Happy Birthday, Sweet 16, The Ups and Downs of Radio Work, Some Live Music, and Other Wonders

Welcome back to my archives!!!

I have very little time this week, so I will be far less verbose than usual. 

First up is a tape I've owned, and loved, for decades. It comes from Lake Forest, IL, and features two different recordings from the 1957-58 school year of a bunch of girls who were, apparently, mostly High School Juniors that year. Nearly the entirety of both tapes is made up of the girls singing, which I enjoy mightily. 

Here is the relevant (i.e. the marked-up) part of the tape box: 

First up, with have Joan's 16th birthday party, wherein the girls sing a number of fight songs, including some lyrics to the Notre Dame song - about drinking - that I've never heard anywhere but on this tape. They also sing the songs of a couple of nearby high schools, including ones that no one in Lake Forest would have attended, which seems a little weird. Throw in some current pop songs, including the utterly wonderful "Just Between You and Me", originally by the Chordettes, and you have an irresistible little segment. 

Download: Joan's 16th Birthday Party, 9/19/57

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Immediately after this is what's listed as the "Junior Luncheon", which does feature, as the box indicates, an unfortunate hum. I've tried to minimize this hum, but have been unable to do so without also impacting the sound of the recording. Here, again, there is a bunch of singing, although it sure sounds to me as if they are wishing the Senior Class well as they leave the school - why that would be the subject of a Junior Luncheon I'm not sure. But I'm guessing - hence the date - that this happened later in the school year, probably the Spring of 1958. 

But the kicker for me here is that all the songs sung have new lyrics, each of them about a specific girl to whom they are singing. I just think this is a great deal of fun. 

Download: Joan's Junior Luncheon, Lake Forest, IL, Likely 1958

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Let's switch gears here pretty radically and listen to six and a half minutes of production material recorded for radio station WEEP in Pittsburgh, in January of 1976. 

The box has this sticker on it: 

These short little segments are all over the map, and nearly all of them are pretty entertaining, especially if you ignore the John Denver concert promo. Another fun little tape. 

Download: WEEP, Pittsburgh - Radio Productions -January 1976

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So that last sampling was a lot of fun. From about as far away as you can get and still be (I think) in radio, here we have someone I think is practicing being a DJ, or perhaps trying to make a demo tape, or... well, I just don't know. 

It seems pretty half-assed, or perhaps even quarter-assed, but it is incompetent in a fairly interesting way, so I'll just share it here and see if anyone out there has a better idea what's going on. 

Download: Unknown - Possibly DJ Practice

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And in case you wanted to hear some early Randy Travis, guess what I.....

Oops, sorry, this isn't Randy Travis. It's Travis and Randy. See: 

And if you'd been one of the what sounds like no more than five people who were at the Ramada Inn in Tucson, on 10/29/71, you could have heard this little set of music (and probably a lot more, but this is all that was on the tape). 

Download: Travis and Randy at the Ramada Inn, Tucson, Arizona, 10-29-71

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Now it's time for our "Acetate of the Month". In this case, someone named E. Frederick recorded four songs on the accordion - two on each side of a ten inch acetate, way back on November 27th, 1940. The two sides of the record look like this: 

And they sound like this: 

Download: E Frederick - Dizzy Fingers & Two Guitars - 11--27- 40 (Presto Acetate)

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Download: E Frederick - Nola & Beautiful Days - 11-27- 40 (Presto Acetate)

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And finally, a VERY short example of a "Very Short Reel", and an enigmatic one at that. I'll let the track I've titled "Can You Hear That There?" speak for itself. 

Download: "Can You Hear That There?"

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