Ray McKinley and Eddie Sauter - the Majestic Recordings

Eddie Sauter and Ray McKinley

The great arranger Eddie Sauter made his name with Benny Goodman, but the many songs he arranged for Ray McKinley's excellent postwar band deserve to be remembered as well.

Previously I've posted McKinley's complete RCA Victor recordings, including a number of Sauter compositions. I've now remastered that set in ambient stereo.

Today we'll explore: 

• The sides that McKinley made for the small Majestic label just before joining Victor, specifically the 19 songs that Sauter arranged for the band, including many of his own works

• As a bonus, excerpts from a radio appearance from the same time period, with two additional Sauter arrangements

The Ray McKinley Band, 1946

I want to acknowledge my friend and frequent collaborator, the indefatigable Dave Federman, who first covered these recordings in his new Substack site, Dave's Desk, which I heartily recommend. Before Dave hipped me (as they said in the 40s) to these recordings, I had not heard them. What a revelation!

Let me quote here from Dave's essay on Sauter and McKinley: "His [McKinley's] recordings for the Majestic label in 1946-7 are, for me, pinnacles of progressive jazz - mainly because they feature Eddie Sauter arrangements. These are so surrealistic and free-form that they represent a parallel to the abstract expressionist art then being developed by the likes of Arshile Gorky and Hans Hoffman. The arrangements often seem goofy and Keatonesque, and are mindful of the playfulness of abstract art before it left the realms of form and representation entirely."

The Majestic Recordings

Here, we'll examine the McKinley-Sauter Majestics in chronological order, as is our usual practice. The set includes all the Sauter arrangements that I know about; there may be more.

Eddie arranged more than his own compositions for the band, and we start off with something far afield from Sauter's own works, Ivor Novello's end-of-war ballad, "We'll Gather Lilacs," in a strikingly good arrangement with a vocal by Ann Hathaway. (She is probably the same vocalist who later issued a well received LP on Motif.)

[Note (November 2024): I discovered that this is not true. There were two singing "Ann Hathaways" in the late 1940s. One was Ann Baker, who appears on this record, a former Louis Armstrong and Billy Eckstine vocalist who also recorded a single for Keynote. She is the artist on "We'll Gather Lilacs." The other "Ann Hathaway" was Betty Ann Solloway, who recorded a single for Avalon and an LP for Motif in the 1950s. I plan to feature both of them later on.]

"Ann Hathaway" (Ann Baker)

Next is one of the many novelties that featured McKinley's genial singing: "In the Land of the Buffalo Nickel," lyricist Bob Hilliard's wacky visit to the old West. This was at about the time that Hilliard was tasting success with "The Coffee Song."

Drummer Paul Kashishian, trumpeters Nick Travis, Chuck Genduso, Joe Ferrante and Curly Broyles

Our first Sauter composition is "Sand Storm," which begins in a bop vein, then settles into an eventful band instrumental with breaks for (possibly) trumpeter Chuck Genduso and clarinetist Peanuts Hucko.

Next, another McKinley specialty - his remake of Gene Raye's "Down the Road Apiece," which had been a hit for Ray, Gene and the Will Bradley Trio in 1940. When Ray sings, "The drummer man's a guy they call Eight Beat Mack," he of course is referring to himself. It's worth hearing, but in truth, Sauter's arrangement could have had more of a boogie-woogie feel.

Teddy Norman

Another ballad was Burke and Van Heusen's "That Little Dream Got Nowhere" from the comedy film Cross My Heart, where it was sung by Betty Hutton. Here it gets a smooth rendition by the talented Teddy Norman.

Next we have three consecutive Sauter compositions, starting with "Tumblebug," a somewhat surreal exercise that starts off in a bop vein, but has guitarist Mundell Lowe throwing in interjections throughout. This is the "abstract expressionism" that Dave mentioned above.

"Hangover Square" was the title of a creepy 1945 film, but Sauter's namesake composition is rather a band tour de force, with the title possibly referring to the musicians' drinking habits.

