Warning... this is an adult site. If reading or viewing things about what gay men do sexually with one another bothers you - you should not read this blog. This blog is a reflection of my adventures and thoughts. Some are fun, some not so pretty. I won't name names, or kiss and tell... but I will live to tell. And baby, trust me - I am gonna spill it all over your pretty little party dress. Enjoy!
William Bruce Ellis Ranken (April11, 1881, Edinburgh - March 31, 1941, London), British artist and Edwardian aesthete. The son of a wealthy lawyer, he was educated at Eton where he studied watercolor painting, and then attended The Slade School of Art in London. With a prodigious output, working in watercolors, oils, and pastels, he received numerous portrait commissions from wealthy Americans, the British royal family and the aristocracy, as well as the interiors of their homes. While in the United States, Sargent introduced him to Isabella Stewart Gardner, and he received commissions to paint portraits of the wealthy, including the Whitneys, Vanderbilts and Havermeyers. He died suddenly of a cerebral hemorrhage at the age of fifty-nine and was buried near his beloved Warbrook House in Hampshire, the home he had owned for fifteen years but had had to sell during the Depression.
William Bruce Ellis Ranken
A fellow student was the actor Ernest Thesiger, who became a lifelong friend; he was painted by Ranken in 1918, and married Ranken's sister Janette Ranken in 1917. Following his unexpected death from a cerebral hemorrhage, his sister Janette gifted over 200 works to be distributed amongst UK public galleries and museums.
William Bruce Ellis Ranken
--- ---
Pictures At An Exhibition - Emerson, Lake & Palmer
In my own personal big gay church, there is a wing dedicated to what can only be described as...The True Divas. These are ones that may do many things in life, but from the moment they opened their mouths to sing they became the one thing they were meant to become: a true diva.
One such stirring soul?
The raw and rhapsodic Carmen McRae.
From where does that voice come from?
Wrapped in the curl of a wisp of smoke and with a musical sense born deep within, it is like no other.
Her phrasing? Her timing? Truly original.
And not hurried. Oh, no... that is not this diva's style.
Whether singing jazz, or selections from the American songbook, or putting her unique stamp on a modern bit of pop... the woman owns it and reels in her listeners like sailors to a siren.
But your in in no danger... unless you hate having a good time.
She wears a song like a pair of shoes... it may start out shiny, tight and new... but with time, this lady stretches them and breaks them in until they're comfortable, lived-in and with a bit of wiggle room.
Our songstress paid her dues the old-fashioned way, and while she may not have shown as brightly or glittered like some... time has been her friend; her place among legends well-earned.
If you don't know much about her, don't be shy. Dig in. Her back catalog is a true delight.
Treat your ears and allow this rarest of souls to cast her spell and work her magic.
So, grab your cocktail of choice, sit back, relax, and listen to a voice which has truly lived and loved her music.
The gospel according to her?
Well, here are three from the hip, dropping from her lips.
The topic? The Piano.
"I went to Chicago and liked the city. In order to stay I had to make a living. A friend of mine who was an ex-chorus girl knew I could play and sing, which I would do just for friends, not professionally. She said, "Why don’t you take a job playing and singing?" I said to her, "Lulu, that sounds great, but I don’t know if I’m capable." She said, "I know someone who wants a girl singer and piano player. If you go and you don’t make it at least you tried." I said, "It’s hard for a woman like myself, who is an Aries, to take a defeat. I would rather hear nothing than hear no." She convinced me, I went, and the man there was beautiful to me. I will never forget him. He gave me a job for two weeks, with a two-week option to play the piano and sing. He advanced me money to join the union. I stayed two weeks, and he picked up the option."
"I realized that my piano playing was very limited, because I had never intended to become a real pianist except just to play for myself or to rehearse a tune. It became essential to play better. I stayed at that job for seventeen weeks. During that time I hired a piano, and as my repertoire was very shallow, I rehearsed every day until my repertoire grew bigger. I stayed in Chicago and worked there for three and a half years, which was the greatest experience I could ever have had. I don’t care that it happened in Chicago. I don’t care where it happened, as long as it happened. I found out that I could make a living playing and singing. My idols were great pianists like Teddy Wilson and Art Tatum, so I could not be fooled by my own piano playing at all. My piano playing was just a means to get where I wanted to get as a singer."
"Going by my experience, it is one of the most important things. I don’t believe I would have whatever reputation I have today if I had not had any knowledge of the piano. That experience of studying music is what put me where I am today. Without it I would perhaps not even be singing, or of I had become a singer, it might not be as impressive as whatever it is I do now. I have said this for years and I still think it is extremely important. It is important if you want to be a lasting artist. Any artist who really knows what he or she is doing musically will last. I think it’s the non-professional professionals who fade out. They earn a lot of money in a minute, yet don’t make it somehow. After they're gone, people don’t even remember who they were. That’s why it’s very important to know your craft."
