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Nelson Riddle

 
Artist: Nelson Riddle
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Similar Artists:

Victor Young, Axel Stordahl, Marty Paich, Les Elgart, Billy Vaughn, Fred Waring, Billy May, Sammy Kaye, Gordon Jenkins, Ray Anthony, Henry Mancini, Mantovani, Guy Lombardo, Ray Conniff, Enoch Light, Lawrence Welk, Percy Faith, 101 Strings Orchestra

Followers:

Sonny Burke, Goeff Roach, Melissa Collard, E Rick Rinaldi, Gaya

Worked With:

Alvin Stoller, Joe Mondragon, Ray Brown, Norman Granz, Paul Smith, Oscar Peterson, Plas Johnson, Ella Fitzgerald, Dean Martin

Formal Connection With:

Frank Sinatra, Pat Benatar, Alvino Rey & His Orchestra
  • Born: June 01, 1921, Oradell, NJ
  • Died: October 06, 1985, Los Angeles, CA
  • Active: '50s, '60s, '70s, '80s
  • Genres: Easy Listening
  • Instrument: Trombone, Conductor
  • Representative Albums: "The Best of Nelson Riddle," "Communication," "The Best of the Capitol Years"
  • Representative Songs: "Route 66 Theme," "Am I Blue?," "Lisbon Antigua"

Biography

Nelson Riddle was quite possibly the greatest arranger in the history of American popular music. Over the course of his long and distinguished career, he was also a popular soundtrack composer, a conductor, a trombonist, and an occasional hitmaker in his own right. He worked with many of the major pop vocalists of his day, but it was his immortal work with Frank Sinatra, particularly on the singer's justly revered Capitol concept albums, that cemented Riddle's enduring legacy. Riddle was a master of mood and subtlety, and an expert at drawing out a song's emotional subtext. He was highly versatile in terms of style, mood, and tempo, and packed his charts full of rhythmic and melodic variations and rich tonal colors that blended seamlessly behind the lead vocal line. He often wrote specifically for individual vocalists, keeping their strengths and limitations in mind and pushing them to deliver emotionally resonant performances. As such, Riddle was perfectly suited to the task of framing vocal interpreters, as opposed to just singers; he was most in sync with the more nuanced and artistically ambitious vocalists, like Sinatra. Riddle knew how to lay back and bring certain lyrics or vocal subtleties to the forefront, and how to add countermelodies that emphasized other lyrics, or made important transitions. He could draw the listener in with catchy embellishments, challenge them with adventurous harmonies, and build to climaxes that faded into surprisingly restrained endings. In short, Riddle was everything a top-notch singer could ask for.

Nelson Smock Riddle was born June 1, 1921, in Oradell, NJ. His father was an amateur musician who performed in a local band, and Riddle learned classical piano as a child, later switching to trombone at age 14. Debussy and Ravel were favorites early on, though he also listened to pop music and big-band swing. In 1940, he joined Jerry Wald's dance orchestra as trombonist and arranger; the following year, he moved on to Charlie Spivak's band, leaving to join the merchant marine in 1943. Exiting the service, he spent 1944-1945 as a trombonist with the Tommy Dorsey Orchestra, also writing a couple of arrangements ("Laura," "I Should Care"). In 1946, he returned to the New York area, where he arranged for big bands like the Elgart Brothers and Elliot Lawrence. By year's end, however, he had decided to relocate to Los Angeles, where he landed a job as an arranger for Bob Crosby. From there he moved on to become a staff arranger at NBC Radio in 1947, also composing background music for dramatic programs, and continued to study arranging and conducting with Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco and Victor Young.

Riddle caught his first big break when Les Baxter recruited him to ghostwrite a few arrangements for Nat King Cole. One of Riddle's efforts, "Mona Lisa," became Cole's biggest hit ever in 1950 (though it was credited to Baxter). "Too Young" was another huge success in 1951, and Cole hired Riddle as his primary arranger; that relationship would endure for over a decade and produce classics like "Unforgettable." In 1952, Riddle wrote an arrangement of "The Blacksmith Blues" for Ella Mae Morse that turned even more heads at Capitol; soon, the label hired him on as an in-house arranger.

