Variety (January 1961)

January 4, 1961 Fifty-fifth Anniversary MUSIC 207 R’n’R and Payola Still With The Music Biz; ASCAP Hassles; Diskeries’ All 33-RPM Move The music biz failed to run ac¬ cording to form in 1960. It was the year that Tock ’n’ roll was slated to be flattened by the comeback by “good musk.” Rock ’n’ roll was as big as ever at the year’s end, albeit with a strong country & western flavor. It was the year that payola was supposed to have been buried in the wake of the Congressional ex¬ posures late in 1939. The payola boys were reportedly doing busi¬ ness at the same old stand despite the edicts, ukases and decrees of the Federal Trade Commission. It was the year that the disk biz was supposed to reach the $500,000,000 gross mark after climbing steadily for the past 10 years. But the first year of the new decade saw the advance grind slowly to a halt with a possibility that the 1960 take will not exceed the gross of the previous year once all the re¬ turns are in. It was the year that peace was to be established in the American Society of Composers, Authors & Publishers via a new consent order which went into effect at the outset of 1960. But when the first divi¬ dend was paid under the new order in October, one of the loudest squawks ever .heard in ASCAP’s long chronicle of internal stress sounded from coast-to-coast and in every tier of writer, from the new¬ comers to the superdreadnaught class. If the expected didn’t happen, the unexpected did. It was a year for comics-on-wax and pic themes; for percussion; and. of course, El¬ vis Presley, who came out of the Army last March and resumed right where he left off two years previously as the most spectacular phenomenon in the history of the disk industry. The single record business, which i had been chronically 111. for the ; past few years, reached the critical phase last year. Sales of hits have [fallen to dangerously low levels. [With the exception of a few sides i with sensational appeal, click disks ! are now lucky to reach the 500,000 [marker. Most of the hits even fail !to get over the 200.000 level and ! the figure keeps shrinking. | Sundry Reasons I The underlying causes for the ! singles slump are varied. Some ' execs believe that the price differ: ential between a 98c single and a ! $3.98 LP is too small and hence encourages LP sales at the expense ; of singles. j The “Top 40” formula, which is now the basic format of virtually ■ every indie station in the country, ; also makes the purchase of a hit ; disk unnecessary since the kids can ; listen to what they want virtually 'any time of the day or night. Finally, the vogue of transistor radios and tape recorders among i the well-heeled juves also has cut ! sharply into single sales. In fact, , among some segments of the teeni agers, anybody buying a disk is considered to be a “square” in view . of the “for-free” angles of hearing the bestsellers. | All-33 RPM Platters A new try to bring back the sin¬ gles biz will be tried this year from another direction. Industry . execs hope that a change in speed from 45 rpm to a new type of 33 [rpm single will help inject some • excitement in the business. While [the 33 rpm single has been out iunder various labels for the past ' year, the entry of RCA Victor this i year with their new “compact” 33s i is slated to be accompanied by a ; powerful promotion campaign that I may give the 33 rpm singles a pubI lie acceptance. By HERM SCHOENFELD [ While the singles were languish¬ ing, the package market was really ; laughing it up last year. From out ! of nowhere, Bob Newhart, an ob| scure comic, broke through with [his “Button Down Mind of Bob ;Newart” and considerably bright¬ ened the picture for the Warner Bros, label. Newart was preceded on the bestseller lists by another “new wave” comic, Shelley Berman, 'whose “Outside” and “Inside” LPs proved to be powerful sellers for Verve Records. The latter label ^Iso came through with solid LP comedy offerings by Mort Sahl and 'Jonathan Winters. Other comedy bestsellers of the year were Dave ; Gardner’s “Rejoice Dear Hearts” under the RCA Victor banner and Woody Woodbury's “Looks At Life and Love” for the indie j Stereo-Oddities label. Via the com! edy route, the “spoken word” disk, ! once an item for the longhair trade via poetry recitations, succeeded , in the commercial