Trombonists Vern Friley, Irv Dinkin and Jim Harwood

Trombonist Vern Friley was credited on the label for his solo work on "Borderline," another Sauter composition.

Sauter produced a fairly standard but still accomplished big band arrangement for McKinley's "Jiminy Crickets." I'm not sure about the trumpeter, but the alto saxophonist is probably Ray Beller,

In case there is any doubt who leads the band ...

We're back in McKinley specialty territory with his "Howdy Friends (E.T.O. Curtain Call)." (I have no idea what "E.T.O" stands for.) The label credits Ray four times - as the singer, composer, bandleader and via a second subtitle to the title - "Ray McKinley's Theme Song." It's a good piece that allows Ray to credit some of his notable band members. In this version he mentions Ray Beller, Mundell Lowe, Vern Friley, Peanuts Hucko and pianist Lou Stein. The lineup in the live version discussed below is different. 

Next, and moving into 1947 recordings, we have the Harold Arlen-Ted Koehler standard "I Got a Right to Sing the Blues," first recorded by the young Ethel Merman in 1932. Sauter provides space for some appropriate hot obbligatos and McKinley permits himself a few brief scat passages a la Louis Armstrong. The few instrumental choruses are much the most interesting part of this piece. Parenthetically, I'm an admirer of the composers, but this is not one of my favorite songs.

"Red Silk Stockings and Green Perfume" is another off-center adventure from lyricist Bob Hilliard, perfectly suited to the talents of McKinley and Sauter.

Guitarist Mundell Lowe, Ray McKinley, baritone sax Deane Kincaide, vocalist Teddy Norman

"Comin' Out" is a rocking instrumental from the band, featuring McKinley on drums. This, "Red Silk Stockings" and the next number, "The Chief," were apparently unissued on Majestic, but later came out on Savoy and Allegro Elite. The transfer of "Red Silk Stockings" is from a Hit pressing, the others from an Allegro 10-inch LP in my collection.

The following two numbers amount to Bob Hilliard's ventures into ethnic stereotypes - then taken as comic, today as questionable to say the least - "Pancho Maximilian Hernandez (The Best President We Ever Had)" and "Civilization (Bongo, Bongo, Bongo)." The latter song was a big hit. The McKinley version did well, but not as well as the Andrews Sisters/Danny Kaye disc.

The bandleader's contract with Majestic was running down but there was time for two more numbers before he and the band were off to Victor. First we have Sauter's "Mint Julep" (not the same song as the Clovers' "One Mint Julep" of several years later).

Finally, a pensive Lynn Warren sings "Over the Rainbow," dragging the beat out so much that the band seems to be getting impatient.

A Band Remote from 1946

Finally, we have several items from a June 25, 1946 radio remote from Frank Dailey's Meadowbrook, a well known club in New Jersey. This comes from a long-ago bootleg with fairly good sound.

Ray predictably starts out with "Howdy Friends," this time with a shout-out to Sauter. He then segues into a really fine performance of Sauter's "Hangover Square," a bit looser than the Majestic recording above.

Sauter then contributes a dynamic arrangement of "The Carioca," an impressive workout for the band. The set ends with another Sauter arrangement, this one of "Tuesday at 10."

These materials were remastered from items on Internet Archive and from my collection. Majestic's sound was not as polished as Victor's, but is still reasonably good.

Sauter of course went on to form the Sauter-Finegan Orchestra with Bill Finegan. The band's output has been covered on this blog fairly extensively. The most recent post is here; it will lead you to all the previous articles on the band that I've published.

LINK to Ray McKinley and Eddie Sauter - the Majestic Recordings

Christmas with the Postwar Bands

The Ray McKinley Band

Interest in America's big bands tailed off in the postwar years, but the most popular bands were still active in the recording studio. And of course they produced that staple of the music industry, the holiday release, whether covering an old favorite or introducing the latest work from one of America's tunesmiths.