When Frank Sinatra signed with Capitol in 1953, the label encouraged him to work with the up-and-coming Riddle; Sinatra was reluctant, initially wanting to remain loyal to his chief Columbia arranger, Axel Stordahl. He soon recognized the freshness of Riddle's approach, however, and eventually came to regard Riddle as his most sympathetic collaborator. The first song they cut together was "I've Got the World on a String," and as Sinatra moved into the LP format, Riddle became a hugely important collaborator. Sinatra wanted to record conceptually unified albums that created consistent moods, and Riddle's arrangements had to draw out the emotional subtext of the material Sinatra chose. Riddle's work was alternately romantic (the 10" LPs Songs for Young Lovers and Swing Easy), desolate and intimate (In the Wee Small Hours, Only the Lonely), or confident and hard-swinging (Songs for Swingin' Lovers!, A Swingin' Affair!). The results were some of the finest and most celebrated albums in the history of popular music.

Capitol signed Riddle as an artist in his own right during the early '50s; leading his own orchestra, he recorded a series of albums (upward of ten) geared for the easy listening audience. In 1956, he scored a breakout hit single with "Lisbon Antigua," an instrumental of European origin that climbed all the way to number one on the pop charts. The follow-up "Port au Prince" made the Top 20, as did two albums, 1957's Hey...Let Yourself Go! and 1958's C'mon...Get Happy!. Plus, his 1958 composition "Cross Country Suite" won him his first Grammy. As the '50s wore on, Riddle got increasingly involved in the motion picture industry, thanks in part to Sinatra; he worked on the scores for the Sinatra films Johnny Concho (1956), Pal Joey (1957), A Hole in the Head (1959), and Come Blow Your Horn (1963), plus the Rat Pack vehicles Ocean's Eleven (1960) and Robin and the Seven Hoods (1964). Branching out into other film projects, he worked on the W.C. Handy biopic St. Louis Blues (1958) and Stanley Kubrick's Lolita, and earning Oscar nominations for his scores for Li'l Abner (1959) and the Cole Porter musical Can-Can (1960). He also served as the musical director on variety shows starring Sinatra, Nat King Cole, and Rosemary Clooney.

In addition to Riddle's 1950s associations with Sinatra and Cole, he wrote arrangements for -- among others -- Betty Hutton, Jimmy Wakely, Peggy Lee, Dinah Shore, and Judy Garland, the latter of whom turned in two of her finest interpretive albums in 1956's Judy and 1958's Judy in Love under Riddle's guidance. At the end of the decade, he began a fruitful relationship with Ella Fitzgerald, cutting two sessions with his orchestra backing her up (Ella Swings Brightly With Nelson and Ella Swings Gently With Nelson) and contributing extensively to her mammoth Songbooks series, particularly the Gershwin, Kern, and Mercer volumes. Over the course of the '60s, Riddle went on to work with the likes of Rosemary Clooney (1960's Rosie Solves the Swingin' Riddle), Dean Martin, Sammy Davis, Jr., Al Martino, Johnny Mathis (1961's I'll Buy You a Star), Shirley Bassey (1962's Let's Face the Music), Billy Eckstine, Jack Jones, Eddie Fisher, Keely Smith, and many, many others. His last full album with Sinatra was 1966's Strangers in the Night, on which Riddle's feel for contemporary pop in the post-rock & roll age helped Sinatra regain his commercial standing.

Meanwhile, Riddle continued his soundtrack work, crafting some of his most notable material for television. He wrote the distinctive theme for The Untouchables in 1959, and his theme song to the series Route 66 was hugely popular, even making the pop charts when it was released as a single in 1962. Although Riddle didn't write the legendary theme song to the Batman TV series, he scored many of the individual episodes. He also worked on shows like The Man From U.N.C.L.E., Tarzan, Emergency!, and Barnaby Jones, among others. In 1967, he signed on as musical director of the popular Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour, and went on to serve in a similar capacity on early-'70s variety shows hosted by Julie Andrews and Helen Reddy. He earned another Oscar nomination for his work adapting the score of Paint Your Wagon (1969), and notched his first Oscar win for the score of 1974's The Great Gatsby. Meanwhile, Riddle continued to work with Sinatra on special projects, including the singer's 1971 farewell concert at the Ahmanson Theater in Los Angeles, and a 1974 comeback show at Madison Square Garden. As his music grew increasingly jazzy and driving, he also continued his own recording career on Sinatra's Reprise label for a time, later switching to Liberty/United Artists and a succession of smaller imprints.

