A Who’s Who of the Early Beatles Ensemble

Posted on January 25, 2022March 30, 2022 by Wolfgang Childerglas

Memorabilia, Music history, Popular Culture, Social History

There have been untold zillions of words written or spoken about the Beatles—in books, in music mags, in newsprint, on the web, in doco films and videos—over the last six decades. Anyone vaguely following the Liverpudlian Foursome’s stellar musical journey would be familiar with the major secondary personalities that feature prominently in the Beatles’ narrative (manager Epstein, producer Martin, the various wives and girlfriends, a few of the band’s musical peers like Jagger and Clapton, the so-called “Fifth Beatles” and so on), but after wading through weighty Beatles biographies by Hunter Davies and Phillip Norman and others, I’m more curious about the lesser dramatis personae who feature peripherally in the Beatles saga. As the Beatles journey on their irresistible path from provincial obscurity to global mega-celebrity, these less well-known names pop in and out of the various accounts of John, Paul, George and Ringo’s formative days on the nascent Liverpool rock scene…so let’s shift the spotlight away from the quartet of pop music icons momentarily on to some of the background players to note their particular part in the Beatles’ back story — most were fleeting and insignificant, others flitted in and out of the Beatles’ orbit without impact and a few were important participants out of the limelight.

The bulk of the minor figures getting a mention in the early Beatles story tend to connect directly with John Lennon, not surprisingly as he was the band’s founder and driving force in the rise of the Beatles phenomena. John’s best friend in childhood was Pete Shotton, who attended the same schools as the future ‘First’ Beatle (Dovedale Infants School and Quarry Bank Grammar). Shotton was there at Lennon’s earliest foray into musical bands, initially in John’s mid-1950s skiffle boy band which became the “The Quarrymen”. Other friends of John joined them in the band including Nigel Whalley, Rod Davis Ivan Vaughan, Len Garry, Eric Griffiths, Ken Brown, Colin Hanton, Chas Newby, Bill Smith, John Duff Lowe…and a little later of course Paul McCartney and his baby-faced pal George Harrison and Stu Sutcliffe (Quarrymen membership history was very fluid). Vaughan’s not insignificant claim to fame resides in his being the member/friend who introduced Paul to John at that famous 1957 church fete. Shotton, Vaughan and Whalley had the further distinction of forming the nucleus of John’s “Woolton Gang”…a mischievous, juvenile ”gang of four” imitating and paying homage to Lennon’s all-time favourite hero of children’s fiction, ’William’ from Richmal Cromwell’s Just William books. Of his many childhood friends and associates, John’s connexion with Pete Shotton lasted the longest. When the Beatles achieved fame and fortune Shotton was a beneficiary, managing first a supermarket owned by the Beatles and then the Apple Boutique. Eventually Shotton severed his business nexus with the band and founded his own chain of restaurants, Fatty Arbuckle’s.

In 1958 Lennon, having abjectly failed his ‘O’ Level exams at Quarry Bank High, shuffled off to Liverpool Art School. Lennox’s art school period was a key phase in the formation of the scruffy “Teddy boy’s” relationships, meeting his first girlfriend Thelma Pickles, his first wife Cynthia (née Powell) and close friend and early Beatle Stu Sutcliffe whose gifted artistic merit influenced him greatly. John formed other friendships at the art school including with Jeff Mohammed who took on a older brother sort of role in helping John try to cope with the trauma of his mother Julia’s sudden death; and with Bill Harry who went on to create Mersey Beat , a local music publication which helped the band gain early traction in Liverpool music circles. Harry also published Lennon’s poems and drawings in the newspaper.

Before Brian Epstein stumbled upon the Beatles the lads had another manager of sorts, Allan Williams. Williams owned The Jacaranda club in Liverpool which the young John and Paul frequented. Williams‘s role as booking agent and manager for the early Beatles (known variously as “The Quarrymen”, “Johnny and the Moondogs” and “The Silver Beetles” before settling on “The Beatles”) was a somewhat informal relationship, coming to an abrupt end in 1961 over a fee dispute, leaving the way clear for Epstein to assume the grid position and steer the Beatles’s career trajectory⦑1⦒. Williams did make an important contribution to the band’s early development as a musical force, he was the one who arranged for the band to undertake the first of a series of nightclub performances in Hamburg, West Germany, where the Beatles over three visits between 1960 and 1962 really honed their musical skills.

