BUILDING YOUR MUSICAL VOCABULARY BY CHOOSING THE REET WORD

The other day when I was listening to the oldies station on my dish, they played Jackie Wilson’s hit, “Reet Petite.” Great song! It reminded me of when I was researching one of the chapters in my soon-to-be-published (fall of ’09) second book of music trivia, and was looking up the term “reet.” Reet, it turns out, is just a slangy jazz-era way of saying “right.” So, when Jackie sings, “She’s all right” and “reet petite” he’s really saying pretty much the same thing. But the ladies aren’t the only gender that employs the word reet. Reet is also applied to the special pleats in men’s zoot suit pants in the same jazz era. Ah, those were the days. Of course, in African-American culture, zoot suits and reet pleats are making a comeback, if they ever really went that far away. So look for males to be once again bedecked in the glory that is, to quote the lyrics from the musical Hair (see video below) the birthright of their sex. In other species males have the grandest plumage, the manes, the antlers etc. It’s only we humans where the males stick to those gray 6-piece suits all the time. But I digress. I think we should not only bring back the fashion of the era, but the slang as well.

So, I want to start hearing some reets out there. You can rhyme it up the way Jackie does. Like, “That is one reet sweet new pair of hip-waders you got there Bob” “Thanks, Phil. My Gladys got ‘em for me; I tell you that woman is reet petite and out of seet”

Okay, just don’t get too carried away.



Here he is, Mr. Entertainment, Jackie Wilson.




And here also, for your interest, is "My Conviction” from the 1960s musical Hair.





Photo from http://images.buycostumes.com
Jackie Wilson video by YT member oldies55
Hair video by YT member ObsessiveBeatles

GLEAMING STEAMING FLAXEN WAXEN – An upate on the HAIR documentary, as promised

In a recent post (17 Feb 08) I mentioned I was going to track down that new documentary about the musical HAIR, and see if I could – as we used to say in the 60s – score a copy. Well, score I did. I found the website, placed an order, then and sat back and waited while the postal service did its thing. And after viewing it, I came to the immediate conclusion: My friends do not pass up an opportunity to see this film. In fact, go out of your way if you have to – it’s a real gem. If you are a fan of HAIR, or you are an ex-hippie, or if you still are a hippie, you will love this film. If you have an historical interest of any kind in the late 60s, the days of love, peace and protest, the anti-War movement, you will love this film.

At a mere 55 minutes, HAIR: Let the Sun Shine In does not require you to hit pause once or twice like so many feature current movies do, but it’s so jam-packed with wonderful insights and memories it has the feel of a longer view. As a documentary, its more than just an account of the (in)famous 60s musical, but a compelling mix of old and new footage of student protests, news clips and actual stage productions. There’s also some old TV footage from the Smothers Brothers and a hilarious spot of James Rado and Jerome Ragni on Johnny Carson. All of this is interspersed with interviews from cast members (Melba Moore, Ben Vereen, Tim Curry, Keith Carradine…) and the visionary creators and producers (Rado &Ragni, Galt MacDermot, Michael Butler), as well as people connected with the international cast.

This film is touching and timely. It puts the Hair experience of the 60s in a much larger context, not only creatively, but socially. It also includes some personal stories – triumphs and tragedies – of those involved. I can just about guarantee you’ll still be thinking about it for some time afterwards. I emailed one of the film’s producers, Pola Rapaport, about showings, and this is what she had to say:

HAIR : Let the Sun Shine In will be shown next internationally in Warsaw, Poland, at the Planete Doc Film Festival, on May 15 and 17th. The next US screenings will be at the Seattle International Film Festival on May 24th and 26th. It will also be shown at the Jerusalem International Film Festival in July.

We are looking for a US television premiere. It played on French/ German Arte a few months ago. Arte provided the basic funding for the film.

When I get more info on US or Canadian etc. showings, I will certainly post them, too. Meanwhile, here’s the website for Ms. Rapaport http://www.blindinglightfilms.com/

And here's the sample video again http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=klObyJY1W_I
HAIR: Let the Sun Shine In (2007) – a film by Pola Rapaport and Wolfgang Held

TIMOTHY LEARY DEARIE - PART 1

Okay, if I haven’t quite convinced you yet that I’m all about the trivia, then this post should settle things once and for all. Not long ago (January 23, 2007), I put up a post here about the hippie-era musical, Hair, which included a link to a YouTube video excerpt featuring the song, “The Flesh Failures/Let the Sunshine In.” Now, this song includes a few lines from an earlier song in the program, “Manchester England England,” sung by the character Claude. This in turn led me to discover that the lyrics “embedded” in the Manchester reprise part (still with me?) are some lines from William Shakespeare’s “Romeo and Juliet,” namely Romeo’s death scene. Well that’s cool. But it’s still not quite the end of it. As I’ve said many times before, when you go look up song lyrics online, and start comparing sites, you can find a lot of disagreement. For one thing, words just don’t sound the same to everybody. And so it is with “The Flesh Failures/Let the Sunshine In.” I’m talking about one small and seemingly insignificant little word near the transition from the “Flesh Failures” to the “Sunshine” parts. Here’s the verse in question:

Singing our space-song on a spider web, sitar
Life is around you and in you
Answer for Timothy Leary, dearie
Let the sunshine, etcetc.