By the mid-'70s, Riddle was largely retired, a combination of changing musical tastes and health problems that necessarily curtailed his activities. He emerged in the early '80s to work with Linda Ronstadt on a succession of traditional pop albums: 1983's What's New, 1984's Lush Life, and 1986's For Sentimental Reasons. The former two both earned him Grammys for Best Arrangement Accompanying Vocals. Riddle's final completed project was Blue Skies, a 1985 collaboration with opera singer Kiri Te Kanawa. He passed away in Los Angeles on October 6, 1985. ~ Steve Huey, All Music Guide
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Actor: Nelson Riddle
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Home > Library > Entertainment & Arts > Actors
  • Born: 1920
  • Died: 1985
  • Occupation: Actor
  • Active: '50s-'70s
  • Major Genres: Comedy, Drama
  • Career Highlights: Lolita, How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying, Batman
  • First Major Screen Credit: Ocean Breakers (1949)

Biography

Nelson Riddle composed many memorable themes and scores for both television and feature films. He began his lengthy career as a piano player as a young teen. By age 14, he was a trombone player and went on to play with a number of well-known bands including those of Tommy Dorsey and Bob Crosby. Following WWII, he worked for NBC radio. Through the 1950s, Riddle worked as an arranger and conductor for several major performers, notably Judy Garland and Frank Sinatra in 1953. In 1955, Riddle had his first number one hit with "Lisbon Antigua." Three years later, he earned a Grammy. By that time, Riddle had begun working in feature films as a composer, arranger, and conductor. His film credits include The St. Louis Blues, Pal Joey, and A Hole in the Head. In 1975, his score for The Great Gatsby earned an Oscar. Some of his better-known television themes include The Untouchables, Batman, Route 66, and The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
Wikipedia: Nelson Riddle
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Home > Library > Miscellaneous > Wikipedia
Nelson Riddle, Jr.
Born Nelson Smock Riddle, Jr.
June 1, 1921(1921-06-01)
Oradell, New Jersey U.S.
Died October 6, 1985 (aged 64)
Occupation Bandleader, orchestrator

Nelson Smock Riddle, Jr. (June 1, 1921 – October 6, 1985) was an American bandleader, arranger and orchestrator whose career spanned from the late 1940s, struggled with the advent of rock 'n' roll, and saw a career revival in the early 1980s. In the 1950s, Riddle was associated with his work for Capitol Records, providing arrangements and musical direction to such vocalists as Ella Fitzgerald, Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Nat King Cole, Judy Garland, Peggy Lee, Johnny Mathis, Rosemary Clooney and Keely Smith and in the 1980s his career was brought back into focus and prominence, working with singer Linda Ronstadt on a series of highly successful platinum selling albums and international concerts.

Contents

Early years

Riddle was born in Oradell, New Jersey, the only child of Marie Albertine Riddle and Nelson Smock Riddle, Sr., and grew up in nearby Ridgewood.[1] Following his father's interest in music, he began taking piano lessons at age eight and trombone lessons at age fourteen. Riddle and his family had a summer house in Rumson, New Jersey. He enjoyed Rumson so much that he convinced his parents to allow him to attend high school there for his senior year.[2] After his graduation from Ridgewood High School, Riddle spent his late teens and early 20s playing trombone in and occasionally arranging for various local dance bands, culminating in his association with the Charlie Spivak Orchestra.

In 1943, Riddle joined the Merchant Marine, serving at Sheepshead Bay in Brooklyn, New York for roughly two years. During this time he continued working for the Charlie Spivak Orchestra and he studied orchestration under his fellow merchant marine, composer Alan Shulman. After his enlistment term ended, Riddle travelled to Chicago to join the Tommy Dorsey Orchestra in 1944; he remained the orchestra's third trombone for eleven months until drafted by the United States Army in April, 1945.

Just months after Riddle entered the Army, World War II ended and he was discharged (June 1946) after serving fifteen months on active duty. Riddle moved shortly thereafter to Hollywood to pursue his career as an arranger and spent the next several years writing arrangements for multiple radio and record projects.

The Capitol years

In 1950, Riddle was hired by composer Les Baxter to write arrangements for a recording session with Nat King Cole; this was one of Riddle's first associations with Capitol Records. Although one of the songs Riddle had arranged, "Mona Lisa," soon became the biggest selling single of Cole's career, the work was credited to Baxter. However, once Cole learned the identity of the arrangement's creator, he sought out Riddle's work for other sessions, and thus began a fruitful partnership that furthered the careers of both men at Capitol.

