Ray Anthony
Encyclopedia
Ray Anthony is an American
bandleader
, trumpet
er, songwriter
and actor
.
, where he began studying the trumpet with his father. He played in Glenn Miller
's band from 1940–1941 and appeared in the Glenn Miller movie Sun Valley Serenade in 1941 before joining the U.S. Navy
during World War II
. After the war he formed his own group. The Ray Anthony Orchestra became very popular in the early 1950s, with recordings
that included Anthony's classic dance songs "The Bunny Hop
" and the "Hokey Pokey
," as well as the theme music
from Dragnet
. He had a #2 chart hit with a remake of the Glenn Miller tune, "At Last" in 1952.
From 1953-1954 Anthony was the musical director on the television series TV's Top Tunes, and he also appeared as himself in the 1955 film Daddy Long Legs
. In 1955 Anthony married his second wife, the sex symbol
actress Mamie Van Doren
and began expanding his own acting career. He starred in a short-lived television 1956-1957 variety show, The Ray Anthony Show. Anthony also appeared in several films during the late 1950s, including The Five Pennies
(where he portrayed Jimmy Dorsey
), and Van Doren's movies High School Confidential
as "Bix" and Girls Town
. In the 1959-1960 television season, he guest starred in the episode "Operation Ramrod" of David Hedison
's espionage
series Five Fingers
on NBC
.
After van Doren filed for divorce in 1958, citing cruelty, they finally divorced in 1960, and Anthony's brief film career ended at about the same time. However, he continued his musical career and had another hit
record
with the theme from Peter Gunn
, which reached #8 on Billboard's
pop chart
. Among his pianists was Allen "Puddler" Harris
, a native of Franklin Parish
, Louisiana
, who had been a member of the original Ricky Nelson
band and Kellie Green, who also played the vibraphone
.
Anthony was considered one of the most modern of the big band
leaders. In the lyrics
to "Opus One
", which imagine a number of players performing the song, he is cited along with Les Brown
and his Band of Renown:
Anthony and his band were also featured in the movie, The Girl Can't Help It
, and were treated as one of the rockers in the line-up, but also shown in performances with Mansfield that are essential to the plot.
Ray Anthony's compositions include "Thurderbird", "Bunny Hop", "Trumpet Boogie", "Big Band Boogie", and "Mr. Anthony's Boogie".
In the early 1980s, Anthony formed Big Band '80s, other members including Buddy Rich
, Harry James
, Les Brown, and Alvino Rey
.
Anthony has been honored with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame
.
As of May 2011, Anthony was still active as a bandleader and musician, and is one of the oldest living big band bandleaders.
Anthony has a close friendship with Hugh Hefner
, which has resulted in him appearing in numerous episodes of The Girls Next Door
.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
bandleader
Bandleader
A bandleader is the leader of a band of musicians. The term is most commonly, though not exclusively, used with a group that plays popular music as a small combo or a big band, such as one which plays jazz, blues, rhythm and blues or rock and roll music....
, trumpet
Trumpet
The trumpet is the musical instrument with the highest register in the brass family. Trumpets are among the oldest musical instruments, dating back to at least 1500 BCE. They are played by blowing air through closed lips, producing a "buzzing" sound which starts a standing wave vibration in the air...
er, songwriter
Songwriter
A songwriter is an individual who writes both the lyrics and music to a song. Someone who solely writes lyrics may be called a lyricist, and someone who only writes music may be called a composer...
and actor
Actor
An actor is a person who acts in a dramatic production and who works in film, television, theatre, or radio in that capacity...
.
Biography
As a child Anthony moved with his family to Cleveland, OhioCleveland, Ohio
Cleveland is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and is the county seat of Cuyahoga County, the most populous county in the state. The city is located in northeastern Ohio on the southern shore of Lake Erie, approximately west of the Pennsylvania border...
, where he began studying the trumpet with his father. He played in Glenn Miller
Glenn Miller
Alton Glenn Miller was an American jazz musician , arranger, composer, and bandleader in the swing era. He was one of the best-selling recording artists from 1939 to 1943, leading one of the best known "Big Bands"...
's band from 1940–1941 and appeared in the Glenn Miller movie Sun Valley Serenade in 1941 before joining the U.S. Navy
United States Navy
The United States Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the seven uniformed services of the United States. The U.S. Navy is the largest in the world; its battle fleet tonnage is greater than that of the next 13 largest navies combined. The U.S...
during World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
. After the war he formed his own group. The Ray Anthony Orchestra became very popular in the early 1950s, with recordings
Sound recording and reproduction
Sound recording and reproduction is an electrical or mechanical inscription and re-creation of sound waves, such as spoken voice, singing, instrumental music, or sound effects. The two main classes of sound recording technology are analog recording and digital recording...
that included Anthony's classic dance songs "The Bunny Hop
Bunny hop (dance)
The bunny hop is a novelty dance that was created at Balboa High School of San Francisco in 1952. It is a social mixer dance, sometimes also referred to as a "party" or "dance party" dance....
