#Pete Fornatale

[paullev]

https://bloggerhythms.blogspot.com/2023/07/its-real-life-alternate-history-of.html?m=1

New review of my alternate history story and radio play about The Beatles

[bigmacdaddio]

Alison Steele 1937-1995 The Nightbird @ WNEW-FM 102.7

André Gardner - When I was Program Director of 92-3 K-Rock/New York in 1994-1995, I had the pleasure to work with NY's rock radio legends...Pete Fornatale, Jimmy Fink, Maria Milito, Vin Scelsa, Meg Griffin, Marc Coppola, Zacherle..but perhaps the biggest thrill for me of them all, outside of Howard Stern of course, was to work with the legendary Alison Steele, "The Nightbird." 

 I listened to her for DECADES, starting in 1978 when we lived in Plainsboro, NJ and I could get both the Philly and NY radio stations on my tuner.  She was the soundtrack of my nighttime insomnia on WNEW-FM, and being able to actually see her and work with her now at K-Rock was the thrill of a lifetime

When I first got the air staff together for a meeting as new PD, and told them my plan for the station, she asked some pointed and honest questions, clearly not satisfied with the way things had been going at the station up until that point.  Thankfully, I think she was satisfied with my answers.  We got along great!

 One immediate change I made to her overnight show was to give it back to her.  For years she'd been on K-Rock, playing each night's playlist and doing her best to interject her wonderful stories and insight in between songs that seemingly had no theme, and she did it better than anyone could.  And that was the problem.

 What Alison was also SO good at was creating musical theme sets, interweaving her talk breaks, poetry and stories in between the breaks in the sets, and that is what really established The Nightbird as the queen of NY Rock DJs.  There would be absolutely no downside to turning the station over to her every night.  So I said to her, "Do The Nightbird Show, just like you always did, from 2-5am, free form, play whatever you think is appropriate, then please just stick to the regular format from 5-6am because so damn many people get up for work at 5am in NY hahaha

She was so happy.  Every night she'd craft these beautiful sets of rock music, just like in her WNEW days, and leave me a copy of her handwritten playlist.  She was on FIRE.  Alison Steele bravely fought cancer throughout 1995 and, sadly, passed way too young that September at just 58.

 As I was looking for something in my studio tonight, I happened upon a copy of one of her overnight playlists she'd leave for me, just one month before her last show at K-Rock.  The sets were perfect and, you can see, she shouted out many an overnight listener during her show.  I saved a lot of her handwritten playlists.  Some had sweet notes written in the margins like "getting lots of phone calls -- business is picking up!" or "So much fun tonight!"

At her memorial service, her sister came up to me and told me how happy Alison had been to be able to return to The Nightbird show she loved to construct every night, in her final year on the radio in New York. Alison was virtually the lone woman in a sea of men in the radio business and, despite all of the road blocks women faced, and still face, in the business, she absolutely killed it and, to quote a song sung by her friend Frank Sinatra, she truly did it 'her way.'  It was a pleasure to get to know you, Nightbird. XOXO

[mayormckinney]

Scott Muni, Pete Fornatale, Alison Steele, Vin Scelsa, Richard Neer and this radio DJ Dennis Elsas were the main providers of rock music https://www.instagram.com/p/Bw3MqftHxUNi0i7doSc4sqHH7RkPNpJibeDmpU0/?utm_source=ig_tumblr_share&igshid=dgagcuxfad6y

[dippedanddripped]

It began life as a tiny emblem, something to adorn a 45 r.p.m. single or the band’s letterhead. It quickly became ubiquitous and, ultimately, the most famous logo in rock ’n’ roll. Over 50 years, the legendary “tongue and lips” of the Rolling Stones has been emblazoned on everything from T-shirts and lighters to stage sets, appearing in countless variations throughout the decades. And while many who love it are fans of the band, the logo has in many ways transcended the Stones. But when it was commissioned in April 1970 its designer, John Pasche, had little idea how popular — and lucrative — it would become.

