ALAN FREED

'Alan Freed' (December 15, 1921 – January 20,
1965), also known as 'Moondog', was an American disc-jockey (DJ) who became internationally known for promoting African-American Rhythm and Blues (R&B) music on the radio in the United States and Europe under the name of Rock and Roll. Many of the top African American performers of the first generation of rock and roll (such as Little Richard and Chuck Berry) salute Alan Freed for his pioneering attitude in breaking down racial barriers among the youth of 1950s America. His career was destroyed by the payola scandal that hit the broadcasting industry in the early 1960s.

Contents

"Father of Rock and Roll"

Pioneer

"'The Moondog'"

1010 WINS New York

Radio Luxembourg

Moves to WABC 770

Movies

Television

Payola

Death

Legacy

References

External links

"Father of Rock and Roll"

While Alan Freed called himself the "'father of rock and roll'", he was not the first to play it on the airwaves, but is credited for coining and popularizing the term "Rock and Roll" to describe a style of music. He was a promoter and he was very successful at what he did, until his own personal failings became exploited by others. They built their own careers upon the legacy created by Freed, while Freed's personal career was obliterated.

Pioneer

Many of the top African American performers of the 1950s have given public credit to Alan Freed for pioneering racial integration among the youth of America at a time when the adults were still promoting racial strife. Little Richard has appeared in several programs about that era, to give the credit to Alan Freed that others have denied him. An example of Freed's non-racist attitude is preserved in motion pictures in which he personally played a part as himself with many of the leading African-American acts of that day. His influence and the music that he promoted crossed artificial racial barriers that were in place during the 1950s.
In the 1956 film ''Rock Rock Rock'' Freed, as himself, tells the audience that, "Rock and Roll is a river of music that has absorbed many streams: rhythm and blues, jazz, rag time, cowboy songs, country songs, folk songs. All have contributed to the Big Beat."
'

"'The Moondog'"

After leaving WAKR in Akron, where he played hot jazz and pop recordings, he moved to Cleveland, Ohio.[1]
Freed had met Leo Mintz in 1948 and saw how Mintz's customers at Cleveland's Record Rendezvous enjoyed Rhythm and Blues records. He left WAKR in December 1949 and in April of 1950 started in the Cleveland market on WXEL-TV (Channel 9) as the afternoon movie show host. [2] Sponsored by Mintz's Record Rendezvous, which sold R&B records, Freed started a late night show called " The Moondog Rock Roll House Party" on WJW-AM (850) radio in July of 1951.[3]
Later that year, Freed promoted dances/concerts featuring the music he was playing on the radio. [4] He was one of the organizers of a five act show called the "The Moondog Coronation Ball" on March 21, 1952 at the Cleveland Arena. This event is known as the first rock and roll concert, and was ended early due to overcrowding. [5]
The Cleveland Cavaliers' mascot Moondog is named in honor of Freed.
The original Moondog was an experimental street musician from New York City.

1010 WINS New York

Following his success on the air in Cleveland, Alan Freed moved to New York City where he turned WINS into a rock and roll radio station.

Radio Luxembourg

In 1956 Alan Freed was introduced to European audiences by his appearances in a succession of rock 'n' roll movies such as ''Rock Around The Clock'', ''Don't Knock the Rock'' and other titles. That same year and while working for WINS in New York City, Alan Freed began recording a weekly half-hour segment of the Radio Luxembourg show called '''Jamboree''' that was aired on Saturday nights at 9:30 PM. The billing of his segment in the '208' magazine programme guide described him as "''the remarkable American disc-jockey whose programmes in the States cause excitement to the fever pitch.''". A year later Dick Clark appeared in a rock 'n' roll movie of his own called ''Disc Jockey Jamboree'' when it was released in the United Kingdom.
''Jamboree'' with Alan Freed was heard throughout the British Isles and much of Europe via the powerful AM nighttime signal of Radio Luxembourg, and outside Europe by a similtaneous relay via transmission on shortwave. Due to the strange effect that the ionosphere had on the skywave signal of Radio Luxembourg, it was heard poorly in parts of southern England with extreme fading and like a local station in northern England cities such as Liverpool. The Beatles' founding members claim to have been influenced by African American artists such as Little Richard and Chuck Berry who were both promoted on Alan Freed's radio shows. The recordings made by these artists were in turn promoted on sponsored shows paid for by the record labels that were also heard over Radio Luxembourg, which was the only commercial radio station heard in the United Kingdom until 1964.

Moves to WABC 770

After departing from WINS, Freed for a time was employed in New York by WABC 770 AM around 1958, about two years before it evolved into one of America's great Top 40 stations by launching its "Musicradio" format. At this time, WABC (unlike rocker WINS) was more of a full- service station which began implementing some music programming elements. Ironically, Freed was employed at the station around the same time as another famous pioneering disc jockey who arose during a different era: Martin Block (of WNEW 1130 AM - now WBBR - "Make Believe Ballroom" fame), toward the end of Block's legendary career. Freed was eventually fired by WABC (1959) during a dispute where he refused to sign a statement assuring that he had never accepted payola.

