gnomon - 45worlds - All Comments

gnomon - 45worlds - All Comments

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Member	Item		Review/Comment
gnomon 12th Nov 2022		78 RPM Bull Moose Jackson And His Buffalo Bearcats - I Love You Yes I Do / Sneaky Pete	That floppy bow tie in Boarding House Blues is a trip. Dad used to do a lot of things just for publicity, any kind of attention. He thought it was good business. My mom was embarrassed by a lot of it and got him to tone things down when she could. One time we went bowling and my dad picked up his ball, held it over his head with both hands, wiggled his hips around then shuffled to the line to send his ball down the lane. That drove my mom nuts, and not in a good way. Mom asked him why he did that ridiculous thing and he said it draws attention. Clearly, my dad was a show-off, but that was part of his aspect of the business. Cab Calloway and Lionel Hampton picked up on some of my dad's antics. Not Duke, Basie, or Pops. They were more elegant. Mom got my dad to put more elegance into his act, but you could still count on him doing spins during a lively number. You might run across some film in your travels of Lucky using a conductor's baton that was more like a switch for a carriage horse. It was huge and, in my opinion, rather annoying. He was certainly known for conducting with a baton a lot of the time. My mom convinced him to start using a classical orchestra conductor's baton. But if you ever see his antics with the switch, you'll know what I mean. I think that floppy bow tie was a similar thing. Nobody had one like that, that I know of, and it wasn't a popular fad to my knowledge either. It is different.
gnomon 5th Nov 2022		78 RPM Bull Moose Jackson And His Buffalo Bearcats - I Love You Yes I Do / Sneaky Pete	It seems like they took my word for things and just made some superficial changes. I agree with Marv that my dad in the pic with my mom does not look like 1955. He is much younger in his face and physique and is wearing completely different attire. The same with Glover. My dad and Glover are wearing that same attire taken with my mom in other photos which places those in the same session as the others, but not the Cathy Ryan session. Popsie Randolph who is credited with taking the photos in both sessions, about 7 years apart, is feasible. He was a well-known music industry photographer in NYC and might have been on-call for noteworthy sessions at that studio, which does seem the same for both sessions. So he either took the 1948 session when he was about 28 and the 1955 session when he was about 35, which is possible, or he only took one of them and not the other. I think he probably took both since he was gaining fame in the 1940s, he had plenty of well-known subjects in the 50s as well, and Getty says so, although that part is not a compelling argument. The excellent quality looks similar for both. I think they based their changes on the pics that had the same clothing as the ones with Cathy Ryan in them and the ones that did not. That makes sense, but that does not give me much confidence in the rest of their changes.
gnomon 4th Nov 2022		78 RPM Bull Moose Jackson And His Buffalo Bearcats - I Love You Yes I Do / Sneaky Pete	It would appear that there are still some inaccuracies left in the Lucky Millinder section of the Michael Ochs Archives at Getty Images, but all of the images with Cathy Ryan in them they have changed the date to simply 1955. There are a couple of photos from that session without Cathy Ryan in them with just my dad and Glover, which they changed to specifically March 3, 1955. Marv Goldberg has cleared up the confusion about his doubting that this was the same Cathy Ryan because he had only looked at the photo of my mom, Dad, Glover, and the two unknown white guys. The description at that time said it was part of the Cathy Ryan session and Marv knew for a fact that the lady, my mom, was not his Cathy Ryan. Now he knows that the lady was my mom and that Getty was just saying that it was taken during the Cathy Ryan session. But anyone who did not know what Cathy Ryan looked like would assume that the lady in the photo was, therefore, Cathy Ryan. Marv also emphasized that the photo of my parents was definitely in the 40s, so I am accepting the Getty Images date of July 28, 1948. But based on the errors I pointed out to them, which they corrected, I have to wonder about their accuracy in general; at least, in that era.
gnomon 4th Nov 2022		78 RPM Bull Moose Jackson And His Buffalo Bearcats - I Love You Yes I Do / Sneaky Pete	Thanks fixbutte. If I knew how to do that I might. Plus, these days (months) I have been occupied with a few genetic genealogic projects that I am working on, with several sets of mysteries, that are taxing my brain at the moment. I am, however, glad that I accidentally ran across this discussion about my parents and took the time to clear up a few things, especially, when answers to such puzzles are not all that forthcoming. I try to break away and visit here though when I can. If I hear more from Marv or Getty I'll let you all know.
