Jerry Herman (1931) - Hello, Dolly!

Jerry Herman (1931)



Hello, Dolly! (1964)

Jerry Herman (born Gerald Herman on July 10, 1931 in New York City) is an American composer/lyricist of the Broadway musical theater. He composed the scores for the hit Broadway musicals Hello, Dolly!, Mame, and La Cage aux Folles.

Raised in Jersey City by musically-inclined parents, Herman learned to play piano at an early age, and the three frequently attended Broadway musicals. His father, Harry, was a gym teacher and in the summer worked in the Catskill Mountains hotels. His mother, Ruth, also worked in the hotels as a singer, pianist, and children's teacher, and eventually became an English teacher. After marrying, they lived in Jersey City, New Jersey and continued to work in the summers in various camps until they became head counselors and finally ran Stissing Lake Camp in the Berkshire Mountains. Herman spent all of his summers there, from age 6 to 23. It was at camp that he first became involved in theatrical productions, as director of Oklahoma!, Finian's Rainbow and A Tree Grows in Brooklyn.

At the age of 17, Herman was introduced to Frank Loesser who, after hearing material he had written, urged him to continue composing. He left the Parsons School of Design to attend the University of Miami, which has one of the nation's most avant garde theater departments.

After graduation, Herman moved to New York City, where he produced the off-Broadway revue I Feel Wonderful, which was comprised of material he had written at the University of Miami.

It opened at the Theatre de Lys in Greenwich Village on October 18, 1954 and ran for forty-eight performances. It was his only show his mother was able to see; shortly after it opened, she died of cancer at 44, and Herman spent the next year in deep mourning.

In an attempt to break loose from his grief, Herman eventually collected enough original material to put together a revue called Parade in 1958. Choreographed by friend Phyllis Newman, and with a cast that included Charles Nelson Reilly (who later co-starred in Hello, Dolly!), it opened at a tiny New York City jazz club called the Showplace. Critical raves and glowing word-of-mouth kept the show running for two years.

In 1960, Herman made his Broadway debut with the revue From A to Z, which featured contributions from newcomers Woody Allen and Fred Ebb as well. That same year producer Gerard Oestreicher approached him after seeing a performance of Parade, and asked if he would be interested in composing the score for a show about the founding of the state of Israel.

The result was his first full-fledged Broadway musical, Milk and Honey (starring Molly Picon), in 1961. It received respectable reviews and ran for 543 performances.

In 1964, producer David Merrick united Herman with Carol Channing for a project that was to become one of his most successful, Hello, Dolly!. The original production ran for 2,844 performances, the longest running musical for its time, and was later revived three times.

Although facing stiff competition from Funny Girl, Hello, Dolly! swept the Tony Awards that season, winning 10, a record that remained unbroken for 37 years, until The Producers won 12 Tonys in 2001.

***


Hello, Dolly! (Film, 1969)

Hello, Dolly! is also the title song of the popular 1964 musical. Louis Armstrong's version was inducted in the Grammy Hall of Fame in 2001.

"Hello, Dolly!" was first sung by Carol Channing, who starred as Dolly Gallagher Levi in the original 1964 Broadway cast. In December 1963, at the behest of his manager, Louis Armstrong made a demonstration recording of "Hello, Dolly!" for the song's publisher to use to promote the show.

Hello, Dolly! opened on January 16, 1964 at the St. James Theatre in New York City, and it quickly became a major success. The same month, Kapp Records released Armstrong's publishing demo as a commercial single.

The best-known recording is by Louis Armstrong in 1964. His version reached number one on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100, ending The Beatles' streak of three number-one hits in a row (they also held the top three spots) and becoming the biggest hit of Armstrong's career, followed by a gold-selling album of the same name.

The song also spent nine weeks atop the adult contemporary chart shortly after the opening of the musical.

"Hello, Dolly!" won the Grammy Award for Song of the Year in 1965, and Armstrong received a Grammy for Best Vocal Performance, Male. Louis Armstrong also performed the song (together with Barbra Streisand) in the popular 1969 film Hello, Dolly!.