In today's post we'll look at 14 of these seasonal specialties. The recordings include both the newest songs and perennials revisited by the upcoming bands.

We'll concentrate on the postwar years, but let's start with two items from the late-war era.

Charlie Spivak

Charlie Spivak's band is largely forgotten, even though he was prominent and popular for quite a period. In 1944, he came out with the new song "A Wonderful Winter (For You and Me)" by Marty Symes and Al Kaufman. It went nowhere on the charts, but still it's a pleasant outing in the hands (lips?) of trumpeter Spivak and singer Jimmy Saunders. Alvin Stoller is the drummer in this band - he will appear at the end of this post in an unfamiliar role as vocalist in a Billy May number.

In early 1945, Les Brown's band was covering a good song with a holiday (or at least winter) veneer, "Sleigh Ride in July." Jimmy Van Heusen and Johnny Burke wrote the piece for Dinah Shore to introduce in the film Belle of the Yukon. The popular version of the song was by Bing Crosby, but Brown's Gordon Drake does it well, too.

Les Brown, Jack Haskell

The following year, Les came back with a two-sided Christmas offering. One side was the new "Christmas Song," presented by his popular vocalist Doris Day. It was backed by "When You Trim Your Christmas Tree," a worthy outing by Doris' male counterpart, Jack Haskell. I may have shared this item a long time ago, but it's worth a revisit. In later years, Haskell had a fair amount of success on television.

"I'll Be Home for Christmas" has become one of the most popular songs of the season. (Second Hand Songs lists 1,295 versions!) The first recording was by Bing in 1943, and there was a well-received release by Perry Como three years later. In 1947, the song was taken up by vocalist/bandleader Eddy Howard, who had a big hit the previous year with "To Each His Own." Eddy was not without his vocal mannerisms, but his reading of "I'll Be Home for Christmas" is sincere and affecting.

Eddy Howard, Ray McKinley

Ray McKinley had a long career as bandleader, and before that was a noted drummer-singer with Jimmy Dorsey and Will Bradley. McKinley was a close friend of Glenn Miller, co-led the Miller AAF Band following Miller's disappearance, and later fronted the Miller ghost band. Even so, the arrangements for his own postwar band betrayed little Miller influence, being done by the noted Eddie Sauter and Deane Kincaid. There is an extensive survey of McKinley's postwar recordings on this blog, but today we'll just sample one - a new song for 1948 called "Little Jack Frost Get Lost" by Al Stillman and Segar Ellis. Ray is the vocalist, and manages as usual to be stylish even though he had very little range.

An Amos Milburn recording session

Johnny Moore's Three Blazers had a hit in 1947 with "Merry Christmas, Baby," with a vocal by Charles Brown. In 1949, another piano-playing singer, Amos Milburn, tried to duplicate this success by pretty much duplicating the song, rearranging the title into "Let's Make Christmas Merry, Baby." It's a basic blues number, but tuneful and well done. The label credits "Amos Milburn and His Chicken-Shackers," not because they had opened a restaurant, but because they had recently enjoyed a chart success with "Chicken Shack Boogie."

Harry Prime

Ralph Flanagan led one of the first and most successful Miller-clone bands. In 1949 RCA Victor was giving him a big push on its Bluebird budget label, including his Miller-esque disc of "White Christmas," with an sonorous vocal by Harry Prime. Victor issued a series of promos at the time, including a Flanagan intro to this record. You can find it on my other blog. The bandleader also has been a frequent visitor on this site.

Freddie Mitchell

Tenor sax playing bandleader Freddie Mitchell could and did turn anything into a boogie, particularly after his 1949 success with "Doby's Boogie," named in honor of Cleveland Indians outfielder Larry Doby. For the holiday season that same year he came out with the "Jingle Bell Boogie," which works much better than you might expect, particularly if you have a taste for rip-roaring tenor saxes and plinkety-plunk upright pianos. The other side of that disc was the "Auld Lang Syne Boogie," which I uploaded several years ago. Sixteen more Mitchell sides (including "Doby's Boogie") can be found here.