gnomon 4th Nov 2022		78 RPM Bull Moose Jackson And His Buffalo Bearcats - I Love You Yes I Do / Sneaky Pete	I have contacted both Getty Images and Marv Goldberg about the Cathy Ryan session date. I asked Getty Images to see if they still had any good accounting of the date of the Cathy Ryan session which is suspected to be 1955 and not 1948. Getty Images has edited the photo information to now reflect that the session was in 1955 and not 1948, but they still have left most of the other photos as before except the one with Ella Fitzgerald that previously identified it as Lucky and Ella, and some woman, who is clearly a man. They fixed that, but the photo with my parents, Glover, and the two unknown white guys remains the same, 1948. I did ask Getty Images if they knew who those two guys are, but they have not mentioned anything to me. I also asked them a few other things while I was at it that they have ignored, so it is unknown if they ever will address them. Marv, on the other hand, questioned whether it is the same Cathy Ryan. I have just sent a reply asking him why he questions it, which I don't know yet, but it does seem like the same Cathy Ryan to me as is in the photos he sent me, only in the Millinder session Getty Images she would not be considered slender as she was in the 1952 photo (also Getty Images) Marv sent me of her.
gnomon 27th Oct 2022		78 RPM Bull Moose Jackson And His Buffalo Bearcats - I Love You Yes I Do / Sneaky Pete	Hello, fixbutte, xiphophilos, Whyperion, et al, Actually, I was born Roger Millinder, but my folks changed it, unofficially, when I was going into elementary school in Granby CT to have my mom's and aunt's family name for my middle name and my uncle's surname as mine. That was supposed to keep busy-bodies from inquiring about why my name was different from my family's. I went along with it, of course, as a child, but that theory didn't make much sense to me. All the kids knew my mom and my aunt and my uncle. The bigger question in my mind was explaining why my uncle had two wives. He didn't, of course, but a man living with two sisters, to me, would have raised more eyebrows. I took up international relations and had to focus on an area, so I went with Latin American studies. When it was evident that I would be studying abroad for a while my folks got an attorney to do an official name change in 1969 I think. I already had my SSN and driver's license in my changed name, so the court just made it official and there were no complications when it came time to get my passport. I do not know who the two white guys are in the photo of Mom, Dad, and Glover. I have wondered for some time. Maybe one day I'll figure it out. I do not know when Nick and my mom produced that 45 on Belmont H. Maybe I can look for some clues on the record itself. Coincidentally, quite recently a friend from high school who was a record collector has been unloading his collection for some time. He said he had a 45 of my mom and Nick and did I want it. I said that I did and he sent it to me. I see that Charlie Grean, who I mentioned before, produced it. If I figure out when it was done, I let you know. But if it came out in the 60s, most likely it would have been the late 60s. I vaguely remember that Mom and Nick were making the 45, but probably I would have had a better recollection of it if it was before I went away to college in 1968. Still, it could have happened in the early 60s. I was in my own world and not really following my mom's musical efforts that much at that time.
gnomon 26th Oct 2022		78 RPM Bull Moose Jackson And His Buffalo Bearcats - I Love You Yes I Do / Sneaky Pete	Yes, that is a good article, although it does have an erroneous reference to Lucius Venable Millinder. Also, it says, as do other articles, that he was born in 1900. He was born in 1910. I am not noted there, most likely because my mom, aunt, and uncle had me sequestered away in northern Connecticut. Vivian Brewington also had a previous child of her own before she married Lucky, but his kids with her were Lucius (L-II) and Tami. L-II had a son L-III, who I am in touch with occasionally. Lucky never had the name, Venable. Having seen it in a jazz history book in the library I asked my mom as a kid where the name Venable came from since it wasn't the LeRoy that I knew. She never heard of it, so when we next visited dad in New York she asked him. Unfortunately, I don't remember exactly what he said, only that his middle name was LeRoy. So, he did give me an answer about Venable but I forget what it was, probably because I did find out that LeRoy was correct and Venable was not. I trust that most people here know Marv Goldberg. I asked Marv if he had any idea where the Venable came from. He said he didn't know for sure, but he thought that Lucky probably just briefly and casually used it to honor an old colleague in Chicago that had helped him a lot when he was new in the business in the 1920s. [I'm paraphrasing.] That person he mentioned was a Venable, but I cannot find my notes on which Venable Marv told me. I believe it was possibly Percy Venable who was a songwriter, a record producer, and an associate of Pops (Louis Armstrong). Even with Marv offering that hypothesis, it still did not jog my memory of whatever Dad had said to me about it. Bottom line: Venable was never part of Lucky's real name. Interesting trivia. You know that Lucky's name was Lucius LeRoy Millinder, but none of you probably know that he had a brother, born the year before him (1909), LeRoy Lucius Millinder. I know, right? LeRoy Lucius and Lucius LeRoy. That confused me to no end until in my genealogy research I found out that people were not accidentally flip-flopping the name and I actually had an uncle by that name.