The Cavern Club in Liverpool was synonymous with the early Beatles who debuted in its damp, dingy warehouse cellar as the Quarrymen in 1957⦑2⦒. Ringo Starr then in another skiffle band had already made his first appearance in the club a week earlier (Ringo went on to join Liverpool’s top ‘beat’ band prior to the Beatles’ ascendancy – “Rory Storm and the Hurricanes”). A key Cavern figure was its longtime emcee/DJ Bob Wooler, instrumental along with Bill Harry in helping arrange Brian Epstein‘s first visit to the Cavern to see John, Paul, George and Pete play.

Another regular Liverpool venue for the Beatles in their various early incarnations was the Casbah Coffee Club, owned by the mother of the band’s drummer pre-Ringo (Pete), Mona Best. Not only were the Beatles able to perform there on dozens of occasions (tallies differ as to the exact number), Mrs Best allowed the fledgling band use of the Casbah’s basement to practice in.

After Epstein and his NEMS Company⦑3⦒ took over managing the four Liverpudlian ‘Moptops’ he recruited Tony Barrow from Decca to handle publicity for the group. In the full flush of Beatlemania fame Barrow found the task easier with the press now scurrying after him, but he was still there to extinguish any Beatles crises that might occur, such as John’s incendiary “more popular than Jesus” claim. Barrow wrote liner notes for the Beatles’ EPs and albums and was also the one who came up with the “Fab Four” tag.

When the Beatles started getting bookings outside of Liverpool they got themselves a road manager, Neil Aspinall, who had gone to high school with Paul and George at the Liverpool Institute. An accountant by training, Neil’s main attribute for the ‘roadie’ job—which he scored by being ‘besties’ with Pete Best at the time—was that he owned a battered old Commer van which was used to ferry round the boys and their amps to venues, and to London for their famous Decca audition on New Year’s Day 1962. After Epstein’s death Aspinall became CEO of the flagship Apple Corps and ran the Beatles’ business empire for 40 years⦑4⦒.

Another Beatle backgrounder Epstein put on the payroll was Tony Bramwell. During their Liverpool school years Bramwell was “besties'” with George Harrison and also a friend of Paul McCartney. From roadie in the Beatlemania days Bramwell rose to become CEO of Apple Films. Today, Bramwell is one of the very few surviving Beatles’ insiders.

When Aspinall got promoted to Beatles’ PA in 1963, the doorman at the Cavern, the 1.98m-tall Mal Evans got the ‘roadie’ gig. As well as being ‘roadie’ for the Beatles’ 1964 and 1965 US tours, Mal copped the brunt of the violent backlash by enraged Filipinos against the “Fab Four” during the notorious 1966 tour of that country. Evans also served as the band’s bodyguard and in-attendance ‘gofer’ for any personal items required by any of the four musicians.

While Mal Evans took care of most of the Beatles’ simple day-to-day needs, NEMS employee Derek Taylor was tasked with organising holiday trips for the boys as well as taking care of more complicated matters like copyright issues and acquiring personal properties on behalf of the four members, plus acting as “spin doctor” for the Beatles, for all of which he earned the sobriquet “Mr Fixit”.

Someone else behind the scenes who did very well from his connexion with the Beatles was music publisher Dick James. Just as the Beatles’ juggernaut was starting its ascent in 1963 James brokered a deal with Lennon and McCartney through their manager Epstein which enriched the publisher and his business partner but more crucially resulted in the two principal Beatles songwriters losing control of their own songs for ever!

Footnote: The Fifth Beatle
Beatles watchers have long speculated on particular individuals whose contribution/ role in the band’s story warrant, justified or not, the appellation fifth Beatle…the “would-be” candidates for the title are so manifold that it invites comparison with the list of numerous contenders regularly thrown up for “eighth wonder of the world“. Those ascribed the Fifth Beatle label over the years include George Martin, Brian Epstein, Neil Aspinall, Stuart Sutcliffe, Peter Best, Chas Newby, Jimmy Nichol, Tony Sheridan and Billy Preston.

