FROM THE VAULTS

Bernie Lowe (November 22, 1917 - September 1, 1993) was an American songwriter, record producer, arranger, pianist and bandleader.

Born Bernard Lowenthal, Mr. Lowe graduated from Central High School and studied piano at The Juilliard School in New York. When he was 13, he was playing the piano in clubs, hotels and cafes around the city.After high school, he played for Meyer Davis and for orchestras led by Howard and Lester Lanin. He performed in night clubs around the country.

He was arranging and conducting the orchestra on "The Paul Whiteman TV Teen Club" in the early fifties when he met Dick Clark, the announcer for the show's live Tootsie Roll commercials. The two became friends and, later, business associates.

At the end of 1956, Lowe founded Cameo Records, with an old friend, Kal Mann (real name Kalman Cohen) and set up offices in the basement of his house in the Wincote area of North Philadelphia. Lowe and Mann got into the record business as songwriters for Hill & Range Songs in New York. Together they wrote "Teddy Bear" for Elvis Presley, which he recorded in January

Lowe & Mann

1957. Lowe was looking for his own Elvis. He found Charlie Gracie, one of the first white artists who had recorded rock 'n' roll. Lowe tamed Gracie into a polite rocker and supplied him with the songs "Butterfly" and "Ninety-nine Ways", both Mann-Lowe compositions (though the writing credit on "Butterfly" went to "Anthony September", their joint pseudonym).

When "Butterfly" went to number one in April 1957, Bernie Lowe was convinced that rock 'n' roll - or at least an approximation of it - was the way to go. Still, Lowe and Mann were the products of an earlier, much different generation and never fully concealed their contempt for rock 'n' roll. It was just that Lowe's "love of money exceeded his dislike of rock 'n' roll", as Bill Millar has put it. In a way, "Butterfly" foretold the shape of things to come : R&R records whose sound was determined more by a producer's formula than by a singer's uninhibited spirit. It was no coincidence that this development started in Philadelphia, a city associated more than any other with the corruption of rock 'n' roll.

Lowe and Mann wrote more songs for Charlie Gracie (Just Lookin', Fabulous, Wanderin' Eyes) and Lowe also plays piano on all of Gracie's Cameo recordings. But by mid-1958, Gracie was gone. "I was expendable", Gracie said. "I was the first one to get screwed by Cameo. I sued for my royalties, settled for $40,000 and left". Lowe and Mann launched Cameo's sister label, Parkway, in 1959. By this time, most of the A&R work was done by Dave Appell, who also led an instrumental group, The Applejacks.

Lowe & Rydell

Lowe co-wrote the early hits of Bobby Rydell (Kissin' Time, We Got Love, Wild One, Good Time Baby), but after that he left most of the songwriting to Mann and Appell. Apart from Rydell, Cameo-Parkway had success with Chubby Checker, the Dovells, Dee Dee Sharp and the Orlons. Jerry Gross of the Dovells says: "Cameo-Parkway was not what I call a professionally run company. It was quick turnover; get the product out, jam as much as they could down the public's throat and sell as much as they could... Bernie Lowe's thing was don't go for quality, go for quantity. Throw enough up against the wall, something's going to stick."

Dave Appell

Cameo-Parkway suffered its greatest loss when patron Dick Clark defected from Philly to Los Angeles in March 1964. By then Kal Mann had already retired and Dave Appell had moved on to other projects. Lowe sold the company to a couple of Texas businessmen a year or two later and retired. In July 1967, Allen Klein, the manager of the Rolling Stones, bought controlling interest in Cameo-Parkway. However, Kal Mann chose to retain the master tapes and after years of litigation, Klein and Mann (who died in November 2001) became bogged down in a legal stalemate, with the consequence that Klein still cannot release CD's of Cameo-Parkway material.

For a time, Lowe continued to work in the recording industry, doing some freelance music work and scouting for new performing groups. But he developed Parkinson's disease after he retired and was soon unable to work.

In April 1993, Lowe was inducted into the Philadelphia Walk of Fame, and his star was placed in the sidewalk in front of 309 S. Broad St., the building that was once the headquarters for Cameo-Parkway. He died in Wyncote, Pennsylvania, a suburb of Philadelphia, on September 1, 1993 (age 75).

(Info edited from Black Cat Rockabilly, Andy Wallace @ The Inquirer and Wikipedia. Quotes are from: The Twist : the story of the song and dance that changed the world by Jim Dawson).

Jack Wilton Marshall (November 23, 1921 – September 20, 1973) was an American guitarist, composer, arranger, and conductor. He was the father of producer-director Frank Marshall and composer Phil Marshall.

Born in El Dorado, Kansas, Jack Marshall was a top producer for Capitol records beginning in the late '50s and early '60s. His musical expertise led him into the combined realm of production and conducting, resulting in classic recordings for vocal artists such as Peggy Lee and Judy Garland.

He also released a number of albums under his own name that featured his own finger-style jazz guitar playing. He was a close friend of Howard Roberts and Jack Sheldon, and produced several of their best albums on Capitol. He wrote his own arrangements, many of which had a big-band, jazzy sound to them. He was officially credited with the arrangement for Peggy Lee's "Fever", although it is now

believed that Lee herself was primarily responsible for that arrangement, while it was Marshall who arranged the other tunes recorded on the session. It was Roberts who did the finger snaps on the record.

Marshalls own albums highlighted his fine playing on acoustic guitar, much of which swung toward the jazz side of things. Influenced by composer and arranger Billy May, he also concocted his own arrangements, displaying a fondness for loud brass. That Marshall was part of the sonically wild, musically outrageous '50s and '60s hi-fi era can certainly be assumed from some of his album titles. Only the space-age jazz astronaut Sun Ra could have a

discography with titles in it such as Sounds!, Soundsville, and Sounds Unheard Of. Marshall was a close associate of fellow studio guitar whiz Roberts, producing all of this artists' mid-'60s albums on Capitol.

Marshall directed Tommy Tedesco, Al Hendrickson, Howard Roberts, Bobby Gibbons, and Bill Pitman as Guitars Incorporated. The collaboration of these studio players was more along the lines of the Ventures, and actually seems to have been influenced by an earlier Marshall project, the Guitar Ramblers.

The question of influence is permanently settled if the notion of "cheesiness" as an artistic quantity is taken into account. While many critics have praised tracks by Guitars Incorporated for being wonderfully cheesy, there is nothing that begs more for this adjective than the title of a Guitar Ramblers album from 1963, Happy, Youthful New Sounds. Also in 1963 Marshall stepped out from session and production work to make a few records of his own. His album “Tuff Jack” is an amazing blend of twist and mod-brass sounds. The title track released as a single was written for Jack Marshall by Billy Strange.

With the public becoming fanatic about the sound of the guitar, particularly the new electric model, Marshall and his buddies eliminated the sometimes controversial vocals and lyrics from '60s pop and cut versions of tunes such as "Come Together" and "Whiter Shade of Pale," or entire

projects dedicated to country performers such as Eddy Arnold and Roger Miller. On the straighter jazz side of things, Marshall also nearly put his fingers in a permanent knot playing in a guitar duet with Barney Kessel, which recorded several albums

Marshall is perhaps best known for composing the theme and incidental music for the 1960s TV series The Munsters and the 1966 tie-in film Munster, Go Home! (the theme music was nominated for a Grammy Award in 1965). He also composed music for the movies The Missouri Traveller (1958), Thunder Road (1958), The Giant Gila Monster (1959) and Kona Coast (1968), as

well as The Deputy, a western television series starring Henry Fonda, The Investigators and The Debbie Reynolds Show.

The range of the man as a composer should never assumed to be limited to goofy ditties, however. He composed the extended "Essay for Guitar," a mini-concerto which was performed in concert by classical guitarist Christopher Parkening and conducted by the great film composer Elmer Bernstein. Marshall also performed the works of classical composers Stravinsky and Webern.

Marshall had scored over 300 TV and film scores and had effectively given up his career as a guitarist to compose. He died September 2, 1971 in Newport Beach, CA., (age 51). His interment was at Forest Lawn - Hollywood Hills Cemetery. Following his death, a scholarship fund for young guitarists was set up in his name at the University of Southern California.

(Compiled and edited from Wikipedia & AllMusic)

Scott Joplin (November 24, 1868 – April 1, 1917) was an African-American composer and pianist. Joplin achieved fame for his ragtime compositions and was dubbed the "King of Ragtime”. During his brief career, he wrote 44 original ragtime pieces, one ragtime ballet, and two operas. One of his first and most popular pieces, the "Maple Leaf Rag", became ragtime's first and most influential hit, and has been recognized as the archetypal rag.

Born in Texas, Joplin was raised in Texarkana, the son of a labourer and former slave. As a child, Joplin taught himself piano on an instrument belonging to a white family that granted him access to it, and ultimately studied with a local, German-born teacher who introduced Joplin to classical music. Joplin attended high school in Sedalia, MO, a town that would serve as Joplin's home base during his most prosperous years, and where a museum now bears his name.