arena, j The ‘Percussion’ Cycle ; Another LP cycle in 1960 be¬ came evident in the flock of per¬ cussion albums. This was sparked jby Enoch Light’s “Persuasive Per¬ cussion” clicks for the Command [ label with the Terry Snyder orch, a format which was given the maxi imum flattery by being imitated by virtually every other label in the business. One of the key fac¬ tors on the percussion front was the new interest in hi-fi sounds. Each percussion set was arranged for sound gimmicks so that cus¬ tomers would be getting their i money’s worth of stereo effects, j Along with comics and percus’ sion, motion picture music had one \ of its most successful years in 1960. jit was a throwback to the time [when every film had a title song, Seven if it came out like “Woman [Disputed, I Love You.” This year, ; the titles were no block to the pic I songs and scores being cut in bulk : and hitting with a remarkably high ■ average this year. ^ j Among the big pic songs in 1960 • were the themes from “The Apart¬ ment," “Exodus,” “The Alamo” | ( “Green Leaves of Summer”), “The ! Sundowners." "The Unforgiven,” | “The Dark At The Top of The ■ Stairs,” “Never On Sunday,” “Summer Place,” and others. The biggest new name to emerge in the disk biz last year was Bren¬ da Lee. a 15-year old songstress from Nashville who came up with a string of hits for Decca, includ¬ ing “I’m Sorry," “Sweet Nothin’s" and “I Want To Be Wanted.” The year's other big names, such as Presley, Bobby Darin, Connie Francis, Paul Anka, Lloyd Price, the Everlv Bros., Ricky Nelson, : Brook Benton, and others were holdovers from previous years. A j newcomer, Bryan Hyland, came j through with the biggest novelty ’hit of the year with “Itsv Bitsy Teenie Weenie Yellow Polka-Dot ; Bikini” on the Kapp label, i Presley, natch was the year’s ! biggest seller and paced the RCA Victor label into being the hottest company in the single field. For the rest, the hits were scattered around various major and indie la¬ bels in a confused pattern which reflected the high risks in an in¬ dustry in which a couple of hun¬ dred labels are competing for a .shrinking market. : f Diskleggers ■ Probably the most disagreeable \ shock for the disk industry this year was the revelation of a wide¬ spread disk counterfeiting racket jin this country. In the past, pub¬ lishers were mostly concerned with j disk companies which failed to pay [royalties on copyrighted tunes and [attorney Julian T. Abeies, in be■half of the Harry Fox office irusj tee for the Music Publishers Pro¬ tective Assn.) obtained numerous ! court victories over shady diskers ’who attempted, to duck the provi¬ sions of the compulsory licensing provision of the Copyright Act. : In recent months, however, a • new wrinkle of outright disk iorgery . in which the original label of hit disks are copied and sold as the real McCoy has come into ike spotlight. The probes into the counterfeiting racket, originally sparked by the American Record Manufacturers & Distributors Assn, have led to arrests in New YoTt, Philadelphia, Bergen County, N. J., and Los Angeles. In each case, thousands of copies of forged hit singles and LPs were being fun¬ nelled into the market via legiti¬ mate retail stores who were willing to buy hot goods at a good dis¬ count. ARMADA proxy Art Talmadge said the counterfeiters “were betting on horses after they , had won" and wre draining a minimum $20,900,000 a year from : the industry. i That figure has since been re, vised sharply upwards in light of a inew belief that bigtime racketeers ; have moved into the disk counter¬ feiting field since it’s lucrative and ! comparatively safe method of mak: ing a fast buck. The safety derives from the fact that there is no pro: teetion for disks in the Federal : Copyright Act and also from the | diversity of laws in the various • states that cover trademark inr[fringement. One of the big cru¬ sades of the disk industry in an attempt to plug up this drainage of more than 5 cr of the Industry's gross, will be for a strong national law to curb the bogus diskmakers. What Have You Written Lately? Bv L. WOLFE GILBERT Hollywood. Nothing offends, or plagues the songmakers, like this query. “What have you written lately?” In the old 28th Rt. days of Tin Pan Alley and Von Tilzer, Fred Fisher, Akst, Agcr, Leslie and Irv¬ ing Berlin, it was nothing for