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Singer Lloyd Price (1933-2021)

Mr. Personality

It wasn’t until I was watching CBS Sunday Morning on May 9 that I heard about the death of Lloyd Price six days earlier. He was a rhythm and blues star and an early rock influence.

Lloyd was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1998. Of the “rock and roll pioneer,” the site noted that he propelled “his own music career and [broke] down doors for Little Richard and Elvis Presley to deliver rock and roll to millions of fans.

“As an entertainment industry entrepreneur, [he] wrote smash hits, launched and owned clubs and record labels, and promoted concerts and sporting events. His talent, positive energy, tireless drive, and love of music still reverberate to this day.”

Lawdy Miss Clawdy, #1 RB for seven weeks in 1952 – a groundbreaking cut that I recall, even though it came out before I was born
Oooh-Oooh-Oooh, #4 RB in 1952, he had several massive hits on the black charts that did not cross over in those pre-rock days
Restless Heart, #5 RB in 1952
Ain’t It A Shame, #4 RB in 1953
Tell Me Pretty Baby, #8 RB in 1953 – a real New Orleans feel

After a stint in Korea for the US Army

Just Because, #3 RB for two weeks, #29 pop in 1957
Stagger Lee, #1 for four weeks both RB and pop in 1959. From PBS: “‘American Bandstand’ host Dick Clark worried the song was too violent for his teen-centered show and pressed Price to revise it: For ‘Bandstand’ watchers and some future listeners, Stagger Lee and Billy peacefully resolve their dispute.”

Where Were You (On Our Wedding Day), #4 RB, #23 pop in 1959
Personality, #1 RB for four weeks, #2 for three weeks pop in 1959. This hit, plus his affable nature, led to his nickname, “Mr. Personality.”
I’m Gonna Get Married, #1 RB for three weeks, #3 for two weeks pop in 1959
Come Into My Heart, #2 RB for three weeks, #20 pop in 1959

Wont’cha Come Home, #6 RB, #43 pop in 1960
Lady Luck, #3 RB for three weeks, #14 pop in 1960
Question, #5 RB, #19 pop in 1960
Misty, #11 RB, #21 pop in 1963. The standard.

More music

Lloyd Price “found his way into other professions through a wide range of friends and acquittances. He… along with boxing promoter Don King, helped stage the 1973 ‘Thrilla in Manila’ between Joe Frazier and Muhammad Ali and the 1974 ‘Rumble in the Jungle’ championship fight between Ali and George Foreman. He was also a home builder, a booking agent, an excellent bowler, and the creator of a line of food products.”

Supremely sad: Mary Wilson, RIP

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The story goes that elementary school girls Mary Wilson and Florence Ballard entered a talent contest. By 1959, they became part of a group called the Primettes, along with a couple of other girls from the Detroit projects, Diane Ross and Betty McGlown. McGlown was replaced by Barbara Martin.

The group changed its name from the Primettes to the Supremes. Martin left, and they went forward as a trio. They were immediately…not very successful. A half dozen songs, none of which cracked the pop Top 40. They were the “no-hit Supremes.”

The group was offered a song the Marvelettes didn’t want, Where Did Our Love Go, written by Holland-Dozier-Holland. They were resistant to recording someone else’s rejects. It went to #1, as did several more tracks. They were the second most successful group on the singles charts in the 1960s.

And the Supremes were the epitome of style with appearances on the Ed Sullivan a dozen times, plus several other music shows. They were not just singers but role models, with their hair, makeup and outfits fastidiously tended to.

But Diana, who had changed her name at the beginning of their successful run, was now getting virtually all of the leads. Mary and Flo were doing a lot of background vocals, which got a bit boring.

By 1967, the billing changed to Diana Ross and the Supremes, to Flo’s dismay. Very long story short, Florence was replaced by Cindy Birdsong. But it was clear that Diana was considered the singular star.

Mary and Cindy didn’t even appear on seven later singles including I’m Livin’ in Shame, The Composer, and Someday We’ll Be Together, though, of course, they appeared on the live version of the latter.

Post-Ross

Jean Terrell took Diana’s slot, but Mary got more chances to sing lead. And she kept the “new” Supremes together, with a rotating cast of members, until 1977.

After a series of legal wranglings, Mary Wilson became the keeper of the Supremes’ flame, writing four books with the word “Supreme” in the title. The one in 2019 was Supreme Glamour.

In 2003, she was “named a US cultural ambassador by the State Department, touring the world and talking to young people about the dangers of HIV and AIDS…

“The family asked that friends and fans support the United Negro College Fund or the Humpty Dumpty Institute. The latter group helps in landmine clearance projects around the world. Wilson… was a spokesperson for the group.”

