Sweet Youth

Another U.S. Youth Orchestra began to sprout last week.* In a Manhattan rehearsal room, under the guidance of a young, handsome, kinetic radio conductor, Raymond Paige, a band of 75 "Young Americans" made a merry din. The Young Americans are vowed to do for U.S. popular music what the Stokowski brood do for the longhairs, are moreover organized specifically to combat subversive ideas. Their sponsor is the League of Young Americans, Inc., whose aim is to rally the one-sixth of the U.S. population that is in its twenties.

Wisconsin-born Raymond Paige was once second fiddle in Grauman's Chinese Theater (Hollywood), became conductor, graduated to movies and radio. Conductor Paige likes sweet tunes, lush arrangements, big orchestras. Says he: "I can do things with eight flutes that you certainly couldn't with one." In 1939 he realized his dream of the biggest, flutiest orchestra ever to play popular music on the air--in 99 Men and a Girl.

Conductor Paige chose his 75 Young Americans from 2,000 applicants. Their ages range from 17 to 26, average under 21. His tuba player was a janitor; a trombonist, a truck driver; a violinist, a housemaid; the concertmaster, a welterweight boxer. Songster for the Young Americans is Carolyn Cromwell, redhaired, 19-year-old Kansan. The orchestra has already made its first recordings; when RCA Victor's Music Director Charles O'Connell heard the Young Americans rehearsing, he put them under five-year contract. Because a radio sponsor is eyeing them, the Young Americans have made only one concert date, for their Manhattan debut next month.

Conductor Paige has nothing but contempt for "sauerkraut conductors" who play a lot of foreign stuff. His band will give out Gershwin, Kern, Victor Herbert, Cole Porter, perhaps some serious U.S. music. "Blatant swing," says the League's hand-out (with the League's spelling), "and abstruse, ultra-modern cachophony will be avoided."

*The first: Leopold Stokowski's applecheeked All American Youth Orchestra, which last summer toured the U.S., Canada, Mexico, then temporarily disbanded.

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