The logo was to be displayed later this month in “Revolutions: Records and Rebels 1966 — 1970,” an exhibition at the Grande Halle de la Villette in Paris that has been postponed because of the coronavirus outbreak. But I caught up with Pasche, 74, in London by telephone last week, for a glimpse into its back story. (I included other witnesses to its history, as well.)

Early in 1970, the Royal College of Art in London was contacted by the Rolling Stones’ head office. The band was looking for an artist to create a poster for its 1970 European tour. The art school recommended Pasche, a Master of Arts student in his final year. Pasche met with Mick Jagger to discuss ideas for the poster, and returned to the frontman with a design a week later. Jagger was not satisfied. “I think it was possibly to do with the color and composition,” Pasche told the Victoria and Albert Museum in 2016.

“He turned it down,” Pasche recalled with a laugh. “I thought, That was that, then. ” But Jagger said, “I’m sure you can do better, John.”’

The second and final version, which harked back to the aesthetics of the ’30s and ’40s but also included a Concorde turbojet, was more pleasing. Pasche was contacted shortly after by Jo Bergman, the band’s personal assistant. This time, in a letter dated April 29, 1970, Bergman specifically asked Pasche “to create a logo or symbol which may be used on note paper, as a programme cover and as a cover for the press book.”

In a meeting with the designer some months later, Jagger was more specific, Pasche recalled: He wanted “an image that could work on its own … like the Shell Petroleum logo. He wanted that kind of simplicity.” During the same meeting Jagger showed Pasche an illustration of the Hindu deity Kali, which Jagger had seen in a shop near his home and asked if he could borrow.

Jagger, according to Pasche, said he was “more interested in the Indian nature of it,” Indian culture in Britain being quite trendy. But the designer was struck by Kali’s open mouth and protruding tongue. “I just immediately picked up on the tongue and mouth,” Pasche said.

Contrary to popular belief, the logo, originally created in black and white and used to create subsequent versions, was not — at least intentionally — intended to represent Jagger’s tongue and lips.

“I said, Surely those were Mick Jagger’s lips!”’ recalled Victoria Broackes, a senior curator at the V&A Museum, who in 2008 bought the original logo design online from an auction house in Chicago on behalf of the V&A. Pasche, she said, “looked rather nonplused and said, ‘Well, maybe subliminally, but no.’”

Pasche contends his logo was also intended to be a protest symbol. “It’s the kind of thing kids do when they stick their tongue out at you,” he said. “That was the main reason I thought it would work well.”

The logo was executed quickly toward the end of 1970. The release of the band’s classic “Sticky Fingers” album in April 1971 marked its first public appearance. It was used on the back cover, on the label and, most prominently, on the insert. However an alternate version of the logo was used for the United States release — “slightly modified by Craig Braun,” said Andrew Blauvelt, curator-at-large for design at the Museum of Arts and Design in Manhattan.

At the time, Braun was working with Andy Warhol to realize Warhol’s idea of a working zipper on the album’s cover. Pasche says that Braun modified the design not because it was lacking in any respect but because it had been faxed to the United States in a rush. The fax “was very grainy and gray” — and the logo, Pasche admitted, “needed redrawing.”

It is Braun’s elongated version, with extra lines and highlights, that continues to be used officially. In Pete Fornatale’s book “50 Licks: Myths and Stories from Half a Century of the Rolling Stones,” Braun said that he had been given Pasche’s logo by Marshall Chess, the president of Rolling Stones Records, and “basically outlined the highlights, the lips, and the tongue.”

(Braun and Warhol were nominated for a Grammy Award in 1972 for best recording package for “Sticky Fingers” but lost to Gene Brownell and Dean O. Torrence’s cover design for Pollution, depicting a chick in gas mask emerging from its shell.)

And Pasche’s logo continues to be attributed to others. “A lot of people think Andy Warhol designed it,” Broackes said, “which of course he didn’t.” She believes it was because Warhol was credited for the rest of the artwork on “Sticky Fingers.”

According to Blake Gopnik, author of “Warhol: A Life as Art,” a new biography, the tongue and lips “could absolutely not be by Andy Warhol.”

“It has nothing to do with the look of his art," he said, “especially the conceptual framework that he always worked in.”

