You wanted eclectic, composer Earle Hagen could give you eclectic. On the one hand, the down-home lope of The Andy Griffith Show theme, which, although best known as whistled by Earle himself, DID have words (“come on take down your fishing pole/and meet me at the fishing hole” etc.), on the other, the faux (and therefore thoroughly seductive) noir stylings of “Harlem Nocturne” (the lyrics to which, by one Dick Rogers, are heard even more rarely than those of the Griffith theme), which we present here in a version by Ray Anthony, who you may remember from The Girl Can’t Help It…
(Not for nothing, but from where we’re sitting right about now, the ’50s look better and better, no?) Most accounts of Hagen paint him as a happy journeyman, which means, among other things, that whatever great stories are in his memoir, he took quite a few more with him…
“On the one hand, the down-home lope of The Andy Griffith Show theme, which, although best known as whistled by Earle himself, DID have words…”
And they were written by Everett Sloane, terrific character actor, best known for his work with Welles in CITIZEN KANE and THE LADY FROM SHANGHAI. (Sloane to Rita Hayworth in the latter: ” Killing you is killing myself. But, you know, I’m pretty tired of both of us.”)