William Tell Overture

The last opera written by Gioachino Rossini was "Guillaume Tell" based on the Freidrich von Schiller play "Wilhelm Tell". Following the 1829 publication in France, Rossini concentrated on religious music. Recorded in New York City in 1895 this is the Italian military concert group of sixty members under conductor Eugenio Sorrentino, Banda Rossa from San Severo and the first recording of "Guillaume Tell Overture". This is from the Irving Berliner collection at the Library of Congress.

What started as a Detroit radio show on WXYZ, now WXYT, in 1933, The Lone Ranger moved to television sixteen years later and captured and audience of millions. "The William Tell Overture” was used for both the opening and closing of the show. The character was created by station owner George Trendle and writer Fran Striker. They had the desire to create an American version of the masked man Zorro.

Spike (Lindley Armstrong) Jones and His City Slickers placed "The William Tell Overture” at number six on Billboard in 1948. Doodles (Winstead) Weaver is calling the race. This can be heard on many Spike Jones compilations. When Spike was a young man, he got the nickname because he was as thin as a spike. Spike was the percussionist on the first recording of the Bing Crosby hit "White Christmas' when he was with the John Scott Trotter Orchestra. Doodles Weaver's nickname came from his mother who called him Doodlebug because of his freckles and big ears. His older brother Pat was president of NBC and his niece was actress Sigourney Weaver.