Why the longstanding confusion? “Warhol’s like a giant cultural magnet,” Gopnik said. “Everything adheres to him. And he made no attempt to clarify matters.” He added, “He preferred factual confusion to clarity, so the idea that he be credited with the logo would have been something that he would have absolutely encouraged.”

The logo has generated an enormous amount of money for the Stones. The British public relations veteran Alan Edwards, who handled the band’s publicity in the ’80s, said the Stones “must have grossed a good billion [pounds] in concerts, record and DVD sales, merchandising and exhibitions” and also used the logo “all over advertising.” Samuel O’Toole, an intellectual property lawyer at Briffa Legal in London, estimated the figure to be “hundreds of millions of pounds.”

Pasche said he was paid just £50 in 1970 (about $970 today), and also received a £200 bonus. It was only in 1976, when an official contract was drawn up between himself and Musidor B.V., the band’s Netherlands-based law firm, that the designer began receiving royalties for his work. Pasche remembers his share as 10 percent of net income on sales of merchandising displaying the logo. He estimates he made “a few thousand pounds” in total in royalties until 1982, when he sold his copyright to the band for £26,000.

Pasche chuckles when he says, “I’d probably be living in a castle now” had he retained his copyright but say the decision was forced by a gray area in copyright law at the time regarding usage rights — if a company had been using something for a number of years and it was recognized as part of the company, it could try to assume copyright. His lawyer told Pasche he could lose in court, so they negotiated a fee.

O’Toole said Pasche’s lawyer was right to take that road. “There’s a good argument,” he said, that the Rolling Stones could have argued that they had “an implied license to make use of the copyrighted work.” Had Pasche fought and lost, he would have been “liable for his own legal fees, and also the legal fees of the Stones, which are probably going to be humongous.”

“It’s almost like David and Goliath, really,” he added. “The one designer up against the Rolling Stones.”

Pasche’s original design can today be seen at the V&A (which has historical ties to the Royal College of Art). Broackes said: “The fact that it was physically designed on the premises and came back to us was in itself a remarkable thing. It’s a star object in a sense for that, not just because it’s the most well-known logo.”

Pasche’s "original and singular design,” as Blauvelt describes it, has come a long way, despite having been done in a low-key fashion and at low cost.

“And with so little expectation for it,” adds Broackes. “It sums up the Rolling Stones themselves — the anti-authoritarianism, the devil-may-care attitude” — and, of course, “the sex appeal.” But she also pointed to its adaptability as a major reason for its massive success.

“It’s been reworked in so many different ways,” Broackes marveled. “There aren’t many logos that can be tiny and on a 45 but also be a stage set. That’s pretty amazing.”

[pianomalone]

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A post shared by Bob Malone (@pianomalone)

Many thanks to @wfuv NYC and Don McGee’s Mixed Bag for being the first radio station to play “Good People!” Radio legend Pete Fornatale started “Mixed Bag” on WFUV in the 60s and I listened to him on WNEW in the 80s when I was just another kid in NJ with rock & roll dreams. What a great place for this to start!📻 . . . #wfuv #wfuvradio #mixedbag #donmcgee #newyorkcity #nyc #pianorock #rockandroll #goodpeople #rockandrolldreams #newjersey #petefornatale https://www.instagram.com/p/B0eg4e3DMDQ/?igshid=2d0ftlxow0jq

[davesmusicmusing]

#50YearsAgo (and a day before Martin Luther King Jr’s Assassination), Simon and Garfunkel’s 4th album, which many considered their breakthrough, was released.  It was a concept album designed to examine a life journey from childhood to old age.  Side one of the album focuses on this with songs exploring successive stages in life - the “theme and theme reprise” tracks serve as bookends to the life cycle.  Side two contained unused material from the soundtrack to The Graduate, which was released earlier in 1968.  Unlike, the soundtrack, Bookends contained the complete version of Mrs. Robinson.  Bookends was released 24 hours before the assassination of Civil Rights Movement activist Martin Luther King, Jr., which spurred nationwide outrage and riots. Disc Jockey and author Pete Fornatale opined that the album served as “comfort food” during rather tumultuous times within the nation.