Isn't It Romantic - Carmen McRae
'Round Midnight - Carmen McRae
Bye, Bye Blackbird - Carmen McRae w/ Count Basie
And one more parting shot...
"Blues is to jazz what yeast is to bread--without it, it's flat."
"I am jazz-oriented; if it weren’t for jazz I wouldn’t be anywhere. I only want to be categorized as a good or a bad singer. I originally started as a so-called jazz singer. I was dubbed that somewhere along the line, and I never really thought about it. I really didn’t start out to be a jazz singer; I just started out to sing. But it was awfully hard, as it is for any musician, to play and not to improvise in some sort of way on the melody. If doing that made me a jazz singer, then yes, that’s what I am. I have also done many tunes that couldn’t possibly be called jazz tunes and made many single records that were not jazz."
"Everything I do, I choose very, very carefully, because if I don't like it, I can't make you like it."
In my own personal big gay church, there is a wing dedicated to the Ladies Of Comedy. Theses are the gals who made us laugh and, on occasion, brought a tear to our eyes. They are visionaries, capturing aspects of the human condition while holding up a mirror to the world. Their characters, style, and phrases have helped form our daily vernacular in ways we are not even always aware of - but that is the power of comedy and the magic these ladies all possess. Breaking ground while breaking all the rules?
One such firecracker?
Rusty Warren.
Knockers up!
The 'Mother of the Sexual Revolution'.
The woman was inescapable.
Dressed in the latest style, seated behind her spinet piano, this diva helped define naughty cocktail humor.
And boy howdy, did she have some impact!
The lady was a huge hit; both live, on the nightclub scene and in the living rooms of sexually adventurous adults - thanks to the sale of her brilliant, progressive L.P.s.
She was there - on the forefront - liberating women one bra at a time.
Many albums later and after years of touring, she retired in Hawaii.
But... this diva had done her tour of duty - freeing up both boob and booty - for the betterment of the world.
The gospel according to her?
Well, here are three from the hip, dropping from her lips.
The topic? Her Sex Evolution
"I started out as a music teacher. Worked a few dinner houses in my college years then, as the years went on, I got to talk more than play the piano."
"I never started out as a comedienne. I was playing piano in small lounges and clubs when one of my bosses asked me if I knew any parodies? I didn't know what he meant, and when I found out I started to buy them from places in New York that used to sell them by the page. He also said that he would give me more money if I would sing them along with my regular songs of the day. I did, he did, and that's how it all started."
"It was the time when cities were spreading out to the suburbs, and the lifestyles were changing to barbeques and backyard parties. They would play my records and just have an evening of their own entertainment. It was reasonable and they could stay at home (as the kids were young then and you can't always go out when you have youngsters). I guess I was doing my thing at the right time and the right place, in the years of the sexual revolution of the '60s."
"Before I ever made albums I played my act every where I could get work. Many of the rooms weren't geared for my type of 'sex talk,' so I would get some walk-outs. Actually, most of the audience enjoyed what I was doing and it proved to be a great 'material experience' - what to use and what to throw out, because it just doesn't work. What a learning venue! In fact, the Knockers Up march was started in Dayton, Ohio, in a club called Mike Longo's. I was telling the gals to 'get your knockers up and let's show the guys we have something to give in this world today.' My boss, Mike, started to go through the room trying to get the gals to throw out their chests, and, as he was going through the room, I started playing a march rhythm on the piano and adlibbing words to what was going down. So that's how it happened and the rest became 'Rusty Warren History.' The Knockers Up march was born!"
"My manager, Stan Zucker, used to tell me that when he was putting together the Midwest tour dates, every club I worked couldn't wait for me to come in with my new show. The club owners made money every time I worked there and it spread by word of mouth to 'buy that Rusty Warren gal - she's naughty but you'll make money.'"
"Every town I played in the Midwest had their own group of women who would show up with their husbands and neighbors, sometimes driving many miles to get to the local club I was appearing at. God, those gals were something else! But they were the driving force of the Rusty Warren movement in the '60s."
"You have to realize that we spoke differently in the '60's. We veiled a lot of what we were saying and how we were saying it. But it was sex just the same. Ours was more innuendo than the realistic way it's talked about on stage today. And the female comediennes today are coming right out and saying what they want to say and don't have to worry about being censored."
Knockers! Up - Rusty Warren
Bounce Your Boobies - Rusty Warren
Am I Growing Older - Rusty Warren
"My mentor was Sophie Tucker who, in her day, was considered 'naughty" for her times. She caught me, or her writer saw my show and told her I did her Life Begins At Forty song at my piano bar, and she asked me to have lunch at her hotel. She asked me why would I ever do that song when I was 24 years-old? She also told me 'to be honest with my audiences as they will know if your lying, because audiences are smarter than you think they are and they'll catch you on it every time.' They are...and they'll catch you on it every time.
