The Big Broadcast “Rent Party”, an evening of music with Jazz Age roots, benefiting the program’s public radio home, WFUV-FM NYC (90.7 FM, wfuv.org) will take place on Tuesday 9/22 at 7:00 PM at 320 Park Avenue. The event will include performances by Nancy Anderson, Peter Mintun, Robert White and Vince Giordano’s Nighthawks. Big Broadcast host Rich Conaty will act as the emcee. Tickets include cocktails, buffet dinner and performance; and are available at $2,000 for tables of four, $500 or $250 for individuals. The Big Broadcast Event Committee includes Joe Franklin, Alan R. Kahn, Charles Osgood, Danny Stiles and George Wein.
In the 1920s, New York apartment dwellers in need of cash would throw “rent parties” to keep the landlord from their doors. Singers and jazz bands would perform while a hat was passed around. There’ll be no hat passing on September 22nd, but there will be wonderful music, including the songs of New Yorker George Gershwin, who was born on September 26th. In an additional nod to the era, one of noted tenor Robert White’s songs will be captured by phonograph expert Peter Dilg on original, 100 year old Edison cylinder recording equipment. White will be following in the footsteps of his father, Joseph M. White, who made such recordings over 80 years ago.
“We plan to give up 2009 for one night to go back in time and revel in the spirit of the 1920s and ’30s. It’ll be like listening to The Big Broadcast, but without the surface noise,” says Conaty, who has been hosting the program since 1973.
“WFUV is especially proud that Rich Conaty first created the Big Broadcast at WFUV over 35 years ago and continues to provide such a valuable resource for a now worldwide audience,” said WFUV General Manager Ralph Jennings.
Airing on WFUV every Sunday evening at 8:00 PM, The Big Broadcast has featured classic jazz and pop tunes of the 1920s and ’30s for more than 35 years, and its focus has remained on the vast amount of music produced in this relatively brief period. Over the years the program has expanded from one to four hours and has found loyal online listeners as far away as Hawaii, Australia and Thailand.
Nancy Anderson has made her mark on Broadway, Off-Broadway, in the West End, and across the country. Nancy also has appeared on Broadway in the Tony-nominated production of A Class Act and Wonderful Town.
Pianist Peter Mintun is one of today’s leading interpreters of popular music written between the two World Wars – those vintage melodies with such classic style that they, in Mintun’s words, “transcend time.”
The New York Times characterized tenor Robert White as “a musician of remarkable sophistication.” There is exceptional range in his repertoire, and he has a special association with the legendary John McCormack. His father, Joseph M. White (known as “The Silver Masked Tenor”) was a popular recording artist in the 1920s.
Vince Giordano has become the authority on recreating the sounds of 1920s and ’30s jazz and popular music, accumulating more than 32,000 scores in his collection.
