up and their placement may be inferior in a multiple-camera setup. Another drawback is in film usage—a four-camera setup may use up to four times as much film per take, compared with a single-camera setup. While shooting, the director and assistant director create a line cut by instructing the technical director to switch between the feeds from the individual cameras. In the case of sitcoms with studio audiences, this line cut is displayed to them on studio monitors; the line cut might be refined in editing, as the output from all cameras is recorded, both separately and as a combined reference display called the q split.
The camera being recorded to the line cut is indicated by a tally light controlled by a camera control unit on the camera as a reference both for the actors and the camera operators. The use of multiple film cameras dates back to the development of narrative silent films, with the earliest example being the first Russian feature film Defence of Sevastopol and directed by Vasily Goncharov and Aleksandr Khanzhonkov; when sound came into the picture multiple cameras were used to film multiple sets at a single time. Early sound was recorded onto wax discs; the use of multiple video cameras to cover a scene goes back to the earliest days of television. The BBC used multiple cameras for their live television shows from 1936 onward. Although it is claimed that the multiple-camera setup was pioneered for television by Desi Arnaz and cinematographer Karl Freund on I Love Lucy in 1951, other filmed television shows had used it, including the CBS comedy The Amos'n Andy Show, filmed at the Hal Roach Studios and was on the air four months earlier.
The technique was developed for television by Hollywood short-subject veteran Jerry Fairbanks, assisted by producer-director Frank Telford, first seen on the anthology series The Silver Theater, another CBS program, in February 1950. Desilu's innovation was to use 35mm film instead of 16mm and to film with a multiple-camera setup before a live studio audience. In the late 1970s, Garry Marshall was credited with adding the fourth camera to the multi-camera set-up for his series Mork & Mindy. Actor Robin Williams could not stay on his marks due to his physically active improvisations during shooting, so Marshall had them add the fourth camera just to stay on Williams so they would have more than just the master shot of the actor. Soon after, many productions followed suit and now having four cameras is the norm for multi-camera situation comedies; the multiple-camera method gives the director less control over each shot but is faster and less expensive than a single-camera setup. In television, multiple-camera is used for sports programs, news programs, soap operas, talk shows, game shows, some sitcoms.
Before the pre-filmed continuing series became the dominant dramatic form on American television, the earliest anthology programs utilized multiple camera methods. Multiple cameras can take different shots of a live situation as the action unfolds chronologically and is suitable for shows which require a live audience. For this reason, multiple camera productions can be taped much faster than single camera. Single camera productions are shot in takes and various setups with components of the action repeated several times and out of sequence. Sitcoms shot with the multiple camera setup include nearly all of Lucille Ball's TV series, as well as Mary Kay and Johnny, The Dick Van Dyke Show, The Mary Tyler Moore Show, All in the Family, Three's Company, The Cosby Show, Friends, Will & Grace, Everybody Loves Raymond, The King of Queens, Two and a Half Men, The Big Bang Theory, Mike & Molly, Mom, 2 Broke Girls, One Day at a Time. Many American sitcom
Nancy Ames
Nancy Ames is an American folk singer and songwriter. She appeared on the American version of the television series That Was the Week That Was; the TW3 Girl, as she was known, sang special material. She was born in Washington, D. C. the granddaughter of Ricardo Joaquín Alfaro, who served as President of Panama from 1931-32. The daughter of a physician, she grew up in Washington, she attended both of them for girls. By 1964 she was married to Romanian hypnotist Triaian Boyer. By 1968, they had divorced. After the divorce, she married a golf course designer, they had one child, a daughter, but divorced. Ames has resided in Houston, Texas since 1972, she and her third husband Danny Ward are the co-founders of Ames Special Events. A folk singer with a Latin repertoire, she was signed to Liberty Records, she broke the top 100 twice in 1966. Barry Sadler's "Ballad of the Green Berets," hit number 89, in the year "Cry Softly" placed in the charts, she had a TV show which aired on KPRC-TV Channel 2 from 1972-77.
