I’m Beyond Salvation

I’ve been listening to Afro-American music for nearly 50 years. And worst, I’ve enjoyed every minute of it – Ted

BLACK HISTORY IN IMAGES: New Orleans in 1960 was sharply divided over the practice of segregation, and the “Citizens’ Council of Greater New Orleans” advocated some pretty silly stuff, including a protest against black musicians. Please share so we may never forget! Image and text from BlackPast.org

Read Full Post »

Orchidea De Santis – Italian Actress

Orchidea De Santis (born 20 December 1948, Bari) is an Italian television and film actress.

Biography
Orchidea De Santis is an Italian actress in cinema, theatre and television. Her films include Il Vizio di Famiglia directed by Mariano Laurenti, Per Amare Ofelia by Flavio Mogherini, Concerto per Pistola Solista by Michele Lupo, Colpo di Stato by Luciano Salce (1969) and Paolo il caldo by Marco Vicario (1973). She appeared briefly in Il Nero by Giovanni Vento (1965) and Una Macchia Rosa by Enzo Muzii (1970). Since the mid-1980s, her film work has declined in favor of other activities.Her theater work includes comedies such as Morto un Papa se ne fa un Altro, Strega Roma and Chicchignola written by Ettore Petrolini, all of which were directed by Ghigo De Chiara and Fiorenzo Fiorentini.

De Santis appeared in Sottoveste by Castellacci e Ventimiglia and Love and Life by Mike Immordino. She wrote and acted in La Bambola Orchidea featuring the music of maestro Aldo Saitto, as well as Chicchignola with Mario Scaccia, and La cicogna si diverte by Carlo Alighero.

For the RAI radio, De Santis appeared in many roles, mainly in the serials Barocco a Roma and Racconto Italiano which were broadcast in the late 1970s. In the 1989 she began working in the international broadcasting department where she produced Notturno Italiano, AZ per gli Italiani all’Estero, Italia Canta, Itinerari Italiani, Facile Ascolto.She was producer of the radio show L’Arca di Noè, and 13 episodes of Ciak si esegue. She also developed and produced a program about animals called L’Anello di Re Salomone. She is currently the director of, Due di Notte.

Her television work includes Roosvelt (Rai Tre 1986), Maga Circe and Lucrezia Borgia (Rai Uno 1987) and Il caso Redoli, a TV series: The Great Trials (Rai Uno 1996).Outside of cinema and theater, she worked with the city government of Rome, organizing a review of 1970s Italian cinema called Italia (de)Genere.

Text from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Read Full Post »

The Kurér Turned 60 In 2010

The Kurér was the first reasonably small portable radio produced in Norway, it was introduced 24^th of April 1950 and it became an immediate success. In spite of the weight, a little over 7,5 kilo with the battery, we brought it everywhere, to our summerhouses, the beach and to the mountain. Here in Norway it has become a real fifties icon. Few Norwegians of a certain age are without a memory or two connected to the Kurér. I had a bluish grey one until my youngest daughter discovered it, now she has – Ted 😉

Read Full Post »

Bettina Le Beau – Belgian-British Actress And Writer

Bettina Le Beau (born 23 March 1932 in Antwerp, Belgium), also known as Bettine Le Beau, is an actress known for her film, radio and television appearances in the UK.

During World War II she was separated from her parents; as she was Jewish, she was held in a concentration camp in southern France. She escaped from Camp DeGurs and was hidden by a family from the Nazis. She went to England in 1945 and attended Pitman’s College. She worked as a model, graphologist and cabaret artist and learned several languages.

As an actress her television appearances include The Benny Hill Show, The Prisoner, Call My Bluff and The Golden Shot. Film appearances include My Last Duchess, A Ferry Ann, Devil’s Daffodil and an uncredited role as Professor Dent’s secretary in the first James Bond film, Dr No. On radio, she was a regular on the BBC World Service programme Animal, Vegetable and Mineral, a version of Twenty Questions.

She worked on a programme for women on radio and wrote a book entitled Help Yourself to Happiness (ISBN 0953421600). She has also lectured on her experience of the Holocaust.

Text from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Read Full Post »

Radio Free Europe And The Truth Dollars

Every dollar buys 100 words of truth. That’s how hard “Truth Dollars” work. Your dollars will help 70 million people resist Kremlin. Keep the truth turned on. Send as many “Truth Dollars” as you can (if possible on for every member of your family) The need is now.

Radio Free Europe started broadcasting in 1950, so were right smack in the middle of the cold war here and the fear of the “Red Plague” rode the right wing Europe and US whipping up a frenzy that lead to the most bizarre accusations against people that didn’t see the world through the eyes of the far right. McCarty and his buddies in Europe didn’t wait long to harass anyone they felt like – Ted

Read Full Post »

Alan Freed – "Moondog"

Article and images from the Hokey Ass Message Board HAMB
Alan Freed or "Moondog" was a notable DJ. He coined the phrase "Rock and Roll". He once said: "Rock ‘n’ roll is really swing with a modern name. It began on the levees and plantations, took in folk songs, and features blues and rhythm. It’s the rhythm that gets to the kids – they’re starved of music they can dance to, after all those years of crooners." Freed promoted dances and concerts featuring the music he was playing on the radio. Freed’s popularity made the pop music business sit up and take notice. Life magazine credited Freed as the originator of the rock ‘n roll craze.

