TVSquad

Talk about bizarre timing.

This morning I was just about to order two different Johnny Carson DVDs. I've been holding off on getting them for one reason or another but decided last night to just order them. Good thing I waited. Respond2 Entertainment has announced that they are going to release a 12 disc set this fall called Heeere's Johnny: The Definitive Collection. Yes, with three "e's."

Tommy Newsom, best known for being the bandleader on The Tonight Show when Doc Severinsen had the night off, died this weekend of cancer at his home in Virginia.

Newsom was also a saxophone player and joined the show in 1962, when Johnny Carson took over from Jack Parr. When Carson retired in 1992, so did Newsom. Newsom was a very dry, laid back guy, and Carson jokingly called him "Mr. Excitement."

Besides his work on The Tonight Show, Newsom also composed music for Kenny Rogers, John Denver, and Skitch Henderson, the first Tonight Show bandleader, who died in 2005.

When Johnny Carson died, his former bandleader Doc Severinsen (along with producer Peter Lassally) came on The Late Show With David Letterman to talk about Johnny and their years on The Tonight Show with him. And Severinsen and his band played Johnny's favorite song, "Here's That Rainy Day," a song I had never heard before but is absolutely beautiful. The video is now up at Letterman's page at cbs.com and it's well worth a look. And yes, that is Tommy Newsom playing the sax and Ed Shaughnessy on drums.