Category Archives: Music et al

Anniversary, Music et al, Music of the 60s, Woodstock Music and Art Fair

Tim Hardin 1 album

2 Comments

Tim Hardin 1 Album

“Tim Hardin 1” album released July 1966

Tim Hardin 1 album

 

Ah, Tim Hardin

Born in Eugene, Oregon on December 23, 1941. High school dropout. Marine Corps enlistee. Heroin addict. New York City resident. Greenwich Village folk singer.

Not the same collection of events in every singer-songwriter’s resume, but familiar enough to merit a nod of recognition.

Many received the Village’s golden touch of success. Many. Not all.

Hardin didn’t feel that tap, surprising to others who knew him, loved his songs, and his talent.

At at time when composers were telling their tale with longer and more elaborate songs (Mr Dylan’s “Like a Rolling Stone” a prime example), Tim Hardin typically stuck with the short: verse > chorus > verse format.

Tim Hardin 1 album

On his first release, Tim Hardin 1, “Reason to Believe” is perhaps the best known of the album’s many wonderful songs. Others have covered the song, Rod Stewart’s in 1971 is perhaps the best known.

If I listen long enough to you
I’d find a way to believe that it’s all true
Knowing, that you lied, straight-faced
While I cried But still I’d look to find a reason to believe
Someone like you makes it hard to live
Without, somebody else
Someone like you, makes it easy to give
Never think of myselfIf I gave you time to change my mind
I’d find a way to leave the past behind
Knowing that you lied, straight-faced
While I criedBut still I’d look to find a reason to believe
If I listen long enough to you
I’d find a way to believe it’s all true
Knowing that you lied, straight-faced
While I criedStill I’d look to find a reason to believe.

Woodstock Music and Art Fair

Those whom Woodstock Ventures invited to their festival and art fair in Bethel, NY ranged from the little known to the famous. “Little known” to some, but loved by many. Hardin was of the latter. Bob Dylan reportedly described Hardin as, ““the greatest songwriter alive.”

Side one
  1. “Don’t Make Promises” – 2:26
  2. “Green Rocky Road” – 2:18
  3. “Smugglin’ Man” – 1:57
  4. “How Long” – 2:54
  5. “While You’re On Your Way” – 2:17
  6. “It’ll Never Happen Again” – 2:37
Side two
  1. “Reason to Believe” – 2:00
  2. “Never Too Far” – 2:16
  3. “Part of the Wind” – 2:19
  4. “Ain’t Gonna Do Without” – 2:13
  5. “Misty Roses” – 2:00
  6. “How Can We Hang On to a Dream?” – 2:04

Personnel

  • Tim Hardin – vocals, guitar, keyboards
  • Gary Burton – vibraphone
  • Bob Bushnell – bass
  • Earl Palmer – drums
  • Buddy Salzman – drums
  • Jon Wilcox – drums
  • John Sebastian – harmonica
  • Phil Kraus – vocals
  • Walter Yost – bass

Woodstock Ventures also scheduled Hardin to open. First day. First performer.

Many wonder what it was like to be in that crowd of 400,000 on Max Yasgur’s 40 acre field, but few ask what it was like to perform in front of that throng. For Hardin the challenge was initially too great a burden and Richie Havens famously filled in.

Hardin did later perform in that day’s gloaming. His short songs filled his short set:

  • (How Can We) Hang on to a Dream
  • Susan
  • If I Were a Carpenter
  • Reason to Believe
  • You Upset the Grace of Living When You Lie
  • Speak Like a Child
  • Snow White Lady
  • Blue on My Ceiling
  • Simple Song of Freedom
  • Misty Roses

Left out and off

Not appearing on the Woodstock album, nor the movie, addiction, and sometimes leaving the country to seek medical help kept Hardin out of the public eye for years. The New York Times described him in a 1976 show, “he is a nervous, self‐absorbed performer who phrases in a wildly unpredictable manner. Sometimes his improvisations are exciting, but sometimes they are simply aimless.”

Hardin died four years later on December 29, 1980, 6 days after his 39th birthday. His addiction finally killed him, but his songs continue to inspire.

Tim Hardin 1 album

Tim Hardin 1 album, Tim Hardin 1 album, Tim Hardin 1 album, Tim Hardin 1 album, Tim Hardin 1 album, Tim Hardin 1 album, Tim Hardin 1 album, Tim Hardin 1 album, Tim Hardin 1 album, 

History, Music et al, Technology, Today in history

Bell Demonstrates Transistor Radio

2 Comments

Bell Demonstrates Transistor Radio

June 30, 1948
Bell Demonstrates Transistor Radio
Regency transistor radio

“Tiny Blue Transistor Radio” by Connie Smith. 

Is it a camera?

In the Exhibition Gallery of the Museum at Bethel Woods Center for the Arts is a display of sleeves for 45 rpm record and several transistor radios. On a tour that includes a young guest, I will ask them whether they know what they are–either of them.

Most times they seem to know, but there are, not surprisingly, times that a head shakes “No.”

In an obtuse way, I kiddingly refer to these radios as PLDs…Personal Listening Devices. The term my attempt at re-naming a product with a 21st century twist.