She is listed as the co-writer of the theme song to The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour with Mason Williams per Williams' own 1969 LP entitled Music by Mason Williams. Ames and Williams co-wrote "Cinderella Rockefella," an international pop hit in 1968; the Incredible Nancy Ames - Liberty – LRP-3276 - A Portrait of Nancy - Liberty – LRP-3299 - I Will Never Marry - Liberty – LRP-3329 - This is the Girl That is - Liberty – LRP-3369 - Let It Be Me - Liberty – LRP-3400 - As Time Goes By - Epic – BN 26197 - Latin Pulse - Epic – BN 26189 - Versatile Nancy Ames - Sunset Records – SUS-5109 - Spiced With Brasil - Epic – LN 24238 - At The Americana - Epic – BN 26378 - 7""Bonsoir Cher" / "Cu Cu Rru Cu Cu Paloma" - Liberty – F-55548 - "Malaguena Salarosa" / "Cu Cu Rru Cu Cu Paloma" - Liberty 55737 - "The Funny Thing About It" / "Shake A Hand" - Epic – 5-9845 - "Let Tonight Linger On" / "It Scares Me" - Liberty – F-55762 - "I've Got A Lot Of Love" / "Friends And Lovers Forever" - Epic 5-9874 - "He Wore The Green Beret" / "War Is A Card Game" - Epic – 5-10003 - "I Don't Want To Talk About It" / "Cry Softly" - Epic – 5-10056 - "Friends And Lovers Forever" / "Dear Hearts And Gentle" - Epic – 5-9885 - "Love's Like Wine" / "My Story Book" - Epic – 5-10149 - "Something's Gotten Hold Of My Heart" / "On Green Dolphin Street" - ABC Records 11100 - "Something's Gotten Hold Of My Heart" / "On Green Dolphin Street" - Silvercloud Records 1001 - 12"Mr. Bongo - "Soul Limbo" / Nancy Ames - "Eso Beso" - Sony Music Entertainment – XPR 2213 - "1-2-3", "A Taste Of Honey" / "Call Me", "The Shadow Of Your Smile" - Epic – EP 9053 - Ward and Ames Special Events Nancy Ames on IMDb Nancy Ames at Discogs
Comedy
In a modern sense, comedy refers to any discourse or work intended to be humorous or amusing by inducing laughter in theatre, film, stand-up comedy, or any other medium of entertainment. The origins of the term are found in Ancient Greece. In the Athenian democracy, the public opinion of voters was influenced by the political satire performed by the comic poets at the theaters; the theatrical genre of Greek comedy can be described as a dramatic performance which pits two groups or societies against each other in an amusing agon or conflict. Northrop Frye depicted these two opposing sides as a "Society of Youth" and a "Society of the Old." A revised view characterizes the essential agon of comedy as a struggle between a powerless youth and the societal conventions that pose obstacles to his hopes. In this struggle, the youth is understood to be constrained by his lack of social authority, is left with little choice but to take recourse in ruses which engender dramatic irony which provokes laughter.
Satire and political satire use comedy to portray persons or social institutions as ridiculous or corrupt, thus alienating their audience from the object of their humor. Parody subverts popular genres and forms, critiquing those forms without condemning them. Other forms of comedy include screwball comedy, which derives its humor from bizarre, surprising situations or characters, black comedy, characterized by a form of humor that includes darker aspects of human behavior or human nature. Scatological humor, sexual humor, race humor create comedy by violating social conventions or taboos in comic ways. A comedy of manners takes as its subject a particular part of society and uses humor to parody or satirize the behavior and mannerisms of its members. Romantic comedy is a popular genre that depicts burgeoning romance in humorous terms and focuses on the foibles of those who are falling in love; the word "comedy" is derived from the Classical Greek κωμῳδία kōmōidía, a compound either of κῶμος kômos or κώμη kṓmē and ᾠδή ōidḗ.