" and the "Hokey Pokey
Hokey Pokey
The hokey cokey or hokey pokey , also known as the okey cokey, hokey tokey, or cokey cokey, is a participation dance with a distinctive accompanying tune and lyric structure. It is well known in English-speaking countries...
," as well as the theme music
Theme music
Theme music is a piece that is often written specifically for a radio program, television program, video game or movie, and usually played during the title sequence and/or end credits...
from Dragnet
Dragnet (series)
Dragnet is a radio and television crime drama about the cases of a dedicated Los Angeles police detective, Sergeant Joe Friday, and his partners...
. He had a #2 chart hit with a remake of the Glenn Miller tune, "At Last" in 1952.
From 1953-1954 Anthony was the musical director on the television series TV's Top Tunes, and he also appeared as himself in the 1955 film Daddy Long Legs
Daddy Long Legs (film)
Daddy Long Legs is a Hollywood musical comedy film set in France, New York City, and the fictional college town of "Walston" in Massachusetts. The film was directed by Jean Negulesco, and stars Fred Astaire, Leslie Caron, Terry Moore, Fred Clark, and Thelma Ritter, with music and lyrics by Johnny...
. In 1955 Anthony married his second wife, the sex symbol
Sex symbol
A sex symbol is a celebrity of either gender, typically an actor, musician, supermodel, teen idol, or sports star, noted for their sex appeal. The term was first used in the mid 1950s in relation to the popularity of certain Hollywood stars, especially Marilyn Monroe and Brigitte...
actress Mamie Van Doren
Mamie Van Doren
Mamie Van Doren is an American actress and singer; who rose to popularity as Universal Pictures's version of 20th Century Fox's Marilyn Monroe....
and began expanding his own acting career. He starred in a short-lived television 1956-1957 variety show, The Ray Anthony Show. Anthony also appeared in several films during the late 1950s, including The Five Pennies
The Five Pennies
The Five Pennies was a semi-biographical 1959 film starring Danny Kaye as cornet player and bandleader Red Nichols. Other cast members included Barbara Bel Geddes, Harry Guardino, Bob Crosby, Louis Armstrong, Susan Gordon, and Tuesday Weld...
(where he portrayed Jimmy Dorsey
Jimmy Dorsey
James "Jimmy" Dorsey was a prominent American jazz clarinetist, saxophonist, trumpeter, composer, and big band leader. He was known as "JD"...
), and Van Doren's movies High School Confidential
High School Confidential (film)
High School Confidential is a 1958 crime drama film directed by Jack Arnold. It stars Mamie Van Doren, Russ Tamblyn, Jan Sterling, John Drew Barrymore, Jackie Coogan. The film also features a cameo by Jerry Lee Lewis who opens the movie singing a song of the same name, which Lewis co-wrote with Ron...
as "Bix" and Girls Town
Girls Town
Girls Town is a 1959 film produced by MGM, starring Mamie Van Doren, Mel Tormé and Ray Anthony; Paul Anka also appears in his first acting role. Van Doren stars as a juvenile delinquent who is sent to a girls school run by nuns, where she finds herself unable to help her sister...
. In the 1959-1960 television season, he guest starred in the episode "Operation Ramrod" of David Hedison
David Hedison
Albert David Hedison, Jr. is an Armenian-American film, television, and stage actor. He was billed as Al Hedison in his early film work. In 1959, when he was cast in the role of Victor Sebastian in the short-lived espionage television series Five Fingers, NBC insisted that he change his name...
's espionage
Espionage
Espionage or spying involves an individual obtaining information that is considered secret or confidential without the permission of the holder of the information. Espionage is inherently clandestine, lest the legitimate holder of the information change plans or take other countermeasures once it...
series Five Fingers
Five Fingers (TV series)
For other uses see 5 Fingers Five Fingers is an NBC adventure/drama series set in Europe during the Cold War loosely based on the 1952 film 5 Fingers, starring James Mason and Danielle Darrieux...
on NBC
NBC
The National Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network and former radio network headquartered in the GE Building in New York City's Rockefeller Center with additional major offices near Los Angeles and in Chicago...
.
After van Doren filed for divorce in 1958, citing cruelty, they finally divorced in 1960, and Anthony's brief film career ended at about the same time. However, he continued his musical career and had another hit
Hit record
A hit record is a sound recording, usually in the form of a single or album, that sells a large number of copies or otherwise becomes broadly popular or well-known, through airplay, club play, inclusion in a film or stage play soundtrack, causing it to have "hit" one of the popular chart listings...
record
Gramophone record
A gramophone record, commonly known as a phonograph record , vinyl record , or colloquially, a record, is an analog sound storage medium consisting of a flat disc with an inscribed, modulated spiral groove...
with the theme from Peter Gunn
Peter Gunn
Peter Gunn is an American private eye television series which aired on the NBC and later ABC television networks from 1958 to 1961. The show's creator was Blake Edwards...