gnomon 26th Oct 2022		78 RPM Bull Moose Jackson And His Buffalo Bearcats - I Love You Yes I Do / Sneaky Pete	The Belmont record you refer to is my mom. This was done long after Mom had essentially retired from the music business. She had a friend, Nick Casciano, who ran a cement/concrete company in Connecticut and had a huge music hobby. Nick had built a pretty sizable studio in his suburban house that had great acoustics. He had a lot of instruments, all of which he played himself, and could have a group playing, or could tape tracks of himself playing all of the instruments on a piece. He and Mom wrote "It's A Wonderful Life" and "My Big Marine". "My Big Marine" was written for my cousin who had joined the Marines. But that is my mother on the record. She was never a singer professionally. As a songwriter, she sang a lot and loved to sing, but Dad probably never used her as a singer in the band because she was "Country". Mom loved country music more than she liked Dad's music. But she was a talented lyricist and could write the kinds of things that the band wanted and needed. Do you know what Henry Glover looks like? If not, you know that Getty Images photo where you got that snippet of my mom that you posted? In the full photo, Glover is standing next to my mom. In the photo you posted, you can see a little of Glover's left lapel as he is shoulder-to-shoulder there with my mom. You can Google "Millinder Getty Images" and see the whole thing there, plus others. Finally, for today, it is said that Lucky could not read music, which might be true, but I do not know that for a fact. I have seen the conductor's arrangement package for "Sweet Slumber" and my mom "believed" that it was all scored in Lucky's hand. There was a substantial amount of scoring involved. In addition, on several visits to see Dad in the studio, he would often be poring over sheet music laid out on the top of the piano discussing different aspects of the arrangements. That is, of course, not proof that he could read music, but it does seem hard for a bandleader to debate passages of the arrangements using the sheet music if you can't read it. I never saw him play an instrument though. So, I can't say that he could read music, but I also can't say that he couldn't. BTW, my mom could not read music, so she as well mainly surmised that Dad could. She did say that she "could have sworn" that she saw him editing sheet music. This raises the question that if my mom couldn't read music how did she write the music to her songs? The answer is that she had people around her who loved her and did write music (she was quite endearing). She would call them and sometimes even wake them up in the middle of the night and sing her melodies to them over the phone. Then they'd send her the manuscripts. Her #1 go-to guy was Charles Grean. Charlie had been the musical director for the Jack Paar Show, the Jimmy Dean Show, the Eddy Arnold Show, and others. Mom was a close friend of his wife Betty Johnson. Charlie could write music like he was writing a note in English. So, he could literally do it half asleep. She couldn't read those manuscripts, of course, but as soon as anyone would play them she knew what was done correctly and what was off. Then whoever she was with at the time using that sheet music could tweak it to her specs.
