Happy Birthday, Doc Severinsen

I just got the memo that today is the birthday of the STILL-LIVING Carl “Doc” Severinsen (b. 1927).

Severinsen was a transitional figure of a very rare sort when I was a kid. Rock and roll had caused such a rift in popular culture in the 1950s and ’60s, that there were very few figures from the big band era who managed to remain on top on show biz after the revolution. Severinsen was obviously able to do so because he was on the young side — he was born when jazz was already over a decade old, definitely a member of the second jazz generation. A cornet player, as a young man he had played with the bands of Tommy Dorsey, Benny Goodman, and Ted Fio Rito. In 1949 he joined the NBC orchestra, which is how he became part of the band for Steve Allen’s Tonight Show, under the legendary Skitch Henderson. Severinson took the band over himself under Johnny Carson, 1967-1992).

Why do I say Severinsen bridged generations? Well, above there was his look, which was very contemporary for the ’60s and ’70s. he wore long hair, a bushy ‘stache, a soul patch, lots of bling, and all kinds of crazy, colorful, clashing hippie clothes. Few men of his age went SO flashy back then. Soupy Sales also wore his hair long like that, one of the few of his generation. And some of the older country musicians (Buck Owens and George Jones wore what considered long hair before Willie Nelson grew those braids!). But most of the big band era guys were downright combative and wouldn’t cede an inch in the war against youth (which they obviously lost). The be bop crowd was much wilder than other factions in the jazz community, and this was obviously Doc’s orientation. Though the style of music on the show was far from experimental. By the ’70s, when I started watching, The Tonight Show was one of the few remaining forums for that conservative swing-era sound. By the middle of the decade, there were all sorts of shows like Midnight Special, Soul Train, Saturday Night Live, and others, that were bringing the music of young people to the popular late-night variety bloc. Paul Shaffer on the Letterman show, brought the pop transition even further. And after Shaffer, everything became more like the SNL band, some sort of eclectic fusion of all sorts of more modern styles.

In addition, Doc pioneered the idea of the bandleader being a sort of third banana in the comedy constellation on the show. He stepped in when second banana Ed McMahon was not around, and was a general trouper, exchanging pleasantries and funny banter with Johnny as opportunities arose, and was generally more present than many bandleaders had been during the earlier television era.

Severinsen was Danish, Swiss and German. He was nicknamed with reference to his father, the town dentist of Arlington, Oregon, himself a violinist.

To learn more about show biz history, please see my book No Applause, Just Throw Money: The Book That Made Vaudeville Famous, and stay tuned for my next book Electric Vaudeville: A Century of Radio and TV Variety, coming November 2023.