To that same young guest, I will ask them if they have a cell phone. Depending on the age they will nod “Yes” with a smile or “No” longingly. I ask those without one how old is someone now when they get their first cell phone? The answers vary, but by the age of 10, cell-phone ownership is common.

I’ll say to guests of all ages, “As much as a child today impatiently waits  for their first cell phone and all it brings with it, a Boomer waited with equal impatience for their first transistor radio.“

Bell Demonstrates Transistor Radio

Portable Listening Device

The transistor radio was not the first “PLD.”  Tubed radios with large batteries existed, but were too heavy and bulky to actually be considered portable. They could be moved and put in a different place, but hanging out with friends at the park with one was simply too difficult.

The transistor radio changed all that. The transistor itself had been successfully developed by Bell labs in the mid-1940s [Wired article] As with any new invention, some scientists looked for other uses. On June 30, 1948 Bell Labs held a news conference at which they demonstrated a prototype transistor radio.

Bell Demonstrates Transistor Radio

Slow commercialization

A prototype is not a commercial product and it was still six years before a commercially viable transistor radio arrived. Two companies working together, Texas Instruments of Dallas, Texas [site] and Industrial Development Engineering Associates (I.D.E.A.) of Indianapolis, Indiana, were behind the unveiling of the Regency TR-1, the world’s first commercially produced transistor radio.  They made the announcement on October 18, 1954 and sales began in November. It cost $49.95, not inexpensive.

Competition and development brought down the cost, though one could never describe even the least expensive models as cheap.

Bell Demonstrates Transistor Radio

Steve & Bill

Whatever the price, the cultural impact was great. Apple’s Steve Wozniak stated, “My first transistor radio was the heart of my gadget love today. I loved what it could do, it brought me music, it opened my world up”

Microsoft’s Bill Gates stated, “Without the invention of the transistor, I’m quite sure that the PC would not exist as we know it today”

Bell Demonstrates Transistor Radio

Released Boomers


Transistor radio untied Boomer teenagers from their parent’s kitchen radio and their parent’s nearby ears. Boomers could listen to their music (at first only on AM radio) with their friends (or alone), wherever they wanted.

And as long as you had a wet tongue, you could test whether that 9-volt battery had any life left!

Bell Demonstrates Transistor Radio

Bell Demonstrates Transistor Radio

 

Black history, Music et al, Music of the 60s

Nina Simone Four Women

1 Comment

Nina Simone Four Women

1966

Nina Simone Four Women

Nina Simone Four Women

Eunice Kathleen Waymon

Nina Simone, born Eunice Kathleen Waymon, aspired to be a concert pianist, not an easy thing for a young black woman, even a very talented young black woman.

With the financial help of her Tyron, North Carolina neighbors and her music teacher, Eunice was able to attend the  Juilliard School of Music in New York. A next step would have been the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, but her application was rejected. A rejection she felt was simply a racially motivated one.

She started to take private lessons and to help pay for them she began to perform a mixture of jazz and blues. Knowing her family would disapprove, Waymon adopted a stage name: Nina Simone.

Nina Simone Four Women

Civil Rights Choice

With the rebirth of the civil rights movement, Simone, like other black artists, faced a decision: speak out and risk a career or take that risk. After the assassination of Medgar Evers and the terrorist attack on the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama that killed four girls and blinded another, Simone’s mind was made up.

“Mississippi Goddam” reflected her anger and decision. She felt that the conciliatory demands, the non-violent approach that Martin Luther King, Jr used were not useful. She adopted he separatist views of a Malcolm X  and the Black Nationalist movement.

Nina Simone Four Women

Wild Is the Wind

The 1966 album, Wild is the Wind (1966), Simone included the song “Four Women.” The album itself reflected the many styles Simone had begun to use by then: jazz, blues, folk, R & B. and pop, but “Four Women” reflected her realization of the choices a black woman in America faced. Continued slavery. The mixed race woman rejected by both races. The prostitute. The militant.

Nina Simone Four Women

Nina Simone Four Women

Four Women

The song, like the women, was rejected as racist by many on both sides.

My skin is black
My arms are long
My hair is woolly
My back is strong
Strong enough to take the pain
inflicted again and again
What do they call me
My name is AUNT SARAH
My name is Aunt Sarah		 My skin is tan
My hair is fine
My hips invite you
And my mouth like wine
Whose little girl am I?
Anyone who has money to buy
What do they call me
My name is SWEET THING
My name is Sweet Thing
My skin is yellow
My hair is long
Between two worlds
I do belong
My father was rich and white
He forced my mother late one night
What do they call me
My name is SAFFRONIA
My name is Saffronia		 My skin is brown
my manner is tough
I’ll kill the first mother I see
My life has been too rough
I’m awfully bitter these days
because my parents were slaves
What do they call me
My name is PEACHES
Nina Simone Four Women

Expatriate

Simone’s career was not an easy one. Difficult marriages.  Illness. Controversial views. An expatriate.  She died of breast cancer in 2003 at her home in Carry-le-Rouet, France, near Marseille.

Peter Keepnews wrote in his New York Times article: Ms. Simone was as famous for her social consciousness as she was for her music. In the 1960’s no musical performer was more closely identified with the civil rights movement. Though she was best known as an interpreter of other people’s music, she eloquently expressed her feelings about racism and black pride in those years in a number of memorable songs she wrote herself.

Nina Simone Four Women