DEAR JERRY: I am looking for an instrumental that came out around the same time as “Mission Impossible” ran on TV. I think the title is “Mission Accomplished.”
There are several other instrumentals using that same title, but they all seem to be from more recent years.
Then, just to complicate things, I found someone selling a CD of TV themes titled “Mission Accomplished.” I thought I'd found it, but when I called the guy he said it didn't include anything using that title. How weird is that?
Whether a sequel, an answer, or a parody I don't know. Nor do I recall the name of the band.
—June Swanson, York, Pa.
DEAR JUNE: This assignment is one where you get to choose from three different solutions, any of which will accomplish your mission.
First is the original 1967 TV soundtrack “Music from Mission: Impossible,” by Lalo Schifrin and His Orchestra (Dot 25831). This LP has 11 tunes from the series, the last of which is “Mission Accomplished.”
Nearly 30 years later (1996), when the “Mission: Impossible” motion picture came out, Hip-O Records jumped on the bandwagon and reissued the contents of the Dot LP on compact disc, as “Music from Mission: Impossible.” To the original 11, they added three bonus tunes: “Intrigue”; “Self-Destruct”; and “More Mission” (Hip-O 076744002129). Dot originally included these three on their 1968 “More Mission: Impossible” collection (DLP-25919).
Choice three is another Hip-O CD, “Mission Accomplished (Themes for Spies & Cops)” (Hip-O HIPD-40017), a 1996 assortment of movie and TV secret agent-type themes. Among its 14 offerings are Schifrin's original “Mission: Impossible” and “Mission Accomplished.”
The album you called about has a slightly misleading title, “Mission Accomplished Too (Themes for Spies & Cops)” because it is essentially volume two in the series. That's why it doesn't have “Mission Accomplished.”
Mission accomplished!
DEAR JERRY: We need you to settle a debate about one of our native Oklahomans, Patti Page.
A friend says when he was a child, his parents played a Patti Page 78 rpm that features her yodeling.
I think I know most of Patti's recordings, especially those that were popular, and I have never heard her even come close to yodeling.
Is there an oddball record by her, or is my pal confusing Patti Page with Patti Montana?
—Will Hassack, Tulsa, Okla.
Montana's signature song is the 1936 western classic, “I Wanna Be a Cowboy's Sweetheart,” and this is exactly the same song your buddy remembers.
With a title modified slightly for city folk, and a more metropolitan arrangement, Patti's “I Want to Be a Cowboy's Sweetheart,” backed with “Down in the Valley” (Mercury 5751), came out in December 1951.
On this track, Patti does a credible job of basic yodeling, sans any of the improvisational gimmicks used by top yodelers.
Overall, the talented and versatile “Singing Rage” seems out of her element as a cowgirl riding the plains.
Not surprisingly, this record flopped, even with Patti being the nation's top vocalist, male or female, at the time.
Let the record reflect that all good yodelers can sing, but not many great singers can truly yodel.
IZ ZAT SO? In the mid-'40s, KTUL, in Tulsa, ran a regularly scheduled 15-minute music program, sponsored by the Page Milk Company.
Instead of buying 30- and 60-second spot announcements, “block programming,” as it is known, provided their advertisers exclusive control for the number of minutes or hours they purchased.
The original star of the Page Milk time slot used the “house name” of Patti Page, meaning when she left the show, her replacement, Clara Ann Fowler, began performing as Miss Patti Page — and still does, after 63 years.
Jerry Osborne answers as many questions as possible through this column. Write Jerry at: Box 255, Port Townsend, WA 98368 E-mail: jpo@olympus.net Visit his Web site: www.jerryosborne.com
All values quoted in this column are for near-mint condition.
Copyright 2010 Osborne Enterprises- Reprinted By Permission