us fellers to write a song a day. We peddled them up and down the street, not only to acquire eating money, hut there was a pride of authorship. Many of these songs are still with us. some are knocking at the door of public domain, and quite a few have already succumbed. Vaudeville was the exposure media then and there was no radio or television and no ASCAP nor BMI. The famous Douglas-Lincoln de¬ bates and the recent KennedyNixon face-to-facers are not to be compared with the debates in our trade as to what or who Is to blame for the current scarcity of new songs of calibre. True, the grandiose stage, musicals are sup¬ plying fine words and melodies to help fill the vacuum. But expert craftsmen who wrote the songs of longevity are absent from the best seller charts. Have they lost the knack? or, are they so secure, that they are just lax and lazy. I've heard it said that the arrival of ASCAP — and the Supreme Court decision providing payments to us for standard songs of vintage, when Used for public performance for profit —acted as a deterrent, and hence we did not woo the muse. We staved with the oldies. Writing., theme and exploitation songs lor motion pictures and tele¬ vision shows have given some of us an avenue to write something current, hut the ever-lovin’ pep song is conspicuous by its absence. ' So the ar foment prevails that the sense of security, w bile a bless: . Ing in disguise, gives us an excuse to bask in the limelight of the old songs, and their earnings. [ I’m sorry, but I don’t go along J with that. I know* we still have the : skill, but we do not have the mari ket. The other side of the medal■ lion shows me that the publishers of great catalogs ‘who da not enjoy the pride of authorship), as , cold busines’S men, reap, the har¬ vest and are cool to new ditties. The fact is. they are reluctant to even listen half of the time. I heard one of the top music pub. lishers say: “Why gamble with a new one; the old ones are still with • us. true and tried, and while the single records have rock ’n’ roll to ' provide new material, the single ' is on the w ane, and the albums are surfeited with the good staple oldies.” Paraphrasing, the lovely Rodgers Hart song, “With A Song In My Heart.” this writer says “With A Song In My Head.” It never gets to be heard because the market is not receptive. Or oh occasion we are told yo.ur song is too good for the present market. I go further in my contention In this great debate. Where are the songs of the new embryonic , writers?. Are they encouraged? ’Whom have these publishers dis¬ covered lately. Where or when have , they unearthed a potential Gershwin. Ilammcrstein, Sammy Calm, Fain, McHugh or Warren? < Spectre of PD’s I contend these publishers are secure but short sighted, overlook¬ ing the obvious fact that the spec¬ tre of public domain hangs over their repertoire, and in time will deplete, if not vitiate, their copvi rights. The great big American enterpri.-cs' have developed what is known as institutional advertising, which does nut necessarily bring new revenue. Plus this, they re¬ furbish t ’ .fir plants. All ' this is written oil fur expansion and good i will I a-'k— why can’t a major pub-’ ilisher, who earns $1,000,000. or, (more a year via ASCAP, set aside 5, or even 10cr to publish and ex¬ ploit newT songs, either by new or established writers. Even if this investment of budgeted money did ■ not bring in profits, it would re¬ plenish the diminishing catalogs I and encourage writers. . I may be dreaming in a fool’s paradise, but wouldn’t it be some! thing if the bosses instructed their 1 contact men to contact writers of [every description and solicit new j compositions. < It’s ironic that the amateur or new writer inevitably asks the veteran: “How do you get the pub¬ lishers to listen to my songs?” I have to tell him, that the recog¬ nized. reputable writer has as dif¬ ficult a time of it, as you do. Again, look at the list of cur¬ rent hits and we might get to be¬ lieve that live now writer gets a quicker listen than we vets do. There’s one consolation for lyric .writers. Jack Yellen. Sammy Cahn, ( Harry Ruby, et al. and myself ean ‘still keep our lyric hand in action, by writing parodies for Friars. Lambs and Masquers dinners. We’re back to where we started. This is. getting kind of repeti¬ tious, so as Cohan said: “Leave them laughing, when you say goodjbye.” And also to ease the tension of this great debate and to keep the big publishers from being mad at me I’ll spin a yarn, and a true one. Some years ago. the late Walter . Donaldson and I wrote a sad song, full of maudlin sentiment, entitled "Poor Little Golden Rod.” We sub¬ mitted it to Phil Kornheiser, the :then professional manager for Feist. Walter sal down at the piano and I. with nvv transposing ton¬ sils, gave out. Lo and behold, . Kornheiser was actually in tears. .’ He took out his handkerchief wiped his eyes and nose, and said.' “Thanks boys. I’ll think it over, = and let you know, don’t call me. I'il call you." As Walter and I were leaving five office Solly Cohen, assitu Phil said. “Fel¬ las. I wa* listening in. you haven’t got a chance, are you crazy? p1 riv¬ ing a song called ’Poo." Little Golden Rod’ for Phil, don’t you knov he's a!\> gle f > golden rod? Phii has live f« • nr" So there— “Wivat have you writ-, i ten lalei v V” I ON MOTION PICTURE MUSIC j — I By DIMITRI TIOMKIN *======£ j Hollywood. ’ j music is scoring greater popularity ! How do you like your caviar*’ [through broader knowledge than : Can I heip it if I like caviar (0 everv0I!e. So!n# .any form— au naturel, with bllnts, ‘may like lt served in different or otherwise? Caviar is caviar and forms than others. It is still music, has universal appeal. Music has ar? aesthetic feast that satisfies ’ universal appeal. I like music, too. Pe°PIe as 110 oilier art can * T • , . . . ... ’ . do. Tennvson expressed the mo Like caviar, it should be distin vajenre ot appreciation of music guished by ..quality, not quantity. Iwhen iie said “The city is bn:!; to Producers* have different ideas, nuisic. thereiorc never built at all. . They always want too much mu an? lhero-ore built lorever.” , , ,.TT In no otner lund can so manv sic. A producer wdl say Here we peopJe railicipau, aKli «. Ing enjov must have music” and I always in meiit than in music. The suc'-essf ;1 quire “Why?" Herring is not teacher, composer, musician. con¬ served with each course. Too much ; duct or receives recognition g:v:ng >. . , , <him great persona?. satLfac ::on. is too much, -iet the producer .other proiest-ons hove diseiaUwt seems to think that music will cov just as rigid as that of a career or up the picture’s mistakes. It musician. The writer writes in doesn’t .loneliness, the physicist and (hem The constant complaint is that?*? “TVdt yeT A „ to perfect a theorv. but fnev do music is not mud enough. The not reach ou* to people hanging composer lias no control over dub them the aesthetic and emotional bing. Tht v alwavs plav up the message that the musician or fom brass, than in the'tlieatre the au I,oser tondneior can do. dience curses the composer under , y,fn;'le lands .me tne .. . . . . same music the people of Amenta its breath. Tne quality is lost m_jove. porhapv thev are fond of volume. caviar, too. The similarity of en Perhaps music appeals to more loyment. of sharing the sine people than herring. It can be a Iorgc-< a bond be! .:.eo:i ;v*o , . .. _ n.f*'. Music I have song fci*. is a cultivated taste, but generally I n,,,;hod wf bringing a-Mfn* feel that music is a part of the fiona! understanding In ;n="* I national scene of all countries shouid Iik<; to see a < m Whether the murie is the drumbeat •/*'*' :r0’T:r in the jungle or the sophisticated 7^. just '’as G.-ms concerto played in a London draw arc ]10ld An ono ingroom, mu-hc speaks to the pco for musician* to en: »» , ♦ ;n pie. friendly n:-*e‘ii.'~-s p-e \ ' rv~ During the past several decades p0; *t:OI’v choral z. -up*-. f... <'>>■ . . , Iras cna?r:!V*r n u n-. f a musical taste in America has « •, . . , Tras chasnsv* musical taste m America has «jVc of ea'i changed. Tiie mo; ion pictine and comnetitiors the radio and television have been , r':'Pf>. vi h a r< spot:; ible i or increasing interest W ah *. or in n.u«r. reflected in tire tremondoit. vokurr of sales of reco; dings •n-'Uiar. r j;i ii y or i.i album*. Young people The proof v.iio str.it n -orri collections while eating h.e in their t-'en. mv on the way to too. The qev. a lile-mne nobby of etno: ing in Pu nined bv ; e. eas.n;d> mo; e suplihticated mu si -Ary of t:.** •s. . Rcrnr : a! oi.dance at s\m quel tv a:! 1;. phony coirerts is evidence {hat palatable. ha*.