The adjective "comic", which means that which relates to comedy is, in modern usage confined to the sense of "laughter-provoking". Of this, the word came into modern usage through the Latin comoedia and Italian commedia and has, over time, passed through various shades of meaning; the Greeks and Romans confined their use of the word "comedy" to descriptions of stage-plays with happy endings. Aristotle defined comedy as an imitation of men worse than the average. However, the characters portrayed in comedies were not worse than average in every way, only insofar as they are Ridiculous, a species of the Ugly; the Ridiculous may be defined as a deformity not productive of pain or harm to others. In the Middle Ages, the term expanded to include narrative poems with happy endings, it is in this sense that Dante used the term in the title of La Commedia. As time progressed, the word came more and more to be associated with any sort of performance intended to cause laughter. During the Middle Ages, the term "comedy" became synonymous with satire, with humour in general.
Aristotle's Poetics was translated into Arabic in the medieval Islamic world, where it was elaborated upon by Arabic writers and Islamic philosophers, such as Abu Bischr, his pupils Al-Farabi and Averroes. They disassociated comedy from Greek dramatic representation and instead identified it with Arabic poetic themes and forms, such as hija, they viewed comedy as the "art of reprehension", made no reference to light and cheerful events, or to the troubling beginnings and happy endings associated with classical Greek comedy. After the Latin translations of the 12th century, the term "comedy" gained a more general meaning in medieval literature. In the late 20th century, many scholars preferred to use the term laughter to refer to the whole gamut of the comic, in order to avoid the use of ambiguous and problematically defined genres such as the grotesque and satire. Starting from 425 BCE, Aristophanes, a comic playwright and satirical author of the Ancient Greek Theater, wrote 40 comedies, 11 of which survive.
Aristophanes developed his type of comedy from the earlier satyr plays, which were highly obscene. The only surviving examples of the satyr plays are by Euripides, which are much examples and not representative of the genre. In ancient Greece, comedy originated in bawdy and ribald songs or recitations apropos of phallic processions and fertility festivals or gatherings. Around 335 BCE, Aristotle, in his work Poetics, stated that comedy originated in phallic processions and the light treatment of the otherwise base and ugly, he adds that the origins of comedy are obscure because it was not treated from its inception. However, comedy had its own Muse: Thalia. Aristotle taught that comedy was positive for society, since it brings forth happiness, which for Aristotle was the ideal state, the final goal in any activity. For Aristotle, a comedy did not need to involve sexual humor. A comedy is about the fortunate rise of a sympathetic character. Aristotle divides comedy into three categories or subgenres: farce, romantic comedy, satire.
On the contrary, Plato taught. He believed that it produces an emotion that overrides ra
Mason Williams
Mason Douglas Williams is an American classical guitarist, writer and poet, best known for his 1968 instrumental "Classical Gas" and for his work as a comedy writer on The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour, The Glen Campbell Goodtime Hour, Saturday Night Live. Williams was born in Abilene, the son of Jackson Eugene and Kathlyn Williams. Williams grew up dividing his time between living with his father in Oklahoma and his mother in Oakridge, Oregon, he graduated from Northwest Classen High School in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma in 1956. It was in Oklahoma, he attended Oklahoma City University and North Texas State University for one semester, served in the United States Navy from 1961 to 1963. In 1968, Williams won three Grammy Awards for his guitar instrumental "Classical Gas". Together with Nancy Ames, he wrote "Cinderella Rockefella", a 1968 number one hit for Esther and Abi Ofarim in the United Kingdom. In 1970, Williams made a television appearance on a variety show, Just Friends, which reunited regulars of The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour.
To create a visual element for his performance, he used a special playable classical plexiglass guitar built for him by Billy Cheatwood and a prop designer for ABC. For the performance, Williams added a couple of goldfish, he used the plexiglass guitar to finger-sync his hit version of "Classical Gas". Williams has recorded five on the Warner Bros. label. The LP cover for the 1968 Music was painted by pop artist Edward Ruscha; the credit reads "Sorry, Cover by Edward Ruscha."Classical Gas" was released as a single from The Mason Williams Phonograph Record in 1968. "Classical Gas" won three Grammys that year for "Best Instrumental Composition", "Best Instrumental Performance", "Best Instrumental Orchestra Arrangement", Mike Post, arranger. It sold over one million copies, was awarded a gold disc, he wrote songs for The Kingston Trio. For both Handmade and Sharepickers, Mason received two more Grammy nominations for "Best Album Cover Design". In 1987, Williams teamed with Mannheim Steamroller to release a new album on the American Gramaphone label.