Movies

Alan Freed also appeared in a number of major and historical rock and roll motion pictures during this period. These films were often welcomed with tremendous enthusiasm by teenagers because they brought visual depictions of their favorite American acts to the big screen, years before music videos would present the same sort of image on the small television screen. One side effect of these movies shown before mass audiences was that they sometimes presented an excuse for thugs to turn a fun event into a riot, in which cinemas in both West Germany and the United Kingdom were trashed.
Alan Freed appeared in several motion pictures that presented many of the big musical acts of his day:
:
★ 1956 - '''Rock Around the Clock''' featuring Alan Freed, Bill Haley & His Comets, The Platters, Freddie Bell and the Bellboys, Lisa Gaye.
::'''Rock, Rock, Rock''' featuring Alan Freed, Chuck Berry, Frankie Lymon and the Teenagers, Johnny Burnette, La Vern Baker, The Flamingos, The Moonglows. [6]
:
★ 1957 - '''Mr. Rock and Roll''' featuring Alan Freed, Lionel Hampton, Ferlin Husky, Frankie Lymon, Little Richard, Brook Benton, Chuck Berry, Clyde McPhatter, La Vern Baker, Screamin' Jay Hawkins.
::'''Don't Knock the Rock''' featuring Alan Freed, Alan Dale, Little Richard and the Upsetters, Bill Haley and His Comets, The Treniers, Dave Appell and His Applejacks.
:
★ 1959 - '''Go, Johnny Go!''' featuring Alan Freed, Jimmy Clanton, Chuck Berry.

Television

It was at the height of Freed's career at the beginning of his new television series that various individuals decided to use Alan Freed as a scapegoat for all that was wrong with the recorded music industry. His show called The Big Beat (which predated American Bandstand) on ABC was suddenly cancelled after an episode, in which Frankie Lymon of Frankie Lymon and The Teenagers was seen dancing with a white girl, offended the management of ABC's local affiliates in the Southern states. Into the void that had been created by the absence of Freed on TV, the career of Dick Clark began to take off. During this period, Freed was seen on other popular programs of the day, including To Tell The Truth, where he is seen defending the new "Rock and Roll" sound to the panelists whom were all clearly more comfortable with swing music:Polly Bergen, Ralph Bellamy, and Kitty Carlisle [Note: The re-broadcast of this particular episode of TTTT occurred on The Gameshow Network on February 4th or 5th, 2007, and also on April 23, 2007].

Payola

In 1958, Freed faced controversy in Boston, when he told the audience, "The police don't want you to have fun", as a result, Freed was arrested and charged for inciting to riot.
The career of Alan Freed ended when accusations were made that he had accepted payola – that is, taken bribes to play specific records. He had also taken songwriting co-credits (most notably on Chuck Berry's ''Maybellene''). This entitled him to receive part of a song's royalties, which he could help increase by heavily promoting the record on his own popular radio show.
Although these practices were not unique to him, he was singled out for attention. Freed lost his own show on radio station WINS, then he was fired from the station altogether. In 1960 payola was made illegal, although this by no means stopped the practice which continues in various forms to this day. In 1962 Alan Freed pled guilty to two charges of commercial bribery for which he received a fine and a suspended sentence.

Death

Although the punishment handed down to Alan Freed was not severe, the side effects of negative publicity were such that no prestigious station would employ him, and he moved to the West Coast in 1960, where he worked at KDAY-AM in Santa Monica, California. In 1962, after KDAY refused to allow him to promote rock 'n roll stage shows, Freed moved to WQAM in Miami, Florida, but that association lasted only two months. He died in a Palm Springs, California hospital in 1965 at the age of 43 suffering from uremia and liver cirrhosis, which was brought on by alcoholism. Shortly before this he had begun working at a radio station in Palm Springs, California. He was initially interred in the Ferncliff Cemetery in Hartsdale, New York, and his ashes were later moved to their present location in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame on March 21, 2002.

Legacy

In 1978 a motion picture entitled ''American Hot Wax'' was released, inspired by Freed's contribution to the rock and roll scene, leading up to a concert that was held in New York City in 1959. Although director Floyd Mutrux created a fictionalised account of Freed's last days in New York radio by utilising real-life elements outside of their actual chronology, the film does accurately convey the fond relationship between Freed, the musicians he played and the audiences who listened to them. Several notable personalities starred in the movie, who would later become well-known celebrities, including Jay Leno and Fran Drescher, and there were even cameo appearances by Chuck Berry, Screamin' Jay Hawkins, Frankie Ford and Jerry Lee Lewis, performing in the recording studio and concert sequences.
In 1986, he was part of the first group inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, which was built in Cleveland in recognition of Freed's involvement in the promotion of the genre. In 1988, he was also posthumously inducted into the Radio Hall of Fame and his pioneering contribution to the genre has been recognized by the Rockabilly Hall of Fame.
Freed appeared in Stephen King's ''Nightmares and Dreamscapes'' as a nightmarish version of himself, who enthusiastically announces the names of deceased rock n roll legends in ''You Know They Got a Hell of a Band'' as part of an upcoming concert to perform. He was portrayed by Mitchell Butel in the television adaptation on the Nightmares & Dreamscapes mini-series.

References

★ ''Big Beat Heat: Alan Freed and the Early Years of Rock & Roll'', by Jackson, John A. - Schirmer Books, 1991. ISBN 0-02-871155-6

★ ''The Pied Pipers of Rock 'N' Roll: Radio Deejays of the 50s and 60s'', by Smith, Wes (Robert Weston). - Longstreet Press, 1989. ISBN 0-929264-69-X

External links

★ http://www.alanfreed.com/

★ Freed's Rock and Roll Hall of Fame page

★ http://www.history-of-rock.com/freed.htm

★

★ Alan Freed Movies