Bing Crosby

Bing Crosby. His voice makes me melt. 

When I was growing up he was legend in my house, still is. Most will know him best from the movie and signature song, "White Christmas". White Christmas became the bestselling single for more than 50 years movie that my family watches ever year at Christmas time. Bing Crosby kind of fell into the music world and won millions over with his smooth velvety voice. 

Background:

Bing Crosby was the fourth of seven children of Tacoma, Washington, brewery bookkeeper Harry Lowe Crosby and Kate Harrigan Crosby. He studied law at Gonzaga University in Spokane but was more interested in playing the drums and singing with a local band. In the early 1930s Bing's brother Everett sent a record of Bing singing "I Surrender, Dear" to the president of CBS. His live performances from New York were carried over the national radio network for 20 consecutive weeks in 1932. His radio success led Paramount Pictures to include him in The Big Broadcast (1932), a film featuring radio favorites. His songs about not needing a bundle of money to make life happy was the right message for the decade of the Great Depression. His relaxed, low-key style carried over into the series of "Road" comedies he made with pal Bob Hope. He won the best actor Oscar for playing an easygoing priest in Going My Way (1944). He showed that he was indeed an actor as well as a performer when he played an alcoholic actor down on his luck opposite Grace Kelly in The Country Girl (1954).

As a Jazz Singer:

Bing Crosby became a movie and TV icon, he was a singer, one of the most popular America has ever known. A large portion of Bing’s song output was jazz, recorded with some of the very best jazz musicians of the era. Crosby's jazz-inspired phrasing and laid-back rascality were an inspiration to Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, and even rhythm-&-blues singer Roy Brown, among many others.

Crosby has had numerous jazz affiliations including with his first vocal group, The Rhythm Boys, but is normally classified as a pop music figure. Be that as it may, he remains associated with jazz through his many appearances with jazz greats, through his love for the music of jazz, and through his singing on several swinging jazz sides and albums. Crosby never studied music seriously. He was blessed with a naturally warm, deep, resonant, and appealing voice and learned how to phrase with it almost by osmosis. In the early 30’s Crosby’s chumming around with the jazz greats of the day helped him pick up on jazz phrasing. He claimed, "I used to hang around The Dorseys and Bix and Bunny Berigan and Glenn Miller and Joe Venuti and Eddie Lang - all the musicians I admired - and I was having a helluva good time. I really had no idea that I was learning anything. But I certainly was."

There Ain't No Sweet Man Worth The Salt of My 

with Bix Biderbecke

Bing comes in after about a minute of instrumental they scat and have very tight harmonies. 

This is one of my favorite collaborations Bing Crosby does with Louis Armstrong. Its so fun to hear Bing's voice and Louis bantering back and forth adding flare, its so laid back and fun to listen to. Scatting sharing the melody and speak singing. Where its like an endless seam of a conversation back and forth between speech and the jazzy vocal line. Its so genuine and believable. ABA and the background staying constant with a mellow rhythmic beat then Bing and Louis improvising above above the foundational percussion. 

Enjoy the recordings!