The album, titled Classical Gas, included a remake of the 1968 song. Another cut from this album, "Country Idyll", was a 1988 nominee for a Grammy in the country music category for "Best Instrumental Performance by a Soloist, Group or Orchestra"; the album went gold in 1991. Williams' plexiglass guitar appears on the cover of this album. Williams released an acoustic instrumental album of Christmas and holiday music, A Gift of Song, on the Real Music label, featuring arrangements of traditional carols and original compositions. In 1992, the Vanguard label released Music 1968–1971, a compilation of cuts from his five Warner Bros. albums recorded in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Williams relates when compiling the album that he went to Warner Bros. and asked "Where's that painting that Ed did for that old cover?" and was told it had been thrown away. In conjunction with the release of this album, Williams added a "Holiday Concert Program" to his repertoire, featuring music from the album as well as other traditional music of the season.
In 1994, he played six sold-out concerts with the Oregon Symphony in Oregon. In the 1990s he performed with the Eugene Symphony with friend Ken Kesey. Williams concentrated on a variety of programs for his concert appearances, his "Concert For Bluegrass Band And Orchestra" titled "Symphonic Bluegrass", has been performed with over 40 symphony orchestras, including the Colorado Symphony Orchestra, Kansas City Symphony, Louisiana Philharmonic Orchestra, Oklahoma City Philharmonic, Louisville Orchestra, the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra. In 1984, Williams released an album, Of Time & Rivers Flowing, on his own Skookum label, containing 14 of the 35 songs performed in the concert. In 1993, the title cut from the album was used as the soundtrack for a ninety-second public service announcement created by The American Rivers Council on the home video release of Robert Redford's film A River Runs Through It; the PSA was on the 1995 home video release of The River Wild. In 1995, Williams was invited to play for Oregon governor John Kitzhaber's inauguration and in 1996, Williams received an honorary Doctorate of Music from his alma mater, Oklahoma City University.
In 1998, BMI, the performance rights organization that tracks air play performances on radio and television, presented Williams with a Special Citation of Achievement in recognition of the great national and international popularity of "Classical Gas". By 2008, the song logged over six million broadcast performances, to become the all-time number-one instrumental composition for air play in BMI's repertoire. In 1999, Williams played again for the governor of Oregon's second inauguration. In February, Williams' "Bus" art piece was included in the Norton Simon Museum exhibition "Radical Past", in Pasadena, California. In the spring he played his Of Time and Rivers Flowing concert with the Oregon Children's Choral Festival, a two-day event involving 3,000 elementary school children singing water and rivers songs with Williams and his band. Williams received the Distinguished Service Award from the University of Oregon in honor of his Contribution to Oregon's arts. In the fall of 1999, he and the Bluegrass Band played for Byron Berline's Oklahoma International Bluegrass Festival in Guthrie, Oklahoma with the Oklahoma City Philharmonic.
Williams' music has been featured in several mov
Television show
A television show is any content produced for broadcast via over-the-air, cable, or internet and viewed on a television set, excluding breaking news, advertisements, or trailers that are placed between shows. Television shows are most scheduled well ahead of time and appear on electronic guides or other TV listings. A television show might be called a television program if it lacks a narrative structure. A television series is released in episodes that follow a narrative, are divided into seasons or series – yearly or semiannual sets of new episodes. A show with a limited number of episodes may be called serial, or limited series. A one-time show may be called a "special". A television film is a film, broadcast on television rather than released in theaters or direct-to-video. Television shows can be viewed as they are broadcast in real time, be recorded on home video or a digital video recorder for viewing, or be viewed on demand via a set-top box or streamed over the internet; the first television shows were experimental, sporadic broadcasts viewable only within a short range from the broadcast tower starting in the 1930s.