~~|+|+|+|+|+|+|+|+|~~
⦑1⦒ securing for Williams the unenviable epithet, “the man who gave the Beatles away”
⦑2⦒ the band didn’t actually play the Cavern as the Beatles until February 1961, but within two-and-a-half years had racked up close to 300 appearances at the venue
⦑3⦒ North End Music Stores
⦑4⦒ after the band broke up Neil became the closest confidant of each of the ex-Beatles

Sydney’s Long-vanished Iconic Boxing Stadiums

Posted on December 16, 2021November 17, 2023 by funambulator@live.com

Inter-ethnic relations, Leisure activities, Local history, Memorabilia, Music history, Popular Culture, Sport, Sports history

Any Sydneysiders born in or prior to the 1890s would have been aware of the opening of Sydney Stadium. 1908 was the year this iconic boxing arena on the eastern outskirts of the city’s CBD first saw the light of day…literally saw the light of day as it was originally built as an open air stadium. The brainchild of promoter Hugh D McIntosh who constructed a ‘temporary’ outdoor boxing ring on the site of a former Chinese market garden in Rushcutters Bay to hold the world heavyweight boxing contest featuring Canadian title-holder Tommy Burns and Australian challenger “Boshter Bill” Squires. The fight was however just a warm-up for a legendary pugilistic bout in the same arena four months later between Burns and African-American fighter Jack Johnson. The fight garnered a lot of attention in Australia and internationally as Johnson was the first black boxer to contest (and win) a world title… and the heavyweight title at that!

The Australian press of the day predictably invoked the race card in the lead-up to the fight, racist descriptions of Johnson abounded, “coloured pugilist” was one of the few politer characterisations of Johnson (Bush Advocate, 28th December 1908). Burns’s thrashing at the hands of his much bigger black opponent—physically it was a real “David and Goliath” mismatch—prompted a backlash from white supremacists. Writer Jack London (ringside at the fight) put out the call for a “Great White Hope” to restore the white man to his ‘rightful’ place atop the professional boxing tree. The decisiveness of Jack Johnson’s triumph tapped into the prevailing currents of eugenic belief of the day, doing nothing to soothe anxieties about the “moral decay and decline” of the white race.

Stadiums Ltd
For almost its entire lifespan (from 1915 to its closure) Sydney Stadium was owned by Melbourne entrepreneur and gambling identity John Wren’s Stadiums Ltd…during that epoch the company enticed most of the top Australian professional boxers including Vic Patrick, Fred Henneberry, Dave Sands, Jimmy Carruthers and Tommy Burns (not the Canadian heavyweight champion) as well as renowned international prize-fighters such as Emile Griffith, Freddie Dawson and ‘Fighting’ Harada, to Sydney Stadium (‘The Wild Ones: Sydney Stadium 1908-1970’, Sydney Living Museums, www.sydneylivingmuseums.com).

“The old tin shed”
In 1912 the stadium was given a lid, an octagonal shaped roof of corrugated iron, and equiped for a capacity of 12,000 seated patrons. As the decades passed, hosting countless boxing and wrestling matches (in operation several nights a week at one point), it acquired the affectionate sobriquet “the old tin shed”❈. From the 1950s while boxing was still its core entertainment, the Sydney Stadium became a venue for popular music entertainers and television stars (eg, Frank Sinatra, Little Richard, Chuck Berry, Buddy Holly and the Crickets, Walt Disney’s Mouseketeers, and so on⚘. This continued into the Sixties with “The Samurai” star Koichi Ose, and perhaps its pinnacle, the Beatles performing there on their 1964 Australian tour (‘Sydney Stadium’, Milesago – Venues, www.milesago.com; ‘World Heavyweight Boxing Championship Title Fight 1908’, Woollahra Municipal Council), www.woollahra.nsw.gov.au).

Leichhardt Stadium in Sydney’s inner west never managed to capture the limelight of Rushcutters Bay but was still very popular in its time, it’s Thursday night boxing events regularly ”packed to capacity” (‘Packing a punch’, James Cockington, 01-Jul-2009, SMH, www.smh.com.au). Leichhardt was Sydney pro boxing’s ‘Medina’ to Sydney Stadiums’ ‘Mecca’, together, this brace of stadiums was the home of professional pugilism in Sydney in the early to middle part of the 20th century. The suburban stadium on Balmain Road, Leichhardt, first opened its doors in 1922. The two Sydney stadiums featured many of the popular active Aboriginal fighters, typically stepping up from the touring boxing tents to try to earn their livelihoods inside their square rings, including Ron Richards, Jack Hassen, George Bracken, the Sands brothers and many more. Other names regularly featuring on Leichhardt Stadium’s draw cards included Jack Carroll, Jimmy Kelso, ‘Kid’ Rooney and Hockey Bennell.