The album peaked at number 1 on the Billboard Pop Album Charts and held that position for seven non-consecutive weeks, remaining on the chart for a total of 66 weeks. #1968Flashback

[lipwak]

VHS #336

American Experience: Ansel Adams, Who Counts: Election Reform in America (election of 2000), The Miles Davis Story, The Cremaster Cycle: A conversation with Matthew Barney, and some of Rock Jocks: The FM Revolution. *** American Experience: Ansel Adams, a documentary film!Ric Burns1:25 See the whole thing here: https://youtu.be/jvt1ImIKi0U *** Who Counts: Election Reform in AmericaPBS, 2002hosted by Frank Sesno(comedy & 2000 election) Darrell Hammond as Bill Clinton, Kennedy School of Government professors, Palm Beach County, the whole day was a complete disaster, butterfly ballot, Darrell Hammond as Al Gore, Gadsden County, FL, caterpillar ballot, someone as DIck Cheney, Demos president, voter roll purge, Jon Stewart feels sorry for Jeb for not being able to deliver FL, Mary Frances Berry, Sen Chris Dodd, 180,000 lost their vote in FL, Sen Roy Blount, Karl Rove, W, Gore concedes then takes it back, Al Gore, Electoral College, Hillary Clinton, Katherine Harris, recount, Darrell Hammond as Gore and Will Ferrell as Bush on SNL, hanging chads, voting machines, Sen McCain, Nov 22 Republican mob stops recount, Katherine Harris certifies vote with Bush winning, Gore takes it to FL Supreme Court, court reverses that decision, US Supreme Court stops the recount, Washington Post recounted the votes. *** The Miles Davis Story 2 hrs, sw/ commercials See most of as clips here: https://www.youtube.com/user/MilesDavisVEVO/search?query=story So What, Shirley Horn, Frances Davis, Clark Terry, Ian Carr, East St Louis, Lincoln High School, Irene Cawthorn his first girlfriend, got her pregnant, his mother wanted him to play the violin, father gave him a trumpet, Miles, Eddie Randle’s Rhum Boogie Orchestra, Clark Terry and Dizzy Gillespie were his heroes, Billy Ecsktine, went to Julliard, Hot House - Charlie Parker, Miles replaced Dizzy in Charlie Parker’s band, Paris, Louisanne Hotel, Juliette Greco, hooked on heroin, Irene’s 3rd child with him, Boplicity, Gil Evans, How Deep Is The Ocean, Prestige Recording, Dig, Oleo, kicked heroin, Columbia, George Avakian, Miles Ahead, The Duke, Blues For Pablo, ’56-'57 back in Paris, music for Louis Malle’s Ascenseur pour l’échafaud, pictures of the recording session, Generique’, Francis Taylor (Davis), wrote Fran Dance for her, he was very sexual, she left West Side Story for him, Shirley Horn, Kind Of Blue, Jimmy Cobb, Blue In Green, Milestones, cop beats him, Miles sues, Dizzy Gillespie, Concierto de Arunjuez, pics of that session, Sketches of Spain, Teo Macero, Teo, played Khachaturian, Ravel, Bartok at home, Cheryl Davis his daughter, painting of him - prove it to me, John Coltrane - So What, Wayne Shorter replaced Coltrane, Ron Carter, Herbie Hancock, Tony Williams, in pain, Francis ran away 3 days after ESP cover taken, coke, Jack deJohnette, Dave Holland, Agitation, Chick Corea, Bitches Brew, Don Alias, Keith Jarrett, Jack Johnson, Yesternow, Turnaroundphase, Dave Liebman, stopped playing for 5 years, Cicely Tyson, Bill Evans (sax), Blues de Pescador, Marcus Miller, stroke, starts painting, doodling, (1985), Blue, that’s (Francis’s) ass, Time After Time, Erin Davis, Tutu, Spike Lee, Portia, John McLaughlin, Joe Zawinul, Sept 1991 he dies of massive stroke, buried in NY, You Won’t Forget Me - Shirley Horn *** The Cremaster CycleA conversation with Matthew BarneyMichael Kimmelman1 hr See the whole thing here: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL9ECAEB7ACE98DF99 transcripthttps://search.alexanderstreet.com/preview/work/bibliographic_entity%7Cvideo_work%7C1844989?ssotoken=anonymous *** Rock Jocks: The FM Revolutionpt 2 PBS, 2004 partial record, see VHS #238 for the rest of this. See also VHS #295  for pt 1, Rock Radio Revolution38:48 http://travisty.tv/Rock-Jocks-2002.html Howard Hessman narrating (of WKRP, Cincinnati) Cousin Brucie, Rick Dees, WKRP in Cincinatti, Howard Hessman, the story of FM, Ben Fong-Torres, Vin Scelsa, stereo, reach the counter culture, Pete Fornatale, Richard Neer, Tom Donahue, Bob Weir, Jim Ladd, KSAN, WOR-FM 7/30/66, Scott Muni, progressive format, Murray The K resigned on-air, WNEW-FM, Rosko, Alison Steele, Kent State, WBCN (WHCN not mentioned), Shadow Stevens, Pat St John, Ron Lundy, Dan Ingram, jerry Blavat, Carol Miller, WKRP, David Crosby on drug songs, Puff The Magic Dragon, The Joker, Goddam The Pusher, tape cuts off.

