![]() He also plays a major role in Marc Fisher's book, Something In The Air, which covers radio's impact in the post-TV years. Neil Fabricant, Legislative Director of New York's ACLU during the 1960s, has said that Fass was "a midwife at the birth of the counterculture." Ralph Engleman, in his book, Public Radio & TV in America: A Political History, cites Fass as "the first to develop the full potential of free-form radio and make it a major vehicle of the counterculture." and Wavy Gravy refers to him as "the father of freeform radio." The system Edl built became a centerpiece of Fass's show, allowing more of his listeners to connect with him, and with each other. In the mid 1970s, Fass asked the station's Chief Engineer, Mike Edl, if there was any way to rig up a contraption that would allow Fass to put as many as ten phone calls on the air at the same time. įass collaborated with Gerd Stern and Michael Callahan's media collective, USCO, which had produced sound fields for Timothy Leary's Fillmore East shows, then dove in and began creating mixes on the air. Bob Fass was a hippie before there were hippies. Radio Unnameable was a counterculture radio show before anyone ever applied the term to America's drop-out youth. Nowhere else in the early 60s could you hear callers and hosts alike criticize LBJ for escalating the War in Vietnam, encourage men to burn their draft cards, or talk in glowing terms about their drug experiences. Playing two records at the same time or backwards, or the same song over and over and over again, simply because he liked its message. Nowhere else, Jay Sand writes, could you hear a DJ The show was described as a free-form show often with random phone calls and political discussion." And I thought, that's it: "Good morning, cabal." Show content Someone sent in a postcard suggesting, "Good morning, cabal." I looked it up in the dictionary and discovered that the word, cabal, comes from "horse." Originally, people met on horseback at night with their identities concealed-even from each other-to plot or plan something subversive. Williams "Good morning, world," says Fass. "I wanted a sign-on line, like William B. His signature greeting, "Good morning, cabal," came from a listener. The Unnamable by Samuel Beckett, which Fass was reading at the time, gave the show its title. He then was given the midnight to dawn time block to use as he wished. Novelist and poet Richard Elman, a friend of Fass's from high school, who was producing programs for the station's Drama & Literature Department, helped Fass get a job as an announcer. In 1963, he began working at WBAI, operated by the Pacifica Foundation. Over the next two years, he played a variety of roles in the show, also acting as assistant stage manager. In 1960, he took over the role of the warden in the legendary off-Broadway production of Threepenny Opera with Lotte Lenya. He appeared on stage in Brendan Behan's The Hostage at Circle in the Square, The Execution of Private Slovik with Dustin Hoffman, and The Man with the Golden Arm at the Cherry Lane, among other New York productions. Fass received a scholarship to study acting with Sandy Meisner and Sydney Pollack at the Neighborhood Playhouse and was also a member of Stella Adler's workshop. ![]() When he went into the army in 1956, he started a theater at Fort Bragg, North Carolina. He graduated from Syracuse University in 1955. ![]() Robert Morton Fass was born June 29, 1933, and grew up in Brooklyn, New York. Fass's program, Radio Unnameable, aired in some form from 1963 until his death primarily on WBAI, a radio station operating out of New York City. Robert Morton Fass (J– April 24, 2021) was an American radio personality and pioneer of free-form radio, who broadcast in the New York region for over 50 years.
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