"Hello, Dolly!" is a pop standard, and has been covered by many distunguished artists, including:

Carol Channing (1964) sang a variation of the song, titled "Hello, Lyndon!"
Petula Clark (1964) in English, French, and Spanish
Bobby Darin (1964)
Duke Ellington (1964)
Ella Fitzgerald for her (1964) albums Hello, Dolly! and Ella at Juan-Les-Pins
Judy Garland and Liza Minnelli (1964)
Marvin Gaye (1964)
Benny Goodman (1964)
Frank Sinatra for his (1964) album It Might As Well Be Swing
Frankie Vaughan (1964)
Lawrence Welk (1964)
Andy Williams (1964)
Herb Alpert's Tijuana Brass (1964)
Sammy Davis, Jr. (1965)
Mary Martin (1965)
The Bachelors (1966)
Pearl Bailey (1967)
Violetta Villas (1968)
Matt Monro (1968)
Pinky and Perky (1968)
Barbra Streisand (1969)
Ethel Merman (1970)
Jean-Jacques Perrey - Moog Indigo (album) 1970. The song was entirely instrumental and re-created with a moog styling.
Lou Rawls (1979)
Cab Calloway (1991)
Wayne Newton (1992)
Liza Minnelli (1997)
Nancy Wilson (2001)
Harry Connick, Jr. for his (2007) album Oh, My NOLA
Zooey Deschanel 2007, in the movie "Raving"
Kelly Ripa 2004, In an episode of "Hope & Faith"

Sinatra's rendition of the song, recorded with the Count Basie Orchestra, features new lyrics, improvised by Sinatra, which pay tribute to Louis Armstrong.

The song's refrain is:

Hello, Dolly! Well, hello, Dolly!
It's so nice to have you back where you belong!

The melody of Hello, Dolly! became caught up in a lawsuit which could have endangered timely plans for bringing out a film version of the musical. Mack David (1912-1993), an Academy Award-nominated composer also known for his compositions for television, sued for infringement of copyright, because the first four bars of Herman's show number, Hello, Dolly!, were the same as those in the refrain of David's song Sunflower from 1948. As he recounts in his memoirs, Herman had never heard "Sunflower" before the lawsuit, and wanted a chance to defend himself in court, but, for the sake of those involved in the show and the potential film, he reluctantly agreed to pay a settlement before the case would have gone to trial.

***

In 1966, Herman's next musical was the hit Mame starring Angela Lansbury, which introduced a string of Herman standards, most notably the ballad "If He Walked Into My Life," the holiday favorite "We Need a Little Christmas," and the title tune.

Although not commercial successes, Dear World (1969) starring Angela Lansbury, Mack & Mabel (1974) starring Robert Preston and Bernadette Peters, and The Grand Tour (1979) starring Joel Grey are noted for their interesting concepts and their melodic, memorable scores. Herman considers Mack & Mabel his personal favorite score, with later composition La Cage aux Folles in a close second. Both Dear World and Mack & Mabel have developed a cult following among Broadway aficionados.

In 1983, Herman had his third mega-hit with La Cage aux Folles starring George Hearn and Gene Barry, which broke box-office records at the Palace Theatre and earned Herman yet another Tony Award for Best Musical. From its score came the gay anthem "I Am What I Am" and the rousing sing-a-long "The Best of Times."

Many of Jerry Herman's show tunes have become pop standards. His most famous composition, "Hello, Dolly!", is one of the most popular tunes ever to have originated in a Broadway musical, and was a #1 hit in the United States for Louis Armstrong, knocking The Beatles from #1 in 1964. A French recording by Petula Clark charted in the Top Ten in both Canada and France. Other well known Herman showtunes include "Before the Parade Passes By," "Put On Your Sunday Clothes," and "It Only Takes a Moment" from Hello, Dolly!;

Herman is the first composer/lyricist in history to have three musicals run more than 1500 performances on Broadway: Hello, Dolly! (2,844), Mame (1,508), and La Cage aux Folles (1,761). (He has been followed in this regard by Andrew Lloyd Webber and Stephen Schwartz).

In 2008, in the film WALL-E -- Herman's music in Hello, Dolly! influences the title character, giving him emotions.

***


James Byron Dean (February 8, 1931 – September 30, 1955) was an American film actor. He is a cultural icon best embodied in the title of his most celebrated film, Rebel Without a Cause (1955), in which he starred as troubled Los Angeles teenager Jim Stark. The other two roles that defined his stardom were as loner Cal Trask in East of Eden (1955), and as the surly farmer Jett Rink in Giant (1956). Dean's enduring fame and popularity rests on only these three films, his entire output in a starring role. His death in a car crash at an early age cemented his legendary status.

