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A Few Words About A few words about...™ Kismet -- in Blu-ray (1 Viewer)

ajabrams

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Doug Bull said:
The first soundtrack recording that I actually bought was a 78rpm. "Aba Daba Honeymoon"/ "Row, Row, Row" from "Two Weeks With Love"
Doug - I had that same 78 when I was very young - I think one of my older sisters bought it. It was one of my two favorite records (the other was Rosemary Clooney singing "Come On-A My House") and I played them so often that the hole in the middle of that yellow label got much bigger. To this day I can sing both "Abba Dabba" and "Row, Row, Row" with every inflection that Debbie Reynolds and Carleton Carpenter used on the recording. It wasn't until many years later that I saw "Two Weeks With Love" on television and, of course I sang along.
 

Matt Hough

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I had reel to reel and cassette tapes of every Fox musical from the 1940s (made just as GlennF described by having a mic right next to the TV speaker and starting and stopping the machine any time a song started) because they didn't release soundtrack albums. Can't tell you how worn out Mother Wore Tights got because I played those songs so much.
 

ahollis

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Matt Hough said:
I had reel to reel and cassette tapes of every Fox musical from the 1940s (made just as GlennF described by having a mic right next to the TV speaker and starting and stopping the machine any time a song started) because they didn't release soundtrack albums. Can't tell you how worn out Mother Wore Tights got because I played those songs so much.
Mercy. I did the same thing. All reel to reel. My family went nuts when I did that because I would demand complete silence from then. The only problem was with Peter Pan when Mary Martin looked at the camera and asked everyone to clap if they believed in fairies. My sisters clapped louder than they ever did. Still have those tapes and enjoy each of then once and awhile.
 

davidmatychuk

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I had a cable with alligator clips connected to the T.V. speaker where the wires were soldered. That's what I used, for radio recording too. Talk all you like, folks!
 

ahollis

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davidmatychuk said:
I had a cable with alligator clips connected to the T.V. speaker where the wires were soldered. That's what I used, for radio recording too. Talk all you like, folks!
My mother keep asking me if there was a way to hook into the TV sound with out the mic. I was not smart about those things then. But then it was an old Zenith color TV that we bought in 1967. Lol.
 

Doug Bull

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I was lucky enough to have an older Brother who was privy to all things technical.
As a result all of our reel to reel soundtrack recordings were done via a direct connection to the TV speakers. (much the same as David's earlier posting)

I even sat upstairs in the Cinema and connected a large reel to reel tape recorder directly into the Cinema's hearing aid sockets.
(I recorded several movies that way including The King and I and Carousel) Thanks to the Cinema Manager's permission.

Those were happy times.

Doug.
 

John Maher_289910

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My grandfather (mother's dad) introduced me to musicals. He used to come to our house and actually bring his console hi-fi with him, and lots of albums, including cast recordings. When stereophonic players were introduced, he gave us his hi-fi, which we replaced with a stereo, in 1963. He also took me to see my very first professional theatrical musical, MY FAIR LADY, in London, starring Julie Andrews and Alec Clunes. It completely changed my life. As for recording off the TV, I did that all the time. Most notably, episodes of LOST IN SPACE, because I loved the score of that series.
 

AnthonyClarke

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The very first 'soundtrack' (actually studio reincarnation) disc I bought was 'Abba Dabba Honeymoon' with 'Row Row Row' on the flipside .. I still have it and still play it -- with a new needle every time of course.
The two most exciting acquisitions were firstly when my parents gained in the 1950s from a friend who bought in the States for them a copy of the very first mono Broadway cast recording of My Fair Lady while that was still banned in Australia (yes, it was actually banned from sale and broadcast) and secondly, in 1973 when I bought as a Christmas present for my wife a German Karousel LP of the soundtrack of Annie Get Your Gun when (just as later on video and DVD) that was just about impossible to buy. I did hear that although early 78s were issued, rights became frozen to Annie Get Your Gun .. some said because Irving Berlin loathed Betty Hutton!
 

Doug Bull

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AnthonyClarke said:
The very first 'soundtrack' (actually studio reincarnation) disc I bought was 'Abba Dabba Honeymoon' with 'Row Row Row' on the flipside .. I still have it and still play it -- with a new needle every time of course.
The two most exciting acquisitions were firstly when my parents gained in the 1950s from a friend who bought in the States for them a copy of the very first mono Broadway cast recording of My Fair Lady while that was still banned in Australia (yes, it was actually banned from sale and broadcast) and secondly, in 1973 when I bought as a Christmas present for my wife a German Karousel LP of the soundtrack of Annie Get Your Gun when (just as later on video and DVD) that was just about impossible to buy. I did hear that although early 78s were issued, rights became frozen to Annie Get Your Gun .. some said because Irving Berlin loathed Betty Hutton!
Anthony, (see previous page) we both bought the same 78 as our first disc. (that's spooky)
I bought mine from a small radio repair/record shop in Bay street, North Brighton, just off Hampton Street. (not far away from your domain)

As far as I know the old MGM soundtrack recordings were often made up and edited from a variety of different takes.
Even the old 16" Radio transcription Soundtrack discs featured alternative versions.
I'm lucky enough to have about 50 of those old acetate Soundtrack discs, although they are starting to peel and flake, making them difficult to play.
The beauty of these old 16" Studio supplied Radio discs is that many films featured were never made available on commercial recordings.

I've also displayed the label from a "Annie Get Your Gun" 78 rpm from the early fifties on the previous page.
My brother purchased the set of 4 discs locally. So it was readily available in Oz before the ban.
It was also available here as a 10" LP during the fifties.

annie lp2.jpg
annie ep.jpg

The original 10" MGM soundtrack LP. One of two 45rpm EPs released in Britain during the 50s.