Televised events such as the 1936 Summer Olympics in Germany, the 1937 coronation of King George VI in the UK, David Sarnoff's famous introduction at the 1939 New York World's Fair in the US spurred a growth in the medium, but World War II put a halt to development until after the war. The 1947 World Series inspired many Americans to buy their first television set and in 1948, the popular radio show Texaco Star Theater made the move and became the first weekly televised variety show, earning host Milton Berle the name "Mr Television" and demonstrating that the medium was a stable, modern form of entertainment which could attract advertisers; the first national live television broadcast in the US took place on September 4, 1951 when President Harry Truman's speech at the Japanese Peace Treaty Conference in San Francisco was transmitted over AT&T's transcontinental cable and microwave radio relay system to broadcast stations in local markets. The first national color broadcast in the US occurred on January 1, 1954.
During the following ten years most network broadcasts, nearly all local programming, continued to be in black-and-white. A color transition was announced for the fall of 1965, during which over half of all network prime-time programming would be broadcast in color; the first all-color prime-time season came just one year later. In 1972, the last holdout among daytime network shows converted to color, resulting in the first all-color network season. Television shows are more varied than most other forms of media due wide variety formats and genres that can be presented. A show may non-fictional, it may be historical. They could be instructional or educational, or entertaining as is the case in situation comedy and game shows. A drama program features a set of actors playing characters in a historical or contemporary setting; the program follows their adventures. Except for soap opera-type serials, many shows before the 1980s, remained static without story arcs, the main characters and premise changed little.
If some change happened to the characters' lives during the episode, it was undone by the end. Because of this, the episodes could be broadcast in any order. Since the 1980s, there are many series that feature progressive change to the plot, the characters, or both. For instance, Hill Street Blues and St. Elsewhere were two of the first American prime time drama television series to have this kind of dramatic structure. While the series, Babylon 5 is an extreme example of such production that had a predetermined story running over its intended five-season run. In 2012, it was reported that television was growing into a larger component of major media companies' revenues than film; some noted the increase in quality of some television programs. In 2012, Academy-Award-winning film director Steven Soderbergh, commenting on ambiguity and complexity of character and narrative, stated: "I think those qualities are now being seen on television and that people who want to see stories that have those kinds of qualities are watching television."
When a person or company decides to create a new series, they develop the show's elements, consisting of the concept, the characters, the crew, cast. They "pitch" it to the various networks in an attempt to find one interested enough to order a prototype first episode of the series, known as a pilot. Eric Coleman, an animation executive at Disney, told an interviewer, "One misconception is that it's difficult to get in and pitch your show, when the truth is that development executives at networks want much to hear ideas, they want much to get the word out on what types of shows they're looking for."To create the pilot, the structure and team of the whole series must be put together. If audiences respond well to the pilot, the network will pick up the show to air it the next season. Sometimes they save it for mid-season, or father review. Other times, they pass forcing the show's creator to "shop it around" to other networks. Many shows never make it past the pilot stage; the show hires a stable of writers, who usually
Janis Ian
Janis Ian is an American singer-songwriter, most commercially successful in the 1960s and 1970s. Born in 1951 in New York City, Ian entered the American folk music scene while still a teenager in the mid-1960s. Most active musically in that decade and the 1970s, she has continued recording into the 21st century, she has won two Grammy Awards, the first in 1975 for "At Seventeen" and the second in 2013 for Best Spoken Word Album, for her autobiography, Society's Child, with a total of ten nominations in eight different categories. Ian is a columnist and science fiction author. Born in New York City, Janis Fink was raised in New Jersey on a farm, attended East Orange High School in East Orange, New Jersey, the New York City High School of Music & Art, her parents, Victor, a music teacher, Pearl were Jewish-born liberals who ran a summer camp in upstate New York. As a child, Ian admired the work of folk pioneers such as Joan Odetta. Starting with piano lessons at the age of two, Ian, by the time she entered her teens, was playing the organ, French horn and guitar.
At the age of 12, she wrote her first song, "Hair of Spun Gold", subsequently published in the folk publication Broadside and was recorded for her debut album. In 1964, she changed her name to Janis Ian, taking her brother Eric's middle name as her new surname. At the age of 14, Ian wrote and recorded her first hit single, "Society's Child", about an interracial romance forbidden by a girl's mother and frowned upon by her peers and teachers. Produced by George "Shadow" Morton and released three times from 1965 to 1967, "Society's Child" became a national hit upon its third release after Leonard Bernstein featured it in a CBS TV special titled Inside Pop: The Rock Revolution; the song's theme of interracial relationships was considered taboo by some radio stations, who withdrew or banned it from their playlists accordingly. In her 2008 autobiography Society's Child, Ian recalls receiving hate mail and death threats as a response to the song and mentions that a radio station in Atlanta that played it was burned down.