Ray Anthony, Ronnie Deauville

Peter De Rose and Carl Sigman penned "A Marshmallow World" in 1950. It's a winning song, and while never a huge hit, did attract the attention of some heavy hitters, including Bing and Vic Damone. Our entry will be the version by the Ray Anthony band, another part-time Miller clone outfit that was very popular for years. The vocal here is by Ronnie Deauville, a particular favorite of mine. I devoted several posts to him and his sad story in the early days of this blog.

Louis Jordan

"May Every Day Be Christmas" is a sentiment that has long been a popular with songwriters (and others). This 1951 iteration is by alto saxophonist and vocalist Louis Jordan, one of the greatest hitmakers of the postwar era. Here he fronts a big band plus organist Wild Bill Davis. The earnest results are quite a contrast with such jaunty Jordan hits as "Five Guys Named Moe."

Tex Beneke and Cash Box ad

Also in 1951, Tex Beneke came out with a two-sided Christmas special - "The Santa Claus Parade" and "A Rootin' Tootin' Santa Claus." By this time, Tex had left the Miller scene behind and was making records for M-G-M without a trace of Glenn's trademark sound. These two are engaging novelties from the saxophonist-vocalist, whose other work can be found here.

Eddie Sauter and Bill Finegan

As the 1950s wore on, bands tried to distinguish themselves by trying something different - in the case of Eddie Sauter and Bill Finegan's band, it was to drop any pretense of playing for dancers, rather presenting themselves as a concert ensemble. The musical results were often exciting, but seldom commercial - not pop enough to be popular and not classical enough to attract the high-toned crowd. The band's 1952 Christmas issue is a good example of the Sauter-Finegan approach - a winning arrangement of the "Troika" movement from Sergei Prokofiev Lt. Kije Suite, called "Midnight Sleighride" by the arrangers. Prokofiev's piece has become associated with the season, and the band's sleigh bells point up that connection. The Sauter-Finegan Band has been featured here several times.

Billy May

Finally, Billy May's "Rudolph, the Red-Nosed Reindeer Mambo" from 1954. This was one of May's contributions to the mambo mania of the time. Drummer Alvin Stoller does a knocked-out Perez Prado routine - instead of Prado's "ugh" he shouts "May!" and a number of other interjections, some I can even understand. The chart's slurping saxes were characteristic of May and well suited to this kiddie favorite.

May was another bandleader (his was a studio band) who had a Miller connection - he played trumpet in the band (as did Ray Anthony). Bill Finegan was a Miller arranger. As noted, Ray McKinley was in the AAF band and later led the Miller ghost band. Tex Beneke was in the prewar band and led the official Miller band postwar.

These selections were remastered from needle drops found on Internet Archive. The sound is generally vivid, as is often the case with old 78s (believe it or not).

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Ray McKinley on RCA Victor, 1947-50

While drummer-singer-bandleader Ray McKinley had a long career, the 1940s were his heyday.  Today we'll look at his longest-lasting band via a selection of 32 recordings he made for RCA Victor from 1947-50.

McKinley (1910-85) became a band musician in his middle teens, joining the Dorsey Brothers at 24. Will Bradley brought him on board in 1939 as a featured artist, labeling his recordings of the time as the "Will Bradley Orchestra Featuring Ray McKinley." Their big hit was "Beat Me Daddy, Eight to the Bar" with a vocal by McKinley, who wrote the piece with Don Raye and Hughie Prince.

McKinley went out on his own in 1942, making records for Hit and Capitol before joining old friend Glenn Miller's Army Air Force Band. After Miller's disappearance in 1944, McKinley co-led the band with arranger Jerry Gray.

McKinley re-started his civilian band in 1946. The group first made records for the small Majestic company, then switched to RCA Victor in 1947.

