[Dixielandjazz] Red Blanchard

[Don Kirkman]

On Tue, 2 Nov 2010 13:08:33 -0700, you wrote:

>Any one about my age who lived on the West Coast might remember Red Blanchard.  He had a radio show for teenagers in the 1950s that was crazy.  He was syndicated in LA, SF and Sacramento.  Perhaps other markets also, not sure.  
>
>He was the first to use an echo machine and used to give people a Bully.  He did dumb skits.  When soda first came out in cans, he had everyone send him the empty cans and he built a tower out of them.  
>
>Red did many other things in radio over the years, including being a CBS staff announcer.  
>
>Red is 89 now and lives in, or near San Diego.  He has been a good friend of mine for years.  
>
>Here is part of an email from him.  Thought some of you might enjoy listening to the music.  
>
>There are a lot of other interesting things on his web sites.  
>
>*******
>
>Well I stumbled across an old tape of a series of 'remote' broadcasts from 1948,
>mostly from the Somerset House in Riverside.  Some of these musicians are funny,
>yet, at the same time, real musicians.
>Some are totally great jazz players.  Probably mostly dead by now. Too bad.  The
>junk they play today can't hold a candle to these guys...
>www.redblanchard.com/Remotes.mp3

Hey, Bob, all I can do is simply repeat what I wrote in 2007 when Red
was mentioned in DJML:

Thanks for this post, Bob.  You've made my day - no, my year.  I had
the best of all possible worlds in the 1950s, living in Berkeley and
Marin County, listening to Red Blanchard and Bill Weaver on local
radio and catching Jim Hawthorne with T. Ernie Ford from Pasadena via
the evening long skip.  I gradually lost track of all of them but
Tennessee Ernie. I knew Red was a ham, but I'm not sure I ever knew
his call.  And I've still got a few years to go to match his 60 years
under license, but I look good to make 50 years in a couple more
tries.  [Nov., 2010:  I did make it.  :-)]

These guys and others like them were my idols and mentored my musical
tastes.  'Tain't their fault I turned out the way I did.  Musical
fillip:  "Turn your radio on!"

Old age brings pleasant memories, sometimes of things that really
happened.
-- 
Don Kirkman
donsno2 at charter.net