RIP - Mitch Miller

Mitch Miller

b. : 04 June 1911

d. : 31 July 2010

. Mitch Miller passed away last weekend at the ripe old age of 99, and everybody under the age of 55 undoubtedly is saying, "Who??" . He was a musician (oboist), singer, conductor of an orchestra, and record company executive. But his claim to fame was a TV program called Sing Along With Mitch, which ran from 1961 to 1964. You can read the Wikipedia article on him here. . SAWM was your standard early-60's variety show - singing, dancing, comedy skits, etc. except that you could sing along with the muscial numbers because the feed had the technological marvel of lyrics running across the bottom of the TV screen. You even knew how long to hold the note, because of a bouncing ball (that's what I'd call it, but Mitch vehemently maintains it was a dot) that hovered just the right amount of time over each syllable. .

I don't remember ever "singing along with Mitch", but I'm betting that my parents did, since it was a regularly-watched show in our house. I suspect it harkens back to their childhood days, before there were television programs and even radio broadcasts. Once upon a time, the usual family evening pastime was to gather 'round the piano and sing songs. Once upon a time, a song's commercial popularity was measured not by record sales, but by how many copies of its sheet music were sold.

.

So Mitch Miller was more or less the original karaoke host (although Wiki begs to differ), and also the last gasp of the "good old days" of Pop music. While he was trying to get you to sing show tunes with him, four mopheads from England were preparing to take America by storm, and some fuzzy-haired leftist in New York City was telling people that the times, they are a'changin'.

.

So farewell, Mitch Miller. When I realize that you were already 50 years old when your show debuted in 1961, and that you were still alive and kicking last week at this time, I am truly and utterly amazed.