Fantastic - rants & raves - craigslist (2024)

Russ Garcia and His Orchestra

"Fantastica — Music From Outer Space"

https://youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_klI3rv2GpbjlHa1bBQVRBpgoFU7s2is6M

Composer-conductor Russ Garcia brings you
a new orchestral suite in a mood as vast as
outer space-and added to the already imaginative
score, are electronic devices and effects
created by Ted Keep, Liberty's chief engineer.
LISTEN to Hi-Fi sounds in stereo you've
never heard before-fascinating, exciting
sounds from other planets... Enjoy this new
"science-fiction" music as it takes you far, far
from the Earth...A journey into space!
five...four...three...two...one...
Relax...close your eyes and open your
mind...We are catapulted into the outer
atmosphere-surrounded by the deafening
roar of rockets which suddenly fade into
nothingness, and we are enveloped by the
silence of space and swallowed into a nebulous
mist of weightlessness... floating far and wide
"INTO SPACE."
In the distance a shower of stardust bursts
like fiery sparks from a gigantic pinwheel...
"NOVA," an exploding star, lights up the sky
with its magnificence.
Onward we fly — when an unbelievably
forlorn and mournful sound reaches out to us.
"LOST SOULS OF SATURN" — desolate and
lonely beyond belief.
After hours of travel, a constant sensation
of groping through the blackness and a sense
of deep depression has settled over us, when,
without warning, the grotesque "MONSTERS
OF JUPITER" appear. Plodding through the
dense yellow and red clouds floating over its
surface, shapeless blobs lumber through the
mist. Remembering the spooky fun house or
the dark little ride in the tunnel at the carnival,
you ask yourself — "Is all of space filled with
these unspeakable horrors?...this is certainly
no 'laugh in the dark"!"
Suddenly we are in a higher strata, and the
"nightmare" is over. Out of nowhere come the
"WATER CREATURES OF ASTRA," shimmering
and gleaming as they swim in placid,
silver waters. Then past the dazzling splendor
of "VENUS" we sail.
During the second phase of our sightseeing
journey into space, we see the dark wastes of
"FROZEN NEPTUNE" with its crystallized,
impenetrable blocks of ice. From there we visit
the comical, eccentric "GOOFY PEEPL OF
PHOBOS" jabbering in their peculiarly
whimsical fashion.
The liquid fire of the "VOLCANOES OF
MERCURY" turn the sky into a sea of scarlet,
and as we whisk by this barren inferno a glowing,
whirling mass appears in the distance, we
are witnessing the "BIRTH OF A PLANET."
Onward we fly toward Earth and past the
dry, desolate "RED SANDS OF MARS." The
desert stretches endlessly in a crimson blanket.
During the final stage of our journey we watch
breathlessly the lunar display before us — the
exquisite "MOON RISE" in all its majestic
and peaceful beauty...we're almost home!

--------------

Russell Garcia, QSM (12 April 1916 – 19 November 2011) was an American composer and arranger who wrote a wide variety of music for screen, stage and broadcast.

Garcia was born in Oakland, California, but was a longtime resident of New Zealand. Self-taught, his break came when he substituted for an ill colleague on a radio show. Subsequently, he went on to become a composer/arranger at NBC Studios for such television shows as Rawhide 1962 and Laredo, 1965–67. He worked at Universal Studios and MGM, where at the latter he composed and conducted the original scores for such films as George Pal's The Time Machine (1960) and Atlantis, the Lost Continent (1961). He also orchestrated the music for Father Goose (1964) and The Benny Goodman Story (1956). Garcia collaborated with many Hollywood musicians and celebrities, including Ella Fitzgerald, Louis Armstrong, Anita O'Day, Mel Torme, Julie London, Oscar Peterson, Stan Kenton, Maynard Ferguson, Walt Disney, Orson Welles, Jane Wyman, Ronald Reagan, Andy Williams, Judy Garland, Henry Mancini, and Charlie Chaplin making arrangements and conducting orchestras as needed. Russ loved to ski so he would write on-site scores to ski-content films. ...

Professional career
When he was eleven years old, the Oakland Symphony Orchestra performed his arrangement of "Stardust". By the time Garcia was in high school, he was working five nights a week playing music and earning more than his father, who was a credit manager in a large department store. After one year at San Francisco State University he dropped out because he felt he was not learning enough and instead went on the road with several big bands. But he remained unsatisfied because, he said, "I wasn't advancing fast enough." He recalled, "I quit and went to Hollywood and had lessons with the best teachers I could find." He studied composition, harmony, orchestration, counterpoint and form. He took lessons on every instrument so he could write for each with a deeper awareness, rather than just by ear as he had done in the past. He also conducted the West Hollywood Symphony Orchestra once a week for two years, a remarkable experience for a young man in his 20s; he said it primed him for what was to come.