[jardimecletico]

Joe Cocker completaria 73 anos hoje. Cantor morreu em 2014.

John Robert Cocker, OBE (Sheffield, 20 de maio de 1944 — Crawford, 22 de dezembro de 2014) foi um cantor britânico de rock, influenciado pela soul music no início da carreira.

Começou sua carreira musical em sua cidade natal na Inglaterra, aos quinze anos de idade. Com o nome artístico de Vance Arnold tocou com The Avengers, depois Big Blues (1963) e então a Grease Band (a partir de 1966). Em 1969 ele foi o astro convidado do programa The Ed Sullivan Show.

Seu primeiro grande sucesso foi a antológica canção "With a Little Help from My Friends", uma versão da música dos Beatles gravada com o guitarrista Jimmy Page. No mesmo ano ele apareceu no Festival de Woodstock, com um show consagrador, sobre o qual ele fala no livro Woodstock, do jornalista [Pete Fornatale] : "Tivemos uma reação emocionante quando tocamos With a Little Help from My Friends. Foi como um sentido maravilhoso de comunicação. Era o último número do show, eu lembro, mas senti que finalmente tínhamos nos comunicado com alguém".

Coker ainda conseguiu mais alguns hits com "She Came Through the Bathroom Window" (outra versão de uma música dos Beatles), "Cry Me a River" e "Feelin Alright". Em 1970 sua versão ao vivo do sucesso "The Letter" dos Box Tops, lançado na compilação Mad Dogs & Englishmen tornou-se sua primeira canção a entrar no Top Ten americano.

[comicmix]

Ed Catto: Podcasts… and an Enduring Favorite

Ed Catto: Podcasts… and an Enduring Favorite

I’ve been driving a lot more since my move to the Finger Lakes and I’ve been trying to use my time wisely. For music, I catch up on Pete Fornatale’s Mixed Bag from WFUV and ComicMix’s own Mike Gold’s Weird Sounds Inside the Gold Mind from The Point Radio. Both offer great tunes and insightful, thoughtful commentary. And for thoughtful discussion, I’ve been really enjoying John Siuntres’s Word…

[paullev]

23-minute radio play, followed by 18 interview with the writer of the original short story, It's Real Life

[bigmacdaddio]

DJ Pete Fornatale - WNEW-FM 102.7 - in NYC.

Pete’s last show, of April 14, 2012, in its entirety:

 lewgoodman.com/041412.mp3

[mother-venus]

foto de belleza

Feliz cinco de mayo!

Megan is home for the weekend, except she's at a surprise party for her grandpa right now. Tyler wanted to go to a movie with the two of us, but I'd kind of rather get smashed with my family today. I guess it's better he's laying in bed sick today. 

