The record changer (Mar 1945-Feb 1946)

gray Sunday morning not so long to. Those who had been summoned ) the special meeting had received lessages from the secret printing ress via pigeon carrier. They came gaggling down the long plains of Est 57th Street one at a time, caretilly avoiding conspicuous grouping, urtively, they ducked in through a lass door set in a long, blank wall f cement building blocks. Once inside, the early stragglers athered in a confused huddle. The nusual time set for the meeting was ood for avoiding detection, but didn't ure the "Sunday-morning feeling" uffered by some. The setting was deal for a clandestine project. Heaps if film props were scattered all over | he room. One of these was a big sky background set up at a realistic angle >ehind a cross-section of a pilot's raining plane. This and similar obects enabled those present to deduce hat the session was to be held in a film itudio. A historically-minded person •emarked rather ruefully that this vould probably be the first filming of i jam session. G-men were scattered throughout ill the tiny groups now forming, but if course they were in disguise. One )f them was setting up a recording outit to take the music for V-discs, while I wo others were grouping the lriusi:ians. Counting noses, they found here wasn't a clarinetist in the studio. 50 they sent a girl named Brenda .round the corner to call Edmond Sail and Pee Wee Russell. The studiomen fussed with spotights. Someone wanted the piano top ■emoved and a call went out for Frank. 7rank appeared, long, lanky, graylaired and in shirtsleeves. The top eemed to come off easily for him, alhough no one else had known just , low to work it. Captain Vincent of OWI set up his recording outfit (he wanted to cut V-discs separately from i:he soundtrack) and took some of the warm-ups, playing them back for the )and. For first warm-up, they chose Sunny Side of the Street; everyone felt bette-r after hearing it played back. The cameramen went to work on SEPTEMBER, 1945 the mobile camera, setting up a big trestle. They talked about dollies, cranes, booms, and 7.r>0-watters ; they brought out photoelectric light meters, held them up to musicians' faces. Then they measured the distance of each player from the cameras, and when they'd done that, they taped everyone in a circle, drawing footmarks on the floor with chalk for the men to stand in. Pee Wee arrived just as everyone was wondering how you could make jazz without a clarinet. That made the line-up as follows: Bill Davison, trumpet ; George Fugg. trombone : Pee Wee Russell, clarinet; Joe Bushkin, piano; Kansas Fields, drums; Eddie Condon, guitar ; George Foster, string bass. Condon cracked: "Will one chorus be enough to get the balance ?" The musicians laughed, but the soundmen blanched. They tried Honeysuckle Rose. It sounded good. , t "Keep going till I tell you to stop!." the director yelled, and they did. They let it out easily, touching the melody every now and' then, while Lugg filled in the holes with a raspy Dixieland trombone. Bushkin, Davison, and Kansas, all in uniform, were glad to be back in a band. You could feel their pleasure, a release from discipline, in the music. "When you hear three bells, be quiet!" A studio man shouted this warning to everyone. When the band was finally set, a little after 2:30, two cameras were in order, one stationary, the other on the trestle. I counted eleven spotlights, trained on the players from above, from below, and from both sides. In their glare, the definitely nervous crew of sweaty musicians sat rather stiffly in front of a gray velvet backdrop. "All right, here we go!" "Gonna shoot this !" A prop man came forward with a ■ zebra-striped black and white pair of sticks, bearing a legend giving production number, director, and cameramen. Three bells sounded. You could have heard a bug crawling across a barn floor. "Ok, why don't you go ahead?" It was the cameraman talking to the sound man. 'T can't go till I get the buzzer!" Everyone turned and looked angrily at him. He stood his ground. "Hey, it's disconnected \" The electrician ran into a far corner and shoved a plug in one of the outlets. Then everyone heard a funny, squeaky sound, like a timorous mouse. This was the buzzer. "All right!" The prop man held up the zebra sign. The green light glowed on the sound man's box. The zebra slats clicked together. "Sticks'!" With a sign from Condon, the band plunged into a spirited rendition of Honeysuckle Rose, with Joey Bushkin's big GI shoes beating out the rhythm. •Everyone heaved a sigh of relief when the last notes of the last chorus had died out in the still, big room. "Cut!" the soundman yelled. th e cameraman answ cred. Condon stretched. "I certainly am a Chesapeake and Ohio cat," he remarked, yawning. Thev kidded Condon for being a sleephoarder. Soon they were ready for the next take, which turned out to be Ain't Gonna Give Nobody None of My Jelly Roll. Someone remarked that a vocal or two would help. So Charles Edward Smith hopped into a cab and chased over to a Broadway theatre, where Jimmie Rushing was appearing. By this time, the band had warmed up to the idea of filming. In the first place, the layout of the studio equipment was impressive, once they'd relaxed enough to take a look around. A film outfit is more complex than the average sound studio, where all these men are just a shade this side of blase. The cineman's principal of good technical behavior seems to be to take an article, say a spotlight — put this on a stand, then give the stand an elongating arm, and when it all becomes thoroughly complicated, place another stand underneath the first one. This other stand must be able to go in the opposite direction, and every one of the units must roll, wheel, crane, and turn ! Alice never saw anything more topsy-turvy (and methodical at the same time) on the day she stepped through the lookingglass. Jelly Roll was a decidedly warmer set. (Continued on page 6) See editorial, page 35.