In 1891, the first traceable evidence of Joplin's music career is found, placing him in a minstrel troupe in Texarkana. In 1893, he played in Chicago during the Columbian Exposition was held, reportedly leading a band with a cornet. Afterward, Joplin settled in Sedalia, worked with other brass bands and founding a vocal group called the Texas Medley Quartette. During an 1895 appearance in Syracuse, NY, the quality of Joplin's original songs for the Texas Medley Quartette so impressed a group of local businessmen that they arranged for Joplin's first publications. Around 1896, Joplin enrolled in Sedalia's George R. Smith College for Negroes to study formally, publishing a few more pieces in the years to follow.

In 1899, publisher John Stark of Sedalia issued Joplin's second rag time composition, "Maple Leaf Rag”. By the end of 1899, Joplin presented his first ambitious work, the ballet The Ragtime Dance, at the Wood Opera House in Sedalia. It didn't appear in print until 1902, and then only in a truncated form. Joplin moved to St. Louis in 1901, as did Stark, who set his new

publishing venture up as "The House of Classic Rags." Joplin wrote many of the other rags he is known for during this time, including "The Entertainer,""The Easy Winners," and "Elite Syncopations."

In 1903, Joplin organized a touring company to perform his first opera, A Guest of Honour, which foundered after a couple of months, leaving Joplin destitute. He had recovered well enough to appear at the 1904 St. Louis World's Fair to present his rag "The Cascades," which proved his second great success. Joplin also married for a second time to a woman who died only a few weeks into their marriage after a bout with pneumonia, plunging Joplin into another bout of despair.

During a visit to Chicago in 1907 he renewed an acquaintance with the St. Louis pianist Louis Chauvin, who did not long outlast the visit. Joplin utilized a strain drawn from Chauvin's playing into the finest of his "collaborative" rags, "Heliotrope Bouquet." This was published after Joplin moved to New York in 1907. Stark had also resettled there, and they resumed their partnership to some degree, but Joplin also published through Seminary Music, likewise home to aspiring songwriter Irving Berlin. Through Seminary many of the best of his late works appeared, such as "Pine Apple Rag," the transparently beautiful "Mexican serenade""Solace," and the harmonically adventurous "Euphonic Sounds."

From 1911 until his death in 1917 most of Joplin's efforts went into his second opera, Treemonishia, which he heard in concert but never managed to stage during his own lifetime. With his third wife, Lotte Joplin, Joplin formed his own music company and published his final piano rag, "Magnetic Rag" (1914), one of his best. By this time, debilitating, long-term effects of syphilis were beginning to break down Joplin's health, although he did manage to make seven hand-played piano rolls in 1916 and 1917; though heavily edited, these rolls are as close as one is likely to get to hearing Joplin's own playing.

Joplin died in a mental facility convinced that he had failed in his mission to achieve success as an African-American composer of serious music. Were he alive today, Joplin would be astounded to learn that, a century after his work was first printed, he is the most successful African-American composer of serious music that ever lived -- by far. Some of his works have been recorded hundreds of times and arranged for practically every conceivable instrumental combination, played by everything from symphony orchestras to ice cream trucks. For a couple of generations of Americans who have even never heard of Stephen Foster, the music of Scott Joplin represents the old, traditional order of all things American.

Were he alive today, Joplin would be astounded to learn that, a century after his work was first printed, he is the most successful African-American composer of serious music that ever lived -- by far. Some of his works have been recorded hundreds of times and arranged for practically every conceivable instrumental combination, played by everything from symphony orchestras to ice cream trucks. For a couple of generations of Americans who have even never heard of Stephen Foster, the music of Scott Joplin represents the old, traditional order of all things American. (Edited from Wikipedia & AllMusic)

Richard MacQueen "Dick" Wellstood (November 25, 1927 – July 24, 1987) was an American jazz pianist.

He was one of the two great stride pianists (along with Ralph Sutton) to emerge during the 1940s when members of their generation were generally playing bebop. He kept an open mind toward later styles (he loved Monk) while sounding at his best playing classic jazz. A little more subtle than Sutton, Wellstood was also a powerful pianist who was a superb interpreter of the music of James P. Johnson and his contemporaries.

Wellstood was born in Greenwich, Connecticut. He studied the piano in Boston and New York and made his professional debut in 1946 at Jimmy Ryan's, on what was once a haven for jazz in Manhattan, 52d Street which was then known as Swing Street. He played with Bob Wilber's Wildcats in 1946, and became a mainstay on the trad jazz scene, playing with Sidney Bechet in 1947 and in the 1950s with Jimmy Archey, Conrad Janis, Roy Eldridge, Rex Stewart, Charlie Shavers, and Eddie Condon.

Here's "Mule Walk" from above album.

During those years, Mr. Wellstood played the piano to pay his way through college. He later worked his way through the Columbia University Law School, from which he graduated in 1958. He was the house pianist at New York City clubs Metropole and Nick's in the late 1950s and 1960s. he did session work as well playing on albums such as The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan (1963) and Odetta & The Blues (1962)

Wellstood played with the Gene Krupa Quartet. When Mr. Krupa first retired in 1967, Mr. Wellstood joined a group that played clubs along the Jersey Shore, a group known variously as the Fifth Avenue Four, Can of Worms and Dick Wellstood's Hot Potatoes. Work at Law Firm. He later joined the World's Greatest Jazz Band.

He played locally in the 1970s playing solo concerts, performing at jazz parties, and recording quite a few memorable albums. In 1977 completed a tour of the UK with the Dutch Swing College Band. In the 1980s he played often with Kenny Davern. From 1980 to 1986,

he was the house pianist at Hanratty's restaurant at 92nd and 2nd in Manhattan for 6–8 months a year. In 1985, a slow summer for him, Mr. Wellstood decided to put his law degree to use. He spent 10 months with a law firm and returned to Hanratty's.

''The firm liked my work, and I could have stayed there,'' he said. ''But I realized that all those years in music had ruined me for something like the law.'' John S. Wilson, a music critic of The New York Times, noted that despite the layoff, ''Mr. Wellstood's stride piano-playing was as energetic and virtuosic as ever.''

In 1987 he died of a heart attack in Palo Alto, California where he went to attend the Peninsula Jazz Party. At the time of his death he was the pianist for Bemelman's Bar of the Carlyle Hotel in New York City.

(Compiled and edited from Wikipedia, AllMusic and NY Times)

Arthur & George C. McFarland (born 26 November 1906) were twin saxophonists active during the late 20’s through to the mid 40’s.

Born in Long Island, New York, Art and George played with the Fred Waring Orchestra until 1929 when they did solo engagements. They were the first to play at the Cavalier Beach Club which opened on Memorial Day in 1929. George played alto sax and brother Arthur the tenor sax.

By the late 30’s they decided to expand into the dance band arena.

Whether or not they were truly representative of this genre is debatable. Their stylized sound was widely described as ‘Mickey Mouse’ by critics, with its accent on novelty and irreverent fun. Nevertheless they persevered, and in the 40s switched their style to a more polished, musical standpoint. Engagements in this period saw them include pianist Geoff Clarkson in their ranks, alongside singers Betty Engells, Dick Merrick and the Norton Sisters.

They recorded regularly for OKeh Records, including their theme song, ‘Darkness’, and proved a popular if light-hearted attraction at various ballrooms throughout America. The McFarland Twins band also did a single session with Bluebird in January 1942 that featured young Don Cornell on vocal singing "Hey Zeke. However, by the advent of World War II the novelty of their fraternal leadership had grown thin and they rarely performed again.

Arthur died July 17, 2008 in Carmel California and George apparently died during 1997.

(Info very scarce but edited mainly from AllMusic and Stoddards Hale blog - Any more information about these two would be gladly received)

Eddie South (Louisiana, Missouri, November 27, 1904 – April 25, 1962) was one of the top American jazz violinists and band leaders of the pre-bop era. He was a brilliant technician who, were it not for the universal racism of the time, would probably have been a top classical violinist. In his day he was billed as “The Dark Angel of the Violin.”

A child prodigy, Edward Otha South graduated from the Chicago Music College. Since classical positions were not open to black violinists in the 1920s, South learned to play jazz (helped out by Darnell Howard). In the early to mid-'20s, he started his career playing in vaudeville and jazz orchestras with Freddie Keppard, Jimmy Wade, Charles Elgar, and Erskine Tate in Chicago. He studied at the Chicago College of Music alongside violinist Petrowitsch Bissing.

In 1927 he started his own group, Eddie South and his Alabamians, named after the Alabam club where they played in Chicago, and, along with pianist and composer Henry Crowder, toured with them in Europe from 1928 to 1930. During this period the band recorded for Victor Records.

In the 1930s on he was in great demand in a wide range of venues, appearing and recording in Hollywood, Chicago, New York and Paris, frequently performing and recording in Europe: France, England and Holland. South's visit to Europe (where he studied at the Paris Conservatoire) made a deep impression on the violinist,

particularly his visit to Budapest.

The expressive lyricism of gypsy violin music made a deep impression on South, and remained a powerful influence for the rest of his life. However, that this inclination (and his classical tendencies) conspired to marginalize his popularity among Jazz and Popular audiences. Nonetheless, a central European repertoire and gypsy tunes was the mainstay of Eddie South’s personal musical style and he would often utilize gypsy melodies as a basis for jazz improvising. In 1931, South returned to Chicago, where his regular band included the young bassist Milt Hinton.