gnomon 22nd Oct 2022		78 RPM Bull Moose Jackson And His Buffalo Bearcats - I Love You Yes I Do / Sneaky Pete	Dad had a lot to do with the song "I Love You, Yes I Do". If you ever check out the old movie "Boarding House Blues" featuring my dad's friend Jackie "Moms" Mabley, at about 1 hour 4 minutes in (I skip to the good part; the movie itself leaves a lot to be desired) there is a run of five songs done consecutively by my dad and his band. I'm not that crazy about all of the acts in the "entertainment section" of the movie that leads up to the finale with my dad. But it does start off with "Crip" Herd, the famous one-legged/one-armed dancer. Moms Mabley does some light banter and a little soft shoe. The dancing Berry Brothers are featured as are the comedy act of Stump and Stumpy who also dance. There is a lot of vaudeville holdover. Una Mae Carlisle does a couple of numbers, which seemed a bit out of place for a black revue; although, of the acts besides dad's I liked Una Mae's the best. But it was not as improvisational as I would have liked. The first number by Dad is possibly the best song in the set, but I don't know its title and I believe it is still something of a mystery. If anyone recognizes it, please let me know. We can play it by ear, but what is it? Then comes "Sweet Slumber" with Paul Breckenridge. The vocal songs here illustrate the use of really long intros before the voices come in. In fact, with these numbers, the vocalists aren't even on center stage (or visible on screen) when the intros start. They amble in when the intros finally wind down. After this comes Annisteen Allen singing "Let It Roll". This song always makes me wonder if the Doors ever made a deal regarding its use when they did "Roadhouse" 20 years later. Next comes one of the saxophonists in the band, Bull Moose Jackson to sing "I Love You, Yes I Do". My mom was very fond of Benjamin Jackson, but I only remember meeting him one time as a child. The closing number they do is "D-Natural Blues". There is some question regarding the evolution of this piece. It was one of my dad's "theme songs". At least he used it a lot. And it is essentially "The Hucklebuck". Which came first? There are some who think "The Hucklebuck" was stolen from the "D-Natural Blues". If there is anyone in the know here who can shed some light on this, it would be appreciated. Anyway, they close here with a rendition of "D-Natural Blues". I like this movie mainly for the five classic numbers, including the public version of my mom's song. There's a lot of good stuff packed into these five consecutive numbers. The photo of my mom you posted is cropped from a Getty Images photo. Hope it's cool with them. That's me, Roger Nix White in her obit, and my daughter Kimberly Margaret White (named after Cookie). I have a copy of that sheet music. Even though Dad was not named as a composer and Bull Moose Jackson had the hit, in the day it was always associated with Lucky Millinder and his orchestra. Singers up until about that time were treated less significantly as "musicians" and the bands they were in took the spotlight. Things changed with Ella Fitzgerald, Billy Holiday, Frank Sinatra, and others who paved the way for singers to be the main attraction. So, to me, it makes sense that it is shown as a Lucky Millinder piece. You know those picture postcards of New England Churches in the winter snow? The funeral service at the First Congregational Church named in the obit was such a church located in Granby CT. My mom did not belong to that church but loved it because it was her quintessential New England. That is why we had her service there. She was cremated in Florida, her ashes sat in an urn on my TV in the Washington DC suburbs for months until we could do the service in Connecticut, then she sat on my TV again for another few months until we could arrange to take her back home to Mineola TX to the Nix family cemetery plot where Aunt Cookie's ashes were already buried.
gnomon 22nd Oct 2022		78 RPM Bull Moose Jackson And His Buffalo Bearcats - I Love You Yes I Do / Sneaky Pete	That's right. When I speak of northern Connecticut, we first moved to Simsbury, then to West Hartford. From West Hartford, we moved to Granby, where I went to elementary school and high school. Over the years, my aunt and uncle and my mom were getting on each other's nerves, so when I was 16 (theoretically, old enough to withstand the trauma of a household reorganization) my mom moved to Hartford. I had a residence in both places. Aunt Cookie was my aunt who was my second mother. This is from my AncestryDNA tree. Dad: Lucius 'Lucky' LeRoy Millinder B: 8 Aug 1910 Anniston, Calhoun, Alabama, USA D: 28 Sep 1966 New York City, New York, USA Mom: Sarah Josephine Nix B: 28 May 1919 Mineola, Wood, Texas, USA D: 14 July 1989 Daytona Beach, Volusia, Florida, USA Second Mom: Margaret "Cookie" Virginia Nix White B: 15 Feb 1916 Mineola, Wood, Texas, USA D: 20 Jun 1988 Elkhart, Elkhart, Indiana, USA Second Dad: James Andrew White Sr B: 9 Nov 1917 Marshall, Lyon, Minnesota, USA D:12 Jan 2012 Elkhart, Elkhart, Indiana, USA My mom's home address was in Allendale just south of Daytona Beach and across the Halifax River from the long strip of land that is the oceanfront of Dayton Beach, but she died in the hospital in Daytona Beach. My uncle, Jim White, was an electronics engineer. In Connecticut, he worked for United Aircraft. Later he and Cookie moved to Elkhart, Indiana because a company called Ames that was later bought out by Miles Laboratories, and subsequently Bayer (of aspirin fame), hired him to invent the workings of the "Glucometer". They owned the rights to the name "Glucometer, but it didn't work. Working there, my uncle got several patents on his inventions that actually measured blood sugar levels accurately. Unfortunately, he did so under contract with Ames/Miles/Bayer, so he got bonuses and not wealthy. But there is no diabetic in this country today that does not use some modern version of my uncle's invention.