Watching the Kentucky Derby and all I want is a giant hat. It's making me sad I used to have one and it's gone missing... Congrats to "I'll Have Another"! My mum is celebrating by doing just that haha

Pete Fornatale, a great radio personality, died this year and they're celebrating the 20th anniversary today. I keep welling up because this is so beautiful, except it's hard to do with a margarita in my hand...

Also, the Lion King is on TV.

[obitoftheday]

Obit of the Day: A "Mixed Bag"

Growing up in New Jersey, my father was an avid WNEW listener. The station "Where Rock Lives" not only featured the greatest music in rock and roll history but some of the greatest on-air talent to match: Scott Muni (who hosted OOTD's favorite show, "Ticket to Ride," which featured only Beatles songs), Jonathan Schwartz, Alison Steele, and Pete Fornatale. Mr. Fornatale who had been a DJ in New York for 45 years, died at the age of 66.

WNEW, and Fornatale along with it, pioneered the "progressive rock" format, which gave DJs a latitude to play what they wanted, when they wanted. It was a distinct style change from the disc jockeys of the 1950s, like "Cousin Bruce" and "Wolfman" Jack, and their high-energy intros and established playlists. Fornatale and his colleagues would talk to listeners, provide background stories not only on the artists, but on the songwriters, producers, and musicians. They could play a top ten hit, a "deep track," or even an entire album.

Fornatale began his broadcasting career at Fordham University, where, as a sophomore, he convinced the administration to allow him to start a progressive rock show on the college station. In 1969 he joined WNEW. His best-known show was "Mixed Bag," which he developed in 1982, featured music and interviews with singer-songwriters. He would take his show with him to WXRT, after WNEW changed to a more conventional music format, and then eventually back to WFUV at Fordham.

Fornatale, who also wrote or co-wrote five books (his last was Back to the Garden: The Story of Woodstock in 2009) was awarded the Armstrong Excellence in Broadcasting Award in 1983 and AFTRA's Media and Entertainment Excellence Award in February 2012. He suffered a stroke on April 15, 2012 and died on April 26.

(The album Time It Was (The Simon & Garfunkel Songbook) - 2009 ItsAboutMusic.com - features Fornatale introducing almost every song. Aztec Two-Step recorded the album before a live audience, through Fornatale's "Mixed Bag Radio" from Fordham. Fornatale had an encyclopedic knowledge of Simon & Garfunkel, having written a book, Simon & Garfunkel's Bookends (Rock of Ages) 2007, documenting the duo's career.)

[lnthefade]

Do you remember rock and roll radio?

Pete Fornatale died yesterday.

Who was Pete Fornatale, you ask?

Pete Fornatale was the voice of my youth. He was my guide through the world of rock and roll. He shaped my musical tastes, opened my mind to all sorts of music. With just his voice and his records, he became my friend, someone who - through the magic of radio - hung out with me in my bedroom, telling me stories, playing music and teaching me that there was so much more to musical life than top 40.

I was fortunate to grow up in a place where WNEW FM existed. For a kid like me who clung to music like a life preserver, having that station, having Fornatale and Vin Scelsa and Scott Muni and Alison Steele be musical mentors was a gift. In a radio world where AM was still king - an impersonal, hit churning king - WNEW was a port in the storm. They played deep cuts and long versions of songs and bands that would never see the light of day on other stations.

Pete Fornatale was so much a part of my youth. It wasn't just the music. He used the music as a means to tell a story, to weave songs together to take you on a journey. He was an astounding interviewer, getting artists to open up like old friends sitting in a bar talking, a skill he used to make his Mixed Bag show a joy to listen to.  He was a master at what he did and my own musical history is the better for having "known" him.

From today's NYT:

“If you give me the right idea for a program,” Mr. Fornatale said in 2004, “I can give back to you a three-hour journey where, if you tune in at any time, you’re likely to hear something that will entertain you. But if you take the ride with me, when we get to the end, you’ll say, ‘Wow, what a long, strange trip it’s been.’ ”

RIP, Pete. Thank you.

Pete Fornatale's Mixed Bag on WFUV

[paullev]

hot off the screen!  my reading yesterday morning @readercon of my brand new story "It's Real Life"