who inspired Tubby and who performe the original recording?

[enewberger]

Hi, all. I was chatting yesterday with David Tripp, the son of the late Paul Tripp, who wrote the Tubby story and worked with composer George Kleinsinger to put together the original record, on which Tripp also served as narrator.

On his behalf, I'm eager to learn the names of two tuba players.

First, the name of the tuba in the WOR-radio house orchestra who, in December 1941, after the orchestra broadcast "Jack and Homer the Horse," an earlier Tripp/Kleinsinger collaboration, approached Tripp and asked him if he couldn't please write something for tuba.

According to David, his dad told him he couldn't sleep that night, thinking about the conversation, got out of bed, and wrote the story line. He followed up with Kleinsinger, got a furlough from the Army for 10 days to do the recording, and the rest is history. First expected to sell 8-10,000 records, it sold some 300,000. (We need more tuba works like this, I needn't say.)

Second, who played the Tubby solo on the original recording (not the one with Danny Kaye narrating)? David is concerned that on virtually all the commercial productions, the names of the tuba soloists are missing, and he wants to set the record straight, so to speak. (He's our kind of guy.)

Thanks!

Eli