If you listen to the big band sounds of the 30s and 40s, who is your favorite female band singer of the swing era? Mine is Helen Forrest. She had quite a melodic soft beautiful voice that is just a pleasure to hear.
Hello!
some 25 years ago I fell in love with the sound of Glenn Miller’s band…
As for the female singers I’d probably have to say Andrews sisters…
And check this out - this lady just ripped my a** off:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o5c_XZaArH4
Swing On!
Paweł
Incredible talent by those young ladies.[B]
I do listen to Swing Era music once in a while when I’m building or editing photos. All the greats: Glenn Miller, Artie Shaw, Tommy Dorsey, Benny Goodman. Buddy Rich and Gene Krupa on drums are awesome. I also enjoy Western Swing from the 1940’s, like Bob Willis and his Texas Playboys and Spade Cooley. Spike Jones might sneak in there sometimes too.
Of course, Viola Davis proves that drummers are a special breed.
Asleep at the Wheel is one of my favorites. They have cast themselves as the re-incarnation of Bob Wills and the Texas Playboys
I have seen them in person at least a half a dozen times, from venues as large as the FT Worth Botanic Garden to the Arlington (TX) Music Hall. My favorite was when the city of Mansfield (TX) got them to play at the street fair as part of the Pickle Festival
They have a trilogy of Bob Wills albums. Their latest album is Half a Hundred Years recounting their career
They do nod to classic jazz. Check out Choo Choo Boogie where they drop into Thelonius Monk’s ‘Straight, No Chaser’ for a few bars.
https://www.texasmonthly.com/arts-entertainment/how-band-hippies-potheads-kept-western-swing-alive/
Completely and totally love the music from that era!
I listen to it sometimes during building too. I also made copies of the Liberty records my Father saved from destruction back during the war.
I’d have to stick with the Andrews Sisters. They even did a movie or two with Abbott and Costello so how can you go wrong? Rosemary Clooney wasn’t bad either.
Vera Lynn. I especially loved “White Cliffs of Dover.” That was really popular during the war years.
Sounds like the music from Tom and Jerry… [proplr]
Usually have a mix of all types of music on while building. Swing, Pop, Classical, Opera, Jaz, Country Western. Love it all. Probably because I was raised in an Italian house in the 40’s & 50’s, I grew up hearing opera that my grandfather brought over from Italy (1 sided 78’s that I wish I still had). Then my mother sent me to Combs Conservatory in Phila. to study Classical music. Don’t care for most of the newer music from after the 70’s. I understand it but don’t care for it. Sorry, don’t mean to offend anyone.
Jim [cptn]
Stay Safe.
Another type of music I enjoy while at the bench is Epic from Two Steps From Hell.
Music that makes you braver!
My dad loved to hear opera. He had tons of opera Lps and listened to them for hours.
Sets the mood when building WW2 era aircrafts. I love listening to Sing Sing SIng and watching swing dance on YouTube. Been wanting to find Swing Kids on DVD but haven’t had a chance.
If my knees weren’t so sore, I’d love to take up swing dancing lessons.
When my grandfather came home from the barber shop he owned, the Victrola (something else I wish I still had) was cranked up and the opera came on. No one dared touch it.
Jim [cptn]
Stay Safe.
I remember a Victrola my parents had. Don’t know what happened to it.
Love big bands, Glenn Miller would have to be my tops. Sirius 40’s Junction on when I am driving home from work.
I enjoy listening to swing music. Had plenty of exposure to it between my parents and my wife’s step father being a big band leader. Now and again I’ll listen to my swing playlist while working on a project to put me in the proper frame of mind.
As far as favorite female vocalists from that era goes, I’m quite partial to Peggy Lee.
Love it. My grandfather had his own band in the 30s and early 40s before being shipped off to England in '42 courtesy of the Army Air Corp. They were the house band at the Tavern where he met my grandmother, who worked there. It’s my understanding at one point he even played drums for Perry Como and possibly Jimmy Dorsey’s band.
Regarding female singers, I’d have to make that a second on Peggy Lee, especially while with Benny Goodman. Martha Tilton a close second.
Timeless music From the greatest generation to ever draw breath…
I love it. As I came across this thread I was listening to Jo Stafford singing Blue Moon.
I do appreciate it and it does sound good, I just don’t listen to it unless it’s in a movie or something. I am younger than probably most members here. I was born in the 60’s and grew up in the 70’s. So I am firmly entrenced in rock music. 60’s-80’s for me pretty much all I listen too. Anything after that I don’t like and the earlier stuff is pretty good, but not my preferred style. I am an audiofile and listen to music whenever I can, especially while I’m building.
BK
My Father woiuld sit at the kitchen table and read his paper while listening to his music from WWII and eat at the same time with a cigar in his Air Transport Command ash tray, all at the same time.
It took some time before I started to listen to a couple songs from then but it helped watching the Abbot and Costello movies from the war years and a bit beyond.
I didn’t pay much attention to the music of the 50s and only picked up on a few, but what would you expect, I was born during the Koreaan War. I also never got into the Monroe thing either, I didn’t consider her a very good actress.
It was in tyhe 60s that I really started to pay attention to the music on my transistor radio and burned up a lot of batteries in the process. Meanwhile the 40s music was sneaking its influence in and then the 70s hit and I was drafted and overseas listening to the canned shows from A.F.R.T.S. who would play all types of music shows twice a day before scrapping the records.
Now I have a collection of a lot of different types of musicincluding show tunes (don’t laugh), and classical. That started when my kid started playing in his school band and my brother in law took us to a PDQ Bach concert south of here. It sounds strange but think of Weird Al as a lost member of the Bach family and what might happen. There was music of a whole new type, some with only the mouth peices, a piece where it was decided that the percussion section was not getting enough play time but the rest of the orchestra eventuall throwing in its own songs. Think of concert casting where there were refs and anyone could be put into a penality box. The music professor was quite creative.