Maynard Ferguson -- Theme from "Star Trek"

 

Coincidentally, I had found out how old actor and bon vivant William Shatner was just a few days before his birthday came around yesterday. I know that he's been around for a long time but my eyes still boggled when I realized that he turned 90 years old on March 22nd. 

I've shown my "Star Trek" geekiness occasionally on "Kayo Kyoku Plus", and yep, with all due respects to Chris Pine (who I also liked in the character), I think Shatner is still the one true Captain James Tiberius Kirk of the starship Enterprise. And even from a blog that centers around Japanese music from the Showa Era, I still wanted to pay tribute to this old Montrealer with the distinctive thespian delivery. 

So I'd been wondering what the song would be. When the original "Star Trek" was shown in Japan under the title of "Uchuu Daisakusen"（宇宙大作戦）, it didn't come up with any original theme of its own created by any Japanese songwriters. I even checked out the Japanese voice actor who dubbed Kirk, Masaaki Yajima（矢島正明）, to see if he had released any songs of his own, but no dice there.

Then I realized that during my years in Japan, from time to time on Japanese variety programs, often travel-related, the theme song from the original "Star Trek" was used to accompany the footage of heading out to the far-flung areas outside of the nation such as Hawaii or Los Angeles. I gather that was the case because of the wondrous and romantic nature of travel and the whole thing about the premise of "Star Trek" was going out into the unknown to explore strange new worlds and civilizations.

However, it wasn't the original theme by Alexander Courage that was the travel footage's melodic companion, but a disco cover of the song by jazz trumpeter Maynard Ferguson. Like Shatner, Ferguson also hailed from a part of Montreal, Canada, and in the West, he's probably much more well known as the musician behind "Gonna Fly Now", the theme song for Sylvester Stallone's "Rocky" (1976). I will probably have to do a ROY article on that one fairly soon.

Still, I like Ferguson's take on "Star Trek". I figure if Meco can come up with disco "Star Wars", then why not a glitter ball-friendly version of "Star Trek"? Wouldn't it be nice to view the NCC-1701 soar through the sky while drinking down that cocktail by the beach?

Both "Gonna Fly Now" and his cover of "Star Trek" are on his March 1977 9th album "Conquistador", Perhaps Ferguson himself, who passed away in 2006, may not be all that well known to the population at large in Japan nowadays, but I think both of those songs still have some resonance and recognition although folks would probably be able to identify the movie for "Gonna Fly Now" faster than that for the other theme song.

Anyways, happy 90th to William Shatner!