I hate to say this because it dates me and is a reminder of how people when they get to a certain age are fond of saying (much to the chagrin of their kids), “back in the good old days,” but the good old days were great for music.
By now you know that I love music, and have stated before that I probably should have been a musician. As it is, music is always playing while I write. It gives me motivation and sometimes an idea for a column, like it has today.
I first became aware of music probably in the middle to late 1940s with the great swing bands of that era. The original Ink Spots drew me in the late 1940s when I biked about 10 miles to a friend’s house and discovered his parents had a sound system installed in their beautiful home.
This was the first and maybe only time I have experienced a home with a central sound system. Apparently his folks had money. This friend is deceased (he died in a car accident in North Carolina years ago) but back then we were classmates and in my only and last visit to his house he introduced me to the sound system.
My friend began and ended by playing the Ink Spots, and I immediately fell in love with their sound and their songs. I still love them, although you seldom hear them anymore.
There have been around 100 different Ink Spots over the years, but the original members were Orville “Hoppy” Jones, who did the bass talk parts, Ivory “Deek” Watson, Charlie Fuqua and Jerry Daniels, who was replaced in 1936 by Bill Kenney, who if you never heard him you have missed an incredible voice.
If you ever get a chance listen to them sing “If I didn’t care”, “My Prayer”, “Whispering Grass,” “Maybe,” “I’ll never smile again,” “We three (My echo, My Shadow, and me),” and “Java Jive” you will be hooked.
My friend had to almost kick me out of his house, I was so overwhelmed with strong emotions while listening to the Ink Spots. It’s the same way today, although as I said I don’t hear them much anymore.
The Ink Spots, Glenn Miller, country singers like Hank Williams, Webb Pierce, Hank Snow, and Ernie Tubbs formed my early bond to music. Then along came the 1950s and doo-wop, which blew me away at a time when I really needed it.
I was in my dark years in the middle 1950s when I started to hear Doo-Wop and a song like, “In the Still of the Night” by the Five Satins. And the Platters, anything by them, including but not limited to songs like “Only You,” The Great Pretender”, “Smoke Gets in Your Eyes”, “Harbor Lights,” and “Twilight Time.”
There was “Earth Angel” by The Penguins, “Save the Last Dance for Me”, by the Drifters and, of course, “Singing in the Rain” by Johnnie Ray.
About 10 years ago I had a brief Internet conversation with an old flame. We had gotten together as young teens in the 1950s, during my dark years. She was a light that shone bright on me for several years and when I accidentally ran across her on the Internet the first thing she remembered about those times was our song, “Singing in the Rain” by Ray. She said ever once in a while she would have a flashback and Ray’s voice would come through to her.
So maybe I didn’t have an impact on her latter life, but Johnnie Ray did. And Ray and all the others have had a tremendous effect on me through all these years. It was a good time, although as I said I was in my dark years. The music – the doo-wop – made it less painful.
Once I graduated from high school in 1958 I headed back east to my old stomping grounds and to school at Alfred. In the almost two years I was there before four of us left for California, I had a chance to relive my younger teen years with doo-wop.
There was three of us – me, Dale and Lynn – who roamed through the small towns in that neck of the woods. This was done mainly on weekends when I was back in my small hometown (Portville, N.Y.) and staying at my sister’s house.
We would hit out-of-way beer gardens, with the radio blasting, smiles on our faces, no fear in our gut and love on our mind. Lynn and Dale both had girlfriends who eventually turned into wives, but I was free, free as a bird and about as flighty.
There were the occasional fights, the ban I received from the county’s hot spot – Cuba Lake Pavilion – for knocking out a pest one night (I somehow managed to skirt the big burly bouncers and get back in once in a while), and the long and crazy night drive to Keuka Lake in the Finger Lakes to meet up with a couple college girls.
During this period of time I sang for a brief while in a country-western band in a beer garden. Most of my singing was a poor imitation of Hank Williams. But when the listeners are half in the bag, you can sound pretty good.
My connection to that time is gone. Lynn, Dale and the three guys I went to California with are all gone. I don’t know why they have departed this Earth and I’m still around, but it is what it is. I’m sad about it because I can remember most of those times as vivid now as if they were just happening.
The one thing that didn’t die was the music. I’m playing some of the doo-wop now, thanks to American Routes, which comes to me via Lafayette, Louisiana.. The “Lion Sleeps Tonight” by The Tokens, and now The Regents are singing their signature song, “Barbara Ann.”
My life has been one long and big and journey to get here. I’ve done things that I would do all over again – including hitchhiking across the country – and I would want to make sure the music of that time followed me.
The world today is a lot more complicated – I kind of feel sorry for kids today who face so much so fast and with a lot of uncertainly swirling about the world. When I was young, there were a lot less people and life was a lot simpler. Nobody had ADD or any of the other acronyms, and we almost always played outside without parents interference or them wondering where we were.
News – mostly bad now – didn’t follow us with electronic smart phones. In fact, we kids didn’t know or care to know what was happening outside our little square mile or so of turf.
But it is what it is now. The music has changed – it’s much louder for one – and a lot less of innocence comes with the words. I don’t think I heard a swear word of note until l got into high school. We kids either didn’t know any or just didn’t find a reason to use them. But you can’t walk around town now without hearing the worst of the worse.
That too is life. You adapt or you don’t survive.
I do have, though, access to the old music, and maybe the good old days where not as good as I remember them, but it sure is nice to go back in time through the music and forget for a moment that we have killers all around us now waiting to pounce at unsuspecting souls, as just happened in the Navy Yard in D.C. and in Kenya.
I’m going out with this from the Platters singing “Only you.”
“Only you can make this world seem right
Only you can make the darkness bright
Only you and you alone
Can thrill me like you do
And fill my heart with love for only you
Only you can make this change in me
For it’s true, you are my destiny
When you hold my hand
I understand the magic that you do
You’re my dream come true
My one and only you
Only you can make this change in me
For it’s true, you are my destiny
When you hold my hand
I understand the magic that you do
You’re my dream come true
My one and only you
Only you can make this change in me
For it’s true, you are my destiny
When you hold my hand
I understand the magic that you do
You’re my dream come true
My one and only you”
Be well pal.
Be careful out there
Have a great day
You are loved