Mark Your Calendars: More Jack & Friends on Chicago Rad

[Maxwell]

Silly me not to look farther ahead than this week's "Those Were the Days" show yesterday. Upon further review here's more of interest for fans of Jack and his cohorts in comedy, thanks to Chuck Schaden. I can't tell you what time the recordings of these shows will be on, but the program itself runs from 1:00-5:00 p.m. CDT on WDCB (90.0 FM) and is streamed live at http://wdcb.org. These programs are also availble for streaming audio at http://www.nostalgiadigest.com beginning the following Tuesday.

Here are ths upcoming shows I found today:

April 16:

The Phil Harris-Alice Fay Show (11/27/53) "The Traffic Problem in Los Angeles." Phil’s daughters are late coming home because there’s no traffic light on a crosswalk by their school.


April 23:

The Jack Benny Program (6/16/40). "Last show of Jack’s 1939-40 season. Jack is concerned about his summer replacement, Henry Aldrich." (Coming, Mother!)

Burns and Allen (3/21/44) "George and Gracie keep guest Rita Hayworth company while her husband, Orson Welles, is away."

The following week (April 30) should also be fun, as it is the 35th anniversary broadcast of Schaden's show. It promises to be a microcosm of what listeners have enjoyed since 1970. Ken Alexander, the show's equivalent of Don Wilson (although his best imitation is Edgar Bergan) will read from an old newspaper, probably from the '40s or '50s. The Steve Cooper Orchestra will do a recreation of the Hit Parade and also a big band tribute. Mike Bezin's West End Jazz Band will simulate a broadcast of the Coon-Sanders Nighthawks from the Blackhawk Restaurant, ca. 1929. (The Blackhawk is a longtime sponsor of the show, although it's now in suburban Wheeling and not downtown as it was when Coon-Sanders, Bob Crosby, et al. were playing there.) The Those Were the Days Radio Players will recreate several famoous radio scenes. (In the past they've done recreations of several shows, often with original cast members.) Karl Pearson, a big band expert, and Bob Kolososki, a movie historian, will discuss their areas of expertise, and there will be one actual OTR show: Fibber McGee and Molly (5/28/46).

[Maxwell]

I caught the part of the Phil Harris-Alice Faye Show on the way home from a ball game today. The tape was interesting because it included the warmup for the show in which Phil told (among other stories) the one about the guy who comes into the barber shop wanting to know how many people were waiting. (I just heard that one somewhere else lately. Was it here?)

At any rate a couple of things caught my ear. One was when the announcer (senior moment here: his name is escaping me and I know it like the back of my hand) mentions that RCA Victor is the sponsor and that the show is really fortunate because it is one of the few sponsored network shows left.

The other thing that really made my ears perk up was when Phil recognized a couple of the members of Walter Scharf's orchestra: Alvino Rey and Red Nichols. Pretty decent talent!