“Two Beats on a Bat” (1952) Tommy Dorsey/Bill Finegan with Sam Donahue and Charlie Shavers

“Two Beats on a Bat”

Composed and arranged by Bill Finegan.

Recorded by Tommy Dorsey and His Orchestra in mid-March 1952 for Standard Transcription Service in New York.

Tommy Dorsey, first trombone, directing: Charlie Shavers, first trumpet; Art DePew, Nick Tancredi, George Cherb, trumpets; Nick DeMaio, Sam Hyster, Obie Massingill, trombones; Eddie Scalzi, first alto saxophone; Marv Koral, alto saxophone; Sam Donahue and Gene Cipriano, tenor saxophones; Teddy Lee, baritone saxophone; Gene Kutch, piano; Sam Herman, guitar; Mert Oliver, bass; Eddie Grady, drums. Scalzi and Koral doubled on B-flat clarinet; Cipriano on flute; Lee on bass clarinet.

The story:

In the early 1950s, Tommy Dorsey, one of the biggest stars of the swing era, continued to lead a band of remarkably high quality despite the fact that the market for swing music was shrinking. Tommy’s dynamic personality, high musical standards, and aggressive business style allowed him to survive in those perilous times, though not without major challenges and costs. The challenges lay in simply securing enough work for his band to continue operation. Tommy accomplished this by operating as his own booking agent (after 15 turbulent years with Music Corporation of America [MCA], with whom he severed ties in late 1950) (1), and with a three-year recording contract with Decca Records, running from August of 1950 to August of 1953 that guaranteed him $52,000.00 per year. (Multiply by at least 10 to get the value in today’s dollars.) The Dorsey booking office, run out of the penthouse suite of offices Tommy maintained in the Brill Building in Manhattan, was called Tomdor Enterprises, Inc., and was operated by ex-saxophonist Vince Carbone. After running through a series of personal managers, Tommy finally settled on the young (age 26), smart and aggressive Tino Barzie, another former saxophonist, as his personal and road manager at the end of 1950.(2)

When TD and MCA went their separate ways, Tommy immediately placed ads in various trade papers announcing that he was doing his own booking. But he did it with the Dorsey flair, tinged with hostility. He also had vanity license plates made for his car which read “4QMCA.”

Although the business side of Tommy’s  operation was solid, something he insisted upon and monitored obsessively, it was nevertheless an up-and-down ride on a speeding emotional roller-coaster for those who worked for him, no matter how good their performance was in their jobs. This was the case because TD’s personality was such that he had not only to lead, but he had to dominate those who were associated with him. In addition, after Tommy stopped drinking in the 1940s, he began using various other stimulants to keep him on the razor’s edge where he felt he functioned best. These included “uppers as well as codeine and turpenhydrate…”(3) This increased the frequency of his emotional outbursts. Once, during the early days of his association with Tino Barzie, he became enraged at Barzie, grabbed him and began banging his head on a wall.(4) When word of this reached Frank Sinatra, who had had his difficult moments with TD when he was singing for Tommy 1940-1942, he said: “He’s the most fascinating man in the world, but don’t put your hand in the cage.”

Those close to TD observed that the uppers had such a powerful effect on him that he found it difficult to sleep. When he felt ready to crash from exhaustion, he would take sleeping pills so he would get a full night of sleep. He did this on the night of November 26, 1956, and as always, slept soundly. (Tommy also had resumed drinking by then, but limited it to a couple of glasses of wine with dinner.) Unfortunately, while he slept, he became nauseated and began to vomit, but was unable because of the pills and wine to wake up sufficiently to deal with that. Consequently, he aspirated the vomit, and suffocated to death. A bizarre end no doubt to one of the most spectacular musical careers in American show business history.

But in the early 1950s, Tommy was working full-bore with his band, always seeking new opportunities and better gigs. His three-year association with Decca Records produced a lot of excellent music, but was less successful commercially than Tommy had hoped. He chafed at the restrictions he felt he constantly had to deal with at Decca. He also was by the mid-1950s completely dissatisfied with the business model the recording industry used whereby artists signed exclusive contracts to have their music recorded, but after that was done, the record companies, not the artists, owned the masters that the artists had recorded. Tommy wanted to own the masters. Needless to say, the recording industry disagreed strongly with him on this point. “Tommy was becoming increasingly more interested in forming a mammoth record company in which he would be joined by other top recording stars. His plan: each of the artists would have a financial interest in the company, each would own his own masters, each could make more money than by recording on the usual royalty basis for another company because his profits would be realized in capital gains and thus fall into a lower tax bracket…”(5) Tommy was never able to realize this dream because of his unexpected death at the end of 1956. However, Frank Sinatra did strike out in this direction in the 1960s when he organized and operated Reprise Records. (Above right: Tommy Dorsey in the early 1950s.)