Doug.
 

Matt Hough

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There is another reason why those MGM soundtracks were so precious to me. The local TV stations in my area didn't seem to buy many of the MGM syndicated movie packages (they must have been super expensive to license). For example, other than In the Good Old Summertime and Summer Stock (and Oz, of course), I hadn't seen any of Judy Garland's celebrated MGM work like St. Louis, Harvey Girls, Easter Parade, The Pirate, or the Mickey-Judy movies until the advent of home video. Even the revival theater we had in Charlotte didn't program them. So, the official soundtracks and unlicensed LP releases recorded off the soundtracks were all I had to go on. Suffice to say movies like Kismet, Kiss Me Kate, It's Always Fair Weather, etc. were also not a part of my movie knowledge apart from the soundtrack recordings for many years.
 

Ethan Riley

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I guess I was lucky. In Los Angeles, they all ran repeatedly in the 70s. There was an MGM package that would run on Saturday afternoons and I saw all of those. There was a Goldwyn package that ran sporadically. Sundays had RKO packages along with FOX. There was a show that would run Shirley Temples, Francis the Talking Mules, or Ma and Pa Kettles in rotation. Nobody needed AMC or home video in those days!
 

Rob_Ray

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bigshot said:
Tom Hatten made sure we all saw classic films in LA.
I still have copies of many films where Tom had an in-house guest (Bette Davis, Ruby Keeler, etc.) or did a telephone interview (Claudette Colbert). He would often have week-long tributes to stars or directors (Busby Berkeley, Preston Sturges). Those were the days, even though the prints were old 16s and often cut for time.

Ruby Keeler, in particular, was very self-effacing and down-to-earth. When Tom would praise her singing and dancing, she's admonish him with, "Oh come on, Tom!". And she described Footlight Parade's Shanghai Lil number as "Jimmy's relentless search for this exotic creature and when he finds her, out of the barrel pops this little nothing!"
 

John Maher_289910

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All those films played with regularity in Philadelphia, as well. I wasn't even that much of a fan of MGM's stuff. We also got all the Universal musicals (where the hell are they???) and Fox (my favorites). Between the old stuff on television and the current stuff at the cinemas, (not to mention the Philadelphia try-outs and Broadway shows) I was sure exposed to a lot of musicals when I was growing up.
 

Doug Bull

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I'm using my sometimes questionable memory here, but I'm sure that after a couple of the original "Topper" films released by MGM, our very first truly MGM production shown on TV in Australia was "Mrs. Miniver"

I remember setting up the audio Tape recorder to copy the soundtrack (using David's alligator clip method) and to actually have a recording of Leo roaring over the opening titles.
That was a huge thrill back then and certainly a moment to cherish.

Doug.
 

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I've loved reading these stories. Whilst I'm younger (32) I can add my own story, which involved me holding a tape recorder to the speaker of a TV to record the audio of "Nancy Goes to Rio", from a video which had been leant to me by one of my aunt's friends. The film had been taped from one of its airings on TNT (yes, TNT) and had lots of cool bumpers saying "We now return to Ann Sothern and Jane Powell in "Nancy Goes to Rio"".

Just goes to prove what my 'technological capabilities' were, back when I was 13 years old or something.
 

AnthonyClarke

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I used my tape recorder for almost the same thing .. in my case, to get highlights of the soundtrack of 'To Have and Have Not' with Hoagy Carmichael and Lauren Bacall ... though legend has it that Lauren couldn't sing, and the voice we heard singing 'Am I blue' was in fact the very young Andy Williams.
My record store was a radio shop too, opposite Hampton Station. I dropped in one day after I heard an amazing new record called 'Heartbreak Hotel' by someone called Elvis Presley' "Sorry mate, that's sold out", my friendly retailer said. "But this is the same song and it's just as good", and he slid across the counter a 78 of 'Heartbreak Hotel' by another singer, one Stan Freberg.
By golly, I liked it even better. Still have it.
 

Doug Bull

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Little things meant so much in those happy and uncomplicated times - the fifties

Example: A small suburban shop selling haberdashery among other things, also had a range of 78rpm recordings.
This was of course before the LP came along.
They usually stacked their supply of records flat on the counter in about 4 or 5 piles.
You would pick up one record at a time from a pile and put it down elsewhere to start a new pile.

You could see hints of the upcoming disc's label color, through the spindle holes, as you went through the pile.
MGM had the distinct YELLOW label, so whenever I spotted a hint of yellow coming up I would get very excited.
Could it be another MGM soundtrack recording from an upcoming musical?
One record to go and then that Yellow label would be exposed. What will it be? The excitement grew.

OH NO!!! PLEASE NO !!! Damn!!! it's , George Shearing!!! Joni James!!!! Billy Eckstine!!!!

But sometimes it did turn out to be something absolutely wonderful.
Jane Powell, Howard Keel, Fred Astaire, Gene Kelly, Anita Ellis ;) and that fabulous MGM Studio Orchestra.
I'll never lose my love for that old yellow label.

Doug.
 

Rob_Ray

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Back in the early 80s in the old MGM Grand Hotel in Las Vegas, someone had dumped some old MGM playback studio recordings into the bins at the MGM memorabiliia store. My friend picked up a playback recording of a song called "The Sobbin' Women" from the MGM production soon to begin filming entitled "A Bride for Seven Brothers". I can only imagine that the Production Code office must have later demanded that they add six more brides.
 

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