His first break came in 1939, when the composer/conductor of the radio show This is Our America fell ill and Garcia was recommended to fill in. He so impressed the director, Ronald Reagan, that he was kept on for two years. Reagan was then married to Jane Wyman who recommended Garcia to NBC, where he was hired as a staff composer and arranger. As word got out, he said he never had to look for work: "It's always come to me. I do lead a charmed life." Soon after, Henry Mancini called on Garcia and his extraordinary talent of transcribing note for note, instrument for instrument, to work on The Glenn Miller Story.

Universal Studios contracted Garcia to work as composer, arranger and conductor in the 1950s. He remained in the post for 15 years.

According to ... the Los Angeles Times and his obituary by Marc Myers in Jazzwax, a daily jazz blog, Garcia did the orchestration for "the 65-piece studio symphony" for Charlie Chaplin's 1952 film Limelight. However, in 1972, when Limelight won an Oscar for the best original dramatic score, the three Oscars were given to Chaplin, Raymond Rasch and posthumously to Larry Russell, who was also a composer and movie arranger at the time.

In 1957, through his Universal Studios contract, he arranged and conducted Louis Armstrong and Ella Fitzgerald's record album Porgy And Bess. He undertook three more albums and a concert at the Hollywood Bowl with Armstrong.

Bethlehem Records often called on Garcia for his arranging abilities; he was one of the few Hollywood soundstage and studio veterans who could easily and naturally switch from film scoring to jazz arranging. Developing a parallel career, not only did he provide arrangements for many singers and instrumentalists, he recorded over 60 albums under his own name, as well as composing for cutting-edge projects such as the Stan Kenton Neophonic Orchestra.

He was considered an innovator with his music using experimental frameworks on which newer and greater presentations could be fashioned, as he proved, assembling his unexpected and groundbreaking four-trombone band with brass players Frank Rosolino, Tommy Pederson, Maynard Ferguson and Herbie Harper. Marty Paich can even be heard on some of these sessions at the piano. He used this instrumentation and sound to great success in collaborations with singers like Frances Faye and Anita O'Day, and brought it back in his most recent collaboration: a recording of all Garcia originals with New York vocalist Shaynee Rainbolt.

Although he loved what he was doing, he decided to walk away from it all in 1966. ... -- Wikipedia

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Previously on Great Instrumental Music ... :

https://washingtondc.craigslist.org/nva/rnr/d/one-of-the-greatest/7767282521.html

https://washingtondc.craigslist.org/nva/rnr/d/given-up-his-sign-painting-business/7767240493.html

https://washingtondc.craigslist.org/nva/rnr/d/other-worlds/7767234772.html

https://washingtondc.craigslist.org/nva/rnr/d/they-went-on-to-more-cosmopolitan-botes/7766970293.html

https://washingtondc.craigslist.org/nva/rnr/d/blast-off/7766920846.html

https://washingtondc.craigslist.org/nva/rnr/d/its-trip/7766647666.html

https://washingtondc.craigslist.org/nva/rnr/d/elgartian-impressions/7766594780.html

https://washingtondc.craigslist.org/nva/rnr/d/out-of-this-world/7766589257.html

https://washingtondc.craigslist.org/nva/rnr/d/space-escapade/7766318757.html

https://washingtondc.craigslist.org/nva/rnr/d/destination/7766261010.html

https://washingtondc.craigslist.org/nva/rnr/d/electric-violin-triangles-theremin-and/7766151141.html

https://washingtondc.craigslist.org/nva/rnr/d/moon-gas/7766111102.html

https://washingtondc.craigslist.org/nva/rnr/d/around-the-world/7766010534.html

https://washingtondc.craigslist.org/nva/rnr/d/let-the-sun-shine-in/7765715594.html

https://washingtondc.craigslist.org/nva/rnr/d/let-me-riddle-you-this/7765708574.html

https://washingtondc.craigslist.org/nva/rnr/d/guess-what/7765639524.html

https://washingtondc.craigslist.org/nva/rnr/d/nine-flags/7765505097.html

https://washingtondc.craigslist.org/nva/rnr/d/mon-oncle/7765473453.html

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