[Dixielandjazz] Ray Ellington, The Goon Show

[Robert Ringwald]

This from another email List.  


I've recently been recalling the summer evenings exactly 30 years 
ago when I discovered
"        ". Not owning a TV back in those young and hungry days, I listened
to the radio a lot. I happened to discover on KCSM -- which is now an all jazz station
in the SF Bay area, but back then featured a variety of programming -- this weird
and hilarious show called "The Goon Show". The weird and hilarious part was supplied
by Spike Milligan, Peter Sellers and Harry Secombe.
But also of interest to me were the musical numbers featured on each program. There
was always an instrumental by harmonica player Max Geldray and later in the show
a vocal number by the Ray Ellington Quartet. Ellington's band and his own vocal styling
recalled the early Nat Cole Trio -- had that sort of swing, style and hipness. He
sang a few standards, but also a lot of novelty numbers.
Back then, in those pre-internet days when there was really little opportunity to
find out more about this old BBC program (or should that be programme?) here in the
States, I assumed Ellington was the pianist in the group. It wasn't until many years
later, when I had learned the magic of Google, that I discovered he was actually
a drummer!
Does any one here know much more about him? Wikipedia doesn't have a lot of information
about him. Was he well-known in the UK prior to being featured on "The Goon Show"
or did that gig make him a star? Did he have much of a career post-Goons? I have
a couple of CD compilations of some of his recordings, but even the liner notes to
those don't fill in a lot of holes about this man. He was a very enjoyable singer
and he always sounded very relaxed and casual in his performances, to me at least,
even when performing uptempo tunes.


--Bob Ringwald
www.ringwald.com
Fulton Street Jazz Band
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