Well, after the commentary on the previous installment of I Remember JFK, the subject of this week's column was pretty obvious. The public wants Herb Alpert! And what the public wants, it gets, at least this time. :-)
Herb Alpert was born on March 31, 1935. That makes him a bit too senior to be a Boomer, but he was a strong source of memories for the Boomer generation.
His father was a tailor who emigrated from Russia. His family loved music, and he grew up listening to his father play mandolin, his California-born mother play violin, his sister the piano, and his brother the drums. When Herb was eight, he decided that he wanted to learn the trumpet.
A prodigy he was not. It took Herb years to make the trumpet sound the way he wanted. But he patiently stuck with it, and by the time he was sixteen, he had formed a small band that played weddings, bar mitzvahs, and the like in his L.A. neighborhood.
Not yet convinced that music was his future, he enrolled at USC after high school and joined the gymnastics team. However, he also played with the Trojans' marching band. In 1955, he was drafted into the army. He was able to grab local musical gigs during evenings to help support his new wife and family.
In 1957, Herb garnered a job as a songwriter for Keen records. He struck up a partnership with Lou Adler, who was also just starting out. Together, they penned some familiar refrains, including What a Wonderful World (with Sam Cooke), Alley Oop for the Hollywood Argyles, and Baby Talk for Jan and Dean.
Here's fodder for you trivia fans: Herb tried his hand at acting, and landed a bit role blowing a shofar in Cecil B. DeMille's The Ten Commandments. However, he decided that music was a better career move than the silver screen, much to the delight of us Boomers.
It was 1962 that saw him take a quantum leap in the field of music. In his garage/studio, he recorded a tune that featured crowd noise and his own layered horn playing. It was released as The Lonely Bull by The Tijuana Brass featuring Herb Alpert. Not only was the song a Top Twenty hit, but it was actually released by an independent record company that Herb and his pal Jerry Moss had founded. The company was known as Carnival Records, but would soon change its name to A&M.
Alpert saw his future producing Latin-tinged brass recordings. He cut several more songs and released the album The Lonely Bull. The Tijuana Brass was still just Herb, magically overdubbed in the studio.
The public clamored for live appearances, so Alpert hired a team of session musicians. Though the sound was distinctly south of the border, the TJB consisted of Italians, Jews, and one plain old American. Non-Latino comedian Bill Dana also frequently appeared in concerts.
With the luxury of controlling his own releases, Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass cranked out hit single after hit single. The group also gained a bit of notoriety with the album cover for Whipped Cream and Other Delights, featuring a beautiful young lady clad in nothing but, yes, whipped cream.
The TJB's mellow brass tunes punctuated Top Forty lists dominated by the British Invasion, protest music, and Woodstock generation hard rock. Their sound appealed to Boomers, their parents, and their grandparents. This was an amazing accomplishment in an era dominated by a generation gap.
In 1969, Herb felt the need to change a few things in his life. That meant the end of the Tijuana Brass. It also meant a divorce, and marrying the new love in his life, musician Lani Hall. He began concentrating on running A&M Records and finding new talent. And find new talent he did.
During the 70's, A&M signed and recorded Carpenters, Carole King, Billy Preston, Peter Frampton, Styx, and Supertramp, among many others.
However, the economic upheavals of the 70's beat up on A&M like it did so many other corporate entities. In 1979, facing serious financial difficulties, its co-founder went back to his trumpet and the recording studio and came up with Rise. Not only did it top the charts, it was adopted as the theme for the 1980 Olympics. A&M would officially survive the 70's.
The company continued to fly high through the 80's. In 1987, they sold out to Polygram, with the understanding that Moss and Alpert would still call the shots. They did so until 1993, when they grew tired of dealing with corporate stupidity that has led directly to the RIAA-influenced/infected record business of today. Herb and Jerry bailed in time to watch the whole monstrous mess stagger towards its present day near-extinction.
The duo started another independent label, Almo Sounds, and they continue to find and sign new talent. Their biggest success is Garbage, a band that's just a bit too new for an old goat like me to dig.
So here's a hearty tip of the fedora to Herb Alpert: musician extraordinaire and record exec with a conscience. BTW, he and Lani are still together, happily married and touring. Perhaps one day the dying record industry will look at the success of this visionary and change. Nah, I don't think so.
Comments (10)
Yes indeed, my parents listened to HAATB on albums on a portable stereo record player during the sixties. And I remember liking the sound. Later on in the seventies, I aqquired a few of HAATB eight tracks! Yes, I'm sorry, I was a product of the eight tracks. Herbs Trumpet was very good and the Band was tight! I think today, his music from that period holds up! The TJBrass sound also had a risky sense of sound to it also. I am sure some of it may have been played in Go Go clubs? But I wouldn't know about stuff like that. Herbs music is also heard in Cheech and Chung Up in Smoke when they go down to Tijuanna! Mom still has his albums. I still have my eight tracks!
Posted by Rivers End | January 17, 2010 7:47 AM
Posted on January 17, 2010 07:47
I adore Herb Albert!
I had all of his albums.
I am surprised that you didn't post a you tube of HIM...guess I will have to do that for you. Thanks for the memories.
Sharon
~The Baby Boomer Queen~
Posted by Sharon/Baby Boomer Queen | January 17, 2010 2:02 PM
Posted on January 17, 2010 14:02
What an excellent choice for a topic, Ron. I first became familiar with Herb when I was six. My dad bought and played South of the Border. He quickly got more. I think it might have been Lonely Bull, with others to follow. I knew them all well. I would even play them myself. Dad had an old RCA record player and a single speaker cabinet which was an amplifier, mono.
