Tom Scott

Tom Scott

CBS, 8:15 Mon, - Fri. WQXR, 11:45 A.M. Mon, - Fri.

TOM SCOTT, American troubadour, whose broadcasts are heard over CBS from 8:15 to 8:30 A.M. Monday through Friday and daily over WQXR from 11:45 to 12 Noon, features folk songs that almost all Americans are glad to hear and didn’t know they had as part of their national heritage.

The first time you hear this Kentucky born six-footer you somehow get the impression of meeting and talking with a young beardless edition a Abraham Lincoln. It’s not so much a matter of skin-deep facial resemblance as heart-deep love of people and the love of the land. Tom gives to the simplest folk songs the dignity of a sound musicianship, plus a sincere and natural interpretation. His musical education was obtained at the University of Kentucky and the Louisville Conservatory of Music. Before that, he had learned to play the saxophone, clarinet, violin, tuba, guitar and piano.

Scott first learned many of his songs during his boyhood from the Negroes and the mountain folk. He still spends all of his spare time searching for more, through the Appalachian region.

When Tom decided to try his luck in New York, he left home in Lexington, Kentucky, with his few belongings tossed into a bag, eight dollar in his pockets, and a box of his mother’s sandwiches clutched in his hand. To support himself, he worked with a bridge gang, and he was a singing porter in an ale house. At night he made the rounds of amateur shows, until his winning of so many first prizes got to be a gaga among the contestants who eked out a living that way.

A job in Fred Waring’s Glee Club, which also gave him the opportunity to do some arranging, was the turning point in his career. Fred became interested in the Southern lad’s mountain music, and it wasn’t long before he was a full-time staff arranger. An engagement at the Rainbow Room was so successful that he was booked into other supper clubs.

Today he is a recognized authority on this type of music. Over a hundred his arrangements have been published and are widely used by choral groups. He has composed symphonic and chamber music that has been performed by leading artists, ensembles and symphony orchestras, and several ballets.

Recently, he put the research into a book on American folk music, called “Sing of America,” and he has recorded a number of these songs in an album also entitled “Sing of America.”