South also hooked into another aspect of Gypsy tradition during his many lengthy stays in Europe, joining up with Django Reinhardt -- who was transforming his Manouche gypsy tradition into a fresh new Jazz style with Stephane Grappelli in their Quintet of the Hot

Club of France. The result was some of Eddie South’s most

spectacular collaborations and best pure jazz records, such as his exquisite 1937 duet with Django called “Eddie’s Blues” and several outstanding records of the Quintet with both Stephane and Eddie such as “Dinah” “Lady Be Good” and “Fiddle Blues.”

Although playing in the big bands of Earl Hines from 1947 to 1949 and also leading his own bands that included pianist Billy Taylor, South never really had a major breakthrough commercially in his career. Through the ‘40s & ‘50s South continued to be heard widely on radio in the U.S.; held numerous residencies in New York, Los Angeles and Chicago; and performed on Armed Forces Radio.

A 1951 recording for Chess Records, Eddy South and his Orchestra credited Johnny Pate on bass and arrangements and was also the first of a series of Chess recordings on which Pate collaborated with saxophonist Eddie Johnson. South also recorded for Mercury, and also made a final set released by Trip in 1959. He was even on Chicago television in the 1950s, and later in New York with such TV personalities as Dave Garroway, continuing to perform until a few weeks before his death in Chicago April 25, 1962.

Eddie South's early recordings (covering 1927-1941) have been reissued on a pair of Classics CDs.

(Edited from Wikipedia, Jazz Rhythm & AllMusic)

Michel Berger (born Michel Jean Hamburger; 28 November 1947 – 2 August 1992) was a French singer and songwriter. He was a figure of France's pop music scene for two decades as a singer and as a songwriter for such artists as Françoise Hardy, Johnny Hallyday, and his own wife, France Gall.

Berger was born in Paris and raised by a renowned medical doctor father and a classical musician mother. He began playing piano in his early childhood. He quickly was taken by an urge of learning other instruments as well as arrangement, orchestration, composing skills, and theory. Though his formation was classical, and like many musicians of his generation, Berger fell in love with the rising sounds of R&B and rock & roll.

Slowed down by his shyness, he first wrote and worked for other artists, his first, kind of unlikely, collaboration being Bourvil's "La Girafe." Pretty soon, though, he began to release a series of singles under his own name and got himself an artistic director job at Pathé-Marconi's, for which he produced Jean-François Mickaël's hit single "Adieu Jolie Candy." In 1970, he produced Jeremy Faith's single "Jesus" during a Los Angeles stay, started producing Véronique Sanson's albums in the early '70s, and '60s-fame Françoise Hardy's 1973 comeback album. In 1971, when Véronique Sanson, with whom he had been having an affair, left him for Stephen Stills, he had taken some time to write his first LP, Puzzle, in which he had tried to synthesize most of his English pop influences with his heartbreak-inspired lyrics, but that would disappear under the radar.

During his multiple studio activities, though, he had met France Gall, also left heartbroken by her separation with Julien Clerc. Kind of destroyed after the 60s, at the end of which she had drawn back from the music business because (among other reasons) of the trick she said Serge Gainsbourg had played on her by making her sing the ambiguous fellatio parable "Les Sucettes," she was in need of a rightful, serious comeback that would display her real talents. Berger would be the one for the job, and would write the entire 1973 La Déclaration album for her.

The collaboration happened to be successful, both artistically and emotionally, and Gall and Berger got married in 1976. Berger kept working at his usual intense pace when he came up, with Quebec's Luc Plamondon, with an idea for a musical telling the life and times of a rock singer, Johnny Rockfort, and entitled Starmania. The record was released in 1978, and French and Canadian singers were cast for stage play, including Daniel Balavoine as Johnny Rockfort, Diane Dufresnes, and Fabienne Thibeault.

Starmania happened to be a huge success, and was played again in 1980 with a different cast and translated into English under the title Tycoon in 1991, with such famous overseas acts as Cock Robin's Peter Kingsbury, Tom Jones, Céline Dion, Nina Hagen, and Cyndi Lauper.

In the early '80s, Berger finally won over his shyness and, fueled by the many Starmania and France Gall hit singles, began to take over the stage, releasing many strong singles with his own singing, revealing a voice too rarely heard in the past years, and incredibly compatible with France Gall's. In 1985, he got to write material for French fame massive record seller Johnny Hallyday, offering him a nice comeback and refound credibility.

The '80s undoubtedly were Berger's golden era. Only the Plamondon co-signed musical La Légende de Jimmy would happen to be received in a lukewarm way.

Two of his most famous singles pay respect to some of his idols: the Jerry Lee Lewis-inspired "Il Jouait du Piano Debout" and the Elton John-inspired "La Groupie du Pianiste."

Involving himself more and more in humanitarian actions alongside his close friend Daniel Balavoine, Berger ended up getting bored and took a short break to concentrate on non-musical projects. In 1992, feeling ready, he released a comeback album, Double Jeu, under the name of Berger/Gall, which came as a surprise but was warmly received by both critics and popular audience.

Berger decided to plan a stay in the French Riviera to relax before the beginning of the following tour with his wife. The news of his death by heart attack on August 2, 1992, after a tennis game came as a shock to the music business and to the French people in general, who had already lost such beloved characters as Balavoine and Coluche in the '80s. Sadly, Berger's death made of Double Jeu a sinister parallel to Lennon/Ono's Double Fantasy.

(Edited mainly from AllMusic)

Bobbi Martin (November 29, 1943 – May 2, 2000) was an American country and pop music singer, songwriter, and guitarist.

Born Barbara Anne Martin in Brooklyn on November 29, 1938, but grew up and began her singing career in Baltimore, working her

way up from local venues onto the national nightclub circuit. Bobbi began her recording career with the tiny Maypole Records in 1960 with the release (Ay Ay Ay) I'll Wait Forever/Is It True. It did well enough on a regional basis to get her a deal with Decca's Coral subsidiary in 1961, where she would experience almost four years of frustration trying to land that one breakthrough national hit until she released her debut album, Don't Forget I Still Love You.

The title track was a hit in the U.S., peaking at No. 2 on the Easy Listening (adult contemporary) chart and No. 19 on the Billboard Hot 100. A follow-up single "I Can't Stop Thinking of You", first introduced on the nationally televised Dean Martin Show won her the Cashbox Disc Jockey Poll as Most Promising Female Vocalist of 1965.

Judging from the results of her next eight Coral singles, at least insofar as the Hot 100 was concerned, it looks like the effects of the British Invasion finally took hold (as it did on quite a few other North American artists), although she clearly had established a loyal following within the Easy Listening market. Then, in October 1966, her cover of the 1958 Don Gibson hit, Oh, Lonesome Me, reached # 64 Country and # 134 Hot 100 Bubble and then two more failed releases following which she was dropped by Coral in early 1967.

Next stop was United Artists where she again experienced frustration with these five straight failed releases, most of which were covers of old hits: While popular at nightclubs in Miami Beach, New York, Las Vegas and Puerto Rico, and on TV appearances with the Jackie Gleason, Ronnie Dove, Tonight, and Dean Martin Shows, it would be 5 years before she scored another hit with "For the Love of Him", from the album of the same name. This song went to No. 1 on the Adult Contemporary chart and No. 13 on the Hot 100. Bobbie toured with Bob Hope on his 1970 USO military Christmas Show in Vietnam.

The singer charted with many smaller regional, Bubbling Under Hot 100 and Easy Listening chart records up to 1972. But while she would then retain her new-found popularity with the Easy Listening audience for the next little while, the Hot 100 would more or less elude her.

In 1971 she got married and resurfaced at Buddah Records where she charted with two records Tomorrow and Something Tells Me (Something's Gonna Happen Tonight). It was also during that year she lost her mother to cancer. Then more tragedy struck when she lost her voice due to swelling of her vocal chords.

In 1975 she had a daughter and she tended to family life in Dallas, but by 1981 her marriage fell apart and she lived off the remnants of “For The Love of him” royalties. She worked painstaking hours with a vocal coach and gradually her singing voice returned. She continued recording into the early 1980s and after which she retired and sold real estate.

Martin died of lung cancer on May 2, 2000 at the Brighton Wood Knoll medical facility in Baltimore. Martin had one daughter, Shane Clements.

(Compiled and edited from Wikipedia,Amazon & Times Herald-Record)

Mary Virginia Martin (December 1, 1913 – November 3, 1990) was an American actress, singer, and Broadway star. A muse of Rodgers and Hammerstein, she originated many leading roles over her career including Nellie Forbush in South Pacific and Maria von Trapp in The Sound of Music. She was named a Kennedy Centre Honouree in 1989. She was the mother of actor Larry Hagman.