Saxophonists Deane Kincaide, Billy Ainsworth, Ray Beller, Peanuts Hucko, Pete Terry circa 1947

It was quite a talented ensemble, including at various times Nick Travis, Vern Friley, Ray Beller, Chuck Genduso, Buddy Morrow and Mundell Lowe, among others. Among those handling the charts for McKinley during this period were Deane Kincaide and Eddie Sauter, two notable names among big band arrangers.

One Band, Two Styles LP

About the only collection that RCA reissued from this period was a 1955 LP called One Band, Two Styles, which came out on the budget Camden label. Neither of the two "styles" on the record were entirely characteristic of the McKinley band, worthy though they may be on their own.

Ray McKinley, Eddie Sauter, Deane Kincaide

The first "style" was represented by six compositions by Eddie Sauter recorded at the end of 1947. These surely were earmarked for an album, but it was one that RCA never issued. Only "Idiot's Delight" - one of the more abstruse compositions in the set - was pressed on 78. The rest remained in the vaults until the Camden LP.

Sauter, who made his name with Red Norvo and Benny Goodman, went on to form the Sauter-Finegan Band with Bill Finegan, That band has appeared on this blog a number of times.

 

The second "style" on the Camden LP encompassed a reissue of the 1950 set Ray McKinley Plays Rodgers and Hart for Dancing. This was one of 15 albums that RCA issued simultaneously in an attempt to hypo the band business, which had hit the post-war doldrums. RCA's promotional campaign was called "Here Come the Dance Bands Again," even though the release encompassed everyone from Spade Cooley to Miguelito Valdes. The record company labelled the records as being "Designed for Dancing" - certainly a contrast to the Sauter compositions, which for many listeners might have been designed for head-scratching.

There are two vocals among the Rodgers and Hart songs, one by McKinley, the other by the excellent Dale Nunnally. The Sauter materials are entirely instrumental.

Dale Nunnally

1947-50 Singles

As noted, neither side of the Two Sides LP was characteristic of the McKinley band of the period - at least of its recorded repertoire. To give you a better idea of how the band sounded on record and presumably in its live appearances, I've put together 20 songs derived from RCA Victor singles of the period.

The first thing you may notice is that while only two of the 12 songs on the LP have vocals, 17 of the 20 singles do. Most of the vocal chores are handled by McKinley himself, who often abandoned the drum kit to step out in front of the ensemble. He was an engaging entertainer - I've linked before to a band short from 1946 in which he sings "Hoodle Addle" and introduces the band, including Beller, Friley and Lowe. The "Hoodle Addle" arrangement was by a decidedly more relaxed Eddie Sauter, who even throws in a few "hey baba-re-bop" licks into the mix.

McKinley was always more of a performer than a crooner. He has very little range and doesn't change his approach much from song to song.

Jean Friley

Heard on two vocals are Marcy Lutes, who a decade later made a well-regarded LP for Decca, then essentially disappeared from the scene. She was succeeded by Jean Friley, who is good but gets little chance to shine. The final vocalist was the previously mentioned Dale Nunnally.

Most of the arrangements are unattributed, although Kincaide does get two label credits, being billed as Deane "Look, Ma, No Zither" Kincaide on "The 3rd Man Theme." Much of the repertoire consists of the usual pop songs from the time - "Put 'Em in a Box," "Sunflower," "Little Jack Frost Get Lost" and so on. "The Irish Washerwoman" makes an appearance as "Boogie Woogie Washerwoman."

The sound on all 32 sides is quite good. The One Band, Two Sides LP was drawn from my collection. I remastered the 78s from lossless needle drops found on Internet archive. The download includes label scans, more photos, etc.

McKinley folded his band in 1950, then became a part-time bandleader until the Glenn Miller revival took hold following the release of The Glenn Miller Story in 1954. In 1956 Miller's widow asked him to organize a new band under Miller’s name using the original library and style. McKinley led that band for a decade, making quite a few LPs for RCA Victor.

Note (August 2024): these recordings have been remastered in ambient stereo.

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