Bloggerhythms

Once again, it's time to ring out the old year and ring in the new one. It's been several years since I've posted an end-of-year "best of" list. There are two reasons I no longer do. First, I don't listen to nearly as much new music as I used to back in the days when this blog almost exclusively featured current releases. Secondly - and I have no idea why - almost nobody read them. However, after recently perusing numerous music blogs this week that posted their annual December retrospectives I've decided to feature a few of them here for your reading pleasure. A couple of them are published by writers with national reputations and others are by personal bloggers, like me, who have smaller readerships. I have a blogroll located on my sidebar that you can access only by clicking on the three parallel lines located at the top lefthand corner of my homepage. All of the blogs mentioned in this post can be found there. Whenever bloggers...

This post first appeared here eleven Decembers ago, and since we're all looking to add a little class to our holidays I'm rerunning it now. Enjoy the humor and have a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year. Singer-comedian Yogi Yorgesson's real name was Harry Stewart (1908 – 1956). Yorgesson was simply a persona the latter used to release over forty songs for Capitol Records beginning in 1949. Stewart was originally a radio announcer in the late 1920s in Tacoma, Washington where he invented an act featuring Yorgesson in the mid-30s. Stewart later took his shtick to night clubs where the Swedish character evolved over the years. Finally - in 1948 - Stewart became a singer and recorded two songs under the Yorgesson name. When the sides proved successful Capitol Records picked up his contract and the following year they released "I Yust Go Nuts at Christmas" with "Yingle Bells...

If you've never heard jazz vocalist Samara Joy McLendon sing before you'll swear that the 2023 Grammy winner for Best New Artist is way older than twenty-four years old because she's a fully mature talent who sounds much older than her age. To show you how far she has come in such a short time the songstress also won an additional trophy this year for Best Jazz Vocal Album for her second full length record, Linger Awhile .  Comparisons can be made to the renowned jazz divas of the Great American Songbook. Joy's voice has the soulfulness of Billie Holiday and the smoothness of Ella Fitzgerald. The Bronx native was raised on gospel music. She sang in church, then discovered jazz and recorded two albums of pop and jazz standards during the last two years before her brand new, six-song, Christmas EP,  A Joyful Holiday was released in October. On this fine holiday set, the rising star was assisted by her regular ...

Until Mark Lewisohn came out with his massive and magnificent tome, All The Years: Volume 1 - Tune In ,  in 2013 Philip Norman released the best Beatles biography, Shout! The Beatles In Their Generation way back in 1981. Lewisohn's book is a must read for all Beatle fanatics but Norman is a Beatles scholar too. In addition to Shout! and his brand new George Harrison biography he has also written separate books about the lives of John Lennon and Paul McCartney. Is Ringo Starr next? Norman's  George Harrison: The Reluctant Beatle  starts off slowly for anyone who has read earlier, more detailed histories of the world's most famous band. To me, the first half is mostly a collection of warmed-over facts that are only marginally pointed in Harrison's direction. If you've never read a Beatles biography before this book serves as a good introduction to their story, but for a full dose of Fab Four history you...

I don't know where to begin. "Over The Rainbow" is my favorite song from The Wizard Of Oz - my all-time favorite movie - and I HATE  most musicals. As a child I fell in love with the film, the music, even Judy Garland as Dorothy. Many decades later I feel the same way about this masterwork of fantasy films. Beginning in 1956, and for many years afterward, the 1939 classic was shown on TV every year with gargantuan ratings, and in this era before home video and streaming were available I had to watch it on network TV every year. I believed that Garland's performance of "Over The Rainbow" was so wonderful that I never wanted to hear anyone else sing it. Cover versions just never rang true, and I've often said a law should be passed preventing anyone else from ever singing it. Immunity will only be given to Israel  Kamakawiwo'ole  (better known as Iz) for his Hawaiian folk version performed solo on a ukulele. "Over...