In the summer of 1967, "Society's Child" reached number 14 on the Billboard Hot 100, the single having sold 600,000 copies and the album 350,000. At the age of 16, Ian met comedian Bill Cosby backstage at a Smothers Brothers show where she was promoting Society's Child. Since she was underage, she was accompanied by a chaperone while touring. After her set, Ian had been sleeping with her head on her chaperone's lap. According to Ian in a 2015 interview, she was told by her manager that Cosby had interpreted their interaction as "lesbian" and as a result "had made it his business" to warn other television shows that Ian wasn't "suitable family entertainment" and "shouldn't be on television" because of her sexuality, thus attempting to blacklist her. Although Ian would come out as lesbian, she states that at the time of the encounter with Cosby she had only been kissed once, in broad daylight at summer camp. Ian relates on her website that, although the song was intended for Atlantic Records and the label paid for her recording session, Atlantic subsequently returned the master to her and refused to release it.
Ian relates that years Atlantic's president at the time, Jerry Wexler, publicly apologized to her for this. The single and Ian's 1967 eponymous debut album were released on Verve Forecast. In 2001, "Society's Child" was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame, which honors recordings considered timeless and important to music history, her early music was compiled on a double CD entitled Society's Child: The Verve Recordings in 1995. "Society's Child" stigmatized Ian as a one-hit wonder until her most successful US single, "At Seventeen", was released in 1975. "At Seventeen" is a bittersweet commentary on adolescent cruelty, the illusion of popularity and teenage angst, from the perspective of a narrator looking back on her earlier experience. The song was a major hit as it charted at number 3 on the Billboard Hot 100, hit number 1 on the Adult Contemporary chart and won the 1976 Grammy Award for Best Pop Vocal Performance - Female, beating out Linda Ronstadt, Olivia Newton-John and Helen Reddy.
Ian appeared as a musical guest on the series premiere of Saturday Night Live on October 11, 1975, performing "At Seventeen" and "In the Winter". The album, Between the Lines, was a smash and reached number 1 on Billboard′s album chart; the album would be certified platinum for sales of over one million copies sold in the US. Another measure of her success is anecdotal: on Valentine's Day 1977, Ian received 461 valentine cards, having indicated in the lyrics to "At Seventeen" that she never received one as a teenager."Fly Too High", produced by disco producer Giorgio Moroder, was Ian's contribution to the soundtrack of the Jodie Foster film Foxes and was featured on Ian's 1979 album Night Rains. It became her first international hit, reaching number 1 in many countries, including South Africa, Australia and the Netherlands, going gold or platinum in those countries as well as charting in the UK. Another country where Ian has achieved a high level of popularity is Japan: Ian had two Top 10 singles on the Japanese Oricon charts, "Love Is Blind" in 1976 and "You Are Love" in 1980.
Ian's 1976 album Aftertones topped Oricon's album chart in October 1976. "You Are Love" is the theme song of Kinji Fukasaku's 1980 movie V
The Who
The Who are an English rock band formed in London in 1964. Their classic line-up consisted of lead singer Roger Daltrey and singer Pete Townshend, bass guitarist John Entwistle and drummer Keith Moon, they are considered one of the most influential rock bands of the 20th century, selling over 100 million records worldwide. The Who developed from an earlier group, the Detours, established themselves as part of the pop art and mod movements, featuring auto-destructive art by destroying guitars and drums on stage, their first single as the Who, "I Can't Explain", reached the UK top ten, followed by a string of singles including "My Generation", "Substitute" and "Happy Jack". In 1967, they performed at the Monterey Pop Festival and released the US top ten single "I Can See for Miles", while touring extensively; the group's fourth album, 1969's rock opera Tommy, included the single "Pinball Wizard" and was a critical and commercial success. Live appearances at Woodstock and the Isle of Wight Festival, along with the live album Live at Leeds, cemented their reputation as a respected rock act.