gnomon 18th Oct 2022		78 RPM Bull Moose Jackson And His Buffalo Bearcats - I Love You Yes I Do / Sneaky Pete	As a young child on up until I could drive myself, Mom would often take me with her when she made her periodic trips from northern Connecticut (Hartford County) down to NYC to see music people and Dad. Whenever we would visit the Duke, or Pops, or Bill Basie, or the Mills Brothers, they would always introduce my mom to others as Sally Millinder. But to my knowledge, Mom was never married to Dad. I know that Dad's marriage to Clara Townsend was essentially over in the early 1940s and by sometime around 1943 or 44 everyone knew that my mom and Lucky were together. They were clearly a couple until shortly after 1950 when I was born. Mom had to stop working with the band full-time to take care of me. When I was born and came home from the hospital I was living with Mom, her sister, her brother-in-law, their adopted son, and their dog. Lucky did not live with us but visited a lot. My birth was anticipated, of course, but eventually led to the breakup of Mom's familial relationship with Dad. Dad was with the band all of the time and Mom could not be. When my aunt and uncle moved from NYC to northern Connecticut, Mom and I had no choice but to go with them since my aunt was my second mother and was the main one looking after me. A few years after that, Dad married Vivian Brewington. Vivian was wonderful and after Mom and Lucky had both died, Vivian and I were put in touch with each other by Mom's closest friend, Ruth Bowen. Some of my earliest memories were of Ruth and Billy Bowen. Every couple of months or so Vivian and I would spend an hour or two on the phone with each other. She being in NYC and me in the suburbs of Washington DC. I was in touch with Ruthie a lot, but even more with Vivian. Mom was born in May of 1919 in Mineola TX, where she is currently buried in the Nix Family cemetery plot. She died of lung cancer in 1989, a few months after my daughter was born. She did have a chance to spend some time taking care of her granddaughter for a few weeks right after she was born. Mom had moved to Daytona Beach FL with friends in the mid-80s. While she was still in Connecticut she was treated for cancer and it went into remission. But Mom, like so many others of her generation, started smoking cigarettes when she was probably as young as 12 or so. Even though she had battled her cancer successfully, she could not stop smoking and her cancer returned. This time she kept it to herself and her doctor. She had said after her first bout that if it ever came back she would not have the strength to fight it again. Unfortunately, that was not enough of a deterrent to prevent her from smoking. So, I lost Mom in July of 1989. Age 70 is so young, but of course not nearly as young as Dad who only lived to 56.
gnomon 16th Oct 2022		78 RPM Bull Moose Jackson And His Buffalo Bearcats - I Love You Yes I Do / Sneaky Pete	Hello. I just joined specifically to make this comment. My father was Lucky Millinder (Lucius LeRoy Millinder) and my mother was Sally Nix (Sarah Josephine Nix). "I Love You, Yes I Do" was possibly my mother's favorite song that she wrote. It reached its peak as a hit before I was born in 1950. When I grew up she would sing it a lot throughout the house. Frankly, as a child, I got really sick of it, although I later came to appreciate it. The original lyrics in their entirety were never published. The final verse was changed because the original lyrics were supposedly too racy. I grew up with the original lyrics drummed into me as my mother sang them around the house. Originally, the lyrics in the final verse used "to have and hold" as a theme. That theme became "to hug and kiss" in the change. Evidently, "have and hold" was shamefully explicit whereas "hug and kiss" was not. I can only figure that somebody's pockets got lined in the process. I knew Henry Glover, who is named as one of the two original composers. My mom was primarily a lyricist. Sneaky Pete, which she is credited with 100% she said had a lot of input from my dad, who got no official credit. Mom told me that she got the melody for "I Love You, Yes I Do" from my dad, not Glover (as we all called him, even me as a young child). I asked her why Glover was named as her co-writer. She said she didn't know, but she did know that Dad would often sell/trade his authorship of music when there was financial duress regarding the band. That is possibly what happened with Glover in this instance. Glover was involved in a lot of things. Mom would never sell or trade her rights to her work. The "Tonight He Sails Again" fiasco (plagiarism lawsuit) did not really affect my mother's contribution, which was supported by the court. She wrote the lyrics to "I Love You, Yes I Do" based on the melody that was presented to her. The court recognized that fact and so her status as a composer of the song stood. The music, on the other hand, was deemed a rip-off of "Tonight He Sails Again", so that's when Sol Marcus, Eddie Seiler, and Guy Wood were then listed as composers.