ᗝ 𝔚𝔯𝔢𝔰𝔱𝔩𝔦𝔫𝔤 𝔞𝔱 𝔏𝔢𝔦𝔠𝔥𝔥𝔞𝔯𝔡𝔱 𝔖𝔱𝔞𝔡𝔦𝔲𝔪, 1936 (𝔖𝔬𝔲𝔯𝔠𝔢: 𝔖𝔱𝔞𝔱𝔢 𝔏𝔦𝔟 𝔬𝔣 𝔑𝔖𝔚

ஓ๑ஓ

‘Blood’ sports and ”show biz” mash-up
Like it’s older relative at Rushcutters Bay, Leichhardt Stadium’s “bread-and-butter” remained pro-boxing and wrestling. However, during the Depression, the suburban stadium, perhaps anticipating Lee Gordon, innovated by incorporating the prevailing popular form of stage entertainment…Saturday night featured a program of boxing contests intermixed with “Vaudeville entertainment” acts (‘Leichhardt Stadium. 1922.’, Sydney Morning Herald, 08-Dec-1930 (Trove); Milesago).

𝔖𝔬𝔲𝔯𝔠𝔢: 𝔉𝔞𝔠𝔢𝔟𝔬𝔬𝔨

ஓ๑ஓ

By the mid to late 1960s Australian professional boxing was in the doldrums and the stadium itself at Rushcutters Bay closed in 1970. Three years later the complex was demolished to make way for the Eastern Suburbs Railway. Leichhardt Stadium’s demise as a boxing venue occurred not long after in 1975.

◥ 𝓦𝓱𝓲𝓽𝓮 𝓒𝓲𝓽𝔂 𝓯𝓾𝓷 𝓹𝓪𝓻𝓴 (𝓢𝓸𝓾𝓻𝓬𝓮: 𝓦𝓸𝓸𝓵𝓵𝓪𝓱𝓻𝓪 𝓜𝓾𝓷. 𝓒𝓸𝓾𝓷𝓬𝓲𝓵)

Footnote: White City’s fleeting existence
In 1913 another landmark was erected in Rushcutters Bay, a 9-iron’s distance from Sydney Stadium. The White City Amusement Park, also built on former Chinese market gardens, was a precursor of Sydney’s better known Luna Park. White City offered pleasure-seekers a smorgasbord of lakes, canals, river caves, “pleasure palaces”, “fun factories”, the city’s first roller coaster and it’s pièce de résistance, a gigantic (Pennsylvanian-constructed) carousel. White City lasted less than four years before being burnt to the ground after a lightning strike in 1917 (‘Lost Sydney : White City Amusement Park’, Pocket Oz, www.visitsydneyaustralia.com.au). In the early 1920’s the White City tennis complex was erected on the site.

𓇬𓇬𓇬𓇬𓇬𓇬𓇬𓇬𓇬𓇬𓇬𓇬𓇬𓇬𓇬𓇬𓇬𓇬𓇬𓇬𓇬𓇬𓇬𓇬

❈ also known as ” the old barn”

⚘ expat American promoter Lee Gordon was the brains behind this move into pop music, bringing out big US bands, singers and duos for concerts at Rushcutters Bay, backed by Australian support acts

Biography of a Small and Unassuming Zulu Pop Song: ’Mbube‘ versus the Goliaths of the Music Industry

Posted on September 30, 2021March 4, 2022 by Wolfgang Childerglas

Biographical, Commerce & Business, Inter-ethnic relations, Music history, Performing arts, Popular Culture

According to Guinness World Records the pop song that has been covered more times than any other record is the 1965 Beatles’ 1965 Paul McCartney-penned Yesterday (a staggering 1,600-plus recorded versions). Conversely The Lion Sleeps Tonight trails far behind the record-holder with a mere 160 or more covers (still a very large number of covers), but few popular songs in the modern era of music can match it’s convoluted, controversial and even tragic history.

