Christmas Records, Day 24: Dean Martin
Post categories: Christmas records
|09:30 UK time, Thursday, 24 December 2009
Dean Martin and Andy Dunn. Can you spot the difference?
The Kings College Choir are usually on pretty heavy rotation in my house in late December, but even the best of us can tire of those 16 cherubic voices after a while. So when that point is reached (somewhere between laying the table and The Queen's Speech) we reach for Dino.
There's something about that Italian-American accent, the whiff of a late night in Vegas and some straight-up classic Christmas songs that transports you away to a different kind of Christmas. This is not the yuletide of soggy sprouts and re-runs of Dibley, this is Times Square, or a log cabin in upstate New York. It's the Christmas you see in the movies.
We used to have a different Dean Martin Christmas album, but it got all scratched and had something sticky on it, hopefully nothing more sinister than a bit of figgy pud, nevertheless the one we listen to now has digitally re-mastered versions of most of the greats: Let It Snow!, White Christmas, Baby It's Cold Outside and Silent Night. They sound great... but then they always did.
Dino was of course famous for liking a wee dram during his performances so his velvety tones are also a signal that, whatever time it is, the sun is surely over the yardarm - anyone for a Stones Ginger Wine?
N.B. Please drink responsibly. As Dino himself used to say: "If you drink, don't drive... in fact don't even putt"
Dean Martin - Marshmallow World
Comment number 1.
At 16:56 7th Feb 2010, Rememberthe70s wrote:“You Skinny Hebrew”
By: Dean Dino Martin
Never before Available to the General Public
(A 1953 humorous & satirical birthday tribute song from Dean Martin to Jerry Lewis)
Dean Martin (June 7, 1917 – December 25, 1995), born Dino Paul Crocetti in Steubenville, Ohio to Italian immigrant parents, Gaetano and Angela Crocetti.
Martin and Lewis' official debut together occurred at Atlantic City's 500 Club on July 24, 1946 and they were not well received.. More than a few people dubbed them "The Organ Grinder and the Monkey".
Lewis and Martin agreed to "go for broke", to throw out the pre-scripted gags and to improvise. Dean sang and Jerry came out dressed as a busboy, dropping plates and making a shambles of both Martin's performance and the club's sense of decorum until Lewis was chased from the room as Martin pelted him with breadrolls. They did slapstick, reeled off old vaudeville jokes, and did whatever else popped into their heads at the moment. This time, the audience doubled over in laughter. This success led to a series of well-paying engagements on the Eastern seaboard, culminating in a triumphant run at New York's Copacabana.
The act broke up in 1956, 10 years to the day from the first official teaming.
Dino made a public reconciliation with Jerry Lewis on Lewis' Labor Day Muscular Dystrophy Association telethon in 1976. Frank Sinatra shocked Lewis and the world by bringing Martin out on stage. As Martin and Lewis embraced, the audience erupted in cheers and the phone banks lit up, resulting in one of the telethon's most profitable years. Lewis reported the event was one of the three most memorable of his life. Lewis brought down the house when he quipped, "So, you working?" Martin, playing drunk, replied that he was "at the Meggum" – this reference to the MGM Grand Hotel convulsed Lewis. This, along with the death of Martin's son Dean Paul Martin a few years later, helped to bring the two men together. They maintained a quiet friendship but only performed together again once, in 1989, on Dean's 72nd birthday.
Martin died of acute respiratory failure at his home on Christmas morning 1995, at the age of 78.
“You Skinny Hebrew”
By: Dean Dino Martin
Never before Available to the General Public
(A 1953 humorous & satirical birthday tribute song from Dean Martin to Jerry Lewis)
If you go to the Apple iTunes Store and type "You Skinny Hebrew" in the search line, you will see the Dino to Jerry song.
You can also click on this link: https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/you-skinny-hebrew-live/id352134363?i=352134391&ign-mpt=uo%3D4
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