March 17, tickets go on sale for Petula Clark at Mohegan Sun, in Connecticut, on Mother’s Day. It’s about an 80-mile drive from home. I’ve never seen her live, and I’m certainly hoping to be there.
(That’s a screen grab, so it isn’t clickable.)
Category: Music
Sibley Declares Pet ‘Dame-in-Waiting’
I would like to direct your attention over to Brian Sibley’s blog, where, at this link, he has written a lovely piece promoting the Dame Petula Clark PET-ition. Being an Englishman born and bred, his input should pack a bit more welly than my Boston-based entreaties. Thank you, Brian. (Just reading his stuff compels me to write with more style than my usual pedestrian prose!)
PETition Home Stretch
We’re getting close to March 12! That’s the last day for UK citizens and residents to e-sign Irene Seaton’s PETition for Prime Minister Brown to recommend Petula Clark be awarded the title of Dame.
Today the post (to use the UK vernacular) brought quite a surprise. A large envelope from The International Petula Clark Society in England. Thank you, Terry Young and Bonnie Miller! The contents include a lavish program book from Pet’s appearance at Theatre Royal on November 26, 2006 with the BBC Concert Orchestra. November ’06 was also when the BBC broadcast Petula Clark: Blue Lady. You can watch it at this link.
My wondering eyes also beheld an autographed 8×10 glossy photo. These days, images developed on photographic paper are becoming increasingly rare, and this scan just doesn’t do justice to the image quality of this lovely, suitable-for-framing portrait.
Here’s a Petula Clark song from 1967 that you may not have heard in a while. I remember it from listening to WABC in NYC.
[audio:http://www.dograt.com/Audio/2008/FEB/CatInTheWindow.mp3]Radio station am740 in Canada featured Petula on its Applause show shortly before her birthday. Here it is.
[audio:http://www.dograt.com/Audio/2008/FEB/PetulaApplause.mp3]Walter Cronkite and The Beatles
A few weeks ago I posted a picture of two sisters, backstage with The Beatles at the Ed Sullivan Show. Who at CBS, I asked, would have had enough clout to arrange such a meeting? I received several e-mail requests for the answer. Here are the girls, Nancy and Kathy Cronkite, with their father.
Walter Cronkite takes credit for having shown a news clip about The Beatles that caught the attention of Ed Sullivan. And the rest is, of course, history. I extend my sincere thanks and appreciation to CBS News for providing this video.
© 2007 CBS Worldwide Inc.[media id=229 width=440 height=350]
Curvebender’s Kaleidoscope Eyes
One of the most impressive and praiseworthy objects I have ever beheld, held, and owned, is the RTB Book: Recording The Beatles, by Kevin Ryan and Brian Kehew, published under their Curvebender Publishing imprint. As I said a year or so ago, at $100 this book is a bargain.
Curvebender has a new Beatles book coming out, called Kaleidoscope Eyes: A Day In The Life of Sgt. Pepper. It’s a collection of photographs, taken during the day in 1967 when recording began for “Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds.”
Limited to 1967 copies, it costs a whopping $495, and at that price I would consider this book to be an extravagent indulgence, so I won’t be buying it. Nevertheless, I hope it sells out and goes up in value.
Over at one of the Wired blogs is this item about a Beatles exhibit at the Museum of Making Music in Carlsbad, CA. The show is curated by Kehew and Ryan, and features original recording and playback equipment that the Beatles used at Abbey Road Studio 2.
You can hear the classic songs coming out of the same speakers used in the sessions, and gawp at the original technology, some never before seen in public.
Gawp indeed! This is almost irresistibly tantalizing. If the exhibit were in New York, I would go.
In other Beatles related doings, we watched Across The Universe with Eric, who commented that The Beatles are “eternally cool.” That’s good to know. Our enjoyment of the movie benefited greatly from watching it with the Panasonic PT-AX200U video projector.
“I want to make Pet a Dame!”
Have only just a sec’, because I’m supposed to be on break! Petula Clark fan Richard Harries is featured in this Yorkshire Evening Post article.