The Evening Birds, 1939 (Solomon Linda on the far left)

Ripped off from the debut single
The story starts in the Gallo Recording Studio in Johannesburg in 1939. Migrant labourer Solomon (Ntsele) Linda and his troupe of a capella singers (the Evening Birds) cut a record in the Zulu asisicathamiya style. The tune with its spartan lyrics is called Mbube or perhaps more correctly Imbube (‘lion’ in the Zulu language). The tune they sing is not a particularly remarkable piece of music except for Solomon’s melody. As Cape Town music journalist Rian Malan, who is to play a key role in the Mbube story as it develops, puts it, “there was something terribly compelling about the underlying chant, a dense meshing of low male voices above which (soprano) Solomon yodeled and howled (“a blood-curdling falsetto”) for two exhilarating minutes” improvising as he went along…“a haunting skein of fifteen notes” (’In the Jungle: Inside the Long, Hidden Genealogy of “The Lion Sleeps Tonight”’, Rian Malan, Rolling Stone, 14-May-2000, www.rollingstone.com). Recorded, the song sells over 100,000, copies in South Africa by 1948. Linda’s cut, 10 shillings for the recording plus a menial job in the record company (in the process signing over all rights to the song to company proprietor Eric Gallo).

From a humble back room recording in Sub-Saharan Africa’s only recording company to the American Top 40
This pattern of exploitation, injustice and racism (both overt and by omission) escalates when the story moves to America. Struggling folksinger Pete Seeger hears Solly and the Original Evening Birds’ 78 record, digs the sound and records it with his group the Weavers. But Seeger misinterprets what Solomon Linda is singing, changing the Zulu refrain ‘Uyimbube’ (“You’re the Lion”) to ‘Wimoweh’ on their recording (‘Mbube’ becomes the song ‘Wimoweh’). It’s a hit in the US in 1952 and Seeger’s career receives a big boost. No credit and no royalties for composer Solomon – although later Seeger motivated by pangs of guilt sends Linda a cheque for $1,000 via TRO/Folkways, however it gets siphoned off on-route and never reaches the impoverished Linda in the slums of Soweto in Jo’burg.

In 1961 a new chapter in the story opens, “doo-wop” band the Tokens, like all pop music enthusiasts in the US, are familiar with the super-catchy “Wimoweh” refrain and want to record it. Their RCA producers get songwriter George David Weiss to revamp the song. Weiss adds new lyrics (“In the jungle, the mighty jungle”, etc) and shifts the focus of the song on to Linda’s chanting melody. ‘Mbube’ having previously morphed into ‘Wimoweh’ is repackaged by Weiss as ‘The Lion Sleeps Tonight’, all three versions still bearing the essential imprint of Solomon Linda (Malan). The Tokens’ single—with singer Jay Siegel’s distinctive high falsetto—reaches # 1 in the US and internationally, eventually selling more than three million copies§. Again, no credit and no moolah for Linda who dies destitute in 1962 with just $25 in his bank account, leaving a widow and a half-dozen young children behind.

Spreading the largesse to TRO
While credited songwriters Weiss and RCA’s Creatore and Peretti cash in big time on ‘The Lion Sleeps Tonight’s’ soaring sales, other formidable industry figures in the US were getting in on the act from another angle – again to the exclusion of the song’s original creator. Eric Gallo in South Africa injudiciously trades his rights to Linda’s song in America to big international music publishers TRO, (The Richmond Organisation) cutting himself off from benefitting from the ongoing “gravy train” and enriching TRO founder Howie Richmond and his partner Al Brackman.

Industry eyes only on the prize
Rather than making an act of goodwill or perhaps an atonement of sorts for the wrongs done to Solomon Linda by shuffling a financially meaningful sum in the direction of Linda’s daughters, the major stakeholders, fixating on the riches they see before them, at the beginning of the Nineties dig their heels in, even resorting to wrangling among themselves. TRO and Richmond on one side and Weiss and co-writer Creatore on the other end up fighting each other in arbitration presided over by copyright law judges…”rich white Americans squabbling over ownership of the most famous melody ever to emerge from Africa” (Malan).

