Origins: Jeopardy Tune (upon death of Alex Trebek)

Subject: RE: Origins: Jeopardy Tune (upon death of Alex Trebek)
From: GUEST,gillymor
Date: 09 Nov 20 - 05:59 AM

Jeopardy used to be a regular part of my day and I still tune in for the Tournament of Champions and the College tournament. It's hard to imagine it without Alex but I hope it carrys on.

Subject: RE: Origins: Jeopardy Tune
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 08 Nov 20 - 03:19 PM

Merv Griffin seems largely forgotten now, but he was a big mover in a lot of the game shows in the 1970s and 80s. Prior to that he had a talk show my mother always watched in the afternoon, and he was a talented performer, singing at the piano. He was in the movies mostly in the 1950s, and a look at IMDB shows his earliest performances were as a band leader and vocalist.

I read a long obit for Alex Trebek in the Los Angeles Times this morning. He had quite a long career as a host after starting as a news broadcaster. He had a nice speaking voice but I never heard of him doing any singing or musical activity. I only found one mention at IMDb, something about singing a couple of lines from a BeeGees song. No idea when or where. But this was a good segue to the story, Gargoyle.

Subject: Origins: Jeopardy Tune
From: GUEST,.gargoyle
Date: 08 Nov 20 - 02:29 PM

New York Times interview in 2005 with Merv Griffin regarding
the 30 second Jeopary tune, he said at first "he wrote the melody as a lullaby for his son, Tony, and that it took him under a minute to write it."

The song brought in royalties for Griffin that he said astonished him.

"That little 30 seconds has made me a fortune, millions.
You don’t want to know. Probably close to $70-80 million.”

Sincerely,
Gargoyle

A quick musical inclusion. Alex deserves better than the lower regions.