IT IS pretty well settled that you cannot—at least until the arrival of boxoffice television—get programs of straight, listening music on network television. Certainly not jazz, and I think symphonies are found only in isolated instances.

The presence of Stan Kenton and what is billed as his band on a CBS show called Music ’55 is a commercial package pegged on the Kenton reputation, his personality, and in a very small measure, his band.

It is (or was) a summer replacement program. It is sustaining.

The half-hour I witnessed wasn’t much less commercial than Ed Sullivan. Whenever the opening announcer shouts his introduction of the star, I automatically get on the defensive. Kenton was shouted on, and immediately introduced Cab Calloway.

Calloway recited a little personal travelogue and sang It Ain’t Necessarily So. When this song comes along in the middle of Porgy and Bess, it is remarkably meaningful. Coming as an act in a variety show became a mere scat song.

I was still waiting to hear some Kenton music after Calloway finished, but were led to the Calvin Jackson quartet. I am an ignoramus on jazz, but this grouping of vibes, piano, bass, and drums made extremely pleasant listening for me. In a little gimmick that didn’t hurt the music, two of the musicians—I presume Mr. Jackson and a Mr. Appleyard—played simultaneously on one piano, then on a drum, then on set of vibes.

Still waiting to hear Kenton, we got “Pretty Perky Peggy King,” who stuck her forehead against Kenton’s forehead and then sang Just One Of Those Things, accompanied not by Kenton, but by Jackson. After a year or so of watching Pretty Perky Peggy King on the Gobel show, I was getting curious how she would handle a number when released from the syrup she has to dish out with Gobel. Well, Pretty Perky is very loud, and is well suited for Gobel and Ed Sullivan, and maybe Eddie Cantor. She’ll make lots of money.

Finally some Kenton music. He sat at the piano and reviewed the band from 1940. “We played a real choppy kind of music that sounded like this.” Kenton said, and I don’t think any band he ever led sounded as bad as he made his outfit sound. Next was ’45, and Intermission Riff. I personally liked this best. ’47, Artistry in Rhythm. Then, “We discovered people were willing to pay a little extra to sit and just listen.” He wound up with the present day, a few bars of what sounded like Three hearts in A Flat, and it was a real stinkeroo.

That was the Kenton music for the evening—a few snatches of four songs, plus a travesty of an early one. We got another Peggy King in a standard TV variety treatment, and a finale of Calloway murdering one of the loveliest songs Gershwin ever wrote, Summertime. He was aided by four dancers.

The promise of good jazz is only implied in the presence of Kenton. Even the title, Music ’55, doesn’t say we’re going to get anything but what was presented. It was music. Probably Kenton suffers as much as anyone as Miss King renders They Can’t Take That Away From Me. I think I saw Leonard feather’s name on the credits as a writer, and who among those present wouldn’t like to see an entire show put in his hands?

Music ’55 is a television variety show. There certainly are a lot of television variety shows.

Mabley. “Radio & TV. The Kenton Show.” Down Beat 22, no. 19 (21 September 1955): 46.

Besides performing on the show, my dad was musical contractor for the TV program. I remember him telling me about the CBS executives who insisted on having sub par musicians. My dad fought to get as many Kenton alumni as possible.

— Joseph Varsalona