He was the first actor to receive a posthumous Academy Award nomination for Best Actor and remains the only person to have two posthumous acting nominations. In 1999, the American Film Institute ranked Dean the 18th best male movie star on their AFI's 100 Years…100 Stars list.



[8932 Williams / 8931 Herman / 8931 U. Ghana]

University of Ghana Postal Workers (b. c. 1931)

The University of Ghana is the oldest and largest of the five Ghanaian public universities. It was founded in 1948 as the University College of the Gold Coast, and was originally an affiliate college of the University of London, which supervised its academic programs and awarded degrees. It gained full university status in 1961, and now has nearly 24,000 students.

The original emphasis was on the liberal arts, social sciences, basic science, agriculture, and medicine, but (partly as the result of a national educational reform program) the curriculum was expanded to provide more technology-based and vocational courses and postgraduate training.

The University is mainly based at Legon, about five miles north-east of the center of Accra.

University of Ghana - Postal Workers Canceling Stamps



[8931 Herman / 8931 U. Ghana / 8931 Tema Harbor]

Tema Harbor Singers (b. c. 1931)

Tema, population 209,000 (2005), is a city on the Atlantic Ocean coast,



east of the capital city of Accra, in the region of Greater Accra, in Ghana, West Africa.



Originally a small fishing village, it grew after the construction of a large harbor in 1961 and is now the nation's largest sea port. It is also home to an oil refinery and is an important centre of manufacturing. It is linked to the capital by railway and a highway. Tema is one of Ghana's two deep seaports; Sekondi Takoradi is the other. Tema is the nearest city to the geographical position of 0 degrees latitude and 0 degrees longitude (which lies several hundred miles south in the Bight of Benin).

Tema originates from the Ga words "Tor" ("Gourd," after the crop locally raised) and "Man" (Town or City). This altered and evolved mainly due to the Europeans, and became Tema.



Ghana - Tema Harbor Worksong



[8931 U. Ghana / 8931 Tema Harbor / 8931 Bollywood]

Development of Bollywood Film Industry (c. 1931)

[Bombay, 1905]

Bollywood, is the informal term popularly used for Bombay (Mumbai)-based Hindi-language film industry in India. Bollywood is often incorrectly used to refer to the whole of Indian cinema; it is only a part of the Indian film industry. Bollywood is one of the largest film producers in the world.



The name is a portmanteau of Bombay and Hollywood, the center of the American film industry. However, unlike Hollywood, Bollywood does not exist as a real physical place. Though some deplore the name, arguing that it makes the industry look like a poor cousin to Hollywood, it seems likely to persist and now has its own entry in the Oxford English Dictionary.



Bollywood is commonly referred to as Hindi cinema, even though Hindustani, understood as the colloquial base common to both Hindi and Urdu, might be more accurate. The use of poetic Urdu words is fairly common. There has been a growing presence of Indian English in dialogue and songs as well. It is not uncommon to see films that feature dialogue with English words and phrases, even whole sentences. There is a growing number of films made entirely in English.



[The first Indian sound film, Ardeshir Irani's Alam Ara (1931)]

Raja Harishchandra (1913) was the first silent feature film made in India. It was made by Dadasaheb Phalke. By the 1930's, the industry was producing over 200 films per year. The first Indian sound film, Ardeshir Irani's Alam Ara (1931), was a major success. There was clearly a huge market for talkies and musicals; Bollywood and all the regional film industries quickly switched to sound filming.


India - Bollywood Film Music




The Bollywood selection apparently quotes the signature laugh of Woody Woodpecker in its bridge section.

Woody Woodpecker is an animated cartoon character, an anthropomorphic woodpecker who appeared in theatrical short films produced by the Walter Lantz animation studio and distributed by Hollywood's Universal Pictures. Though not the first of the "screwball" characters that became popular in the 1940's, Woody is perhaps the most indicative of the type.

Woody was created in 1940 by storyboard artist Ben "Bugs" Hardaway, who had previously laid the groundwork for two other "screwball" characters, Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck, at the Schlesinger/Warner Bros. studio in the late 1930s. Woody's character and design would evolve over the years, from an insane bird with an unusually garish design to a more refined looking and acting character in the vein of the later Chuck Jones version of Bugs Bunny. Woody was originally voiced by prolific voice actor Mel Blanc, who was succeeded by Ben Hardaway and later by Grace Stafford, wife of Walter Lantz.

