one night on tv is worth weeks at the Paramount ✰*✰*✰ Console-ing Passions Television and Cultural Power Edited by Lynn Spigel one night on tv is worth weeks at the Paramount ✰*✰*✰ Popular Music on Early Television murray forman Duke University Press Durham and London 2012 © 2012 Duke University Press All rights reserved Printed in the United States of America on acid- free paper ∞ Designed by Heather Hensley Typeset in Garamond Premier Pro by Tseng Information Systems, Inc. Library of Congress Cataloging- in- Publication Data appear on the last printed page of this book. “tv Is the Thing.” Written by Phil Medley and William Sanford. © 1985 Straylight Music (ascap), You Look Good Music Publishing (ascap). All Rights Reserved. Used by Permission. International Copyright Secured. “Dear Mr. Godfrey.” Written by Ruth Wallis, 1953. Courtesy of Alan Pastman. In memory of my father, wIth gratItude to my mother. Contents acknowledgments xI * Popular Music and the Small Screen Frontier: An Introduction 1 * 1. Music, Image, Labor: Television’s Prehistory 17 * 2. “Hey TV!”: Musical Pioneers and Pessimists 51 * 3. Harmonizing Genres 115 * 4. The Look of Music 169 * 5. Music in a “Sepia” Tone 231 * 6. Maracas, Congas, and Castanets 273 * conclusIon Rocking the TV Conventions 319 * appendIx 341 * notes 343 * BIBlIography 363 * Index 389 * “tv Is the thIng” If you wanna have fun come home with me You can stay all night and play with my tv tv is the thing this year, this year tv is the thing this year Radio was great, now it’s out of date tv is the thing this year By Phil Medley and William Sanford Recorded by Dinah Washington in 1953 on Mercury Records (Mercury 70214) ACknowledgments This project has long been in the works, and at times it seemed that its completion might take as long as it took to invent and perfect the television. My work benefited immeasurably from the funding support of the City University of New York (cuny- psc Grant), the Marion and Jasper Whiting Memorial Founda- tion, the Faculty- Undergraduate Research Initiative (furI) at Northeastern University, and the Office of the Provost at North- eastern University. Also at Northeastern, the former dean of arts and sciences James Stellar, and the former vice provost Patricia Maguire Meservey facilitated project funding and a valuable re- search leave, for which I am grateful. Stuart Liebman was simi- larly helpful at Queens College–cuny. I am especially indebted to the National Endowment for the Humanities, which awarded me a research fellowship for this project in 2003–4. My sincere thanks to the staff at the libraries and archives where I conducted my core research: Snell Library at Northeast- ern University, Boston University’s Mugar Library (microfiche division), the New York Museum of Television and Radio (now the Paley Center for Media), The Museum of Broadcast Com- munications in Chicago, the Wisconsin State Historical Ar- chives, the ucla Film and tv Archive, the Library of American Broadcasting at the University of Maryland, the Smithsonian Institution, and the Museum of American History. I was also assisted by the librarians of the Boston Public Library, the Free Library of Philadelphia, and by those of the New York Pub- lic Library system at the library’s main branch as well as at the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, the Science, Industry, and Business section, and the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts. Ray Faiola and John Behrens at cBs Television kindly assisted me during my brief research foray at the network’s New York headquarters. Mark Can- tor (Los Angeles) and J. Fred MacDonald (Chicago) took time to discuss my project and to share rare video materials from their extensive personal col- lections of music on early television. The experience (and the footage) was very useful; special thanks to each of you. Numerous bright minds in Canada and the United States assisted me with this project. Some provided books and articles or other archival materials, others sent along the written fruits of their own research labor, while others provided editing and organizational suggestions. Thanks to Doug Battema, Elaine Hayes, Michele Hilmes, Steve “The Machine” Kosareff, Jason Mittel, Keith Negus, Elena Razlogova, Brian Rose, Lynn Spigel, Haidee Wasson, David Weinstein, and Mark Williams. Keir Keightley, Vincent Rocchio, David Sanjek, and Matt Stahl went above and beyond what was asked of them, taking time away from their own brilliant research projects to read and comment on sections of this book. Omar Arenas also provided helpful comments for chapter 6. Gentlemen, I thank you. Norma Coates is a kin- dred scholar (her work on television music after 1956 is the bomb!) and she too read several sections of the manuscript while freely sharing segments of her own excellent research directly and on conference panels; thanks, Norma. You’re up! Finally, Ken Wissoker was a perfect editor throughout the process, offering encouragement and guidance