Road Show

The Show

On the night of Saturday, October 10, 1959, more than twelve thousand people braved a pouring rainstorm in Lafayette, Indiana, to hear memorable performances by Stan Kenton’s Orchestra, June Christy, and the Four Freshmen. Filling the more than six thousand seats of the vast Music Hall at Purdue University for two consecutive shows, audiences were treated to an evening of the finest modern music available anywhere.

The fine acoustical properties of the Music Hall governed Capitol’s choice of Purdue night as the time to record highlights of the cross-country tour. The hall permitted studio-like quality of recorded sound; and the large, appreciative audience provided the enthusiasm and spirit that helped these musicians and singers to deliver the outstanding performances heard in this album.

One of the many who ventured out on this night, in defiance of the elements, was Mr. Bill Peeples, columnist and critic for the Louisville Times. He comments:

“By the time this show hit Purdue University on October 10, it had really jelled and the stage was set for the recording session that produced this album.

“Touring and starring with Kenton were June Christy, who got her start with the band in the mid-40’s, and the Four Freshmen, whom Stan also helped up the ladder to recognition. The band Kenton had for this tour was one of his finer ones. The section work was crisp and dynamic, the rhythm section loose and driving. The show was on the road from September 28 through November 4, and from its first concert date at Murray State College in Kentucky to its last one at Boston, it played with the disciplined power and cohesion that Kenton has always demanded and usually succeeds in getting.

“The people who filled Purdue’s Edward C. Elliott Hall of Music to capacity on this particular night were in a happy frame of mind. It was a football weekend on the campus and that afternoon Purdue had defeated Wisconsin for the first time since 1945.

“In the first set, Kenton served a mixture of old standbys from his book and a few new things, including the haunting, baroque Marty Paich arrangement of My Old Flame. The set closed at a gallop with a piece called The Big Chase, in which drummer Jimmy Campbell and Mike Pacheco on the Cuban drums engaged in a lengthy percussion discourse that rolled along on waves of applause from the audience.

“Then Christy came on. June had what Stan calls her “road voice”—even huskier than usual this time because of a cold. There were some rough edges. But the polish and precision that can be achieved in a studio recording session were well compensated for by the immediacy and presence of the live performance. June can project as much sex with her voice as any girl singer in the business. And she has an instinctive feeling for jazz phrasing. She can take a light confection like It’s a Most Unusual Day and convert it into a swinging message, punctuated with time changes ranging from three-four to double-time.

“And she sang Bewitched with the restraint and sensitivity a first-class ballad deserves.

“The Four Freshmen sang, clowned, played, and sang some more. The comic relief delighted the audience. When the Freshmen settled down, however, they demonstrated that, showmanship aside, they can cut most vocal groups around today, and without resort to distorted voicings and other gimmicks. Their funky sound on Angel Eyes is a case in point.

“To cap the evening, the Freshmen, June and the Kenton band joined forces for a close that was, in turn, rollicking and nostalgic.

“The band charged in with the familiar arrangement of Love For Sale employing Afro-Cuban rhythms. Next, June and the Freshmen added the vocal dimension to Kenton’s instrumental rendering of September Song. Here, the band’s section voicings created a surging, lyrical sound.

“When the band swung into Gerry Mulligan’s Walking Shoes, June and the Freshmen slipped in some vocal riffing that established a jam session mood. They did it again in The Peanut Vendor, the Kenton fixture in which his ten-piece brass section was put on its mettle. The brasses romped through the tricky dissonant passages and high-register pyrotechnics without a sign of a flub. Stan signed off with a few bars of his Artistry in Rhythm theme and suddenly it was all over.

“No account of the concert would be complete without a mention of the work of some of the sidemen in the Kenton band…the darting, inventive runs of Charlie Mariano on alto sax, for example…Bill Trujillo’s glancing tenor work…the punching trumpet exclamations of Bud Brisbois and Rolf Ericson…the trombone improvisations of Kent Larsen, Archie Le Coque and Don Sebesky. It was, all in all, a night to remember.”

—BILL PEEPLES

The Road

On September 28, 1959, Stan Kenton, his orchestra, June Christy, and the Four Freshmen began a five-week road tour. The road! The wonderful, miserable, exciting road. A hectic endurance test which rivals military survival experiments. Stan, June, and the Freshmen are certainly no strangers to the road. At least once during almost all of the past seventeen years, Stan Kenton has packed his suitcase and taken his orchestra on tour. Until recent years, June Christy accompanied him as featured performer. The Freshmen, who seem to be wanderers at heart, have souvenirs from just about every city in the country.

However, as any veteran of the road will insist, no one ever really gets used to it. Each tour has new excitement, new faces, new experiences and problems sprinkled in with the usual assortment of trials and tribulations. This tour was certainly no exception.

To begin with, doing 38 shows in as many days while traveling several thousand miles is no mean feat. It means that the entire tour is made up of one-nighters some of them “hit-and-runs,” when everyone climbs on the bus right after the concert and leaves immediately for the next city, often arriving just in time for the next performance.

Obviously, on such a tour, much of the time is spent riding from place to place. Inside the bus there is often silence. Dog tired musicians are trying to sleep or at least relax by watching the countryside roll past. However, an interested observer will hear occasional scraps of conversation which go something like this:

“‘Remind me to get the address of that last hotel; I left my cufflinks on the dresser:”

“I wonder if I'll have time to call my wife tonight?”

“Who has the bicarb?”

“I'll open.”

“I wish they could make the outside of a suitcase smaller and make the inside bigger.”

“I call and raise.”

“The guy that designs bus seats can't be over three feet tall” (this one probably from Stan).

“Who has an aspirin?”

“Right now I'd hock my horn for a meal that doesn't talk back.”

“I fold.”

“I wish we'd stop long enough to get my laundry done.”

“Who has the paper cups?”

“I knew you were bluffing.”

“I wonder what it's like to get eight hours sleep?”

The road has many problems, but there are also rewards. Sometimes it is possible to steal a couple of hours and have a look at a new city. Lifelong friendships are often made. Jokes and humor are frequent. Ideas are exchanged.

There is one thing above all others that makes a tour such as this worthwhile. It is a feeling that grows gradually as the tour rolls on. This feeling comes from being an integral part of a great musical presentation. Night after night of working together, days spent traveling on the bus welds the entire show into a magnificent unit. A musical rapport is created which seems to make the whole even greater than the sum of its parts, each person continually striving to make a larger contribution.