With their success came increased pressure on lead songwriter Townshend, the follow-up to Tommy, was abandoned. Songs from the project made up 1971's Who's Next, which included the hit "Won't Get Fooled Again"; the group released the album Quadrophenia in 1973 as a celebration of their mod roots, oversaw the film adaptation of Tommy in 1975. They continued to tour to large audiences before semi-retiring from live performances at the end of 1976; the release of Who Are You in 1978 was overshadowed by the death of Moon shortly after. Kenney Jones replaced Moon and the group resumed activity, releasing a film adaptation of Quadrophenia and the retrospective documentary The Kids Are Alright. After Townshend became weary of touring, the group split in 1983; the Who re-formed for live appearances such as Live Aid in 1985, a 25th anniversary tour in 1989 and a tour of Quadrophenia in 1996–1997. They resumed regular touring with drummer Zak Starkey. After Entwistle's death in 2002, plans for a new album were delayed.
Townshend and Daltrey continued as the Who, releasing Endless Wire in 2006, continue to play live with Starkey, bassists Pino Palladino and Jon Button, guitarist Simon Townshend serving as touring players. A tour with a complete symphony orchestra, along with a planned studio album, are both scheduled for 2019; the Who's major contributions to rock music include the development of the Marshall stack, large PA systems, use of the synthesizer and Moon's lead playing styles, Townshend's feedback and power chord guitar technique, the development of the rock opera. They are cited as an influence by hard rock, punk rock and mod bands, their songs still receive regular exposure; the founder members of the Who, Roger Daltrey, Pete Townshend and John Entwistle, grew up in Acton and went to Acton County Grammar School. Townshend's father, played saxophone and his mother, had sung in the entertainment division of the Royal Air Force during World War II, both supported their son's interest in rock and roll.
Townshend and Entwistle became friends in their second year of Acton County, formed a trad jazz group. Both were interested in rock, Townshend admired Cliff Richard's début single, "Move It". Entwistle moved to guitar, but struggled with it due to his large fingers, moved to bass on hearing the guitar work of Duane Eddy, he built one at home. After Acton County, Townshend attended Ealing Art College, a move he described as profoundly influential on the course of the Who. Daltrey, in the year above, had moved to Acton from Shepherd's Bush, a more working-class area, he had trouble fitting in at the school, discovered gangs and rock and roll. He found work on a building site. In 1959 he started the Detours, the band, to evolve into the Who; the band played professional gigs, such as corporate and wedding functions, Daltrey kept a close eye on the finances as well as the music. Daltrey spotted Entwistle by chance on the street carrying a bass and recruited him into the Detours. In mid-1961, Entwistle suggested Townshend as a guitarist, Daltrey on lead guitar, Entwistle on bass, Harry Wilson on drums, Colin Dawson on vocals.
The band played instrumentals by the Shadows and the Ventures, a variety of pop and trad jazz covers. Daltrey was considered the leader and, according to Townshend, "ran things the way he wanted them". Wilson was fired in mid-1962 and replaced by Doug Sandom, though he was older than the rest of the band, a more proficient musician, having been playing semi-professionally for two years. Dawson left after arguing with Daltrey and after being replaced by Gabby Connolly, Daltrey moved to lead vocals. Townshend, with Entwistle's encouragement, became the sole guitarist. Through Townshend's mother, the group obtained a management contract with local promoter Robert Druce, who started booking the band as a support act; the Detours were influenced by the bands they supported, including Screaming Lord Sutch, Cliff Bennett and the Rebel Rousers, Shane Fenton and the Fentones, Johnny Kidd and the Pirates. The Detours were interested in the Pirates as they only had one guitarist, Mick Green, who inspired Townshend to combine rhythm and lead guitar in his style.
Entwistle's bass became more of a lead instrument. In February 1964, the Detours became aware of the group Johnny Devlin and the Detours and changed their name. Townshend and his room-mate Richard Barnes spent a night c