As a child she was encouraged by her parents, Juanita and Judge Preston Martin, to study violin and voice. Her love of the theatre was obvious at an early age. She sang in almost every church choir in town, wrote and performed plays for family and friends, and was an avid movie-goer. She began taking voice lessons at age twelve, and by age sixteen she was attending Ward Belmont Finishing School in Nashville, Tennessee

At seventeen she married Benjamin Hagman, an accountant, and they had one son, Larry,. Larry Hagman would grow up to be a well known actor in his own

right, becoming most famous for his role as ‘J.R. Ewing” in the prime time television drama series “Dallas”. After the birth of her son, she opened the Mary Hagman School of Dance in Weatherford. During a trip to Hollywood to further her dancing studies, Martin's childhood desire to perform was rekindled. Subsequently she moved to Hollywood, divorced her husband in 1935 and spent two years auditioning for the movies.

It was not in the movies, but rather at the Trocadero nightclub, where Martin's career was finally launched. She sang a swing version of "Il Bacio," and the audience, including Broadway producer Lawrence Schwab, went wild. If "Il Bacio" took Martin to Broadway, it was "My Heart Belongs to Daddy" which kept her there. In 1938 she landed the part of Dolly in Leave It to Me at the Imperial Theatre. Her rendition of "Daddy" was a spectacular hit

and led to star billing and a contract with Paramount Pictures. She eventually made her film debut in 1939’s “The Great Victor Herbert”.

Under contract to Paramount Motion Picture Studios, over the next three years she starred in ten more films, which would comprise almost her entire filmography such as Rhythm on the River, Love Thy Neighbour, Kiss the Boys Goodbye, New York Town, The Birth of Blues, Star Spangled Rhythm, and Happy Go Lucky.

It was during this period that Mary Martin met and married the love of her life, producer Richard Halliday. Mary's yearning to work on the stage led them to return to New York, where Halliday assumed his new vocation as her manager. From 1943 through the remainder of her career Martin worked almost exclusively on the stage, for she loved most to work directly with people rather than with a camera. It was her ability to share her exuberance with the people who watched her that made her so loved by musical comedy audiences.

Martin returned to the New York City, New York stage in 1943, to play ‘Venus’ in “One Touch of Venus”, for which she won the New York Drama Critics Poll. In 1947 she had the lead in a touring production of “Annie Get Your Gun”, which won her a Special Tony Award in 1948. In 1949, she originated the role of ‘Nurse Nellie Forbush’ in the Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein musical “South Pacific” and won a Best Actress Tony Award in 1950 for her performance. She later continued the role in the London, England production of the musical.

In 1954 she played the title role in “Peter Pan” for 152 performances, earning another Best Actress Tony for her work. She took on the lead for “The Sound of Music” in 1959 and remained with the show for four years, winning her fourth Tony Award for her portrayal of ‘Maria’.

She co-starred with Robert Preston in 'I Do! I Do!' in 1966 when she was once more nominated for a Tony Award. Martin's stage career slowed during the 1970s but after the death of her second husband, she returned to Broadway in 1978 in “Do You Turn Somersaults?” She made her final appearance on the London stage

in the 1980 Royal Variety Performance when she performed “Honeybun” from 'South Pacific.' Martin was honoured by the John F. Kennedy Centre for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C., in 1989.

Martin died on November 3, 1990, at the age of 76. Her long-time friend, Carol Channing, had been at her bedside at Martin's Rancho Mirage, California, home less than an hour before she died of liver cancer. "She was heaven," said Channing. (Compiled from various sources including Wikipedia & Gale Encyclopedia of Biography)

Jesse Crawford (December 2, 1895 – May 28, 1962), known as "The Poet of the Organ" was an American pianist and organist. He was well known in the 1920s as a theatre organist for silent films

and as a popular recording artist. In the 1930s, he switched to the Hammond organ and became a freelancer. In the 1940s, he authored instruction books on organ and taught organ lessons.

Crawford's father died when Jesse was one year old, leaving an impoverished wife and mother. She placed the baby in an orphanage asylum near Woodland, California where Jesse taught himself music. By age nine, he was playing a cornet in the orphanage band. At age 14 he left the orphanage to play piano in a small dance band, and then took a job playing piano in a ten-cent-admission silent film house.

His early theatre organ experience was at Washington's Spokane Gem Theater in 1911 and at the Clemmer-owned Casino Theatre (on an eight-rank Estey organ). He next played briefly at theatres in Billings, Montana, Spokane, Washington and Seattle. When he met Oliver Wallace, Crawford learned about the then-new types of theatre organ sounds. Crawford’s next jobs were playing at the Strand in San Francisco and the Mission Theatre in Los Angeles.

In the 1920s, Crawford began forming a fan base and was dubbed the "Poet of the Organ" for his style of playing ballads in Chicago. In 1921, he was employed by the Balaban and Katz theatre chain playing its 29-rank Wurlitzer in the Chicago Theatre. Likewise, Crawford was hired to play a large Wurlitzer organ in Grauman's Million Dollar Theatre in Los Angeles.

During the greatest years of his career, Jesse was married to Helen Crawford, herself a fine theatre organist in 1923. The organs in Chicago and New York were equipped with twin consoles so that they could play duets - the New York recording studio also had twin consoles, and a few records feature the husband and wife team playing duets. Helen died after being injured in a road accident in 1943.

After some recordings for the small local Autograph Records label, Crawford made a series of gramophone records for the Victor Records label which proved very popular with record buyers. He had hits such as "Rose Marie", "Valencia", and "Russian Lullaby". Other popular songs included "At Dawning" and "Roses of Picardy".

Here's "La Estrellita" from above 1950 recording.

With the end of the silent film era, work for theatre organists in movie houses dried up. Crawford played a Kilgen organ at Chicago's Century of Progress World's Fair in 1934, and in 1936 he got a job as staff organist in NBC Radio studios in Chicago.

In the 1930s, Crawford switched to the Hammond organ, and began playing engagements across the United States. In addition to his numerous sound recordings, Crawford recorded player organ rolls on the Wurlitzer "R Rolls" system. His own compositions included "Vienna Violins", "Louisiana Nocturn", "Harlem Holiday", and "Hawaiian Honeymoon". Between 1937 and 1940, he appeared with his wife Helen in several Vitaphone short films released by Warner Brothers

In 1940, the self-taught Crawford undertook his first formal music study with Joseph Schillinger, whose other students included George Gershwin, Benny Goodman, Glenn Miller, and movie score composers Leith Stevens and Nathan Van Cleave.

Crawford recorded Hammond organ LPs for Decca Records and worked and began writing, producing sheet music song arrangements for Hammond organ and instruction books. He also taught organ students, both in one-on-one lessons and in class style lessons, where he mostly lectured.

He made many hundreds of 78s on theatre pipe organs, plus many more on Hammond; made several theatre pipe organ LPs in the 1950s using the Lorin Whitney Studio Robert Morton organ in Glendale California. His final LP recordings were made at Richard Simonton's residence organ in Toluca Lake, California.

He died on May 27, 1962 in Los Angeles, California from a cerebral hemorrhage. (Edited mainly from Wikipedia)

François Deguelt (born Louis Deghelt, 4 December 1932 – 22 January 2014) was a French singer, best known for his participation on behalf of Monaco in the Eurovision Song Contests of 1960 and 1962.

Born in Tarbes, in the Hautes-Pyrénées region of France in 1932, François Deguelt was raised by his grandmother in Barbezieux , Charente , where he spent all his youth. He had originally other career aspirations in mind before entering the glamorous world of entertainment.

He was persuaded to give up his philosophy studies in the early fifties, moving to Paris to become a cabaret singer at the Tire Bouchon at Monmartre. In 1952 he composed his first song “Coquette et Vieyday.” In 1953, he started on the radio on the Francis Claude program and then toured with Jean Nohain for the show Reine d'un jour. It wouldn't take long for

his vocal abilities to receive recognition, already in 1956 he was winner of the prestigious Grand Prix du Disque award. However, duty called in the late fifties and he was obliged to perform his military service in Northern Africa.

After returning to his homeland, he performed on stages such as the Olympia and A.B.C. before being asked to represent Monaco for the first time at the Eurovision Song Contest in 1960. François jumped at the chance, and so took the song Ce soir-là (That evening) to London and earned Monaco a highly repectable third place.

He went on to record an impressive eighteen more songs before being requested once again to represent the principality, at the 1962 Eurovision Song Contest, this time a little closer to home. The contest took place in Luxemburg and he took Monaco to the dizzying heights of second place with the entry Dis rien (Say nothing). His second and third placings have earnt him entry into a

rather unique group in Eurovision terms – there are only five other artists who have appeared at the contest and managed the same feat: Cliff Richard, Katja Ebstein, Chiara and Željko Joksimović being the other four.

He continued to record after both appearances and recorded almost a hundred songs throughout the sixties and seventies, scoring major hits in the process with songs such as "Le Ciel, le soleil et la mer" (1965) which sold over 100,000 copies."Le printemps" (1966), "Minuit, le vent, la nuit" (1968) and "La libération" (1968). He married Dora Doll in 1965 but later divorced due to his career.

In the 1970’s he lived on a barge moored at the bridge of Saint-Cloud and composed many songs. During the summer months he sailed in his nine-ton sailing boat called "Nectos III". He carried on touring and performing throughout the french speaking world enjoying a special appeal to fans of nostalgia right up until as recent as 2006.

He passed away at his long time home of Var on the Côte d’Azur yesterday after a lengthy period of illness aged 81.