‘The Lion King’ jackpot

Disney’s turn to exploit the melody’s popularity
The “golden egg” of ‘The Lion Sleeps Tonight’ explodes to new astronomical heights in 1994 when the Disney Corporation releases The Lion King, a blockbuster of a a movie—using ‘The Lion Sleeps Tonight’ song—which by 2019 has raked in $1.65 Bn at the box office, plus spin-offs such as videos and merchandise. Not stopping there, Disney follows it up with a 1998 sequel Lion King II and a Broadway musical theatrical release (highest grossing Broadway production of all time – >$1 Bn). Added to all this is about another thirteen films that includes ‘The Lion Sleeps Tonight’ song, plus its use in television commercials, endless airplay on radio and so on.

The long quest for justice and some light at the end
An amelioration of the unconscionable plight facing Linda’s family only emerges after Rian Malan takes up their cause in the Nineties, writing a penetrating exposé (published in 2000) which gets their predicament publicity and legal support, and also embarrasses the “fat cat” beneficiaries who make some insultingly meagre financial concessions to the family. A series of court cases ensue but untangling the complicated web of ownership of the three versions of ‘Mbube’ is not straightforward – for one thing both Linda and his two surviving daughters have already signed over their rights to ‘Mbube’ in transactions which were legal, also there are issues with expiry of copyright in both RSA and America. In 2004 the Ntsele sisters with the aid of copyright lawyers initiate a lawsuit against Disney. The 2006 ruling acknowledges that ‘The Lion Sleeps Tonight‘ was of South African origin and rooted in Zulu culture (‘Copyright in the Courts: The Return of the Lion’, Owen Dean, Wipo Magazine, April 2006. www.wipo.int). In an (undisclosed) out-of-court settlement Disney (keen to avoid a PR disaster) and Abilene Music❆ agree to make an equitable and substantial payout to Linda’s surviving daughters. (’The Lion Sleeps Tonight’, Lydia Hutchinson, Performing Songwriter, 01-May-2017, www.performingsongwriter.com; ‘In the Jungle, the Unjust Jungle, a Small Victory’, Sharon LeFraniere, New York Times, 22-Mar-2006, www.nytimes.com).

Malan estimates (2002) that given the seeming limitless sales potential of ‘Mbube’/‘The Lion Sleeps Tonight‘ in all its versions and forms, the royalties owing to the song’s composer would lie in the region of US$15 million, a figure that Solomon’s descendants won’t ever see in their bank accounts…however through the unflagging, dogged persistence and refusal of Malan not just to grasp the nettle but to never let go of it⇼, and the stirling pro bono services of lawyers stirred to action by the injustice, the future is now secure for them, and credit for the classic song is now rightfully attributed to their father. One of those South African copyright lawyers Owen Dean expresses optimism that royalties will be secured for “the use of Mbube in all its derivatives, including ‘The Lion Sleeps Tonight‘, for the benefit of the family” (Malan), noting also that there is “some pride in having successfully championed the cause of the small creator among entertainment industry giants” (Dean).

Postscript: Remastered: The Lion’s Share, a 2019 documentary shows writer and documentarian Malan’s quest to trace the roots of the mega-successful ‘The Lion Sleeps Tonight‘ song, one of the most instantly recognisable pop melodies in American music, and his untiring efforts to help get fair compensation for the surviving daughters of the Black South African composer air-brushed from his part in music recording history.

🎶➿🎶➿🎶

—————————————-———————

§ artists to cover ‘The Lion Sleeps Tonight’ include the Springfields, Roger Whittaker, The Tremeloes, Robert John, Glen Campbell, Brian Eno, R.E.M., They Might Be Giants and Tight Fit

☥ another go-to pseudonym—one used by Al Brackman to grab a cut of the songwriting royalty payments pie—was “Albert Stanton” (www.secondhandsongs.com)

❆ who licensed the song to Disney for the movie

⇼ The Guardian aptly summarises this irrepressible trait of the controversial RSA journalist: “Malan is at his best when he finds a story that allows him to employ the full power of (his) instinctive reluctance to take yes for an answer” (Tim Adams, 2nd March 2013).