After clicking around at a whole bunch of lyrics sites, I can roughly estimate that about half of them list the second-to-last line as “Answer for Timothy Leary, dearie,” as it is in the above example. The other half say the word is “from.” As I considered which one might be correct, there was something about those two choices, especially “for,” that I couldn’t quite put my finger on. I thought about it for a while, gave up, and then, as often happens when you move on to something else, has a flash of inpsiration, and remembered an important clue. Earlier in the Hair program, Claude sings the full version of “Manchester England” which contains the following verse:

Now that I've dropped out,
why is life dreary dreary?
Answer my weary query
Timothy Leary dearie

Now, as you check out those 4 lines, recall that Timothy Leary’s most memorable quote of the hippie era was “Turn on, tune in, drop out.” Claude has dropped out, and is finding that it’s not all he thought it would be; in fact, it’s pretty darn dreary. He wants an answer from Dr. Leary, the head hippie guru, the big bwana himself. If you want my opinion, I think this proves that the word in question is “from” not “for.” However, I will say this, listening to it, it does sound more like “for” than “from.” But then again, the lyrics are rushing by pretty fast for totally clear diction. I’ll stand by “from.” Plus, it makes good sense – Claude asks Dr. L. why his life is so dreary, and the answer back from Leary is simple, “Let the sunshine in!” (probably through some windowpane acid…)

Thus, the mystery appears solved, but as is often the case, when one trivia door closes, another opens. Now I want to know if Timothy Leary actually ever said this alleged quote, “Let the sunshine in.” He certainly could have said it; I think we can agree on that. Or are they the words of Rado and Ragni, written in the “spirit of” Leary? It’s one more bit of trivia I’d really like to know. So, if there are any Leary-philes or scholars out there, or any aging hippies with a box full of yellowing Leary books in the attic, then let me hear from you! As for me, I gotta go close the mini-blinds; the afternoon sunshine is just brutal…

Here is the previously posted link http://ca.youtube.com/watch?v=klObyJY1W_I to the video of “The Flesh Failures/Let the Sunshine In” in case you want to listen again. I’m currently trying to track down a copy of the complete documentary by creators Pola Rapaport and Wolfgang Held. If I find it, you can be sure I’ll give you a full report!

GIMME A HEAD WITH HAIR

Now that's a song I bet a lot of baby boomers identify with in a rather different way today than they did back in the late 60s. Who here remembers the musical HAIR? Very good, I'm glad to see so many hands. The show's official title was "Hair - An American Tribal Love-Rock Musical" and it was all that and a bag of...well, never mind. Let's just say it wasn't chips. Perhaps these days the only songs anyone remembers are "Aquarius/Let the Sunshine In" (The 5th Dimension), and the title song "Hair" (The Cowsills). And maybe "Good Morning Starshine" (Oliver) and "Easy To Be Hard" (Three Dog Night). Oh, and I think "Frank Mills" survived total obscurity too, but I don't recall at the moment who recorded it. That may seem like a goodly number of songs, but there's so many more aren't heard any more. I was something of a "Hair" devotee way back when. I had both the original Broadway cast recording (acid green and orange) and also the pink one, done by (as incongruous as it may sound) The Royal Shakespeare Festival Public Theater. Both records had most of the same songs, but each had some good ones the other didn't. Between these two, I think I had everything covered.

Speaking of covered, "Hair" was infamous at the time for including nude scenes in the some of the productions. Many venues banned the nudity part, but other more progressive ones went for it. I saw "Hair" in Detroit, with the Detroit cast, in 1970. While I'm pretty sure there wasn't any nudity in that one, I honestly can't remember. But I didn't exactly have front row seats, so if there was any nakedness on stage, I probably wouldn't have gotten a corrupting peek at anything. Gee, all that censorship for nothing. Of course, the wealthier kids who had close-up seats would have been damaged forever.

Anyway, here's a link that will give you the history of the show, if you're into it.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hair_%28musical%29
As you'll see, the original Broadway cast is to modern popular music what SNL is to subsequent sitcom and comedy movies - a real talent farm.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=klObyJY1W_I
This is one terrific video, and obviously done recently. Great voices, and a nice touch at the end - the kids meet up with a "slightly older" James Rado (one of the creators of Hair) at the end. The 5th Dimension's version was a more commercial "hybrid" of two "Hair" songs. It was good, but this is the way "Hair" purists like me like to hear it. Peace out.

Later that same day...
I thought I'd put this little post script here for those (like me) die-hard trivia nutjobs. The full title of the above-linked song is "The Flesh Failures/Let The Sunshine In." Here is a link for the lyrics to the Flesh Failures part, which will help you decipher the layers.
http://www.guntheranderson.com/v/data/goodmor1.htm

If you are a Mensa-level trivia buff, you will probably already be aware (sigh - I had to look it up) that the underlying lyrics are from Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet." Here's a link for that, too. Scroll down to Lines 112-114.
http://www.clicknotes.com/romeo/T53.html
In conclusion, I guess having a production done by the Royal Shakespeare Festival wasn't so incongruous after all...