During the same year, Riddle also struck up a conversation with Vern Yocum, (born George Vernon Yocum) a big band jazz musician (brother of Pied Piper, Clark Yocum) who had transitioned into music preparation servicing Frank Sinatra and other entertainers at Capitol Records. A collaboration followed with Vern becoming Riddle's "right hand" as copyist and librarian for the next thirty years.

In 1952, Capitol Records executives viewed the up-and-coming Riddle as a prime choice to arrange for the newly-arrived Frank Sinatra. Sinatra was reluctant however, preferring instead to remain with Axel Stordahl, his long-time collaborator from his Columbia Records years. When success of the first few Capitol sides with Stordahl proved disappointing, Sinatra eventually relented and Riddle was called in to arrange his first session for Sinatra, held on April 30, 1953. The first product of the Riddle-Sinatra partnership, "I've Got The World On A String," became a runaway hit and is often credited with relaunching the singer's slumping career. His personal favorite, a Sinatra ballad album, Only the Lonely.

Riddle was to stay at Capitol for another decade, during which time he continued to arrange for Sinatra and Cole, in addition to such Capitol artists as Judy Garland, Dean Martin, Keely Smith, Sue Raney, and Ed Townsend. He also found time to release his own instrumental albums on the label, most notably Hey...Let Yourself Go (1957) and C'mon...Get Happy (1958), both of which peaked at a respectable number twenty on the Billboard charts.

Later years

In 1962, Riddle orchestrated two albums for Ella Fitzgerald, Ella Swings Brightly with Nelson, and Ella Swings Gently with Nelson, their first work together since 1959's Ella Fitzgerald Sings the George and Ira Gershwin Songbook. The mid-1960s would also see Fitzgerald and Riddle collaborate on the last of Ella's 'Songbooks', devoted to the songs of Jerome Kern (Ella Fitzgerald Sings the Jerome Kern Songbook) and Johnny Mercer (Ella Fitzgerald Sings the Johnny Mercer Songbook).

In 1963, Riddle joined Sinatra's newly-established label Reprise Records. Much of his work in the 1960s and 1970s was for film and television, including his hit theme song for Route 66; steady work arranging episodes of Batman and other television series, and the scores of several motion pictures including the Rat Pack features Robin and the 7 Hoods and the original Ocean's Eleven.

In the latter half of the 1960s, the partnership between Riddle and Frank Sinatra grew more distant as Sinatra began increasingly to turn to Don Costa, Billy May and an assortment of other arrangers for his album projects. Although Riddle would write various arrangements for Sinatra until the late 1970s, Strangers In The Night, released in 1966, was the last full album project the pair completed together. The collection of Riddle-arranged songs was intended to expand on the success of the title track, which had been a number one hit single for Sinatra arranged by Ernie Freeman.

During the 1970s, the majority of his work was for film and television, including the score for the 1974 version of The Great Gatsby, which earned Riddle his first Academy Award after some five nominations. In 1973, he served as musical director for the Emmy Award winning The Julie Andrews Hour. Nelson Riddle's Orchestra also made numerous concert appearances throughout the 1970s, some of which were led and contracted by his good friend, Tommy Shepard.

1982 also saw Riddle work for the last time with Ella Fitzgerald, on her last orchestral Pablo album, The Best Is Yet to Come.

1983 Career revival

In 1982, Riddle was approached by Linda Ronstadt, then considered the leading female voice in rock 'n' roll, to write arrangements for an album of pop standards Ronstadt had been contemplating since her stint in Pirates of Penzance. The agreement between the two, resulted in a three-album contract which included what were to be the last arrangements of Riddle's career. Ronstadt recalls that when she approached Riddle, she did not know if he had ever heard of her— he had not. He hated rock 'n' roll, but his daughter was a Ronstadt fan and told her father "don't worry, her checks won't bounce."

When Nelson learned of Ronstadt's desire to learn more about traditional pop music and agreed to record with her, he insisted on a whole album or nothing. He was at first skeptical, but once he agreed his career turned upside down immediately[3] because Ronstadt was the queen of rock during this period.[4] For her to do "elevator music", as she called it, was a great surprise to the young audience. Joe Smith, the president of Elektra, was terrified that the albums would turn off the rock audience. The three albums together sold over seven million copies[5] and brought Nelson back to a young audience during the last three years of his life. Arrangements for Linda Ronstadt's "What's New" (1983) and "Lush Life" (1984) won Riddle his second and third Grammy Awards (the last was awarded posthumously in 1986).

