If I’ve got a couple making passionate love, I want Sheldon's trumpet

January 2, 2020 7:09 AM

Jazz trumpeter and singer Jack Sheldon has died at 88. Well-known as a master trumpet player and the sidekick for the Merv Griffin Show, he was possibly best known (at least among my generation) as the voice behind Schoolhouse Rock songs including I'm Just A Bill, Conjunction Junction, and the vocal tour-de-force Rufus Xavier Sarsaparilla.

There aren't a lot of clips of him online, most of which are in the obit, but a documentary about his life, Trying to Get Good (trailer) was released a few years ago. Here's one more I always liked, clowning around with Dom Deluise.

posted by Mchelly (16 comments total)

Decades after his run with Griffin ended in 1986, he was perhaps most recognizable to a mass audience in the 21st century as the voice of the “Schoolhouse Rock” perennials “I’m Just a Bill” and “Conjunction Junction,” to the point that he parodied them as a guest vocalist on episodes of “The Simpsons” and “Family Guy,” respectively.

Wow, I had not realized that they got the original vocalist on that "Simpsons" parody

I was a little young for the Merv Griffin Show, but it seems like they had a great band; I know that the great jazz guitarist Jim Hall played for them after he got sober and wanted to stay out of nightclubs for a while.

I just checked out one of the clips and he was really good!
posted by thelonius at 7:17 AM on January 2, 2020 [2 favorites]

Oh, man. Schoolhouse Rock was a huge part of my childhood. Huge.

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posted by Mr. Bad Example at 7:46 AM on January 2, 2020

In a 2019 filled with notable obituaries, his was the last one I saw on December 31st. On Mark Evanier's blog, he told an anecdote of Jack doing a small role on a Jack Webb cop show on which an LAPD drug-sniffing dog also appeared. Kliph Nesteroff's "old showbiz" tumblr has other details from Jack's varied career, including an audio clip of his stand-up comedy act.
posted by oneswellfoop at 8:37 AM on January 2, 2020 [5 favorites]

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posted by briank at 8:44 AM on January 2, 2020

Well, dammit.

I hope wherever he is, Bob Dorough and Blossom Dearie have met up with him.

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posted by droplet at 9:32 AM on January 2, 2020 [6 favorites]

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posted by allthinky at 1:10 PM on January 2, 2020

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posted by jim in austin at 1:35 PM on January 2, 2020

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posted by jadepearl at 2:25 PM on January 2, 2020

Lest we forget, the ever-increasingly timely:

Energy from Schoolhouse Rock.

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posted by tzikeh at 3:18 PM on January 2, 2020 [2 favorites]

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posted by JoeXIII007 at 3:53 PM on January 2, 2020

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posted by camyram at 4:28 PM on January 2, 2020

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posted by BlahLaLa at 7:00 PM on January 2, 2020

Star Trek fans, take note: Mr. Sheldon was the piano player in the holodeck in the Bynar episode of The Next Generation, "11001001."

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posted by bryon at 9:40 PM on January 2, 2020 [1 favorite]

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posted by filtergik at 9:58 PM on January 2, 2020

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posted by ZeusHumms at 10:39 PM on January 2, 2020

Jack Sheldon - The Falcon (from 'The Nut House', 1964) -- standup while (probably) quite high
posted by pracowity at 2:13 AM on January 3, 2020