Continuing the look back at various years in history - today it's 1960. The one that got the decade that was off to a frenzied start.

Beginning with the hopeful wedding of Princess Margaret and quickly falling apart with the Francis Gary Powers U-2 Spy plane incident and the disintegration of the Paris Summit Conference. It was that kind of year.

Continuing with Cuba, the upheavals in Africa, riots in Japan, the Cold War spiraling out of control at the UN. Civil war in The Congo, and winding up with the election of John F. Kennedy to President.

Compared to other years in other decades 1960 probably paled by comparison. But at the time it signaled an end to the nervous 50's and a beginning of a new and interesting decade. Even if the operative word "interesting" was used in the Chinese curse sense.

And you get to hear all about it, from UPI's Yearly Radio Roundup of news events of the year.

Two of the Jazz greats this weekend, live onstage at the 1960 Newport Jazz Festival - Trumpeter Art Farmer and Alto Sax Benny Golson and their Jazztet consisting of Lex Humphries on drums, Addison Farmer on Bass, Duke Pearson and Piano and Bernard McKinney on Trombone. Recorded on June 30, 1960 for The Voice Of America.

A beautiful 45 minute set - but don't take my word for it.

Something a bit special this weekend. A Hollywood Bowl concert featuring Dave Brubeck and his Quartet as opening act for Keely Smith with Nelson Riddle's Orchestra from 1960. I've posted the second half of this concert before, which featured The Kingston Trio, but not the opening acts and many people have asked me if there is any live Keely Smith (apart from the Louie Prima/Keely Smith Vegas gigs) from early on in her solo career. Ironically, this is one of her first appearances as a solo artist and her first-ever appearance at the Hollywood Bowl.

And Brubeck is wonderful as always, with Paul Desmond paving a smooth way.

Good concert all around - enjoy and get comfy for the next hour.

As FM broadcasting evolved into more than just elevator music or the higher quality simulcast of AM radio, stations started catering to an audience whose tastes in music were changing and becoming more eclectic. In the mid-late 1950's and all the way into the 60's, Folk Music had branched out of its rural roots and into the mainstream. With acts like The Kingston Trio, The Limelighters, The Brothers Four and countless other groups grabbing places on the Pop charts, it created an awareness and an appetite for the casual listener, as well as the enthusiast and budding musician to go looking for more. And FM was the perfect place to find it.

Around 1954, New York Disc Jockey Skip Weshner began a series of live broadcasts called Accent On Sound from the former Cafe Society club in Greenwich Village, which had been closed, revamped and reopened as One Sheridan Square. His program featured a vast array of talents, including early Bob Dylan and Joan Baez among many others.

This tape is a one-hour segment of an original three hour special program Weshner did to celebrate the switch over to WNCN in New York early in 1961. The program was syndicated by tape to KRHM in Los Angeles and features folk legends Pete LaFarge, Ramblin' Jack Elliot, Billy Faier, Logan English among others.

It gives you some idea of what was available on radio during those days. How it was possible to cultivate an eclectic taste in music pretty effortlessly as is evidenced by not only the music featured on Weshner's show but during the intro of the show that followed it. All on December 1960.

I am realizing Elvis Presley is becoming a distant memory for many people these days, and a name only vaguely recognized by many more. But there was a time Elvis Presley was the preeminent pop idol of the mid-20th century. When he was drafted into the Army it was a full-scale tragedy for the millions of fans who hung on every single he released and every syllable he spoke.

By all accounts, his life as a draftee in the Army was far from typical, but he did manage to stay out of the public eye for the requisite number of months in order to fulfill his military service. So when Elvis was discharged from the Army in March of 1960, he gave an interview for the Armed Forces Radio and Television Service just prior to his leaving Germany (where he was stationed) and coming back to the U.S. I'm sure most fans have heard it, but there are probably a lot who haven't.

So here it is.

Every generation swears up and down the generation after it is taking the world on a one-way trip to hell. Children of the Cold War Years, the Eisenhower Years, the Dawning of the Age of Aquarius Years were all single-handedly responsible for dragging life as we knew it straight into the dumpster.

So this episode of the Pop Chronicles deals with the World Of Youth circa 1960. It comes as part of a larger examination of the American family via the NBC Radio project Image America from April 6, 1960.

First off - it's heavy handed. Second; there are music beds that remind you of those really bad sex-education films. Third; it's a tad sexist and misogynistic (just like those years were). Okay - that's the downside.

The upside are the interviews and the observations. Yes, kids were just as screwed up then as now - just as screwed up as they ever were and ever will be. It goes along with the hormones and the impulses. It is timeless.

Remember, the kids in this documentary (and the kids in the picture above) are the same ones who are now your parents - or grandparents. Terrifying thought, I know. But if it's any comfort it signifies that it all does work out. Always has - always will. Whether you realize it or not.

In 1960 of course, we had no idea. In 2010 we still don't.

Listen with an open mind and a modicum of curiosity.

(1960 ended up like just about every other year before and since: Crisis)

It's getting about that time of year when the long glances back start. For C&L and just about every other blog it will be a look at 2009; what went on, what didn't go on, what crisis did we land in or avert. How did life as we know it change this particular year.

Since Newstalgia is mostly knee-deep in the past,I thought I would kick off the roundup of year-enders with a look at 1960 and how the world changed during that particular 12 months, and how a lot of it has remained the same.