(Edited from eurovisionary.com & Wikipedia)

Luis Arcaráz Torrás (December 5, 1910, Mexico City, MX - December 15, 1963 near San Luis Potosí, MX ) Luis Arcaráz led the most popular orchestra in Mexico during the 1940s and 1950s. Shying away from Latin rhythms, his playlist consisted mainly of American and Mexican pop favourites. He developed a large following throughout Latin America and in the United States as

well, where during the late 1940s and early 1950s he consistently ranked number four on the list of all-time favourite bands.

As he was growing-up in Mexico, he had two passions; music and bull fighting. It was said that he was a fine amateur bull-fighter. Both parents had a musical background. His father, a musician recognized his son's talent and encouraged him. His mother wanted him to have a more stable career so he attended school in Spain, studying Engineering and Music. He eventually gave up the engineering to concentrate on music full-time.

Returning to Mexico, his first job was with a radio station XEW in Mexico City where he was paid the equivalent of 36 cents an hour to sing and play the piano. But the exposure nevertheless made Arcaráz a household name, and when his first big band debuted at Tampico's Teatro Palma in 1928, ticket sales were overwhelming.

His talent and reputation for arranging and composing grew quickly and soon he was writing musical scores for motion pictures. In 1951, he was awarded Mexico's Gold Record Award (the U.S. equivalent to a Grammy) for his musical composition, "Quinto Patio". in 1952, his band received a similar award as "Best Orchestra of the Year". By 1963, he had already composed music for 24 films. He also penned some 200 songs during his career, including his theme, "Sombra Verde.”

Throughout the fifties, concurrently with composing, he toured the Mexico with a dance orchestra. His personnel were considered to be the finest musicians in Mexico. His great, long-time trumpet player, Conrad Gozzo was often compared to "a young Harry James." RCA Victor signed the Arcaraz Orchestra to a recording

contract for their special Latin-American label, but because of his popularity they soon shifted him to their standard label.. By 1949 he had, what was considered to be by critiques, as the best big band in Mexico and consistently finished fourth in polls of the all-time best dance bands ever, behind only Glenn Miller, Tommy Dorsey and Duke Ellington.

While the orchestra was famed for its vast American pop songbook, Arcaráz was a prolific composer in his own right. His orchestra did not feature Latin-American music as one might expect. For shows and dances he played a blend of North American pop-tunes and standards as well as some of Mexico's best pop tunes. During the decade of the fifties, besides playing throughout Mexico, he often toured in the United States, mostly the west coast and mid-west as far north as Chicago. His band consistently drew capacity crowds and was one of the all-time favourites at the Palladium in Los Angeles.

In the 1960s, he moved to Monterrey where he commuted between there and Mexico City. It was during one of the commutes that he lost his life in a tragic automobile accident near San Luis Potos, on December 5th, 1963. (info mainly The Big Band Database)

Steve Alaimo (born December 6, 1939) is an American singer who was a teen idol in the early 1960s. He later became record producer and label owner, but he is perhaps best known for hosting and co-producing Dick Clark's Where the Action Is in the late 1960s. He had nine singles to chart in the Billboard Hot 100 without once reaching the Top 40 in his career, the most by any artist.

Stephen Charles Alaimo was born in Omaha, Nebraska, and moved to Rochester, New York, at the age of five. He entered the music business during his time as a pre-med student at the University of Miami, joining his cousin's instrumental rock band the Redcoats, becoming the guitarist, and eventually, the singer. The Redcoats consisted of Jim Alaimo on rhythm guitar, Brad Shapiro on bass, and Jim "Chris" Christy on drums.

After playing a Sock hop held by local disc jockey Bob Green and label owner Henry Stone, the band earned a record deal with Stone's Marlin Records. In 1959 "I Want You To Love Me" became

a regional hit for the band. Green became Alaimo's manager, ultimately giving up the role to Stone. That same year, Dick Clark's Caravan of Stars came to Miami needing a band to back up artists, so the Redcoats became that band.

The Redcoats broke up in 1960, and under Stone's tutelage, Alaimo became a "blue-eyed soul singer" with an all African-American back-up band. Alaimo and the group became the house band for a local club known as Edan Roc. Despite his rising local fame, he released two solo albums that didn't earn him the national spotlight. During this time, Stone put Alaimo to work as a promotion man for Stone's Tone Distributors, which acquainted him with the music industry at large.

Through his promotion job, Alaimo landed his first major record deal with Checker Records, a subsidiary of Chess Records, in 1961. There, he struck a minor amount of gold in 1963 with his single "Everyday I Have to Cry Some", peaking at Number 46 on the Billboard Charts. The song was also a top 5 hit in Miami on local

radio stations. Later that year, Alaimo left Checker for Imperial Records, and ABC Records, but the fame of his recording career would soon be eclipsed.

Remembering the favour the Redcoats had done him, Dick Clark wanted to hire the band again for the music show Where the Action Is, but the Redcoats had broken up. Instead, Clark hired Alaimo as the male host and music director. As music director, Alaimo took the opportunity to promote his own records on air; however, he rarely had time to record new songs. Alaimo would also become co-producer of the show, which lasted from 1965-1967.

Linda Scott with Steve Alaimo

After the show's end, Alaimo signed with Atlantic Records/Atco Records. In the mid-1960s, he began producing music for groups such as Sam & Dave, Harold Melvin & the Bluenotes, and The 31st of February. Alaimo bought partial songwriting credits to some of Gregg Allman's songs recorded with the 31st of February. This became a very fertile period, with Alaimo producing many hit records. He also briefly tried his hand at acting during this time, appearing in four feature films, such as 1967's Wild Rebels and 1970's exploitation crime drama The Naked Zoo, starring Rita Hayworth. Most of his films became forgotten fodder, although Wild Rebels got renewed interest after being featured in an episode of TV's Mystery Science Theatre 3000.

In 1969, Henry Stone reunited with Alaimo, who set up Alston

Records as an outlet for Alaimo's music. Alaimo quit performing to focus on running a record label. In 1972, Timmy Thomas hit with "Why Can't We Live Together" for Stone's Glade Records, which released the single in partnership with Atlantic Records. Stone then consolidated many of his labels under the TK Records umbrella with Alaimo in 1973. Shortly afterward, the business partnership of Casey, Finch, Alaimo and Stone would achieve their greatest commercial success with the heyday of KC & the Sunshine Band.

Alaimo and Stone

TK Records closed in 1981, forcing Henry Stone to seek out Morris Levy for financial relief and forging a new partnership. Alaimo, edged out of the deal, had fallen on hard times. In 1987, Alaimo was back on his feet, forming Vision Records with engineering producers Ron and Howard Albert. Vision specialized in top-notch recordings for stars who had once graced Criteria Studios during the 1970s. The label also dabbled in the production and promotion of Miami Bass records.

Steve and his partners put Vision Records on hiatus around 2000 to concentrate solely on running their recording studio - originally built for in-house use, but later booked out to others. Alaimo still continues in the record business today. (Edited mainly from Wikipedia)

Louis Prima (December 7, 1910 – August 24, 1978) was an Italian American entertainer, singer, actor, songwriter, and trumpeter. He was referred to as the King of the Swingers.

Prima was born into a musical family in New Orleans. His family emigrated from Sicily, and after a brief stay in Argentina settled in the United States. Prima studied violin for several years as a child. His older brother Leon was a well regarded local bandleader. Prima was proud of his heritage, and made a point of letting the audience know at every performance that he was Italian-American and from New Orleans. His singing and playing showed that he absorbed many of the same influences as his fellow Crescent City musician, Louis Armstrong, particularly in his hoarse voice and scat singing.

In his youth, Prima played trumpet with Irving Fazola, his brother's band, and the pit band of the Saenger Theatre before forming his own group, Louis Prima's New Orleans Gang. At 22, he was spotted performing with Red Nichols by Guy Lombardo who encouraged him to move to New York in 1934 where he was working regularly on 52nd Street with old New Orleans friends like Eddie Miller (tenor sax and clarinet) and George Brunies (trombone), and also new acquaintances like Pee Wee Russell (clarinet). Prima's 1936 composition "Sing Sing Sing" became one of his biggest hits and one of the most covered standards of the swing era; Benny Goodman's performance of the song at Carnegie Hall with a featured performance by Gene Krupa on drums has become iconic.

In 1937, Prima and his smaller gang (Federico, Masinter, Pinero, and Meyer Weinberg on clarinet) returned to the Famous Door in New York to perform. He also appeared at Billy Rose's Casa Mañana club in May 1938. He racked up about a quarter million dollars throughout seven weeks at Casa Mañana. He was booked by William Morris Agency in late 1938. This entailed travelling throughout the east coast. Stops were made in Boston, New York, Baltimore, Washington, D.C., Philadelphia, Miami Beach, New

Orleans, and St. Louis. These trips were sometimes made in the course of one night of driving. The crew always travelled by car, since it was the cheapest option.

In 1939, Prima dissolved his Gang in favour of fronting a big band of his own; The Gleeby Rhythm Orchestra. In World War II, Prima was deemed unfit for military service because of a knee injury, so he continued performing. First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt attended his performance in Washington D.C., and formally invited him to President Franklin D. Roosevelt's birthday celebration. He appeared in photographs with the President, which ultimately boosted his publicity.

