Thanks for the welcome!  I suppose I should supply a bit of information about myself:
I'm from Central Illinois (not the dread Chicago!) and am currently 17 (senior in high school).  Of course, I'd always heard in passing some of Bing's stuff at Christmas, but I first really discovered (if that's how you'd put it) him when I was 14, maybe 13?  The first chronologically definite moment I remember would be August or September 2021 (I would've been 14 then), when I was humming Till the Clouds Roll By to myself on the bus to morning practice.  I'm certain it goes back farther than that, but I'm a bit fuzzy on the details.  Anything else anyone would like to know?

Last edited by michaelbiesenthal (26/9/2024 3:59 am)

Hello Michael. 

A huge welcome to the forum!
As David has just touched upon, it's terrific that Bing and his talent can still attract someone of younger years. I am now aged fifty-five and from the UK where during his lifetime, Bing loomed large. I properly discovered him when around a similar age to yours at the time (twelve, I think) - but through his films (1930's onwards) which were still in the 1980's, regularly being broadcast at the weekends on BBC television.

I also had the advantage of the BBC's national radio music station, BBC Radio 2, who were still then very much fully broadcasting Bing's era of music. This was regulalrly played by some wonderful, beautifully spoken and highly informed specialist broadcasters who were steeped in the pre rock'n'roll period of The Great American Songbook.

May I ask, Michael - where you generally accessed and  listened to or watched Bing during the time you were first discovering him - and what are your sources now? I'd be most interested. 



 

Last edited by Ian Kerstein (29/9/2024 2:34 am)

Yes, Michael (please call me Ian),  I hope you have a very long time indeed to keep spreading the word. You certainly sound as if you're making a splash already in your public speaking class. In mine, I spoke about Fred Astaire and now wish I had about Bing (although I did briefly appear as him in a final year school production) .

I'm afraid I receive similar, vague reactions from my (otherwise) dear friends. Those of my generation, at least know him as the singer who played golf, sang "White Christmas" and at best, possibly from the "Road to ... " film series. Then at worst (save me!), as the sadistic parent who continuously thrashed his children black and blue.

At least on that final point, I have managed to successfully explain to them otherwise. This has been with the knowledge and detailed testimony of Gary Giddens, Bing's close singing friend Rosemary Clooney and in person, both our own Malcolm MacFarlane and Bob Hope himself, who demonstrated he was still very cross about it all when I saw him in 1984, the year following the publication of Gary Crosby's now infamous memoir. 

As to my younger friends, especially in their twenties, thirties - and even their forties - forget it. I'm afraid unlike classical music, where you can happily enjoy music as old as five hundred years without being accused of antiquity, trying to now make a case for the popular music prior to the rock'n'roll years is very difficult indeed. 

Apart from the rare examples of The Beatles and Sinatra whose shelf lives seem so far to be outlasting their original audiences (even Elvis is not looking as secure these days), this particular parade seems to have generally well passed by.

I'm delighted you're discovering and enjoying so much of Bing through YouTube. It really is a phenomenal resource and I've yet to fail in finding anything of Bing's on there that I already own on CD or vinyl - and to say it can all be enjoyed free of charge is splendid. Do you have any other favourites of Bing's songs, albums or films? 

Last edited by Ian Kerstein (29/9/2024 6:06 am)

... and with apologies for the length of this:

Yes, Mr Jolson is passing further into history, isn't he? I wonder if there's anyone surviving who actually worked with him? With last week's passing of Kathryn Crosby in mind, I know Jolie's widow survived up until 2004.

I did manage when aged around fourteen years, to persuade a fellow classmate to listen to a few Jolson recordings. Miraculously, he really fell for "She's a Latin from Manhattan" in a big way and every time he visited, I'd have to play it. Bing's singing never did much for him, though -  although he quite liked some of his radio comedy sketches I have on vinyl and the Road films with Bob Hope, which were still being regulalrly shown on BBC television's mainstream channels.

Speaking of whom, I saw Hope in concert, stood next to him afterwards and but didn't get a chance to chat, it was so crowded. I later gave him a series of fully recipricated lone waves with one of his books, as his departing limousine stopped at some traffic lights 

His comments about Gary's book came at the end of his hour long act when he returned after his ovation to give us ten minutes of "serious talk". Not really what we'd highly paid for but so wonderfully non-comedically inappropriate and memorable. Among other things, he sounded off angrily about the Vietnam war and indeed Bing's son Gary's book, not long published in the UK and also newspaper serialised. He asked rather pointedly if any of us present had read it and after yours truly and few others bravely raised our hands and shouted affirmatives ... off the old boy went, raising his voice considerably:

"I wanna tell ya, I worked with Bing for thirty-seven years and never once did I EVER, EVER see anything like that, I'll tell ya that, ladies and gentlemen!!!!" ... "I was around those boys and believe me, ladies and gentleman I didn't see boys who were afraid of their Dad" ... "I think it's a lot of con. I don't think Gary even wrote that book but still took the money!!!!" ... "I've told my family to write mine while I'm still alive so I can read it!!!"

Then soon after, another orchestral blast of "Thanks for the Memory", another standing ovation from a half an empty concert hall and then many still remaining raised eyebrows. 