, which reached #8 on Billboard's
Billboard (magazine)
Billboard is a weekly American magazine devoted to the music industry, and is one of the oldest trade magazines in the world. It maintains several internationally recognized music charts that track the most popular songs and albums in various categories on a weekly basis...
pop chart
Billboard Hot 100
The Billboard Hot 100 is the United States music industry standard singles popularity chart issued weekly by Billboard magazine. Chart rankings are based on radio play and sales; the tracking-week for sales begins on Monday and ends on Sunday, while the radio play tracking-week runs from Wednesday...
. Among his pianists was Allen "Puddler" Harris
Allen "Puddler" Harris
Allen W. "Puddler" Harris is a rock and roll and country musician who played piano in the original Ricky Nelson Band in Hollywood, California, and the last Jimmie Davis band in Louisiana...
, a native of Franklin Parish
Franklin Parish, Louisiana
-Demographics:As of the census of 2000, there were 21,263 people, 7,754 households, and 5,706 families residing in the parish. The population density was 34 people per square mile . There were 8,623 housing units at an average density of 14 per square mile...
, Louisiana
Louisiana
Louisiana is a state located in the southern region of the United States of America. Its capital is Baton Rouge and largest city is New Orleans. Louisiana is the only state in the U.S. with political subdivisions termed parishes, which are local governments equivalent to counties...
, who had been a member of the original Ricky Nelson
Ricky Nelson
Eric Hilliard Nelson , better known as Ricky Nelson or Rick Nelson, was an American singer-songwriter, instrumentalist, and actor...
band and Kellie Green, who also played the vibraphone
Vibraphone
The vibraphone, sometimes called the vibraharp or simply the vibes, is a musical instrument in the struck idiophone subfamily of the percussion family....
.
Anthony was considered one of the most modern of the big band
Big band
A big band is a type of musical ensemble associated with jazz and the Swing Era typically consisting of rhythm, brass, and woodwind instruments totaling approximately twelve to twenty-five musicians...
leaders. In the lyrics
Lyrics
Lyrics are a set of words that make up a song. The writer of lyrics is a lyricist or lyrist. The meaning of lyrics can either be explicit or implicit. Some lyrics are abstract, almost unintelligible, and, in such cases, their explication emphasizes form, articulation, meter, and symmetry of...
to "Opus One
Opus No. 1 (1943 song)
"Opus No. 1" is a popular song, composed in 1943 by Sy Oliver, with lyrics by Sid Garris. The tune is often titled Opus One, or Opus #1. It has become a standard song in the swing, jazz and big band repertoire....
", which imagine a number of players performing the song, he is cited along with Les Brown
Les Brown (bandleader)
Les Brown, Sr. and the Band of Renown are a big band that began in the late 1930s, initially as the group Les Brown and His Blue Devils that Brown led while a student at Duke University. He was the first president of the Los Angeles chapter of the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences...
and his Band of Renown:
- If Mr. Les Brown can make it renowned
- And Ray Anthony could rock it for me
Anthony and his band were also featured in the movie, The Girl Can't Help It
The Girl Can't Help It
The Girl Can't Help It is a 1956 comedy musical film starring Jayne Mansfield, Tom Ewell, and Edmond O'Brien. It was produced and directed by Frank Tashlin, with a screenplay adapted by Tashlin and Herbert Baker from an uncredited novel Do Re Me by Garson Kanin...
, and were treated as one of the rockers in the line-up, but also shown in performances with Mansfield that are essential to the plot.
Ray Anthony's compositions include "Thurderbird", "Bunny Hop", "Trumpet Boogie", "Big Band Boogie", and "Mr. Anthony's Boogie".
In the early 1980s, Anthony formed Big Band '80s, other members including Buddy Rich
Buddy Rich
Bernard "Buddy" Rich was an American jazz drummer and bandleader. Rich was billed as "the world's greatest drummer" and was known for his virtuosic technique, power, groove, and speed.-Early life:...
, Harry James
Harry James
Henry Haag “Harry” James was a trumpeter who led a jazz swing band during the Big Band Era of the 1930s and 1940s. He was especially known among musicians for his astonishing technical proficiency as well as his superior tone.-Biography:He was born in Albany, Georgia, the son of a bandleader of a...
, Les Brown, and Alvino Rey
Alvino Rey
Alvin McBurney , known by his stage name Alvino Rey, was an American swing era musician and pioneer, often credited as the father of the pedal steel guitar...
.
Anthony has been honored with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame
Hollywood Walk of Fame
The Hollywood Walk of Fame consists of more than 2,400 five-pointed terrazzo and brass stars embedded in the sidewalks along fifteen blocks of Hollywood Boulevard and three blocks of Vine Street in Hollywood, California...
.
As of May 2011, Anthony was still active as a bandleader and musician, and is one of the oldest living big band bandleaders.
Anthony has a close friendship with Hugh Hefner
Hugh Hefner
Hugh Marston "Hef" Hefner is an American magazine publisher, founder and Chief Creative Officer of Playboy Enterprises.-Early life:...
, which has resulted in him appearing in numerous episodes of The Girls Next Door
The Girls Next Door
The Girls Next Door, also known as The Girls of the Playboy Mansion, is an American reality television series broadcast on the E! cable television network...
.