Tag: WPFW 89.3 FM

#MusicMonday – Summertime – Billy Stewart

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Billy Stewart was an R&B singer active in the 1960s.

He met Marvin Gaye through the Rainbows, a Washington, DC vocal group. Bo Diddley has been credited with discovering Stewart in Washington, DC. This led to a recording with Bo Diddley’s label Chess Records.

Amazing: I didn’t know that Marvin Gaye and Bo Diddley had ties to Washington DC.

Here’s Billy Stewart singing what Wikipedia calls his “radical interpretation” of Summertime from George Gershwin’s opera Porgy and Bess. Forgive the blurriness of this video.

Not sure about the 10-gallon hat and the folks sitting around on hay bales. 🤔

Billy Stewart died in an automobile accident in 1970. He was 32.

Shout-out to the Sunday Kind of Love program on WPFW 89.3 FM for introducing me to Billy Stewart.

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#MusicMonday – Nancy LaMott – All Those #Christmas Cliches

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Nancy LaMott was a cabaret singer who broke out into radio and the national and international scene in the 1990s. Plagued by serious illnesses for much of her life, she died from uterine cancer on December 30, 1995, only 17 days before her 44th birthday. Her priest blessed her union with Peter Zapp, a little more than an hour before she died.

According to her father, she sang along with Barbra Streisand records when she was a girl. It shows. Sometimes my husband and I confuse Nancy LaMott for Barbra Streisand when we hear her recordings on WPFW 89.3 FM’s Sunday afternoon program The American Songbook.

It was through The American Songbook that I discovered All Those Christmas Cliches, as sung by Nancy LaMott. It’s wistful and nostalgic and takes me back to childhood and how special Mom made Christmas for us. Even today Christmas lights fill me with happiness and wonderment.

That’s what I long for: All Those Christmas Cliches.

Coming soon: a video playlist of the top 10 Christmas songs written by Jews.

#MusicMonday A Foggy Day (in London Town)

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I call Sunday afternoon “Radio Sunday” as WPFW 89.3 PM has 6 hours of great programming, starting with Miyuki Williams’ Sunday Kind of Love from Noon to 2:00 PM, continuing with Donnie McKethan’s American Songbook from 2:00 to 4:00 PM, and winding up with Larry Applebaum’s The Sound of Surprise from 4:00 to 6:00 PM.

Donny McKethan often plays different renditions of the same song back to back. Today he had renditions of George & Ira Gershwin’s A Foggy Day (in London Town) by Billie Holiday and Frank Sinatra.  The beauty of standards such as A Foggy Day is that different singers, with different styles, can perform them and be equally  persuasive.

I had not heard A Foggy Day before, but I smiled when I heard the lyric:

A foggy day in London Town
Had me low and had me down
I viewed the morning with alarm
The British Museum had lost its charm

It reminded me of the weekend that I spent in London, in a hotel room no larger than a closet. Restaurants were so expensive, that I bought a grab’n’go sandwich at Boots to eat for dinner. The serendipitous discovery was that the British Museum was just around the corner from the hotel. I have more to say about the British Museum, but enough for now.

Here is another rendition of A Foggy Day, this time featuring Louis Armstrong and Ella Fitzgerald: