Hoosier Hot Shots Leader Ken Trietsch Dies at 84

Ken Trietsch, leader of the Hoosier Hot Shots, who gained fame with their hokey, happy music on the old “National Barn Dance” radio show of the 1930s, died Thursday at his Studio City home after a yearlong illness. He turned 84 Sunday.

With clarinet, guitar, washboard, bicycle horns, pie-pan cymbal, bells, bass fiddle and other assorted instruments, the quartet livened the Saturday night airwaves with such tunes as “Sheik of Araby,” each time kicked off by Trietsch asking, “Are you ready, Hezzie?”

“Hezzie” was Trietsch’s brother, Paul, who played the musical washboard. Working with the brothers were clarinetist Gabe Ward, who is still living, and bassist Gil Taylor. Ken Trietsch played guitar and sang.

The Hoosier Hot Shots were such a hit on the radio that they were heard on NBC for 18 years. They continued to be a popular attraction at fairs and in World War II USO shows, and appeared in 23 films. They made more than 100 records.

Trietsch spent 55 years in show business. He was born in Muncie, Ind., Sept. 13, 1903, and had three brothers and five sisters. When Trietsch was in his teens, orchestra leader Paul Whiteman hired him and took him to New York. He also played there with the Vincent Lopez orchestra.

But Trietsch hated the big city and returned to Muncie. He and Hezzie, a drummer, then toured the vaudeville circuit with Buzzington’s Rube Band. It was watching a New Orleans shoeshine boy beat out a rhythmic tune on a woodblock and bell that inspired Trietsch to assemble a musical washboard for his younger brother.

They became the Rustic Revelers and made a four-year tour of the Pantages theaters. In 1932, as The Trietsch Brothers & Ward, they were heard five times a week on a Fort Wayne, Ind., radio station.

They became the Hoosier Hot Shots when they were almost late for a broadcast and the announcer said, “Hey, you Hoosier hot shots, get in here!” Their big break came a year later when their Chicago World’s Fair musical broadcast from an airplane 6,000 feet above Lake Michigan was heard on the NBC network.

After that came the “Uncle Ezra Show” and the popular “National Barn Dance,” for which Trietsch added the bass player.

Trietsch once told an interviewer that musician Spike Jones heard the group in 1939 and told them, “I’m going to build a band three times bigger than you guys and really go after it, ‘cause I think you’ve got something.”

Jones’ band was a big success during World War II.

Trietsch leaves his wife, designer Norma-Jean Wright; a daughter, Joan Hatfield, of Las Vegas; stepniece Dolores Jacinto and stepnephew David Jacinto.

Services will be conducted Tuesday at 11 a.m. at the Studio City Ward, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.