He moved to Los Angeles where he headlined at the Famous Door nightclub. In 1948, he hired sixteen year old Dorothy Keely Smith, as his singer and their onstage chemistry was immediate. He would make her Mrs. Prima number four in 1952. In 1954, Prima accepted a booking at the Sahara Hotel in Las Vegas and his late

Prima, Smith and Elvis

show became one of the city’s hottest attractions.

In January 1961, Prima was invited by Frank Sinatra to perform in the inaugural gala for President John F. Kennedy; the two played "Old Black Magic" together. The constant performances and Prima's infidelities were too much for Smith. After finishing up their contract at the Desert Inn, she filed for divorce at the Eighth Judicial Circuit Court of Nevada in Las Vegas. Prima married another singer, Gia Maione, after which he continued to work in Vegas.

In 1967, Disney, in an inspired decision, cast Prima in the animated feature, “The Jungle Book” as the orangutan, King Louis. "I Wanna Be Like You" was a hit song from the movie that led to the recording of two albums with Phil Harris who voiced Baloo the Bear: “The Jungle Book” and “More Jungle Book”, on Disneyland Records. He also appeared on the soundtrack to “The Man Called Flintstone”. Prima's act moved back to New Orleans in the early 1970s.

Prima suffered a heart attack in 1973. Two years later, following headaches and episodes of memory loss, he sought medical attention, and was diagnosed with a brain stem tumour. He suffered a cerebral haemorrhage and went into a coma following surgery. He never recovered, and died three years later, in 1978, having been moved back to New Orleans. He was buried in Metairie Cemetery in a gray marble crypt topped by a figure of Gabriel, the trumpeter-angel, sculpted in 1997 by Russian-born sculptor Alexei Kazantsev. The inscription on the crypt's door quotes the lyrics from one of his hits: "When the end comes, I know, they'll say, 'just a gigolo' as life goes on without me…"

(Info edited mainly from Wikipedia)

Floyd Tillman (December 8, 1914 – August 22, 2003) was an American country musician who, in the 1930s and 1940s, helped create the Western swing and honky-tonk genres. Tillman was inducted into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1970 and the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1984. Willie Nelson has dubbed him the Original Outlaw for his ability to transcend musical stereotypes and stylistic boundaries.

The son of a sharecropper, Tillman grew up in the cotton mill town

of Post, Texas, and as a young man worked as a Western Union telegraph operator while playing mandolin with his brothers at local dances. In about 1934 he began singing as well, forging a distinctive style that has influenced numerous singers, Willie Nelson being the best known. As jazz singers did, he freely interpreted meter and melody, often coming in ahead of or behind the beat; likewise, he often slurred words and bent notes. Later he mastered the resonator guitar, eventually playing jazzy solos on an electrified model, and then played lead electric guitar for Adolph Hofner, a western swing bandleader based in San Antonio. There, listening to other musicians as well as recordings, Tillman absorbed the sounds and styles of numerous pop, jazz, blues, and country musicians.

Tillman’s songwriting, singing, and guitar-playing skills led to jobs with Houston pop bandleader Mack Clark and western swing groups fronted by Leon “Pappy” Selph and Cliff Bruner. Personnel changed frequently in those days, and Tillman worked with many top musicians in these bands, including steel guitarist Ted Daffan and singer-piano player Moon Mullican.

Tillman recorded as a featured vocalist with Selph’s Blue Ridge Playboys in 1938, and, later that same year, Decca recorded him as a solo performer. He scored his first major songwriting hit, "It Makes No Difference Now", giving him his own Decca recording contract. Jimmie Davis purchased the song from Floyd for $300, the rights to which he got back 28 years later. "It Makes No Difference Now" tied with "San Antonio Rose" as the first country-pop crossover hit (Bing Crosby put both songs on the same record)

While his early recordings mainly sought to provide danceable rhythms, songs such as “Daisy May,” recorded in 1940, reveal his trademark half-singing, half-speaking vocals. Tillman's only No. 1 one song as a singer was "They Took the Stars Out of Heaven". It reached the top of the charts in 1944. Previously, he had reached

No. 2 with "I'm Gonna Change All My Ways". His 1944 hit, "Each Night At Nine", struck a chord with lonely servicemen during World War II. Axis Sally and Tokyo Rose played it heavily to encourage desertion.

Jerry Irby, Floyd Tillman and Hank Williams

A big hit for Tillman and also for Jimmy Wakely was 1948's "I Love You So Much It Hurts". His 1949 "Slippin' Around", one of the first country western "cheating" songs, was a hit for Tillman as well as Ernest Tubb, Texas Jim Robertson and the duo of Margaret Whiting and Jimmy Wakely. Tillman had another successful song with his own answer, "I'll Never Slip Around Again", as did the Whiting-Wakely duo. He slowed down on his performing in the early 1950s, although he appeared on ABC-TV's Jubilee USA in 1958 and 1959.

At the peak of his career the independent-minded musician decided to retire from grinding road work. In truth, however, Tillman never quit music altogether, and he continued to record occasionally and to make infrequent TV appearances until shortly before his death. He also kept writing, eventually counting more than 1,000 songs to his credit. It is estimated that recordings featuring his tunes have sold in excess of 50 million copies combined. Thus, his election to the Songwriters’ Hall of Fame in 1970 and the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1984 were well-deserved.

He returned to work occasionally in the 1970's primarily throughout Texas. He did enjoy a part in several of the "Legends" or "Pioneer Reunion" shows in Nashville. Tillman's final album, recorded in 2002–2003 titled The Influence, paired him with country music artists who were influenced by his style and performing: Willie Nelson, Merle Haggard, Leona Williams, Dolly Parton, Justin Trevino, Ray Price, Frankie Miller, Hank Thompson, Connie Smith, Lawton Williams, Mel Tillis, Darrell McCall, Johnny Bush and George Jones.

Floyd continued to work until he reached his 88th birthday, just months before his death. He passed away peacefully at his home in Bacliff, Texas, on August 22, 2003.

(Compiled and edited from Wikipedia & countrymusichalloffame.com)

Jessie Hill (December 9, 1932 – September 17, 1996) was an American R&B and Louisiana blues singer and songwriter, best remembered for the classic song "Ooh Poo Pah Doo".

Hill was born in New Orleans, Louisiana, United States. By his teens he was playing drums in local bands, and in 1951 he formed his own group, the House Rockers. After periods performing as drummer with Professor Longhair and then Huey "Piano" Smith,

Hill formed a new version of the House Rockers in 1958, which enabled him to focus on singing with the band.

The origins of "Ooh Poo Pah Doo" were apparently created from a tune played by a local pianist, who was known only as Big Four. Hill wrote the lyrics and melody, later expanding the work with an intro taken from Dave Bartholomew. It was further honed on stage, before Hill recorded a demo that he shopped to local record labels, finally recording a session at Cosimo Matassa's studio produced by Allen Toussaint.

Upon its early 1960 release, "Ooh Poo Pah Doo" emerged as a favorite at Mardi Gras, selling 800,000 copie and reaching the Top 5 in the US Billboard R&B chart and a Top 30 slot in the Billboard

Hot 100 pop chart. There have been over 100 cover versions of "Ooh Poo Pah Doo" recorded and performed live over the years by other popular musicians.

The success of the record enabled Hill to tour the country. "I hit the road," he said. "The Apollo Theatre, man, I went all across the country. I was making more money than I ever saw in my life." But Mr. Hill's subsequent records failed to match the success of "Ooh Poo Pah Doo," although "Whip It on Me" did crack the Billboard Hot 100. He then moved to California to work with fellow New Orleans musicians including Harold Battiste and Mac Rebennack. In this period, he wrote songs recorded by Ike and Tina Turner, Sonny and Cher, and Willie Nelson.

In 1972, he signed to the Blue Thumb label to cut a solo LP, Naturally, an ambitious but deeply flawed effort that sold scant few copies. Despite his success on the West Coast, Hill nevertheless suffered financial difficulties exacerbated by his growing drinking problem. After a disagreement with Battiste he quit his staff songwriting gig, and while serving a stint in Los Angeles County Jail for an accumulation of traffic warrants, his car, which contained all of his songwriting material, was stolen.

Hill ultimately returned to New Orleans in 1977, but after coming home waving his trademark two tambourines, he found little in the way of either live dates or songwriting work, and for a time he drove his own taxi, a black Cadillac dubbed "The Poo Cab." As his drinking and narcotics use escalated, however, he racked up a series of DWI infractions, and in short order lost his license altogether. His occasional live appearances were typically train wrecks, hastily assembled affairs performed with pickup bands, and for a time Hill was homeless. Several benefit gigs were held in his honour, but did little to revive his

personal or professional fortunes. Hill finally succumbed to heart and kidney failure on September 17, 1996, and his body was laid to rest under a plywood grave marker in New Orleans' Holt Cemetery.

Bernie Cyrus, executive director of the Louisiana Music Commission, said "Whenever I talked about musicians that didn't get what they deserved, Jessie was the first person to come to mind," Cyrus said. Mr. Hill was one of "the R&B stars of New Orleans that had their chance in the sun and didn't get to see their garden continue to grow. Jessie was in a situation where his garden had a lot of weeds in it."

