As a kid, I used to watch this show with my Grandmother. When I went to Concord, California in 1989, I saw everything that I saw in the opening credits.
Absolutely the best drum roll out I've ever heard. Talk about ahead of its time. Put on a set of headphones and listen to the set drummer for the first 21 seconds. The drummer is all out and holding this thing together. I concluded after listening to this that there just can't be a lot of people on the planet that can play a set drum like that in this context. Talk about bringing it! I like this theme enough to eat! It's so Bay Area 1970's.
Pat Williams Soundtrack Intro from the Streets of San Francisco is still one of the damn coolest piecest of music out there ever written...the screaming guitar play, outstanding drums and the wha wha effect is most excellent.
Ich erinnere mich noch als ich als kleines Kind mit meiner Mutter in den 1970 ziger Jahren im schwarz weiß Fernseher die Serie angesehen habe. Es ist immer Freitag spät Abends gelaufen. Viele Erinnerungen. Es war eine tolle Serie mit super Schauspielern und bei der Titelmusik bekomme ich heute noch Gänsehaut. Jetzt bin ich fast 58 Jahre alt und erinnere mich immer noch gerne daran. Danke sehr fürs einstellen.
The 70’s were the pinnacle of TV. First decade of everything in color. The media was still young enough to be fresh, but mature enough to condescend the stereo types of earlier decades. It all went downhill in the 80s, and it has continued!
The Streets of San Francisco A Quinn Martin Production Starring Karl Malden Also Starring Karl Malden's Nose Tonight's Episode: "Don't Leave Home Without It"
Man, this joint right here, SWAT, Vega$, Starsky & Hutch (seasons 1 and 2) Ironside, Quincy ME, The Rockford Files, Barney Miller, WKRP, Emergency, Sanford and Son, The Jeffersons, Good Times, Hawaii Five O, Kojak etc are the all time 70s bangers!
that was my favorite show as a child, Patrick Williams, and Lalo Schifrin as another master of film music, I still listen to it a lot today, just timeless ...
Sounds like Tower Of Power. One of THE funkiest bands in existence!! And straight props to the guitarist who was working that pedal. Outtasight man!! I did some research...Henry Mancini attempted to do the theme but it was a cat named Patrick Williams who was successful at doing it. And dude was leading an orchestra doing it!! Well folks, it's now official, white people, not all but a lot, DO have soul. My respect is given. My mind is blown!! An old white man came out with one of the funkiest themes that ever was!! Vanilla Soul. Funky man, funky!! Black and White. Funkalicious and qualified!! And people, since we all have the power to groove and do it so well, the next time you meet a racist be he or she black or white give em the universal peace sign. One middle finger under a groove. Can you dig it?
Absolutely badass. Imagine tuning in to ABC in the mid-70s and watching this kickin’ opening and music. I was born about a decade too late to see this on broadcast TV, but I saw reruns in the 80s and 90s. Possibly the best theme song and opening of any American TV show ever? It’s right up there. Iconic. Awesome. Gritty 1970s America, with all the Vietnam and Watergate-era angst and nastiness. Things haven’t changed all that much.
I grew up listening to jazz because my parents were fans of the genre but I embraced and loved soul & r&b from when I was a little kid. Jazz taught me to appreciate real musicianship as did soul and r&b music. I remember this theme song because it was one I listened to during the era. The walking bass, the horns, and drums are exceptional; incredible musicians.
May the great Karl Malden R.I.P. Passed away 7/1/2009 age 97 from natural causes. Quite a career he had. Was married to his wife Mona Greenberg 4 nearly 71yrs. One ☝️ of the longest marriages in Hollywood history.
Role model. He was a great actor. As Gabriel Byrne famously said, portraying D'Artagnan, "I believe it is possible for a man to love one woman all his life, and be the better for it". Very true
If Malden had been handsome he'd have been one of the great legendary leading men. He delivered in every role, and he was in so many different and great ones.
I played trumpet in the stage band in junior high back in the 70's. The band that played this tune performed at Westminster College in Salt Lake. My buddy and I got a front row seat when they played it. Knocked our socks off!!
After some research I found it was written and performed by the 'Don Randi Trio' but couldn't find any record or tape of it. Great piece of funky jazz!
Real music! Real and talented musicians! Any listener with a discerning taste in music in all genres recognizes that the best music has already been recorded and that includes this theme song by Patrick Williams. And the horns and bass! Real music!
Someone needs to bring back EVIL , DIRTY Wah riffs like this. The guitar is so high up in the mix for mono tv play - i think this is why this era of theme was so funky. Bass and drums kicked up high too . But the 2 long wah bend runs before it goes into the main verse drum fill and just before the end of the main title are simply pure filth.... A Quinn Martin production all right! I heard that it was Peter "The Monkees" Tork who played the guitar on this session.
