1964

A black boy born into abject poverty in a violent New Orleans neighborhood ends up changing the face of an emerging style of music called jazz and performs around the world in front of Kings and Queens, Emperors, Presidents and millions of beloved fans. At the far end of his career, he sings a Broadway song that can came from a long twisted history, born from minstrel shows, vaudeville and Broadway and Hollywood musicals. 

 

 A group of working class high school dropouts in the port city of Liverpool, England— a town whose name means “a pool of muddy water”—listen obsessively to the music of black American blues musicians—including a musician named Muddy Waters! They form a band playing music deeply influenced by the blues tradition of the Deep South.

 

Three brothers, a cousin and a friend from Southern California start a garage band managed by their father and begin writing songs about surfing, cars and young love influenced by the R &B style and vocal harmonies of old black singing groups. They latter incorporate elements inspired by both jazz and classical music.

 

Four working class Italian American teenagers from Newark, New Jersey get together to form a Doo-Wop singing group, a style that evolved in black American communities during the 1940’s that was influenced by earlier vocal groups like the Ink Spots and The Mills Brothers. 

 

A group of black junior high school girls living in a Detroit housing project form a vocal group that catches the attention of a record producer named Berry Gordy. They eventually become part of group of black artists forging a new musical style known as Motown. 

 

A poor Jewish girl from Brooklyn finds herself obsessed with getting on stage. After singing two songs in a gay nightclub in Greenwich Village to great acclaim, she is encouraged to pursue singing alongside with acting. She does.

 

 At 24 years old, a Brazilian woman from Rio de Janeiro who likes to sing with her friends at parties comes to New York and records a song with her husband and a white Jewish jazz saxophone player that goes on to sell 5 million copies. 

 

What's going on here? The artists above are Louis Armstrong, The Beatles, The Beach Boys, The  Four Seasons,  The Supremes, Barbra Streisand, Astrud Gilberto and Stan Getz. The songs they sang— Hello Dolly, I Want to Hold Your Hand, I Get Around, Rag Doll, People, Where Did Your Love Go?, The Girl from Ipanema and more are all in the top 100 Hit Parade of one extraordinary year— 1964.  These songs were broadcast on the radio airwaves, played in homes with record players and enjoyed by people of all backgrounds. They both reflected and shaped the American (and worldwide) cultural landscape and revealed an extraordinary mixture of influences that criss-crossed and intersected like Venn diagrams on steroids.  A public hungry for someone to express so many parts of themselves that they had to check at the door of the school or office was happy to welcome them all. Here was a music that is America at its best.

 

Yet of course, it’s not that simple. Our painful and ongoing political history of unevenly shared power and a twisted narrative creeps into every corner of our cultural landscape like an invisible poisonous gas and while most everyone’s happy to hear such great music, very few are paying the price of looking backstage to see what’s going on behind the scenes. As proven time and time again, you can buy your ticket to hear Louis Armstrong and love every minute of how he makes you feel when he plays, but still make sure he comes through the back door, doesn’t stay at the hotel or eat at the hotel restaurant. 

 

But if we are to take that long overdue and needed journey backstage, why not start with the truth of what we already know? That that amazing variety of songs and styles and musical groups featured in the 1964 Hit Parade gave— and gives us— so much pleasure is both a motivation to find out how it happened joined with the joy of the music itself. And for some of us— me, for example, who was a ripe 13 years old that year and ready for it to both affirm feelings, open me to new ones, connect me with fellow listeners, it was the soundtrack of my emerging adulthood. 

 

And there’s so much more than just the above! Dean Martin, Roy Orbison, Mary Wells, Al Hirt, Manfred Mann, the Dixie Cups, Ray Charles, The Dave Clark Five, Nancy Wilson (a jazz singer), the Four Tops. I’m determined to either teach a class about this, write a book, do a Podcast or all of the above. Stay tuned!