Suddenly I had a yen for Tubby the Tuba. Straight on to YouTube. Wonderful to hear this mini masterpiece again – words by Paul Tripp, music by George Kleinsinger – recorded incomparably in 1947 for Decca by Danny Kaye with Victor Young conducting his Concert Orchestra. Great!
Second childhood available on the following link:
In the early 1970s, I was head of the Classical Department of CBS Records in the UK, when we signed Daniel Barenboim to make a series of recordings of Elgar’s music, to be produced by Paul Myers. One of the albums had the five Pomp & Circumstance Marches with the LPO and as a keen Elgarian, I attended all of the Barenboim-Elgar sessions. Imagine my surprise when Barenboim turned up with Danny Kaye! – and I sat and chatted with him during the occasional breaks. Whilst the recordings were actually taking place, Danny sat engrossed by the music, giving it his full attention. He told me about his meeting with Kurt Weill, with Rachmaninoff and with Isaac Stern, and I asked him about his love of classical music, which was genuine and quite deeply serious.
The Pomp and Circumstance Marches were recorded out of sequence, and I think began with No 3; there was a break when Barenboim came to the control room to hear a playback, and, once convinced that it was ‘in the can’, asked Danny if he’d like to meet the orchestra, many of whom did not know he was there,
No 2 was the next March to be recorded, and the two Dannys went out to the orchestra, who were more than pleased to see who it was. Barenboim gave Danny Kaye the baton and the great comedian said ‘Right, gentlemen, No 2’ – and proceeded to conduct the work to the manor born (a simple ‘up and down, two-in-a-bar’). But, wickedly, he gradually increased the tempo more and more until it was almost Prestissimo and when the music inevitably fell apart the orchestra collapsed in laughter.
It was truly a genuine piece of musical humour – which everyone loved and no-one could see coming! Sadly, to my regret, Paul didn’t record Danny in P&C No 2 with the LPO – it could have been a smash! But Kaye was a lovely, lovely man and I was thrilled to meet and talk with him.