Some songs

Mary Wilson sang or shared the lead on these, and a few others:

1962: Baby Don’t Go (from Meet The Supremes)
1965: It Makes No Difference Now (From The Supremes Sing Country, Western, and Pop)
1966: Come and Get These Memories (from The Supremes A’ Go-Go)
1967 Falling in Love with Love (from The Supremes Sing Rodgers and Hart)
1969: Can’t Take My Eyes Off You (from Together -Diana Ross and the Supremes, and The Temptations)
1972: A Heart Like Mine (from Floy Joy)
1972: I Keep It Hid (from The Supremes, Produced and Arranged by Jimmy Webb)
1975: Early Morning Love (from The Supremes)
1975: You Turn Me Around (from The Supremes)
1976: Til The Boat Sails Away (from High Energy)

She was a March Pisces like I am, so I had a certain particular affection for her. Here’s my post from Mary’s 70th birthday in 2014, with links to more familiar Supremes fare.

Alex Trebek (22 July 1940-8 Nov 2020)

most game show episodes hosted by the same presenter on the same program

My daughter came up to the office yesterday and said, “Why didn’t you tell me about Alex?” A minute later, I got the sad, but not unexpected news from a Los Angeles Times newsflash that Alex Trebek had died.

In March 2019, Trebek told JEOPARDY! fans that he had been diagnosed with Stage 4 pancreatic cancer. It is a nasty disease that killed three people I knew in real life in 2019, as well as astronaut Sally Ride and QoS Aretha Franklin.

Alex Trebek kept up his hosting, and his humor, wisdom, and grace did not seem to diminish. If anything, he was more forthcoming, such as when he asked fans to guess when he needed a toupee after his treatments.

He was born George Alexander Trebek in Sudbury, Ontario, Canada on July 22, 1940, After growing up in a bilingual household, he earned a degree in philosophy at the University of Ottawa. He did various jobs with the Canadian Broadcasting Company (CBC), before moving to the United States in 1973.

I first noticed Trebek hosting a variety of game shows, most notably High Rollers, before taking over JEOPARDY! in 1984. Having seen the first two episodes recently, it took a little time before he honed the persona that has suited him so well for over 8,000 episodes in 37 seasons.

As I’ve noted several times on this blog, I appeared on JEOPARDY! on November 9 and 10, 1998. It was filmed in Boston. I mentioned that most recently here.

Record setter

Trebek held the Guinness World Record for the most game show episodes hosted by the same presenter on the same program since June 13, 2014. He overtook Bob Barker of The Price is Right. He also hosted the National Geographic Bee for 25 years, until 2013.

Trebek has won five Daytime Emmy Awards for outstanding game show host. In 2011, he received a Peabody Award for “encouraging, celebrating and rewarding knowledge,” and a lifetime achievement award from the folks who present the Daytime Emmys.

But beyond his hosting, Trebek became a cultural icon. He had appeared in dozens of television shows and movies, usually as himself or a variation thereof. The What is… Cliff Clavin? episode of Cheers in 1990 was one of the first of many. His star is on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, near those of Ann-Margret and Vincent Price. Trebek was the familiar spokesperson for Colonial Penn Life Insurance.

Alex Trebek participated in 13 USO tours. He “traveled to many developing countries in support of World Vision, reporting on the organization’s efforts on behalf of children. He adopted a village in Zambia, Africa, helping to build a school, homes for teachers, and a medical facility.”

The book

He spoke of writing his memoir, The Answer Is… which was released on July 21, 2020. “The longer I’ve lived with the cancer, the more my definition of toughness has changed. I used to think not crying meant you were tough. Now I think crying means you’re tough. It means you’re strong enough to be honest and vulnerable. It means you’re not pretending.”

Check out soon a video reel, which will expire 1/1/2021.

When he married Jean Trebek (Jean Currivan), at the ceremony he gave his wedding vow as a joke on the Jeopardy! rule of phrasing an answer as a question by saying, “The answer is … yes”. He taped his last shows on October 29, 2020. He died at home, surrounded by Jean, and their two adult children, Emily and Matthew, and other family and friends. Here’s a brief obit.

JEOPARDY! episodes hosted by Trebek will air through December 25, 2020. The show is not announcing plans for a new host at this time.

John Thompson, Tom Seaver

Mets and Hoyas

I’ve been pondering something since the deaths of basketball Hall of Fame coach John Thompson and baseball Hall of Fame pitcher Tom Seaver. It is that being a sports fan was hugely significant to me for a chunk of my life. But it has waned in recent years.

I could tell you, without looking it up, who won the World Series every year in the 1960s. For the 2010s, I could recall only four. And two of them, the 2017 Houston Astros and the 2018 Boston Red Sox were arguably tarnished.

Tom Terrific

After the decline of my New York Yankees after their 1964 Series loss to the St. Louis Cardinals, I started following their crosstown rivals, the Mets. But they were pretty terrible. They put this young pitcher, Tom Seaver, into the rotation in 1967, and he went 16-13, with a 2.76 ERA. Pretty good on a team that went 61-101. In 1968, the Mets were 73-89, their most wins ever. Seaver was 16-12 but lowered his ERA to 2.20.

