Flights of the Vout Bug

In 1956 producer Lyle Griffin released a two-sided single record by the comedianand monologist Richard Lord Buckley under the futuristic titleFlight of The Saucer. Having become a cult record long since this earlypredecessor of the later 'rap' style at least partly was a recycled version of arecording which had already been made by Griffin in late 1946 only thatthe 'flying object' then had not been the saucer but the vout bug. Actuallyflying on this older record was legendary jazz pianist Michael Dodo Marmarosafor whom Flight of The Vout Bug - suggesting at least verballysome kind of analogy to Rimsky-Korsakov's Bumble Bee - had been writtenas a miniature concertino for piano and big band. Marmarosa certainlywas not unknown then nor is he today. Yet his many 'flights' on recordsor transcriptions from the 1940s to the 1960s - including some of SlimGaillard's humorous excursions into the language of Vout - have neverbeen completely documented in a comprehensive and chronological cataloguewhich is the task the authors have set themselves with the presentpublication. The approach to this task is twofold: on one side is a detaileddiscographical listing of the pianist's known recorded performances andon the other an interpretative survey which seeks to guide the listener'sear to some of the intrinsic artistic values of Marmarosa's ever-beautifuland highly personal piano style.This is the never before published discography and history of a legendary performer.