Remembering Jerry Nelson

Some of us knew Jerry from high school and college.  After Jerry died, one memory led to another and it seemed like it would be a good idea to make a place where people could post their memories or vignettes about Jerry.

So I'll start, 

Jerry often said that Dave Alexander, who was a year ahead of us, came to his fifth grade classroom and pantomimed a recording.  Jerry realized at that point he wanted to do something like that.  When we met him in high school at W&L, he said that he could pantomime to Spike Jones recordings, but we had never seen him do it.  

One day for a school assembly Jerry said he would pantomime "I Went to Your Wedding."  The singer starts off calmly enough.  He gets through the first verse but on the second verse he begins to laugh.  "I Went to Your Wedding
                               although I was dreading
                               the thought of seeing you ...  uhoo... uhoo."  

Pretty soon it's obvious the singer isn't at all unhappy to be getting rid of this person, and thinks the idea that this person is getting married is hilarious.  The laughter outbursts get louder, longer and more out of control.  The Spike Jones version is on You Tube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NB_XDUb_tG0

and here's his version of Cocktails for Two:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lvt4b_qwC_Q&noredirect=1

Jerry arrived dressed in a dark blue suit, white shirt and tie.  We had a brief consultation at the back of the stage about starting the record.  He went up to the microphone and announced the song in his own voice, and then we started the record.  From the back we could see he had the timing, the gestures and the postures down perfectly.  At the first sign of laughter on the record his shoulders shook slightly, then for a longer time.  Soon there was laughter from the audience.  As the record went on, he was throwing his hands out and leaning over and slapping his thigh.  He had the whole place - several hundred people - cracking up.  He would pull himself together in sync with the record (the singer would go "umhum") and start singing again, only to have another outburst.  Pretty soon he had the entire assembly - maybe 800 people - cracking up.