Working with Ronstadt, Riddle brought his career back into focus in the last three years of his life.[6] Stephen Holden of the New York Times wrote, What's New "isn't the first album by a rock singer to pay tribute to the golden age of the pop, but is ... the best and most serious attempt to rehabilitate an idea of pop that Beatlemania and the mass marketing of rock LPs for teen-agers undid in the mid-60s ... In the decade prior to Beatlemania, most of the great band singers and crooners of the 40s and 50s codified a half-century of American pop standards on dozens of albums ... many of them now long out-of-print".[7] What's New is the first album by a rock singer to have major commercial success in rehabilitating the Great American Songbook.[7]

Death and legacy

In 1985, Riddle died at age 64 of liver ailments. He is interred at Hollywood Forever Cemetery in Hollywood, California.

Following Riddle's death, his last three arrangements for Ronstadt's For Sentimental Reasons album were conducted by Terry Woodson; the album was released in 1986.

In February 1986, Riddle's youngest son Christopher, himself an accomplished bass trombonist, assumed the leadership of his father's orchestra. The Nelson Riddle Orchestra continues touring to this day, playing tribute concerts showcasing Riddle's arrangements for Sinatra and others.

Following the death of Riddle's second wife Naomi in 1998, proceeds from the sale of the Riddle home in Bel Air were used to establish a Nelson Riddle Endowed Chair and library at the University of Arizona, which officially opened in 2001. The opening showcased a gala concert of Riddle's works, with Ronstadt as a featured guest performer.

In 2000, Erich Kunzel and the Cincinnati Pops released a Nelson Riddle tribute album entitled "Route 66: That Nelson Riddle Sound" on Telarc Records. The album showcased expanded orchestral adaptations of the original arrangements provided by the Nelson Riddle Archives, and was presented in a state-of-the-art digital recording that was among the first titles to be released on multi-channel SACD.

While in the Army, Riddle married his first wife Doreen Moran in 1945. The couple had six children: In 1968, Riddle separated from his wife Doreen; their divorce became official in 1970. A few months later he married Naomi Tenenholtz, then his secretary, with whom he would remain for the rest of his life.

Riddle was a member of Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia, the national fraternity for men in music.

In a 1982 radio interview on WNEW with Jonathan Schwartz, Riddle cites Stan Kenton's "23 degrees north 82 degrees west" arranged by Bill Russo as inspiration for his signature trombone interplay crescendos.

Discography

Main article: Nelson Riddle discography

Further reading

  • September in the Rain: The Life of Nelson Riddle by Peter J. Levinson, 2001 ISBN 0-8230-7672-5
  • Arranged by Nelson Riddle 1985, Warner Bros. Publications. (A textbook on arranging by Riddle. Includes biography and "Personal and Musical observations")

See also

References

  1. ^ Levinson, Peter J. "September in the Rain: The Life of Nelson Riddle", via Google Books, pp. 17-19.
  2. ^ Cotter, Kelly-Jane. "A Daughter's Devotion", Asbury Park Press, June 15, 2008. Accessed July 7, 2008. "Nelson lived with his parents in Ridgewood but the family rented rooms in a house in Rumson during the summer. Riddle enjoyed the teen music scene in Rumson so much that he asked to spend his last year of high school in the borough. He and his mother stayed in the rental, and his father visited on weekends."
  3. ^ "Jerry Jazz Musician=". The Peter Levinson Interview. http://www.jerryjazzmusician.com/mainHTML.cfm?page=levinson.html. Retrieved April 9 2007. 
  4. ^ "Time=". The Linda Ronstadt Interview. http://www.ronstadt-linda.com/rolling78.htm. Retrieved April 9 2007. 
  5. ^ "Family Week=". Linda Ronstadt: The Gamble Pays off Big. http://www.ronstadt-linda.com/artfam84.htm. Retrieved April 9 2007. 
  6. ^ "Jerry Jazz Musician=". The Peter Levinson Interview. http://www.jerryjazzmusician.com/mainHTML.cfm?page=levinson.html. Retrieved April 9 2007. 
  7. ^ a b "The New York Times". LINDA RONSTADT CELEBRATES THE GOLDEN AGE OF POP: by Stephen Holden Published: September 4, 1983. http://movies2.nytimes.com/mem/movies/review.html?res=9D06E3DC1538F937A3575AC0A965948260. Retrieved 2007-05-10. 

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