Two of his grandsons are James and Troy "Trombone Shorty" Andrews. The pair performed "Ooh Poo Pah Doo" in Episode 7 of the HBO series Treme. A third grandson, Travis "Trumpet Black" Hill, was a rising New Orleans-based performer. Trumpet Black died from an infection while on tour in Tokyo on May 4, 2015.

(Edited from Wikipedia ,usgwarchives.net & AllMusic)

Raymond LeRoy Clark (December 11, 1917 - July 5, 2000) known professionally as Yodelin' Slim Clark was an American musician known for his yodeling.

He was born in Springfield, Massachusetts, the son of Mr. and Mrs. Charles Clark. Two of the biggest influences on Slim's music and career were Jimmie Rodgers and Wilf Carter (Montana Slim).

Around 1930, after hearing a Montana Slim national radio broadcast, he decided to become a cowboy singer. "A cowboy," he said, "is anyone who lives that type of life, no matter where he is."

Slim completed two years of high school, at which time he became a professional musician at the age of 15 in 1932 - however, he was performing at grange halls and fairs as early as 1930.

His early days included performances at WHAI in Greenfield, Massachusetts and WKNE in Keene, New Hampshire. In 1936, he went on the air as "Wyoming Buck" and a few months later the

radio station manager renamed him "Yodeling Slim Clark" - which was his trademark throughout his career. His performances at WKNE starting in 1938 included a memorable weekly show with legendary Keene announcer Ozzie Wade

In 1945, Slim began spending his summers in Maine, and in 1952 he became a resident there. He was married to Celia Jo Roberson Clark in 1943. He had two children with Celia, Jewel LaVerne

Clark and Wilf Carter Clark, both of whom have pursued careers in music, including yodeling. (He was divorced from Celia in 1968)

Though primarily known as a single act, Slim's bands included the "Red River Rangers", "The Trailriders" and "The Trailsmen". Country music favourites Kenny Roberts and Dick Curless (The Tumbleweed Kid) were members of the Red River Rangers and the Trailriders, respectively. In 1946, Slim signed with Continental Records in New York City, at the urging of yodeler Elton Britt. He made his first 78 rpm recording that same year.

The songs he recorded at Continental were largely traditional cowboy and folk tunes, along with a few Wilf Carter songs and some originals, often co-written with Pete Roy. Clark stayed with the label until 1957, followed by associations with several

independent labels. He cut four singles for Doc Williams' Wheeling label in 1953 and later made an album for the Canadian Arc label. In 1965, Clark recorded a few excellent albums for Palomino records.

During his very active career, Slim recorded over 50 78s, 40 45s and over 25 albums. Copies of his old 78s are in the Library at the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum, and have become collector's items. Slim also appeared coast-to-coast on both the NBC network and the ABC network on different jamborees. He was featured on Folk Music USA. Slim performed western music for 70 years. He gained popularity throughout the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and Europe with only a handful of appearances outside his lifelong New England base. After a partial

retirement in the early 1970s, he recorded for Palomino Records, and played many festivals during the summertime. He re-married in 1981 to Dr. Kathleen M. Pigeon Clark.

Slim s confidence was challenged when he suffered a heart attack that triggered emergency surgery. He spent more time at home although still performed at the occasional bluegrass or country festival, where he was always surprised at the enthusiastic response of the crowds. In retirement, most of his time was spent painting. He became recognized for his lifelike paintings of outdoors scenes—one of his most popular paintings being that of a Lombard Log hauler.

Slim won the World Yodeling Championship in 1947 and was inducted into the Yodeler's Hall of Fame, along with Jimmie Rodgers, Elton Britt, and Wilf Carter. He was a member of the Western Music Association's Hall of Fame. He is represented in the Walkway of Stars at the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum in Nashville. Slim died in St. Albans, Maine on July 5, 2000. Kathleen Clark still resides there.

In November 2000, he was posthumously inducted into the Cowboy Hall of Fame. He was also inducted into the Maine Country Music Hall of Fame, Massachusetts Country Music Hall of Fame and the Rhode Island Country Music Hall of Fame. (Edited mainly from Wikipedia)

Harold H. Dickinson Jr., (December 12, 1913 in Buffalo, New York - November 18, 1970) was composer, songwriter, producer and singer with the orchestras of Paul Whiteman, Fred Waring, Charlie Barnet, Glenn Miller and Bob Crosby and the founder and leader of the jazz harmony group, The Modernaires.

Hal Dickinson

The Modernaires began in 1934 as "Don Juan, Two and Three," a trio of schoolmates from Lafayette High School in Buffalo, New York. The members were Hal Dickinson, Chuck Goldstein, and Bill Conway.(Jay Warner, in his book American Singing Groups: A History from 1940s to Today, wrote, "They called themselves Three Weary Willies". He added that the trio performed as Don Juan and Two and Three when they "headed for New York in the mid-'30s".)

After singing on radio station WGR in Buffalo, New York, for "the enormous sum of $10 a month", the trio went to New York City and gained an engagement of 26 weeks on CBS network radio.

The group's first engagement was at Buffalo's suburban Glen Falls Casino, with the Ted Fio Rito Orchestra. Fio Rito also used them on electrical transcription recordings. They then joined the Ozzie Nelson Band, and became known as "The Three Wizards of Ozzie." They next recruited Ralph Brewster to make a quartet and, performing with the Fred Waring Orchestra, became The Modern-Aires (later changing the spelling).

Ray Eberle & The Modernaires with Glenn Miller

Recordings with Charlie Barnet's orchestra in 1936 did not interest the public but brought them greater industry exposure, and in 1937 they joined the George Hall band, soon moving on to the Paul Whiteman radio show. They recorded many of the classic songs of that era, a few with Jack Teagarden, as part of the Whiteman orchestra in 1938.

In October 1940, Glenn Miller engaged them to record It's Make Believe Ballroom Time, a sequel to the original Make Believe Ballroom, which they had recorded earlier for Martin Block's big band show of the same name, on WNEW New York. In January

Paula Kelly & Hal Dickinson

1941, Miller made The Modernaires an important part of one of the most popular big bands of all time. Paula Kelly was added to the Miller band between March–August 1941; she and Modernaire Hal Dickinson had married in 1939.

The group had ten chart hits in 1941 after appearing with Miller's orchestra in the movie Sun Valley Serenade. The group became a quintet when Kelly became a permanent member of the group after Miller joined the U.S. Army, and for the next few decades they toured internationally with the Glenn Miller Orchestra. Johnny Drake replaced Chuck Goldstein (who left the Modernaires the day after the Miller band broke up in 1942), and Fran Scott replaced Bill Conway (who left during the war and never returned to the group).

The original members of The Modernaires (Top to bottom) Chuck Goldstein, Ralph Brewster, Hal Dickinson, & Bill Conway - circa: 1942

Songs made popular by Miller and The Modernaires included "Perfidia,""Chattanooga Choo-Choo," with Tex Beneke (the first-ever "gold record" with over one million copies sold), "I Know Why,""Elmer's Tune,""Serenade In Blue,""Connecticut," and "Kalamazoo" with Beneke, among others. "There! I've Said It Again" became The Modernaires' first top-twenty hit in 1945.

The group was featured in television programming produced by Philco in 1947, using what apparently was an early version of lip synching. An article in Variety magazine's September 10, 1947, issue reported that David Street and The Modernaires guest starred on the Philco program, "simulating singing to off-screen recordings."

Tex Beneke, Marion Hutton, & The Modernaires

After Miller's disappearance, The Modernaires recorded vocal versions of several of Miller's instrumental hits, including "Moonlight Serenade", "Sunrise Serenade", "Little Brown Jug", "Tuxedo Junction", "Pennsylvania 6-5000", and "A String of Pearls". The Modernaires released a 45rpm single on Coral Records, 9-61110, A Salute to Glenn Miller, which included medleys in two parts from the movie soundtrack, A Salute to Glenn Miller, Parts 1 and 2 that reached number 29 on the Billboard charts in 1954.

Hal was president of Compass Productions. Joining ASCAP in 1956, his chief musical collaborators included Alan Copeland, Jack Lloyd, Sidney Lippman and Jack Elliott. His popular-song compositions include "These Things You Left Me", "Everytime I See You", "Jingle Bell Polka", "Romantique", "Birds and Puppies and Tropical Fish", "Tabby the Cat" and "Too Young to Know".

In the late 1950s The Modernaires were featured vocalists with the Bob Crosby Orchestra on his daily TV show. Copeland dropped out in 1956 and was replaced by Dick Cathcart. In the 60s they recorded the theme song for the TV sitcom Hazel, but by this time work began to slow down. They still recorded throughout the years and continued to perform in different variations.

Dickinson had three daughters who were singing sisters on TV and stage in the early 1950s ("The Kelly Sisters Trio") and later were The Modernaires replacements: Paula Kelly Jr., Martha Dickinson (Martz) and Julie Dickinson.

