Bobby Troup

Bobby Troup (October 18 1918 - February 7 1999) was an American actor, jazz pianist and songwriter. He is best known for writing the popular standard "(Get Your Kicks On) Route 66", and for his role as Dr. Joe Early in the 1970s US TV series Emergency!.

Life and music

Bobby Troup was born in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. He graduated from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania. Bobby Troup was a member of the Sigma Alpha Epsilon (ΣΑΕ) fraternity and the Mask and Wig Club.

His earliest musical success came with the song "Daddy" which was a regional hit in 1941. He served as a Captain in the US Marines during World War II. He was the first white officer to be given command of an all black unit in Jackson, North Carolina, where the men were living in tents, with filthy latrine conditions. At the time, in Jackson, a black person was expected to cross the street or stand in the gutter as a white person walked by. Troup's black marines built Quonset huts, new latrines, a nightclub, a boxing ring, a basketball court and formed a basketball team, a jazz band, an orchestra, and had installed a miniature golf course for his men. Soon, white marines of other units began spending time in that part of camp.

Bobby Troup's first marriage was to Cynthia Troup. Troup's light and humorous musical style was similar to that of the Nat King Cole Trio.

In the 1940s Cole had a hit with Troup's best known song "(Get Your Kicks On) Route 66" which became a hit for Cole and then a popular standard. In the 1960s, it was one of the earliest recordings by the British rock group The Rolling Stones.

Troup produced torch singer Julie London's million selling hit record "Cry Me a River" in 1955 and they married five years later, following London's divorce from actor Jack Webb, then directing and starring in the now-classic Dragnet TV show.

Troup's own recordings in the 1950s and 60s were not commercially successful. Nonetheless, he made some excellent recordings for Liberty Records and Capitol Records, many with musicians that included the best of the West Coast school of jazz.

Television and movies

In the mid-1950s, Troup was one of three regular panelists (along with Mel Blanc and Johnny Mercer) in the game show Musical Chairs, a Bill Leyden-hosted quiz program that aired locally on Los Angeles television for two years before NBC broadcast it in the summer of 1955. On the program, the viewing audience was encouraged to submit questions about music in an effort to stump the panel. The Troup Group provided much of the music in the game show. He also served as host of the NBC show "Stars of Jazz" featuring various jazz luminaries, particularly those working in Hollywood.

"The Music of Disney - A Legacy in Song" (1992) lists Bobby Troup as singer of the title song for 1965's 'That Darn Cat', although the IMDB credits this song to Bobby Darin.

While he relied on songwriting royalties, Troup also worked as an actor, playing musician Tommy Dorsey in the film The Gene Krupa Story (1959). Later he had a memorable cameo as a disgruntled staff sergeant assigned to driving Hawkeye and Trapper John around in Japan in Robert Altman's 1970 masterpiece M*A*S*H. (His only line of dialogue is a repeated exasperation, "Goddamn army!", later modified to "Goddamn army jeep!"). In 1972, Jack Webb, who had previously used Troup in a 1967 episode of the television series Dragnet, cast him opposite Webb's ex-wife Julie London in the US TV series Emergency!.

Emergency! was created by Webb, who had recently starred in a revival of Dragnet and was producing NBC's popular Adam-12. London and Troup had remained on cordial terms with Webb, who had used Troup (and his daughter Ronny) in episodes of Adam-12 as well as the revived Dragnet. In the role of Dr. Joe Early, Troup projected a relaxed amiability that brought humor to the show and contrasted with the intensity of actor Robert Fuller in the role of Dr. Kelly Brackett.

Troup also wrote the title song (sung by Little Richard) in the classic 1950s rock and roll movie The Girl Can't Help It. An instrumental rendition of his song "The Meaning of the Blues" appeared on the landmark Miles Davis album, Miles Ahead. Troup's hipster interpretation of the fairy tale "The Three Bears" is often erroneously credited to "anonymous" and re-titled "Three Bears Rap", "Three Bears with a beat" etc. This song was first recorded by the Page Cavanaugh Trio and later by Western Swing bandleader Leon McAuliffe.

Selected compositions

• "Daddy", 1941
• "(Get Your Kicks On) Route 66", 1946
• "Bran' New Dolly" [Written and sung by Bobby Troup on RCA Victor some time between 1947-50]
• "The Girl Can't Help It", Little Richard
• "Their Hearts Were Full Of Spring", The Four Freshmen, The Beach Boys
• "The Meaning of the Blues", Miles Davis
• "The Three Bears"
• "Lemon Twist"
• "Baby Baby All The Time"
• "You're Looking At Me"
• "I'd Like You For Christmas"

External Link(s)

• Bobby Troup at the Internet Movie Database