Charles Randolph Grean

Charles Randolph Grean, performer, songwriter, arranger and music industry executive for more than 60 years, died Saturday (December 20) at a Manhattan hospital at the age of 90. Grean was a copyist for the orchestras of Glenn Miller, Artie Shaw and Charlie Spivak. He arranged the string accompaniment for Nat King Cole's "The Christmas Song" and composed the novelty hit "The Thing," by Phil Harris in 1950. It went to No. 1 on the Billboard pop chart. In 1969, he made his first recording with the Charles Randolph Grean Sounde, a musical ensemble, of "Quentin's Theme," featuring music from the TV series "Dark Shadows." Grean became the head of pop artists and repertoire at RCA Victor in 1950.