Hal Dickinson died in 1970 at the age of 56, Goldstein died in 1974, Conway died in 1991 at the age of 77, Kelly died in 1992 at the age of 72, and Kelly Jr. died in 2012 at the age of 67. Martha, who also sang with the Ed Winters jazz trio, died of congestive heart failure in 2006 at the age of 65. Julie does studio work.

The Modernaires were inducted into The Vocal Group Hall of Fame in 2000.

Latest line-up as of 2014.. Ginger joined in February 2012 and her husband Scott in September 2012. Judie (2nd from right) is the youngest sister of Hal Dickinson's daughters.

(Compiled and edited from Wikipedia & IMDb)

Wayne Paul Walker, (December 13, 1925 - January 2, 1979) was a prolific songwriter, with no less than 526 titles in the BMI database, 23 of which have won BMI awards. He was less successful as a singer, though he made some fine recordings, both in the rockabilly and the country field.

Born in Oklahoma, Walker was raised in Kilgore, Texas, before moving to Shreveport, Louisiana. He worked as a vacuum cleaner salesman, fire escape salesman, car salesman, and roofer while getting his music career off the ground. He appeared on the Louisiana Hayride, where he met Tillman Franks and Webb Pierce and with their encouragement he was soon placing his songs with local artists.

With Pierce he wrote the song "How Do You Think I Feel", which was first recorded by Red Sovine in early 1954 (Decca 29068), but the best known version is of course by Elvis Presley, on his second LP. It was on the Louisiana Hayride (KWKH Studio in Shreveport) that Wayne recorded his first single, "Now Is the Time For Love"/"You Got the Best of Me (I Got the Worst Of You)" (Chess 4860), released in October 1954. Also recorded for Chess in Shreveport (in January 1955) was "Love Me" with Jimmy Lee (Fautheree), a genuine rockabilly classic.

Jimmy Lee & Wayne Walker

Though written by Walker, it was credited to Stan Lewis. Unfortunately, this is the only record by the team of Fautheree and Walker, whose partnership lasted less than four months. But occasionally they would still cooperate, most notably on the song "Sweet Love On My Mind" (basically an adaptation by Wayne of Jimmy's song "Living In A Dream World"), which was first recorded by Johnny Burnette's Rock 'n' Roll Trio on July 5, 1956, and then, three weeks later, by Jimmy & Johnny (Jimmy Lee Fautheree and his younger brother Lynn).

Also in July 1956, Wayne made his second solo recording, the excellent rockabilly song "All I Can Do Is Cry" (ABC-Paramount 9735), which was also recorded by Johnny Bond (1957). He was now living in Nashville where he had signed as a songwriter with one of the major publishing houses, Cedarwood Publishing (co-owned by Jim Denny and Webb Pierce). But Wayne's career as a singer was far from over yet.

In 1957 he signed a contract with Columbia Records and had at least four singles released on the label, the best of which were "Bo-Bo Ska Diddle Daddle" and "Just A Walkin' Around". This was followed by stints at Coral (1958), Brunswick (1959) and a few small labels in the 1960s.

As a songwriter, Walker had his first major hit in the autumn of 1956, with "I've Got A New Heartache", which Ray Price took to # 2 on the country charts. (Price would score another # 2 with a Wayne Walker
composition in 1964 : "Burning Memories"). Wayne's biggest pop success was "Are You Sincere", a # 3 hit for Andy Williams in 1958. Other notable songs from Walker's vast catalogue include "Teenage Wedding" (co-written with Mel Tillis and recorded by Johnny Angel - in reality Jimmy Lee Fautheree - Faron Young and

Tillis himself), "Ain't I'm A Dog" (Ronnie Self), "Cut Across Shorty" (Eddie Cochran), "Little Boy Sad" (Johnny Burnette), "The Cajun Queen" (Jimmy Dean), "Hello Out There" (Carl Belew), "Leavin' On Your Mind" (Patsy Cline), "Memory # 1" (Webb Pierce) and "All the Time" (Billboard Song of the Year Award, 1967, recorded by Jack Greene).

According to William Savage's "Singing Cowboys And All That Jazz", Walker produced a song every three days. He saved none of his most commercial songs for himself, though, and never scored a hit under his own name. Perhaps one reason that he didn't make it as a singer was that he never got over having stage fright and hated travelling. Writing songs was his real passion.

Walker was married for fifteen years to Ernest Tubb's daughter, Violet (nicknamed Scooter Bill), but they divorced in 1973. He died of cancer six years later, on January 2, 1979. He had been inducted into the Nashville Songwriters Hall Of Fame in 1975, along with (among others) Marty Robbins and Marijohn Wilkin, with whom he wrote "Cut Across Shorty".

(Edited from BlackCat Rockabilly Europe)

Edwin LeMar "Buddy" Cole (December 15, 1916 – November 5, 1964), was a jazz pianist and orchestra leader. He played behind a number of pop singers, including Rosemary Clooney, Jill Corey, Johnnie Ray and The Four Lads, who recorded for Columbia

Records. As "Buddy Cole and his Trio" he recorded the albums Some Fine Old Chestnuts and New Tricks with Bing Crosby.

Buddy Cole was born in Irving, Illinois, and started his musical career in the theatre playing between movies. He moved to Hollywood and played with a couple of bands, most notably the Alvino Rey big band, before becoming a studio musician.

Joining the John Scott Trotter orchestra as a pianist in 1947, he worked closely with Bing Crosby for a number of years and in 1954 he began a daily radio show with Crosby supported by a trio comprising Vince Terri on guitar, banjo etc., Don Whittaker on bass and Nick Fatool on drums. Cole also played piano on a number of Nat King Cole's early vocal hits, including "Nature Boy," and toured occasionally with him as an accompanist between 1948 and 1952.

Cole played piano and electric organ. He and Crosby built up a large library of songs which could then be inserted into the show. Cole also recorded a similar library of songs with Rosemary Clooney (with whom he had previously toured) and these songs together with those of Crosby's were employed in The Bing Crosby – Rosemary Clooney Show (1960-1962). Examples of Cole's playing and band leadership on recordings include a pair of Bing Crosby's greatest singles, "In a Little Spanish Town" and "Old Man River".

Albums with his combo were recorded on piano and Hammond organ. Cole recorded for Capitol Records as both Buddy Cole and Eddie LaMar and His Orchestra. He did both commercial and transcription recordings for Capitol.

Although primarily known as a pianist, he had an abiding love for the organ, both Hammond and theatre organ. In his capacity as a studio musician, he worked extensively with Henry Mancini, who used his distinctive Hammond organ sound for the sound track to the TV series "Mr. Lucky". He also recorded several albums for Warner Brothers on piano, Hammond organ and theatre pipe organ.

The theatre organ heard on these albums was the 17-rank Wurlitzer organ from the United Artists theatre plus nine ranks from a one-time radio studio Robert Morton theatre organ which he installed in the garage of a former residence in North Hollywood and on which he recorded three albums for the Columbia and Capitol labels. The combined ranks were installed in a specially built studio next to his home.

Here’s “That Old Black magic” from above album.

Two albums - Modern Pipe Organ and Autumn Nocturne - were recorded for Warner Brothers, as well as two albums done in conjunction with arranger Monty Kelly, one of which contained an arrangement of Richard Rodgers' Slaughter on Tenth Avenue, and the other of which contained transcriptions of big band

Cole and Hoagy Carmichael

arrangements with spaces for the organ. These two albums - for the Alshire label - were Cole's last disc recordings.

Cole had been suffering from an advanced case of heart disease for a number of years, and beginning as early as 1959, suffered a series of heart attacks as a result. On November 4, 1964, Cole was contracted to record some organ pieces featured in 20th Century Fox's blockbuster hit The Sound of Music including sections of the "End Titles", the reprise of "Climb Ev'ry Mountain" and "Processional" and "Maria". In the early hours of November 5, after the marathon six-hour recording session had been completed for the evening, Cole headed home, went to bed and died in his sleep of a heart attack, being found the following morning by a staff member.

Clare & Buddy Cole

Cole married Yvonne King on 17 August 1940, member of the King Sisters, and with her had two daughters, actress Tina Cole and Cathy Cole Green. They divorced in 1953. He married Clare Foley Woodruff on 12 November 1957, who already had two children, Jay and Jeffrey Woodruff, the latter of whom would often assist him in organ tuning. The marriage lasted until Cole's death.

(Edited from Wikipedia & AllMusic)

Bernie Lowe born 22 November 1917

Jack Marshall born 23 November 1921

Scott Joplin born 24 November 1868

Dick Wellstood born 25 November 1927

Arthur & George McFarland born 26 November 1906

Eddie South born 27 November 1904

Michel Berger born 28 November 1947

Bobbi Martin born 29 November 1943

Mary Martin born 1 December 1913

Jesse Crawford born 2 December 1895

Francois Deguelt born 4 December 1932

Luis Arcaraz born 5 December 1910

Steve Alaimo born 6 December 1939

Louis Prima born 7 December 1910

Floyd Tillman born 8 December 1914

Jessie Hill born 9 December 1932

Yodelin' Slim Clark born 11 December 1917

Hal Dickinson born 12 December 1913

Wayne Walker born 13 December 1925

Buddy Cole born 15 December 1916