New York’s Seminal Brill Building: 1960s America’s Pop Music Factory

Posted on June 14, 2019May 16, 2022 by Wolfgang Childerglas

Leisure activities, Memorabilia, Music history, Performing arts, Popular Culture, Social History

(Photo: https://nypost.com)

The Brill Building at 1619 Broadway in Midtown New York City, architecturally, has few distinguishing features to set it apart from most any other homogeneous looking commercial medium high-rise building in the “Big Apple” (save for a rather dazzlingly decorative archway entrance). But for a period from the end of the Fifties to the late Sixties it was the fulcrum (if not quite the epicentre) of innovative and groundbreaking Rock and Pop music-making in the USA.

The young professionals are in the Building!
The collaborative and creative energies of the Brill Building produced a conducive environment for young professional songwriters of the period to work with music producers to create highly productively musical outcomes. So there were song-writing teams that emerged around 1960 (often they were couples) – (Carole) King and (Gerry) Goffin, (Barry) Mann and (Cynthia) Weil, (Jeff) Barry and (Ellie) Greenwich – who linked up successfully with young producers like “wonder-kid” Phil Spector※ [‘The Brill Building: Assembly-Line Pop’, (Reebee Garofalo), Encyclopaedia Britannia, www.encyclopaediabritannia.com].

⬆ Kirshner, King & Goffin

But the Brill Building’s genesis as a revolutionary force in 1960s US pop music actually started in a building across the road – at 1650 Broadway. Here in 1958 “pop entrepreneur” Don Kirshner and musician Al Nevins formed Aldon Music✳. Aldon’s reading of the popular music zeitgeist of the day was that rock and roll’s original impact had dissipated and somewhat lost its way. Kirshner’s remedy was “to take its energies and reapply the old-fashioned Tin Pan Alley❁ disciplines to the craft and professionalism of making hits for the youth market” [Inglis, Ian. “‘Some Kind of Wonderful’: The Creative Legacy of the Brill Building.” American Music, vol. 21, no. 2, 2003, pp. 214–235. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/3250565]. Kirshner put together a stable of aspiring young songwriters, including Goffin and King, Mann and Weil, as well as Howard Greenfield and Neil Sedaka.

1619 + 1650 = the Brill Building style
The term “Brill Building” in the musical context doesn’t confine itself exclusively just to that one building…Brill Building as a descriptor for the achievements in NYC pop and rock creativity of the day is an omnibus reference for what was happening at both addresses, 1619 and 1650 Broadway, New York.

The pioneers of the new professionalism that was to become labelled as “Brill Building” were probably the song-writing team of Leiber and Stoller (Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller) who had earlier written for Elvis Presley, started to write hits for the Drifters from the late 50s that mark the starting-off point for Brill [Garofalo, loc.cit.]. A new wave of songwriters began to etch out pop songs from within the walls of 1650 Broadway and 1619 Broadway (the Brill Building adopted Aldon’s ‘hothouse’ style of songwriting from youthful collaborators with a creative overlap between the two addresses)✥ [Inglis, op.cit.].

Distinguishing features of Brill Building music and music-makers
Kirshner’s writing staff at 1650 Broadway were not only dedicated professionals, they were remarkably youthful…the eighteen songwriters Kirshner had in his employ in 1961 (roughly equally male and female) were aged between 19 and 26, a clear departure from the status quo ante of “middle-age men churning out novelty songs” [ibid.]. This contemporary generation of songwriters, not much older than their target audience, grasped the idiom of teenagers and wrote exclusively for the youth of the 1960s [Garofalo, loc.cit.]♕.

Other composer/lyricist teams to thrive in the environment of the Brill Building included Doc Pomus and Mort Shuman, Tommy Boyce and Bobby Hart (who later worked with Kirshner and the Monkees) and the extraordinarily prolific hit-making duo of Burt Bacharach and Hal David.

The gender equality between songwriters achieved at Brill, brought female pop and rock songwriters like King, Weil and Greenwich to the fore, correlating with the rise of the girl groups of the early 60s… these female writers wrote hits for the Shirelles, the Crystals, the Chiffons, the Ronettes and the like [Inglis, op.cit.]✪.

⬇ The Ronettes: “Big hair” sound!