Herb could be heard in many places. The Dating Game featured him exclusively. Even the Simpsons have played him several times. Herb appealed to such a wide audience because his music was so great. To me, Herb was part of the essence of the 60s. It would not have been the same without him. He did cover some Beatles tunes. He could play somber melancholy material as well as the “Tijuana” sound. Mexico has always like brass. We heard Johnny Cash use the brass in Ring of Fire. But Herb took a sort of style and improved on it and even made it better.
The Beatles had done similar with taking rhythm and soul, and rock a billy and made it better, and shipped it back to us new and improved and touch off a revolution. Herb did this, too. Remember that it was very conservative in most of America at this time and yet Herb appeal to the very toughest audience, conservative America and yet still could attract the young. Perhaps we are so far removed from that time that we forget what a miracle it was to accomplish such a feat. Herb did it with ease. Really, I don’t know if Herb’s star shines in the rock n roll Hall of Fame, but perhaps it should, even if it is not technically Rock. It was pop-ular and deserve special recognition in my view.
For me personally, who deeply loves music, Herb’s 1st 4 albums were so full of optimism, energy, inspiration and pure joy. I missed him for years and when they finally released the 4 greats on CD, yours truly was right there buying them up. I played them for hours and hours. It was total ecstasy as well as a wonderful trip back in time. What took them so long to bring them back, I’ll never know. I’m sure glad they did. I still have my dad’s collection on LPs.
Is Herb’s Tijuana music authentic? Well, who defines what is and what is not? It legitimate and great. Music does not stand still. Mariachi music has been better for it. A few tried to imitate Herb’s sound and success. They failed on all accounts. Herb had that magic hear and touch. Music is so important to me. It’s a big part of the rhythms of life and Herb was so big a part of it. When you says 60s, you gotta put Herb in there.
Now I ask and appeal to the TV execs, where is the bio on Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass. I have not seen or heard one but I should have. What’s taking you guy so long?
I’ll just add that Herb was a significant player in the career of the Carpenters and there is another story that should be told. The Carpenters brought out a sound maybe a little bit older and out of sync with the time, 69 onward, but there has never been, before or since, a voice like that of Karen (the angelic golden voice) Carpenter. Was a sad tragic loss she was and what a great sound her brother and she forged, along with a good deal of support and help from Herb. There was so much great music around then. We who first head it all were so lucky.
Oh yeah, and by the way, how did we ever lose so much so quickly as we did with the 60s?
Posted by Scott Irv | January 17, 2010 9:15 PM
Posted on January 17, 2010 21:15
Thanks for this post, Ron!
Now Herb Alpert is officially included and archived as part of this fabulous Baby Boomer Site!
Posted by NCeddie | January 18, 2010 3:24 AM
Posted on January 18, 2010 03:24
I used to have most of Herb Alpert's albums or cassettes. Now I am starting to collect them all over on CDs and MP3s. Still enjoy listening to the theme of the original Casino Royale film from 1967.
Posted by David | January 18, 2010 8:55 AM
Posted on January 18, 2010 08:55
Oh, that album cover... too funny and such a great memory watching my older brother drool over it! Thanks for the memories. And what can I say about Herb? That man blew a mean horn and I could listen to it all day. Plus, he was so dang GORGEOUS!!! Oh, the memories... sweet. Thanks again.
Posted by Patti | January 19, 2010 6:46 AM
Posted on January 19, 2010 06:46
Yeah, Patti, Herb had an unusually ergonomic way of physically playing the trumpet, unlike that of contemporaries like Al Hirt.
As a kid, because of that and his looks, I wondered if Herb was a male model who faked his playing in the Brass' public appearances.
Posted by Mike Ransom | January 19, 2010 11:24 PM
Posted on January 19, 2010 23:24
HA was def easy listening music, but GREAT easy listening music. As well, his music was almost 100% instrumentals(the lone exception Burt bacharachs'
"this guys is love with you"....I like that song so much I need to talk about it....there was a special on network tv starring the TB, and they had a clip of Albert singing, "This guy's....the public lit up the phonelines asking how they could get that tune, as it was never recorded yet..they soon did, and herbs only vocal was his biggest hit, reaching #1...
such a beautiful song, typical Bacharach...Alpert hesitated to sing, but was encouraged to, and the world was better for it)....
So yes, he hit on a formula, much like Tom Scholtz, of Boston, on his own, in his own studio, and ran with it...Boston did the same, hiring players AFTER the tracks were laid down 100% by sholtz, except for the vocals......HA never really tampered with his "secret formula", and certainly wasn't a musical or horn trailblazer, in the like of Sonny Rollins,
Bird, or Coltrane, but did come out with a wonderfully palatable sounds that all generations could dig, even in a retro sense....
One person that the music industry was much the better for, and few people you can say that about ever, then or now....
Posted by Scott Kuz | January 28, 2010 6:59 PM
Posted on January 28, 2010 18:59
Ron,what took you so long to do a story on Herb Albert? LOL! I bought many of his albums. They were all great. I totally enjoyed listening to them. Thanks for a great story on a great musician!
Posted by Barry Reed | February 3, 2010 11:53 AM
Posted on February 3, 2010 11:53
Thanks for the wonderful appreciation. Herb Alpert has been a kind and classy presence in the music industry for 5 decades! After years of digging about i decided to write a biography on Herb and it is now published by Lulu Books...please click on my url for more info. All the best
Posted by SteveO | June 29, 2010 3:08 AM
Posted on June 29, 2010 03:08