Freed had his share of controversy. Freed, during a "Rock and Roll" show in Boston told the audience, "The police don’t want you to have fun." As a result, Freed was arrested and charged with inciting to riot. In 1957, Freed was given a weekly prime-time TV series, The Big Beat,(which predated American Bandstand) on ABC, which was scheduled for a Summer run, with the understanding that if there were enough viewers, the show would continue into the 1957-58 television season. Although the ratings for the first three episodes were strong, the show was suddenly canceled after the fourth episode. During that episode, Frankie Lymon of Frankie Lymon and The Teenagers, after performing his number, was seen dancing with a white girl from the studio audience. Reportedly, the incident offended the management of ABC’s local affiliates in the southern states, and led to the show’s immediate cancellation despite its growing popularity.

Freed’s career ended when it was shown that he had accepted payola (payments from record companies to play specific records), a practice that was highly controversial at the time. There was also a conflict of interest, that he had taken songwriting co-credits (most notably on Chuck Berry’s "Maybellene"), which entitled him to receive part of a song’s royalties, which he could help increase by heavily promoting the record on his own program.

Freed lost his own show on the radio station WABC; then he was fired from the station altogether. He also was fired from his television show (which for a time continued with a different host). In 1960, payola was made illegal. In 1962, Freed pleaded guilty to two charges of commercial bribery, for which he received a fine and a suspended sentence.

Although the punishment handed down to Freed was not severe, the side effects of negative publicity were such that no prestigious station would employ him, and he moved to the West Coast in 1960, where he worked at KDAY-AM in Santa Monica, CA.. In 1962, after KDAY refused to allow him to promote "rock and roll" stage shows, Freed moved to WQAM in Miami, FL., but that association lasted two months.

He died in a Palm Springs, CA. hospital in 1965 from uremia and cirrhosis brought on by alcoholism. He was 43 years old.

Read Full Post »

The Elvis Presley Radio

These Radios were probably for sale just after the King kicked the bucket so it is strange that the sod that designed it had hardly any recollection of how Elvis looked what so ever. The figure can hardly be called a sharp dresser and the King really was and he looks like a 4 feet high 12 years old Eurasian.
I mean, have you ever seen a picture of El in a turtleneck sweater. How could he soak all those silk scarfs and women’s knickers thrown up on stage in sweat from his chest and throw them to the starry eyed babes in the audients dressed like that.
And those baggy pants, get off it. No Way.

Image found at:

Read Full Post »

Mobile Broadcasting Booth

Article from Popular Mechanics Aug 1951. Found at modernmechanix.com

Radio reporters and commentators view news events at first-hand from weather-proof press boxes built on a truck chassis for Columbia Broadcasting System. As many as four commentators can broadcast simultaneously from the observation platform at the rear of the truck. The Plexiglas window provides full vision on three sides. A plastic bubble atop the truck gives full forward view. The truck has a high frequency transmitter powered by it’s own generator. It has a range of 35 miles from the home station and can tie into telephone cables for longer transmission.

Read Full Post »

Use Vacuum To Aid Hair Growth

From Popular Science nov 1938  – Found at modernmechanix.com

Can science restore hair to the bald? Startling results in the affirmative are reported in 500 cases treated with a new machine, developed by Dr. Andre A. Cueto, of Cincinnati, Ohio. Fourteen to twenty half-hour treatments are said in many cases, to produce the appearance of “fuzz,” and from this point on the patient is declared to progress toward a normal growth of hair. Alternately applying air pressure and vacuum through a cap, the device, it is claimed, restores the functioning of the blood vessels that nourish the hair follicles. Abnormal hair growth upon the legs of hospital patients treated with a circulation-stimulating machine known as a “glass boot,” operating on a similar principle, suggested the new machine, perfected for commercial use.

Read Full Post »

The Yé Yé Girls

Chantal Goya

France Gall

Françoise Hardy

Sylvie Vartan

Yé-yé (French pronunciation: [jeje]) was a style of pop music that emerged from France, Québec and Spain in the early 1960s. The style has expanded out worldwide, due to the success of figures such as the French singer-songwriter Serge Gainsbourg. The yé-yé movement had its origins in the radio programme "Salut les copains", which first aired in December 1959.
The program gained immediate success and one of its sections ("le chouchou de la semaine" / "this week’s sweetheart") turned to be the starting point for most yé-yé singers. Any song that was presented went straight to the top places in the charts. Yé-yé music was unique in a number of ways: first, it was the only musical movement so far to be spearheaded by females; second, it was a mostly European phenomenon.
Yé-yé girls were young (France Gall herself was only 16 when she released her first album, and innocent (most of their songs talked of finding the first love, such as Françoise Hardy’s "Tous les garçons et les filles" (" All the guys and girls my age know how it feels to be happy, but I am lonely, when will I know how it feels to have someone?").

They were also sexy, in a deliberately naïve way. Gainsbourg called France Gall the French Lolita, and, composed the song "Les Sucettes" ("Lollipops") for her. The lyrics go: "Annie loves lollipops, aniseed lollipops, when the sweet liquid runs down Annie’s throat, she is in paradise ".

Images and text found at ”Child Of The Moon”

But when all this is said and done, don’t forget that the greatest Yé Yé Girl of them all was none other than Brigitte Bardot. See her discography and some of her music videos here.

Read Full Post »

British Radio In The 60s

Ronan O’Rahilly, who started Radio Caroline, Britain’s first off-shore pirat radio.

Before 1964 there was little British pop radio. The only alternative to the evening broadcasts of the independent Radio Luxembourg, with its firm commitment to pop, and the heavy backing from the record companies which leased air time, was the BBC’s Light Program. An old-fashioned counterpart to the more “serious” Third Programme (classical) and Home Service (non-musical), its content was epitomized by the perennial “Music While You Work”, which featured dance band arrangements of popular evergreens.Read all about it

Read Full Post »