1960 saw the election of a new President and the Cold War entering new and uncharted territory. It saw Africa emerging as a continent of newly independent nations, the Middle East contemplating Israel as a nuclear neighbor. Latin America was deemed the next hot spot in East-West relationships and Germany struggling with its divided status.

On December 28, 1960 CBS News ran a one-hour round table discussion between Edward R. Murrow, Howard K. Smith, David Schoenbrun, Daniel Schorr and other notable CBS News reporters, weighing the issues that made 1960 a memorable year.

Howard K. Smith: “Well, I think our change is about as drastic a change as you can have under constitutional government. I’ve emphasized the fact that the Presidents and their intents differ drastically. But the men around them differ too. The emphasis in the previous administration was on businessmen. At present I think scholars probably have a plurality. It’s said that if all the appointees made by Kennedy so far were to walk down the hall together there would be a deafening jangle of Phi Beta Kappa keys. And there are three Rhodes Scholars among them. Many of them are famed for some very useful and active ideas, but the main thing that induces me to believe this will be an active administration is the fact there has seldom been, since the Civil War, such an accumulation of crises and merely problems as there is now and we have to act or there will be disaster.”

Always the threat of disaster and some crisis. No matter when.

1960 or 2009 - it doesn't really change.

. . .and neither does the cost of keeping blogs together.

News for this April 4th in 1960 was short and medicinal. President Eisenhower heaped praise on vice-President Richard Nixon as the 1960 Presidential campaign got underway from the Republican camp. The general consensus of opinion was Nixon would be a shoe-in for the nomination.

Meanwhile, violence continued in South Africa with hospitals reporting a shortage of bandages to treat the injured. Protests against the White-Minority government were intensifying, as were the crackdowns.

A board of Inquiry from Civil Aeronautics concluded the recent crash of a National Airlines plane in North Carolina was the object of a bomb planted on board. No clues as to who did it though.

The biggest Communist Youth Rally ever held took place in Havana, Cuba with a sea of Cuba, Si - Yanki, No placards on display. There was seemingly no end to the love for us, particularly in Cuba.

And this night was the night of the Oscars in Hollywood.

All this and some cheery ads for Sylvania Blue Dot Flashbulbs all via NBC News On The Hour.

Since today is Dr. Martin Luther King's Birthday, and since we are also going through an upheaval in our society by way of the Occupy Wall Street Movement, the common thread of Non-violent and peaceful protest is just as relevant now as it was over 50 years ago.

In this debate, which featured Dr. Martin Luther King and Southern writer/editor James J. Kilpatrick over the subject of non-violent protest and the recent lunchcounter demonstrations going on throughout the South, you get some idea of just how entrenched the mind-set of segregation was. The prevailing echo of "what is it you people want?" seems as clear today as it was then. The peaceful use of protest was just as baffling to the power structure then as it is now.

Dr. King: “There are those who would argue that these demonstrations are uncon-
stitutional and that they are illegal. They would go on to argue that they have no
respect for law. But I would say that this is absolutely wrong. The individuals en-
gaged in sit-in demonstrations are revealing the highest respect for law. And they
respect law so much that they want to see all laws just and in line with the moral
law of the universe. They’re willing to suffer and sacrifice in order to square local
custom, customs and local laws with the moral law of the universe. And they are
seeking to square these local laws with the federal Constitution and with what is
the just law of the land.
Therefore, I am sure, I am convinced, that they are just and that they are truly
American, that somehow these sit-in demonstrations send us back to the deep wells
of democracy that were dug by the Founding Fathers of our nation in formulat-
ing the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence. And so in sitting down,
these students are in reality standing up for the highest and the best in the Amer-
ican tradition. And I think it is justifiable because it isn’t a selfish movement. It
isn’t based on seeking merely rights for Negroes or seeking to secure those things
that would apply only to one minority group, but they’re seeking to save the soul
of America.
Truly, America faces today a rendezvous with destiny, and I think these students,
through their nonviolent, direct, courageous action have met the challenge of this
destiny-packed moment in a very majestic and sublime way.”

Some things don't change. And some change takes a very long time.

Not just a message to be brought out once a year to honor a man and his work, to be looked at and nodded and put back on the shelf. The concepts Dr. King brought are still fresh and new - the peaceful use of protest is overwhelming in its power and that desperately needs to be remembered every one of these coming days.

The Debate between Dr. Martin Luther King and James J. Kilpatrick, as heard on The Nation's Future from November 26, 1960.

As a musical-sponged youth, I started my life-long love affair with Jazz by way of MJQ, Kenny Burrell and Stan Getz. It wasn't until a few years later that I discovered The Three Sounds based on a hunch from a guy in a record store who saw me eyeing their Blue Note album Here We Come and told me in no uncertain terms that if I liked MJQ I would love these guys.

He was right. Ironically, Here We Come came out the same year as the milestone collaboration between The Three Sounds and Stanley Turrentine and Blue Hour. So I discovered them at the right time.

Since Blue Hour has been getting a lot of play the past couple of months via my buddy Mike Finnegan, I thought I would post a track from that slightly earlier album as a way of keeping the introduction going if you aren't already familiar with them. Tonight it's Summertime - the Gershwin standard, but done in inimitable Three Sounds style. The Masters of understatement, the essence of cool brilliance.

Strangely, almost all their albums are either out of print in the states or only available in Japan, at least according to my last check at Amazon.com. They are, as far as I can tell, available as downloads though. In any case, try and check them out if you can and pick up what's available.

You can never have too much mellow. Not these days anyway.