I'm George Tompkins. In the words of my old friend Tom Luciani, "tempus fugit," which when translated from Latin means time flies. Here we are in 2013 having just celebrated the 50th Anniversary of the Time Capsule Show. In a conversation I had with my friend Joe Marchesani regarding the 50th anniversary it dawned on us that this past January the Rhythm and Blues Vocal Group Harmony Review had celebrated it's 33rd anniversary. Through some unusual circumstances, and I have to believe some divine intervention, Joe was in town from Iowa the weekend of January 5, 1980. He had done a guest appearance on my show at WARY-FM in Valhalla, New York that morning. Shortly after 5 P.M. that day I received a call from Joe saying to call Bill Shibilski who was waiting for my call at WFUV. When you listen to the first show of January 12, 1980 Bill gives a very accurate description of the events of January 5, 1980. Like a lot of listeners to the Time Capsule Show, I was totally stunned by Tom and Joe's departure from radio the last Saturday of 1977. As the final notes of "September Song" by the Ravens played out, I vowed to myself that I would mount a personal crusade to get them to come out of retirement. In my wildest dreams I never thought that crusade would culminate with my becoming one the hosts of this new show which, as Bill so eloquently stated, was in fact a rebirth or a resurrection of the Time Capsule Show with a new name (R&B Group Harmony Review), but for the continued purpose of playing great vocal group harmony records, which the Time Capsule Show was the pioneer in New York radio.
So here we are in 2013 and, thanks to my late wife Joan, I sit here with a treasure trove of reel to reel tapes of shows dating from January 12, 1980 until my departure from the show on December 17, 1994, one show shy of completing my 15th year at WFUV. For the first two plus years I only owned one reel to reel recorder, so I have to apologize and say, while the Part 1 segments of the shows are usually complete, I only have a small portion of the Part 2 segments. On the earliest shows the four of us would take turns hosting Part 1 or Part 2. Sometime in 1983 I managed to still have enough money to buy rare records and a second reel to reel tape recorder.
In 1983, thanks to Tom and some teeth pulling on my part, we added the legendary singing bus driver from Brooklyn, Sal Mondrone, to the team of hosts. At Tom's suggestion I met Sal at the station in the midst of basketball season so that he and I could put a couple of emergency shows in the can. Call it divine intervention again but it was around noon and we were about to start recording in the unoccupied combo studio when the telephone line feed from the basketball game was lost. Suddenly Sal and I found ourselves live on the air from noon until 5 P.M. that day. Although the tape recorders were rolling, we actually broadcast live for five consecutive hours. Something else happened that day. I must admit I was quite reluctant to do the show with one of the legendary collectors of all time. When we walked out of the studio neither of us said anything but I think we both sensed that something completely unrehearsed and natural had been born. I like to think of it as magic in that two record collectors just sat down and started playing records for themselves and the audience at the same time.
With special thanks to Joe for putting me in touch with Tony and, of course, especially Tony, it is my privilege to present to you several hundred hours of The RnB Group Harmony Review as hosted by the original Three Musketeers of The Time Capsule Show, Tom, Joe and Bill, along with some segments including Bobby Leszczak, myself alone, and the majority with Sal as my co-host. I will also be including shows featuring well known guest collectors. Just listening again to these shows that I have not listened to since they were recorded has evoked a lot of warm memories for me. For those who have heard these shows when they were done you are in for a nostalgic trip down memory lane and for those who have never heard the shows hopefully you will enjoy hearing them for the first time.