Friday, February 05, 2010

Baja Marimba Band

The Baja Marimba Band was comprised of first rate L.A. studio musicians led by Julius Wechter, made interesting albums, performed as a comedy novelty act - drunken Mexicans - so offensive even in the '60s they drew complaints from Hispanic organizations. But they lifted the costumes & schtick from mariachi bands, which sometimes feature a "clown" in the manner of the dimwit stand up bass player in old American country groups. An unseen star of this video is the person conducting the off-camera Hollywood Palace TV show band.

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Comments:
This video is live, not performed by the Palace orchestra. Standard procedure on these shows in the 60's was to have bands lip synch to their records, but this specific segment is live.
 
It's live, but clearly the band is augmented by an off-camera orchestra, just as Baja was expanded in the studio on most numbers by session musicians.
 
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