Concert to honor Kenton’s memory

Young Chang

NEWPORT BEACH -- Jim Thobe was here when life was more intimate, when

he could walk right up to Stan Kenton himself on the Rendezvous Ballroom

bandstand and ask him to play a song.

Thobe would get close enough to make out the pinstriped lines on the

late jazz legend’s double-breasted, one-button roll suit.

He’d talk to him afterward -- giggle with him too.

Thobe was favored in part because Kenton’s baritone sax player married

his best friend’s sister.

“It was the experience of a lifetime, you’d never forget it,” the

75-year-old Crystal Cove resident said. “I can still see the room going

up and down and all the young, suntanned faces.”

Exactly 60 years since Kenton first performed at the Rendezvous

Ballroom on the Balboa Peninsula, the Los Angeles Jazz Institute will

hold a celebration of the musician’s local legacy tonight with the Balboa

Bandwagon 2001 at the Balboa Pavilion.

“It was during the Rendezvous engagement that Stan composed and

arranged ‘Artistry and Rhythm,”’ said Howard Rumsey, an original 1941

band member and Newport Beach resident. “Which became his theme song and

forever identified him as the unique composer and band leader that he

really was.”

Ken Poston, director of the Los Angeles Jazz Institute, said this

history at the ballroom is what they’re celebrating.

“That summer at the Rendezvous was where they made it big time,”

Poston said.

Buddy Childers, Conte Candoli, Bill Perkins, Anita O’Day and other

alumni from different eras of the Stan Kenton Orchestra will perform as

an all-star band at tonight’s gala. Pete Rugolo, one of Kenton’s better

known arrangers, will direct the orchestra along with Rumsey.

Kenton and his 22-piece band, famed for such classics as “Malaguena,”

“Collaboration” and “Artistry in Rhythm,” played regularly at the

ballroom and radio-broadcasted their music around the country from that

stage.

Paul Ramsey, a Newport Beach resident and huge Kenton fan, remembers

hearing the broadcasts as a child from his Des Moines, Iowa, home. After

World War II, having served on the West Coast, he hitchhiked down to

Hollywood and then to Newport Beach just to hear Kenton play live.

His first date with his wife was at the Ballroom on a night when

Kenton played. Nat King Cole was there too.

“He had a very unique style,” Ramsey said of Kenton. “And with the

kids in those days, he was probably the most popular. He was an imposing

figure.”

Thobe said the ‘40s and ‘50s was a time of heightened emotions. When

Stan Kenton was loved, he was really, really loved. When people danced,

they did it intensely. When people heard Kenton live, it was a once in a

lifetime experience.

At the same time, Thobe’s high school newspaper featured a column on

the front page every other Friday headlined “Classmates Killed in

Action.” Every frivolous perk became a thrill, and life was more

appealing because of its potential end.

“You’d think, ‘Oh my gosh, I’m gonna be the next one,”’ Thobe said.

“Everything was magnified and moving fast . . . that was a wonderful

time.”

FYI

WHAT: Balboa Bandwagon 2001

WHEN: Dinner will start at 7:30 p.m., concert at 8:30 p.m. Wednesday

WHERE: Balboa Pavilion, 600 Main St., Newport Beach

COST: $125, dinner included

CALL: (909) 593-4180

BOX

CELEBRITIES GALORE

WHO’S PLAYED AT THE RENDEZVOUS BALLROOM?

Benny Goodman

Lionel Hampton

Woody Herman

Arty Shaw

Ozzie Nelson

The Dorsey Brothers

Harry James and his Music Makers

Nat King Cole

Johnny Mercer

Bob Hope, when he sang with Guy Lombardo

Jerry Colonna

Bob Crosby and his Bobcats

Billy Butterfield

Matty Matlock

Dick Dale