‘Goodbye’ to Benny Goodman

“Goodbye” was the going-out theme song the Benny Goodman band played. It was the only big band I think that had an opening wowser in “Let’s Dance!” and the slow, funereal lament “Goodbye” as its closer.

As a very young school kid I got hooked on the radio-only broadcast of the “Camel Caravan” and avoided study as those legendary band bashes were sent out on what they called “the airwaves.”

His peaceful death really closes that era. Three years ago when he appeared at the Playboy Jazz Festival in the form of Rare Silk, a singing group, I sat in the Hollywood Bowl sunshine and heard a very young lady looking at the program ask “What is a Benny Goodman?” Her companion whom I knew turned and said, “Ask the old guy--this gentleman. He might know.”

Try to explain “a Benny Goodman,” the rabid fans crushing in to the Paramount, screaming, dancing in the aisles and relate it to a present day rock and roller.

For those who heard, knew and reveled in THE big band sound it is no mystery. I predict a swell of renewed enthusiasm for his music and that incomparable Sing-Sing-Sing sound. And a tender Goodbye to an incomparable perfectionist.

RAY CONSIDINE

Pasadena