Birthday in Britain

February 19, 1973, was just another busy day for the Kenton Orchestra. They were on the last lap of a European tour that had taken them to Italy, Switzerland, and Holland, and now they were in England, following a whirlwind schedule that had them playing London, Manchester, Sheffield, Birmingham, Farnworth—one-nighters that seemed to be an endless series of late nights and long, sleepy bus trips to the next location.

February 19 was also Stan Kenton’s 61st birthday, but he wanted no fuss made about it; it was to be business as usual. However, 18 sentimental musicians had a secret, and they planned to give their leader a birthday present he wouldn’t forget.

The moment of truth arrived in Nottingham. The full-house audience was enthusiastic and receptive, and Stan felt the concert was going well. He went to the microphone to announce the fourth number. As Stan addressed the audience, Dick Shearer slipped out of his trombone chair, walked quietly up behind Stan, and gave a downbeat. The band responded perfectly—by launching into a stunning and obviously well-rehearsed arrangement on “Happy Birthday to You”!

Stan says his first bewildered reaction was, “What is happening?”; then he sank onto his piano bench in realization and total surprise, fighting back tears. The best-kept collective secret the Kenton Orchestra ever had was out in the open, and it was a toss-up who was most pleased—the men in the band, Leader Kenton, or an enchanted British audience.

Not by accident, Wally Heider, the noted American recording expert, and his assistant Bill Haseltine, were present. It was Heider who had commissioned arranger Bill Holman to write the “Happy Birthday” chart as a surprise for Stan. It was also Heider who just happened to have airlifted 900 pounds of two-track electronic recording equipment from California to Britain, and it just happened that he, Haseltine, and two English friends, Reg Wing and Arnie Chadwick, were able to record the moment for posterity.

BIRTHDAY IN BRITAIN is, therefore, the happiest album Creative World has ever offered. There is joy in every note, and love in every breath. Happy Birthday, Mr. Kenton, from your Orchestra!

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MESSAGE FROM THE RECORDING ENGINEER

This album was recorded with two Ampex 6-position mixers, with no equalization, on a Nagra stereo tape recorder (the Nagra being designed by Stefan Kudelski and mae in Switzerland), using 7” reels and monitored on two Ampex Model 622, 8” speaker/amplifier units. Fourteen Neumann KM84s, two Shure 564s, and one Shure 570 were the microphones used, some of the KM84s being multied together. This LP was mastered directly from the original two-track ¼” 3M 207 master tape, with no limiting, no echo added, and only minor equalization added.

Except for “Happy Birthday,” all selections were taken from two concerts at Fairfield Hall, Croydon, England, on February 28, 1973.

With the use of the Nagra tape rec order and proper recording techniques (including recording with sufficient level), plus the original recording being “live” two-track, the use of any Dolbys was rendered totally unnecessary. The Nagra, with its superb signal-to-noise ratio, is better than any other known tape recorder made today. In that respect, the extremely soft passages, such as the openings of “Street of Dreams” and “Ambivalence,” are the best evidence of how quiet the Nagra recorder master tape is.

The positioning of the band on stage, including that of the drummer, Peter Erskine, was not changed in any way for the recording, and the band is heard on this album the way it appeared on stage, i.e., saxes left, trumpets in the center, trombones right, etc. Using foam baffling, drum leakage posed no problem and, stereo-wise, the drums were positioned non the left channel for better balance. Piano, bass, and solos played down in front of the band are heard in the center of the stereo.

All of us who worked on this album hope that you enjoy it as much as we enjoyed recording it. Original intended inspiration for this project was S.L.B., but this faltered shortly after our arrival in England. We only hope that we have a chance to record Kenton in Europe again some day, perhaps next time without an S.L.B. failure.