Walk Like An Egyptian - The Puppini Sisters

Sometimes inspiration comes from unusual place - and in the case of The Puppini Sisters (who aren't actually sisters at all, but names themselves as a tribute to The Andrews Sisters) that inspiration for founder Marcella Puppini came from the movie, The Triplets of Belleville.  After seeing the movie, Puppini formed the group and they had a huge hit in the UK with their rendition of The Andrews Sisters classic, "Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy."

Happy listening!

The Puppini Sisters – Walk Like An Egyptian

Take This Job and Shove It - Johnny Paycheck

My sentiments exactly. Johnny Paycheck was the stage name of Donald Eugene Lytle. He led a very colorful life, including a prison sentence for shooting someone (grazing their head, not killing them).

Happy Thursday!

Johnny Paycheck – Take This Job And Shove It

Aganju - Bebel Gilberto

Bossa Nova vocalist Bebel Gilberto (known in many circles as just Bebel) is Brazilian musical royalty. The daughter of Joao Gilberto (The Girl from Ipanema) and the singer Miucha, she grew up around a constant stream of music and concerts, recording for the first time with her mother at the age of 7.

That said, Bebel has definitely made a name for herself as her own musician; she certainly is not resting on the fame of her parents. She remains a fantastic modern example of the beautiful artistry of the genre.

Happy listening!

Bebel Gilberto – Aganju

Thriller - Michael Jackson

Just cuz.

And also because it won 8 Grammys.

Happy (almost) Halloween, and happy listening!

Michael Jackson – Thriller

Werewolves of London - Warren Zevon

Halloween week!  This weeks music selections are all about this special week of tricks and treats. And excess sugar.

We start with this classic by Warren Zevon. Originally released in 1978, this was one of the tracks that made the album, "Excitable Boy" extremely successful and helped Zevon become a familiar face in the music scene of the late seventies.

Zevon died of cancer back in 2003, very shortly after his release of his last album, "The Wind."  He has the distinctive honor of having won two Grammy Awards - both awarded  after his death, and both for this final album.

Warren Zevon – Werewolves Of London

Creole Love Song - Chanticleer

If you have never heard of Chanticleer... catch up, little tomato.


The San Francisco based ensemble was originally founded in 1978 by a graduate student in musicology interested in developing a group that sang music from the medieval and Renaissance periods. He used only male voices, as was the tradition in most churches during the Renaissance.To name the group, "Chanticleer" was suggested - the name of the "clear singing" rooster in Chaucer's Canterbury Tales.

The group has morphed over the years, and has included more than 100 singers over that time.  I had a chance to hear these guys perform a little over a year ago - and it was, hands down, the best concert I have ever attended. Their repertoire has expanded beyond their renaissance and medieval roots, and now perform an incredible array of music.

If you ever have a chance to hear them, I promise you, it will be like nothing else you have ever heard.

This video is from their concert in Budapest in January of this year.

Happy listening!

The Things Our Fathers Loved - Jan DeGaetani

Jan DeGaetani was someone whose voice I heard periodically through my undergraduate music days. She was featured on several recordings on the required listening lists. What I found so incredible was how lovely her voice was while she was singing all these wacky crazy contemporary pieces. She made several recordings still admired today of contemporary work, including the recording of George Crumb's masterpiece Ancient Voices of Children and Schoenberg's Pierrot Lunaire.

As I researched a bit more about her, I was surprised to learn that not only was she a Julliard graduate, but her students include some of the most notable voices in music of recent years, including Dawn Upshaw, Renee Fleming, and Karen Holvik.

She passed away back in 1989 from Leukemia at the age of 56, but I find her recordings to be amazingly sensitive and timeless.  This is a recording of the Charles Ives song, "The Things Our Fathers Loved."  The text is as follows:


I think there must be a place in the soul
all made of tunes, of tunes of long ago;
I hear the organ on the Main Street corner,
Aunt Sarah humming Gospels; Summer evenings,
The village cornet band, playing in the square.
The town's Red, White and Blue,
all Red, White and Blue; Now! Hear the words
But they sing in my soul of the things our Fathers loved.


Jan DeGaetani and Gilbert Kalish – The Things Our Fathers Loved