When the British Invasion of music by The Beatles, Stones, Animals and more happened, network television smelled money $$$.
TV programs that featured music were created, including, Shindig, Hullabalou and others.
Dick Clark was around in the 50s, with American Bandstand. Later, Where the Action Is. There were also regional shows from the East and West Coast.
In the mid 60s, celebrities from movies, television and music were utilized as television host for variety shows that featured (a popular new fad) of teenage music created by The Beatles.
Dean Martin was an American singer, actor and comedian. He gained his status from working with Jerry Lewis. In 1965, he was host of The Dean Martin Show.
Other popular shows in that period of music included The Smothers Brothers Show and Laugh In.
Dean Martin was a crooner from The Great American Songbook.
I remember watching his show in 1965. He would usually present the rock band with some sarcastic comedic punch line. Point out the young musicians hair, outfits or song title. Many host of those shows did the same. This music was just a passing fad, in their opinion.
Elvis got the same treatment when he started appearing on television.
Singers like Dean Martin were intimidated by the sudden explosion of rock and roll music in the 60s. Even the popular artist, Elvis and Frank Sinatra fell off the record charts for a period of time.
The business of music, it’s not much different today. Certainly, Spotify and streaming platforms don’t care about the music or artist. It’s all about the $$$ Ching Ching. Spotify recently created a dedicated category for ai.
At least the 60s presented music from many varieties and styles. Although the host from most of those television shows were “squares” I was highly entertained and exposed to the groups. I could see what brand of drumset the drummer played.
Revisiting these tracks from 1964, I’m amazed that certain 45 records became a hit.
It shows the diversity of taste Americans truly had.
I’m going to get one of those “ripping” ai programs to start ripping tracks as single instrument tracks, the technology of ai is what I find useful…..
It was a great time to be a music fan that's for sure .. and going back to revisit the tunes is an education. I don't know if you have written about California Dreaming yet, but the wonderful harmonic material of the West Coast sound....eventually Crosby Stills and Nash....timeless material in my opinion. I don't know if you tried to evoke any of this through AI but I would certainly like to hear it