Lantz produced theatrical cartoons longer than most of his contemporaries, and Woody Woodpecker remained a staple of Universal's release schedule until 1972, when Lantz finally closed down his studio. The character has only been revived since then for special productions and occasions, save for one new Saturday morning cartoon, The New Woody Woodpecker Show, for the Fox Network in the late 1990s/early 2000s.

Woody Woodpecker cartoons were first broadcast on television in 1957 under the title The Woody Woodpecker Show, which featured Lantz cartoons bookended by new footage of Woody and live-action footage of Lantz. Though less popular today, a repackaged version of The Woody Woodpecker Show is still frequently seen in television syndication. Woody has a motion picture star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame on 7000 Hollywood Blvd. He also made a cameo alongside many other famous cartoon characters in the 1988 film Who Framed Roger Rabbit.

According to Walter Lantz's press agent, the idea for Woody came during the producer's honeymoon with his wife, Gracie, in Sherwood Lake, California. A noisy woodpecker outside their cabin kept the couple awake at night, and when a heavy rain started, they learned that the bird had bored holes in their cabin's roof. Gracie suggested that her husband make a cartoon about the bird, and thus Woody was born. The story is questionable, however, since the Lantzes were not married until after Woody made his screen debut. Their standard story that the bird's cry inspired Woody's trademark "Ha-ha-ha-HAA-ha!" is also questionable, as Mel Blanc had already used a similar laugh in earlier Warner Bros. cartoons such as Elmer's Candid Camera.
Woody Woodpecker first appeared in the film Knock Knock on November 25, 1940. The cartoon ostensibly stars Andy Panda and his father, Papa Panda, but it is Woody who steals the show. The woodpecker constantly pesters the two pandas, apparently just for the fun of it. Andy, meanwhile, tries to sprinkle salt on Woody's tail in the belief that this will somehow capture the bird. To Woody's surprise, Andy's attempts prevail, and Woody is taken away to the funny farm -- but not before his captors prove to be crazier than he is.

The Woody of Knock Knock, designed by animator Alex Lovy, is a truly deranged-looking animal. His buggy eyes look in different directions, and his head is all angles and sharp points. However, the familiar color scheme of red head and blue body is already in place, as is the infamous laugh: "Ha-ha-ha-HAA-ha!". Woody is perhaps the best example of the new type of cartoon character that was becoming popular in the early 1940s -- a brash, violent aggressor who pesters innocents not out of self defense, but simply for the fun of it. Woody's original voice actor, Mel Blanc, would stop performing the character after the first four cartoons to work exclusively for Leon Schlesinger Productions, producer of Warner Brothers' Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies. At Schlesinger's, Blanc had already established the voices of two other famous "screwball" characters who preceded Woody, Daffy Duck and Bugs Bunny. Ironically, Blanc's characterization of the Woody Woodpecker laugh had originally been applied to Bugs Bunny's predecessor, "Happy Rabbit", in shorts such as the aforementioned Elmer's Candid Camera, and was later transferred to Woody. Blanc's regular speaking voice for Woody was much like the early Daffy Duck, minus the lisp. Once Warner Bros. signed Blanc up to an exclusive contract, Woody's voice-over work was taken over by Ben Hardaway, who would voice the woodpecker for the rest of the decade.

Wet Blanket Policy (1948), directed by Dick Lundy, introduced Woody's new adversary Buzz Buzzard and featured Woody's Academy Award-nominated theme song, "The Woody Woodpecker Song".

In 1947, Woody got his own theme song when musicians George Tibbles and Ramey Idriess wrote The Woody Woodpecker Song, making ample use of the character's famous laugh. Kay Kyser's 1948 recording of the song, with Harry Babbitt's laugh interrupting vocalist Gloria Wood, became one of the biggest hit singles of 1948. Other artists did covers, including Woody's original voice actor, Mel Blanc. Lantz first used The Woody Woodpecker Song in the 1948 short Wet Blanket Policy, and became the first and only song from an animated short subject to be nominated for the Academy Award for Best Song.

The Woody Woodpecker Song and the Woody Woodpecker cartoons made extensive use of Woody's famous laugh, upsetting the man who created it, Mel Blanc. Although Blanc had only recorded four shorts as the voice of Woody, his laugh had been recorded as a stock sound effect, and used in every subsequent Woody Woodpecker short up until this point. Blanc sued Lantz and lost, but Lantz settled out of court when Blanc filed an appeal.

[8931 Tema Harbor / 8931 Bollywood / 8930 Bart]