I love your song choices, Michael - particualrly "Ain't Got a Dime". That's also a lovely performed version of "Ol' Man River", isn't it? have you heard Bing's 1928 version which also goes at quite a clip? 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IWcYPgH7FOE

PS: At least once you'd finished your talk, all of your class would then I'm sure had been more than well informed of that dreadful war.

Last edited by Ian Kerstein (30/9/2024 8:38 am)

Yes, they always defended each other in public and Bob seemed vehemently genuine over his concerns with this but their friendship, since the publication of Richard Zoglin's excellently researched and detailed 2013 biography of Bob, "Hope" - has since shone some new, more nuanced and complex light over this. 

Other family members have also noted that Bing apparently, also paid for Gary's any other of his brothers who required psychiatric and detoxification care over the years. After Bing's death, Kathryn (a trained nurse) also cared for Gary in 1983 from the second family's home in Hillsborough. Unbeknownst to her, his book was already at an advanced stage and then published in the US, later that year.

This meant that far later, the hurt she'd originally endured from this, made her decide not to co-operate with Gary Giddins' first volume and only at the intervention of her children who had read it, then assisted hugely with the second (and hopefully the forthcoming) third. 

Just about all celebrity autobiographies and memoirs are inevitably ghosted. Indeed those of both Bob and Bing's. The only performers I can bring to mind of Bing's generation who actually sat down and wrote their own were: Noël Coward, Fred Astaire (who reportedly began and then abandoned his ghost). Astaire's title "Steps in Time" was supplied by his and David Niven's good friend Coward. Niven himself, also wrote his own initial best selling volume. His fellow English actor Sir Alec Guinness did the same and Sir Dirk Bogarde produced seven self penned volumes. I believe Katharine Hepburn's was also by her own hand. Her friend Lauren Bacall always claimed she entirely wrote her own, too. 

Yes, the 1928 orchestration of "Ol' Man River" is so beautifully arranged, isn't it? Have you also heard Bing's small group accompanied version of it from 1955? 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QGc-LuHVaJs
Do you also enjoy Bing's 1970's recordings? 

I too have a weakness for those Steven Foster songs. "Beautiful Dreamer" is my favourite - and this is my favourite version: No need to guess the singer....
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lYhyQQbRSMA

Last edited by Ian Kerstein (01/10/2024 6:11 am)

Yes. It's also apparent in his own interviews, that certainly Gary was also close enough and around his father's second family enough to witness Bing's affectionate exasperated expression towards Gary, over the second brood's behaviour, when they occasionally stepped out of line. Gary's brother Philip over twenty years ago, unequivocally stated how much he loved his Dad. He had nothing but fond memories of spending time with him, just as any normal father, playing baseball and doing the usual father/son activities. True, Bing wasn't around as much, due to his heavy "peak career" commitments but Phil barely recognised any of Gary's published claims. 

As to the Gary named Giddens, his volumes of his Bing biography - including the still unsurfaced third, here's a link, Michael to where it's discussed on here: https://crosbyfanworld.boardhost.com/viewtopic.php?pid=10561#p10561
Funnily enough, the majority of celebrities who have their own autobiographies ghosted, do indeed get to hear themselves talk very much indeed during the process. They tend to undertake a number of audio recorded sessions, where their "ghost" interviews them about their life and then crafts it onto the page. To be fair, to literarily shape and write a whole book is a skill not many possess. Further, to enable your own speaking voice and one familiar to millions to convincingly emerge from the printed word, must be whole talent in itself. 

In the past, it was more usual to feature the ghostwriter's name on the cover, along with the celebrity's. The cover of Dorothy Lamour's book has the, " ..as told to .." acknowledgement which was quite common around the time of its publication in 1981. Now it's fun to read in the Acknowledgements section between the covers and work out who the real writer was. EG: "Finally, special thanks to Michael Biesenthal, without whom this book could not have been written." or "...for helping to arrange my thoughts onto the page", Etc. 

Here's another "Ol' Man River" of Bing's, recorded live at the London Palladium during his 1976 season. Perhaps his fastest ever?  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tdL4LWPmBFA
... and the community chat about Bing's versions, here: 
https://crosbyfanworld.boardhost.com/viewtopic.php?id=1571
What a beautiful rendition of William Warfield's! He had a wonderful, resonant voice, didn't he?
Here's the guy who is most strongly identified with song and played the part in the original Broadway run:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=df4VdyGIqJ8
Just to let you know, your enthusiasm has now cost me almost twenty four dollars, as I've just ordered the Blu-Ray disc of the whole, original and newly restored film. 

Apologies for not noticing that the lovely, "The Good Old Times" being a 'seventies song.
I've found this one to be similar in tone and sentiment:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lNgBY0DS1iQ
This Bing 'seventies chat has now inspired me to purchase his "Feels Good, Feels Right" album on CD, which features three extra tracks not made available on my original UK vinyl edition. 
This is proving to be an expensive conversation, Michael, lol! 

Have you heard his final album, "Seasons"? We have a chat about that, here:
https://crosbyfanworld.boardhost.com/viewtopic.php?id=1912
I must plop my copy of "Bingo Viejo" on my turntable and give it a spin. I haven't heard it for a couple of years. There's an ongoing discussion of it on here: 
https://crosbyfanworld.boardhost.com/viewtopic.php?id=153
I'll add a comment, there once I've heard it, again. 

 

Last edited by Ian Kerstein (02/10/2024 10:32 am)