TEN YEARS AGO THIS WEEK
…
Forgotten Hits Salutes
The Ed Sullivan Show
Exactly ten years ago this week,
Forgotten Hits began a three week salute to The Ed Sullivan Show, the most
successful variety show of all time.
Over his 23 year television run,
Sullivan introduced the world to the biggest names in show business … and
single-handedly brought the latest rock and roll acts right into our living
rooms every Sunday Night.
If an artist was fortunate enough to be asked to appear, it was a pretty safe bet that their record sales would skyrocket in the days that followed. It gave us kiddies at home the chance to see our rock and roll heroes up close and personal, most often in a live (and sometimes “edited”) performance.
And the editing wasn't always just for the purpose of song length and live broadcast time restrictions ... (“Let’s spend some TIME together,”
anyone??? Of course, Jim Morrison and
The Doors more than made up for that blunderous decision a few years later!)
We kicked things off on Halloween,
2011, with The Top Ten Rolling Stones Performances, as hand-picked by Andrew
Solt, who for decades now has owned and controlled the complete library collection
of every available Sullivan broadcast.
The occasion was the release of the new DVD series spotlighting The
Rolling Stones’ six appearances on The Ed Sullivan Show. (Solt has since struck a deal with UME to
digitally share his extensive Sullivan library thru The Ed Sullivan YouTube
Channel, who have regularly been posting full-length performances for the past
couple of years now. New posts go up
almost daily of vintage, full-length clips, most not seen in their entirety
since their original airdates.)
We followed this up on November 1st
with our own personal look back at some very special and memorable Sullivan
performances. On the 2nd, we
gave you the lowdown on Solt himself, which we followed up with our very own
exclusive interview with Andrew on November 3rd.
On Friday, November 4th,
2011, we fondly remembered The Beatles’ appearances on The Ed Sullivan Show and
then on Saturday, the 5th, it was your guys’ turn to reminisce.
The tribute continued the following
week with more looks back at special Sullivan moments as well as the rest of
our interview with Andrew Solt.
But we didn’t stop there …
The FOLLOWING week we ran more
comments and memories … including several from artists who had appeared on The
Ed Sullivan Show, thus achieving the pinnacle of their show-biz career in the
process … if you made it to The Ed Sullivan Show, that meant that you had REALLY made it!
The fun continued thru November 21st
… three solid weeks of Sullivan Memories.
You can scroll back to discover (or re-enjoy)
the whole thing here:
Forgotten
Hits: 10/30/11 - 11/6/11 (forgottenhits60s.blogspot.com)
Start your journey here on October 31st via the link above and then just click the “Newer Posts” link at the bottom of each page to jump to
the next several chapters.
[You’ll see that several of the
clips we featured then appear as unavailable now …
That’s because these links have since been replaced over the past decade by newer, cleaner full-length clips, now featured regularly on The Ed Sullivan YouTube Channel. Please allow yourself some time to browse around here because you are in for a REAL treat as you discover more and more of these timeless appearances. Links to The Ed Sullivan Show YouTube Channel (The Ed Sullivan Show - YouTube) and EdSullivan.com appear here and below.]
A lot has changed in The Sullivan
Universe since our series first ran ten years ago.
In June of 2020, Solt’s SOFA Entertainment struck a deal with UME to digitally share performances from the vast Sullivan library thru the newly launched Ed Sullivan YouTube Channel. Andrew's son Josh Solt to over the reigns on this project ... and by August of this year, the new channel had already passed 150 million views and continue to post new clips daily, proving the long-lasting, universal appeal of this prime time television classic and the quality of artists it presented. (With literally thousands of clips to choose from, UME has structured a three year plan to make most of this material available for viewing again. Forgotten Hits has been posting highlights of the latest postings every month since this new project began.)
The Ed Sullivan YouTube Channel doesn’t only deal in rock and roll clips (although this is certainly the area where most of our readers will find interest.) Vintage performances by the day’s most popular comedians, live on stage recreations of scenes from Broadway’s hottest shows, puppets for the kids, tumblers, jugglers and American Icons from Ethel Merman and Louis Armstrong to Mickey Mantle and Willie Mays all made appearances. The Sullivan Show DEFINED variety … and performances from all of these various walks of life live on thru these newly posted streams. (The Ed Sullivan Show prided itself on presenting entertainment for the entire family ... who could gather together on Sunday Nights AS a family and all find not only something of interest, but discover something brand new along the way as well. Sadly, these memories today are of a bygone era.)
While their first US television appearances may not have been on The Sullivan Show, it was their appearances on Ed’s program that catapulted the careers of Elvis Presley and The Beatles literally overnight. SO many other acts followed in their wake. The Sullivan stage welcomed everyone from Buddy Holly, Paul Anka and The Everly Brothers … to Connie Francis, Bobby Darin and Bill Haley and the Comets … to The Supremes, The Temptations and The Jackson Five … The Mamas and the Papas, The Fifth Dimension and Dionne Warwick ... to The Doors, Janis Joplin and The Byrds … Sly and the Family Stone, The Beach Boys and Ike and Tina Turner … along with The Four Seasons, Simon and Garfunkel and Creedence Clearwater Revival. The list goes on and on. Nearly everybody who was anybody made their way to the Sullivan stage.
The British Invasion years were
especially fruitful as Sullivan introduced us to The Dave Clark Five, Herman’s
Hermits and Petula Clark … Gerry and the Pacemakers, The Animals and Freddie
and the Dreamers! Peter and Gordon, Chad and Jeremy, Manfred Mann ... and so many more.
Browse around these sites to
discover a massive number of vintage, one-of-a-kind clips of your all-time
favorite artists, doing what they do best …
The Ed Sullivan
Show - YouTube
Ed Sullivan brought the biggest names in show business and popular music into our homes every Sunday Night for 23 years. He made Rock And Roll Music acceptable to the parents of teenagers who otherwise may have just figured their kids had gone off the deep end.
And yet this man is NOT in The Rock
And Roll Hall Of Fame.
In fact, he has never even been so
much as NOMINATED for this honor!
This is just one more example of the short-sighted
injustice in a long list of Rock Hall oversights and blunders ... and it REALLY needs to be rectified.
Alan Freed is recognized for bringing rock and roll to radio. Squeaky clean Dick Clark is a Rock Hall inductee for his American Bandstand program. But Ed Sullivan, who brought us everyone from Elvis Presley to Buddy Holly to The Beatles to The Rolling Stones to The Supremes to The Doors to Topo Gigio (all right, we can forgive him for that last one) has never even been nominated … and that’s just wrong. (kk)