Great LA session men,Wah Wah Watson, Lee Ridenour and later, Dennis Coffey.Lots of the television shows went to first call studio musicians who many went unnamed or uncredited for contractual reasons, but they were top flight, believe it!!
This and Starsky & Hutch theme songs seemed so “tough” to me. Love the 70s shows which truly highlighted the cities they lived in. Again, so very 70s. Wonderful!
Absolutely loved the shows' intro theme, which was most evident in "the 30-year pin" episode. The voice over really grabbed you in the opening credits!
I've had both Pat Williams and Henry Mancini's version of this tune on constant rotation since I downloaded them from Napster 21 years ago. Supreme musicianship!
I know a guy who was living and working in SF in 1974, and one day on lunch break walked down to a local park -- and there was Michael Douglas...on lunch break from filming a sequence of the latest Streets episode. They shot the breeze -- mostly small talk -- for about an hour. No one else came into the park during that whole time, they were pretty much alone. At the end, they shook hands, nice to meet you, good talking and all that. My buddy worked in a local small corner grocery store, and simply walked back to work. As you might expect, the two of them never met or saw each other again, but I told my buddy (Luke is his name) that I wondered that if they ever did meet again, if Douglas would remember that day and that conversation also. Probably not, but who knows?
As a kid I'd tune into this show just for the kickass theme music. I'd usually get bored and turn it off after 10 minutes or so. But that theme song is one of the heaviest ever.
@@muziklvr7776 TELL IT!!! I envision Malden and Douglas everytime I hear it. LOL Karl and Mike in the riding the streets in that big Ford. "A Quinn Martin production"
This is before Michael Douglas flew over the Cuckoo's Nest, which led him Romancing the Stone while chasing after the Jewel of the Nile, which led to a Fatal Attraction to work on Wall Street, which kept him from Falling Down so he could play The Game, only to warn us that Money Never Sleeps.
I remember Roscoe in various TV episodes, also from the John Wayne movie, "The Cowboys," as Mr. Nightlinger, the cook. Wonderful actor, a class act, passing away in 2007. He served in WW2, was a competitive athlete--running--a teacher at Lincoln college (French, English, Comparative Literature) and a wine connoiseur/salesman. Quite the Renaissance man!
Could not agree more frisco21, used to watch it with my dad as a kid, as well as Starsky and Hutch and other shows like The Rockford Files.... kids of today have no idea how good those shows were!
How is it possible that this show had such a totally bangin’ theme tune yet it was just another cop show. Okay so a lot of cop shows have brilliant title music but this one is special!
Cuando era niño enloquecía al escuchar el intro de esta serie;al igual que con Baretta y Starsky and Hutch. Con los años supe que se llamaba Funk. De esos años se transformó en mi música favorita,junto con el blues y el Jazz Funk y el Jazz Rock.
The wah guitar on this is evil. And so in sync with the bass and drums - a real rhythm section basically. When everything was HIGH up in the mix and mixed dry for mono Tv. I believe this was Tom Scott on the Sax, who wrote the best Starsky and Hutch theme a few years later -"Gotcha"
i LOVED THE THEME from this show-and for seeing the episodes rebooted on the vintage channels, i can reminisce of those SF spots-now long gone (tear downs, not retro-fitted, etc)
Tonight's Episode: A trout in the milk Always loved this theme that I vcr recorded it to learn the drumtrack. Hard beginning. I keep expecting that voice to come in saying the title, actors, and episode.
This show, almost forgotten now, was a terrific entry in a lineup of excellent programming during the 1970s, before cable networks destroyed television with the shoddy garbage they produced. It's a shame young people these days never experienced the kind of quality these shows brought to TV.
Regrettably you are absolutly right with your assassment. Just now in a German quiz show the answer to the question who had played Lieutenant Mike Stone had been rated SPECIAL KNOWLEDGE. Unbelivable to me, having watched every episode in my youth and all the reruns :) The concurrence show KOJAK is still much more in the memory of most Germans.
@@jamesrobertson2712 And I would imagine that when and if a Streets remake is made (likely for CBS), it will be skewered mercilessly in comparison to the Malden/Douglas/Hatch one that was on ABC in the 70s (the more classic one a lot of us grew up around), just like is done w/the current O'Loughlin Five-0, as compared to the O-R 1968-80 Jack Lord Five-O.
I love the show but it's been forty years now. No show of that age can be regarded as common knowledge. There is great television today. We're all just getting older and the world moves on. Get over it!
