Quincy and Stanley.

My father, Stanley I. Tannenbaum, had a long career in advertising. He rose to become Chairman of the Board of a merged-out-of-existence agency (it was a top-twenty-agency when he was there) called Kenyon & Eckhardt.

That was the first 25 years of his career. For the last 15, he was the founder and Chairman of Northwestern University's Medill School Integrated Marketing Communications program.

If you said, he "wrote the book" on integrated marketing communications, you might be trite. But you wouldn't be entirely wrong. My father literally wrote the book. I'm not sure if, 30 years after it was published, people still read the book, but for a long while it was the sine qua non of advertising text books.

Somehow, Integrated Marketing Communications send me to Quincy Jones.

Like many people who still live in a fact-based, literate world, I read early last week the great Quincy Jones' obituary in The New York Times. Entirely worth reading if you believe people like Jones shape culture not Verizon using Beyonce in an over-produced commercial.

Reading Jones' obituary, I felt ignorant. I wanted to hear some of the music I hadn't to date paid particular attention to. I downloaded this album and listened to some of it this morning on my way to the private-equity-disaster of a grocery store to buy paper napkins, low-fat yogurt and a dozen eggs.

When I got to the song at the top of this post, a song I knew primarily through Paul Williams' version, my ear buds almost popped out of my ears.

This post won't do you any good if you don't take 150-seconds and listen to Quincy Jones' arrangement.

But if you do, better than anything my father every theorized and taught about it, you'll understand what integrated marketing communications is all about in practice, not merely in textbook. 

Because what you have is a true "audio campaign." You have the original "hucklebuck" tune. That's the foundation of the marketing campaign, then you have different instruments (i.e. channels) adding to it. Diverging from it. Coloring it in. Taking it in slightly different places. Making it theirs. Working their strengths, their humor, their interpretations.

But always always always, the orchestra (the various agencies, creatives or channels involved) come back to the original theme. They stay true to the song. While making the song theirs. While adding to the song. They always come back to the song.

I think that's what a modern multi-channel campaign is supposed to do. I think that that's always been true. 

Listen to Paul Williams' Huckle-Buck. Listen to Quincy Jones' arrangement.

You might learn something about advertising. And how to make it work better. Sound better. How everything works together and uses its strengths.

We used to care.