By 1969, the leagues divided into East and West divisions. Shockingly, the Mets amazed sports fans with a 100-62 record. They swept the West’s Atlanta Braves in three games. They were widely assumed to be the underdogs to the Baltimore Orioles with the Robinsons Franks and Brooks, among other stars. Yet the Mets won the World Series four games to one. Tom Seaver in 1969 went 25-7, with a 2.21 ERA.

A letter writer in the Boston Globe remembers this. “That year, Seaver had made a statement that ‘if the Mets can win the World Series, then we can get out of Vietnam,’ an extraordinary act in those days for a professional athlete.”

I followed Seaver through his career with the Cincinnati Reds and Chicago White Sox. I forgot he pitched for the Red Sox in 1986, but he was injured during the 1986 Series, so didn’t play against the winners, NYM. It was just as well for the legacy of the greatest Met. He died in late August in his sleep of complications of Lewy body dementia and Covid-19.

Big John

For a couple years in the mid-1960s, John Thompson was a backup center for Bill Russell of the Boston Celtics. It was probably before I saw the Celtics in an exhibition game at the IBM Country Club in Endicott, NY. The NBA’s Celtics and the New York Knicks were my teams then.

I didn’t become a follower of the men’s college game until the late 1970s. I tended to root for the teams in the Big East, which was formed in 1979 and featured Syracuse, the premiere team in upstate New York. But I’d root for any BE team, including Georgetown, against non-conference opponents.

John Thompson inherited a Georgetown Hoyas team which had been 3–23 the year before. He led them to a .500 record in season two. “By his third season in 1974–75, Georgetown qualified for the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 1943.”

So when North Carolina beat Georgetown in the March Madness finals in 1982, I was disappointed. And when the Hoyas beat Houston in 1984, making John Thompson the first black coach to win the Final Four, I was quite thrilled. And when underdog Villanova, from the Big East, beat Georgetown in the championship game in 1985, it was actually OK. “Over 27 years, Thompson’s Hoyas went 596–239 (.714), running off a streak of 24 postseason appearances – 20 in the NCAA tournament and 4 in the NIT.”

Thompson’s coaching legacy includes the recruitment and development of four players in the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame: Patrick Ewing, Alonzo Mourning, Dikembe Mutombo, and Allen Iverson.” Iverson thanked Thompson for “saving my life” in an Instagram post.

Sean Gregory wrote in an appreciation for Time, “No coach of his generation, in any sport, was more influential.” John Thompson died in late August.

Chadwick Boseman – Wakanda forever

learned to T’Challa

I’ve been musing on why I found the death of Chadwick Boseman so affecting. Only recently I noted three films he starred in. “MARSHALL (2017) a biopic starring Chadwick Boseman as Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall I had intended to see.” Ditto for the film GET ON UP (2014), about the Godfather of Soul James Brown that I had coincidentally recorded to the DVR last month.

I had started watching 42 (2013) the movie about Jackie Robinson. It was the day I was being discharged from the hospital after a health scare. I think I tried to stall my release time to finish watching it.

Cancer. As the Chicago Tribune noted, “The cancer was there when his character T’Challa visited the ancestors’ ‘astral plane’ in poignant scenes from the Oscar-nominated ‘Black Panther,’ there when he first became a producer on the action-thriller ’21 Bridges,’ and there last summer when he shot an adaptation of a play by his hero August Wilson…”

The South Carolinian died at the age of 43 of colon cancer, only a couple years older than my brother-in-law John when he died of the same damn disease in 2002. And while I knew of John’s struggle, most of us didn’t know Chadwick had been diagnosed at stage 3 in 2016. It was none of our business, but I’m always surprised when something can remain a secret in Hollywood.

A bit of Killmonger

I totally get this quote. Boseman said he “more easily identified with” Black Panther’s “antagonist, played by Michael B. Jordan, who had been cut off from his ancestral roots: ‘I was born with some Killmonger in me, and I have learned to T’Challa throughout my studies.'”

“‘It’s the place where you start. All African Americans, unless they have some direct connection, have been severed from that past. There are things that cannot be tracked. You were a product, sold. So it’s very difficult as an African American to connect at some points directly to Africa. I have made that part of my search in my life. So those things were already there when I got into the role.'”

In my review of Black Panther, which I LOVED, that Chadwick Boseman had the less showy part. That’s not meant as a knock on the actor. The “villain” often gets the juicier role.

Incidentally, the Howard University graduate noted on Stephen Colbert’s show his roots. DNA testing indicated that his ancestors were Krio people and Limba people from Sierra Leone, and the Yoruba people from Nigeria.

His unexpected death brought out tons of tributes. “Marvel Studios president and CCO Kevin Feige called Boseman’s death ‘absolutely devastating,'” and I would agree. “‘Each time he stepped on set, he radiated charisma and joy, and each time he appeared on screen, he created something truly indelible.'” As a good friend of mine and I said when we departed last month, “Wakanda forever.”