‘Brill’ place, ‘Brill’ music?
Recollections of the songwriters’ working conditions at the Brill Building doesn’t suggest an ideal environment to inspire the creation of Top 40 hits: writers were assigned their “respective cubby holes” (Carole King), “a tiny cubicle the size of a closet”…”no window or anything” …(an upright) “piano and a chair” …”we’d go in and write songs all day” (Barry Mann, ibid.). The creators of pop and rock worked in an assembly line fashion in something akin to a standard nine-to-five office job [Garofalo, loc.cit.]. Kirshner would play one young writing team off against another to enhance their productivity [Sociology of Rock, Simon Frith (1978)].

The hit factory
And yet despite these strictures it somehow worked! The songwriting team did come up with “teenage drivel” from time to time, but collectively, the youthful penners of contemporary Sixties song generated a steady series of musical hits for a Pop-crazy world! Fusing the urgency of R & B with “the brightness of mainstream pop” melodies, Goffin and King, Greenfield and Sedaka and the other B.B. star writing teams came up with perennial pop classics like “Will you Love me Tomorrow?”, “Calendar Girl”, “Leader of the Pack” and the much revered “You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feelin'” [ibid.].

A vertical integration of the pop music biz on a micro-scale
The “B.B. factory” was good at matching artists to appropriate material. By 1962 the Brill Building contained 165 separate music businesses. This meant a B.B. musician “could find a publisher and printer, cut a demo, promote the record and cut a deal with radio promoters, all within this one building”, Garofalo, loc.cit.; ‘The Brill Building’, Wikipedia, http://en.m.wikipedia.org; Continuum Encyclopedia of Popular Music of the World Volume 8: Genres: North, (Edited by John Shepherd, David Horn), 2013, www.books.google.com.au]

Time call on the Brill Building
By the mid to late 1960s the B.B. music line was losing its energy. A new creative force was rapidly filling its void – the rise of the singer-songwriter, heralding a new era of artists who wrote their own material. The new wave led by the phenomenal global success of the Beatles (the unsurpassed potency of the Lennon/McCartney songwriting duo) and the guru-like acclaim afforded Bob Dylan, fairly swiftly relegated the Brill Building writers to the edges of pop music relevance [Garofalo, loc.cit.].

Footnote: A Brill Building ‘sound?’
The Brill Building style of songs drew inspiration from diverse strands of earlier music – R & B (rhythm and blues), Latin, jazz and African-American gospel. The result was often referred to as the “Brill Building sound” but there actually wasn’t a specific or distinctive sound at all. The only similarities between the Brill ‘products’ was in the recurring themes and components in the song lyrics (might be described as “First World problems” seen through the eyes of 60s American youth) [‘The Brill Building pioneered assembly line pop music but left a legacy of hits’, (Troy Lennon), The Daily Telegraph, 13-Sep-2017, www.dailytelegraph.com.au]; Inglis, op.cit.].

〰️〰️〰️〰️〰️~~〰️〰️〰️〰️〰️~~〰️〰️〰️〰️

※ Spector was both a collaborator with the Brill songwriters and a customer of their compositions

✳ described by Ian Inglis as “a crucial moment in the development of Brill Building’s pop sensibilities”

❁ Tin Pan Alley was a loose collection of composers, lyricists and music publishers based in NYC who dominated the industry for several decades through the first half of the 20th century (Irving Berlin, Cole Porter, the Gershwins, Sammy Cahn, Hammerstein and Rodgers and many more)

✥ although two of the mainstays of the Brill team, Goffin and King, never actually worked in the Brill Building, producing their entire creative output in the period over at Aldon Music (they did however sell some of their compositions through the Brill Building)

♕ many of the Brill writing alumni went on to be highly successful performers in their own right – top of the totem industry names like Neil Diamond, Gene Pitney, Paul Anka and Paul Simon

✪ another interesting juxtaposition emerging from the Brill Building music factory was the contrast between writer and artist – the songwriters were all white and mostly Jewish, writing largely for emerging black girl groups (Inglis)

Just blogging away … doing the hard blog

Continuing the search for signs of Intelligent Life in the University.

Music history

A Who’s Who of the Early Beatles Ensemble

Sydney’s Long-vanished Iconic Boxing Stadiums

New York’s Seminal Brill Building: 1960s America’s Pop Music Factory