What’s On Your Top Playlist?
February 2008
Dean Joss and his grandson
at the keyboard
STANFORD GRADUATE SCHOOL OF BUSINESS —The Platters, Puccini, and Banjo Patterson were some of the names on a top music playlist Dean Robert L. Joss gave radio station KZSU. The campus station’s Lunchtime Special show invites Stanford faculty and staff as on-air guests to share their favorite music and tell why.
Joss appeared on the Feb. 4 show with the following playlist.
1. “Only You,” by the Platters—The Platters were a very popular 1950s group when my wife and I were in high school, and over the years, this has become “our song!”
2. “Rock around the Clock,” by Bill Haley and the Comets—The first rock and roll song to really gain widespread consciousness in the 1950s and bring rock and roll into the mainstream. It came out in 1954 or 1955, the year I started high school. Before this (strange as it may seem today), adults and children all listened to the same music! The “Hit Parade” of top 10 songs was something you and your parents would both watch and listen to on TV. After rock and roll appeared, the parents and kids went their separate ways musically.
3. “Rhapsody in Blue,” by George Gershwin—Everyone recognizes this today as the United Airlines theme song, but Gershwin was perhaps American’s preeminent 20th century composer, and he produced this most famous piece (which he played with the orchestra) in the 1920s. It remains a classic, and this was a piece I played (parts of it) at one of my piano recitals around 1955. I enjoy symphony a lot, particularly the piano concertos/solos.
4. “Pine Top’s Boogie Woogie,” by Clarence “Pine Top” Smith—Growing up, I took piano lessons from age 6 to 14, and had to play regularly in recitals arranged by my piano teacher, Mrs. Raynor. To keep me interested, she allowed me to deviate from the more traditional pieces by Beethoven or Chopin or Rachmaninoff, to play songs more appealing to a teenager in 1954. One recital song she let me perform was this classic boogie-woogie number—thought to be the first-ever recorded by the “father” of boogie. I stopped taking lessons when I went to high school but have continued to play popular music (mostly show tunes, Broadway musical, old favorites, sing-alongs, Christmas carols, etc.). I mostly play by ear and with others singing!
5. “Nessum dorma!,” aria from Turandot, by Puccini—I am not a big opera buff but have attended many performances over the years at the San Francisco, Sydney, New York, and Paris Opera houses. When living in Australia, we had a chance to see the Three Tenors perform to a large crowd at the Melbourne Cricket Ground, and Pavoratti (as usual) brought down the house with this famous (probably his signature) aria. It would rank as my favorite opera piece.
6. “Waltzing Matilda,” written by Banjo Patterson—This is an Iconic Australian song, rich with history/folklore, and practically the national anthem of the country. Having lived nearly seven years in Australia as CEO of Westpac Bank, and returning each year since 1999, I have come to love the song and the country.
7. “I Still Call Australia Home,” by Peter Allen—This is another famous Australian song by one of the country’s best-loved songwriters—made famous in the musical “Boy from Oz,” and now the QANTAS theme song.
8. “You Can’t Stop the Beat,” from the musical Hairspray—My wife and I love big production musicals and go whenever we have a chance in New York, London, or San Francisco. One of the more recent ones we saw was Hairspray in New York, so here is a song from that musical which gets everyone out of their seats and dancing! Plus, my granddaughters love this one, and sing it by heart.