The music: 

Bill Finegan’s composition/arrangement of “Two Beats on a Bat” is a colorful and exuberant piece of music that would challenge any band today, and still sound great if it was well performed. It, like all great music, is timeless.

Despite Tommy Dorsey’s mercurial behavior toward many of the musicians in his band and his business associates, Finegan seemed to be spared from any ugly encounters with TD. This is very likely because Tommy greatly admired Finegan’s musical talent, and Finegan wisely stayed out of his way, appearing only at rehearsals where he would pass out new arrangements to the Dorsey band, and lead them through the first run-throughs to get the music under their fingers. Then he stepped away and Tommy put the finishing touches on the music. (At left: arranger Bill Finegan.)

The introduction Finegan fashioned for this piece is intriguing: the sound of a a Harmon-muted trumpet is combined with another instrument (what is it?) to create a melodic fragment that is repeated twice. Under this are the TD-led trombones blended with Teddy Lee’s baritone saxophone and a bit of Gene Kutch’s jaunty piano. Then there is  a burst of different sounds – open brass and descending reeds, then another salvo of sounds. A lot has happened and we are only twenty seconds into the performance!

The first chorus melody statement is handled by the gliding unison saxophones with strategically placed muted brass chirps behind them. When the brass return, they are open and hot: Tommy on lead trombone blows hard and aggressively, as does lead trumpeter Charlie Shavers. The next tract of saxophone melody is supported by the buoyant trombones. Then the trumpets join in with Mr. Shavers leading the way in fiery fashion. The next sequence has the saxophones in robust dialogue with the brass. (Above right: Charlie Shavers.)

A clever interlude that spots the brassmen holding their cup-mutes half-closed while the reeds surge and Mr. Kutch tinkles a bit springs tenor saxophonist Sam Donahue (6) into a flowing and swinging sixteen bar jazz solo. Now those brass instruments are alternately played with the mutes held to close their bells, and then open – a delightful musical effect. Charlie Shavers, on open trumpet, plays through a series of breaks, then sails off into an ecstatic solo highlighted by him executing in machine-gun fashion a repeated three-note fragment through four bars. (Above left: tenor saxophonist Sam Donahue.)

The saxophones return to remind the listener of the main melody, then there is a cadence and a dynamically softer finale.

The recording presented in this post has been digitally remastered by Mike Zirpolo.

Notes and links:

(1) After Tommy and MCA parted company, he quickly obtained a vanity license plate for his black Cadillac that read: “4Q MCA.”

(2) Tommy Dorsey …Livin’ in a Great Big Way, by Peter J. Levinson (2005), 239. Vinnie Carbone was also young, 29, when he began to work for TD. Dorsey’s band members, and increasingly his business associates were young men as the 1950s began. Tommy himself was 45 years old in 1950, and had been leading his own band for 15 years by then.

(3) Ibid. 252.

(4) Ibid. 240.

(5) The Big Bands, by George T. Simon (1967), 175.

(6) Sam Donahue spent the year 1952 as a member of Tommy Dorsey’s band.

P.S. Here is a wonderful interview jazz historian Loren Schoenberg did with Bill Finegan in the early 1990s. There is much information in this interview about Bill’s early years. Great stuff for which we all owe Loren a big Thank You.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8kyBqcpDPXU

Here are links to some other great performances of Bill Finegan’s arrangements by Tommy Dorsey’s band, and others:

https://swingandbeyond.com/2020/10/21/cheek-to-cheek-1953-tommy-dorsey-bill-finegan/

https://swingandbeyond.com/2018/08/11/in-finegans-wake-part-2-counterpoint-counterpoint-song-of-the-volga-boatmen-1941-and-the-keel-row-1952/

https://swingandbeyond.com/2024/03/06/alone-together-1939-artie-shaw-1957-les-and-larry-elgart/

https://swingandbeyond.com/2021/12/03/moonlight-sonata-1941-glenn-miller-1971-enoch-light/

https://swingandbeyond.com/2016/11/10/reads-and-re-reads/