at just the right times; thanks also to Leigh Barnwell at Duke University Press for helping with the details and getting the answers when I asked and Neal McTighe who assisted with the final production work. I am indebted to many colleagues and dear friends for their ongoing encouragement in this undertaking and all else. The initial inspiration for the book you now hold can be indirectly traced to George Szanto. When- ever daunting challenges in the research or writing emerged I could always blame George . or thank him, which I do here. At Northeastern Univer- sity many of my past and present colleagues in the Communication Studies Department have been extremely supportive; a special shout out to Jayson Harsin, Alison Hearn, P. David Marshall, David Monje, Joanne Morreale, Craig Robertson, Vincent Rocchio, Kumarini Silva, Marcus Breen, Michael Woodnick, and Alan Zaremba. Noah Danoff proved to be an excellent re- search assistant while providing fine company in the microfiche trenches; xii * ACknowledgments big up, Noah! My intellectual fire was also fueled by my former coeditors at the Journal of Popular Music Studies, Reebee Garofalo, Jeff Melnick, Deborah Pacini Hernandez, Emmett Price III, and Rachel Rubin; thanks, guys! I enjoy the unqualified love and support of my family; a tip of the hat and a raised glass to Jan, Shawn, and Dave. La familia Arenas en Caracas, Venezuela, shared music, laughter, arepas, and rum; muchas gracias a todo la familia. My daughter Bayla Metzger patiently listened to me explain the joys of screening a Peggy Lee performance or the ongoing struggle to at- tain writer’s eloquence; thanks for all that and more, Bay. As ever, Zamawa Arenas offered unfailing encouragement and “held the fort on Fort” while I was away doing research (or locked in mortal combat with an uncoopera- tive computer). Strong of mind and character, tender of heart, Zamawa is a pillar in my world. Maybe now we can get back to that bolero, “polishing the buckle.” Te amo, mi amor. Finally, it was my parents who first introduced me to many of the musi- cians referenced in these pages. They each shared their recollections of post- war popular music and early television, providing important “real world” testimonies for some of my more uncertain ponderings. It is to them that I dedicate this book. My father passed away before this manuscript was com- plete, but he heard enough about it to know where it was heading. Perhaps, like Glenn Miller, he’s still out there, eternally flying in his Lancaster, navi- gating to the dulcet strains of the band. ACknowledgments * xiii Popular music and the small screen Frontier * An IntroductIon Shortly after the launch of mtv in 1981, when advertisers, re- cording industry corporations, and teen television viewers each applauded the network’s debut, there was a surge in critical assessments about its impact and the shifting role of the con- temporary popular musician. Music television was the topic of intense debate across varied sectors of the entertainment in- dustry and among the questions raised was how a twenty-four- hour all- music network might alter the status of musicians whose recorded sounds were heard widely and whose appear- ances in magazines, as television guest performers or hosts of tv “specials,” in films (often documentaries), or in live concerts, extended their public recognition and celebrity presence. While some artists such as Joe Jackson (who, it was wryly noted, “has a face for radio”) expressed exasperation at the music industry’s growing reliance on videos as promotional vehicles, many other established and rising artists leapt at the chance to advertise their sound and image over the music television network. The network’s publicity slogan “I Want My mtv” quickly became a clarion call among eager young viewers across the nation. When mtv was introduced with a barrage of advertising, cultural critics and television historians cited some of the network’s more pertinent television precedents. These included U.S. shows from the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s such as American Bandstand, Shindig!, Hullabaloo, Soul Train, Don Kirshner’s Rock Concert, or The Midnight Special, and such his- toric televised musical events as Elvis Presley’s spate of 1956 broadcast per- formances, the Beatles’ first guest spots onThe Ed Sullivan Show in 1964, or Presley’s truly engaging 1968 nBc “comeback” special. In these examples, the benefits of “breaking” new acts on television were readily apparent, as were the potentials for veteran artists to introduce new material or to reha- bilitate their careers by transforming their image or popular profile. Since its debut, mtv (and other music television networks in North America and internationally) has delivered countless groundbreaking musical tele- casts, attaining its own status as a recognized cultural icon and trendsetter (something that continues even as the network has reduced its reliance on music videos in the United States).