#35: After School by Randy Starr
City: Hull, QC
Radio Station: CKCH
Peak Month: June 1957
Peak Position in Hull ~ #4
Peak position in Vancouver ~ #26
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #32
YouTube: “After School”
Lyrics: “After School”
Warren Nadel was born in 1930 in the Bronx, New York. He successfully completed his dental studies at Columbia College in 1954. Around the same time, he wrote songs that were recorded by Jackie Wilson, Connie Francis, the Kingston Trio, Red Foley, Martin Denny, Cliff Richard, The Browns, Chet Atkins, Santo & Johnny, Kay Starr, Nelson Riddle, and others. In 1957, going by the name Randy Starr, Nadel signed with the small Dale record label.
Continue reading →
#40: French Foreign Legion by Frank Sinatra
City: Hull, QC
Radio Station: CKCH
Peak Month: April 1959
Peak Position in Hull ~ #5
Peak position in Vancouver ~ #44
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #61
YouTube: “French Foreign Legion”
Lyrics: “French Foreign Legion”
Francis Albert Sinatra was born in 1915 in Hoboken, NJ. Sinatra spent much time at his parents’ tavern in Hoboken, working on his homework and occasionally singing for spare change. After leaving school before graduating, Sinatra began performing in local Hoboken social clubs and sang for free on radio stations such as WAAT in Jersey City. In New York, Sinatra found jobs singing for his supper or for cigarettes. He got his first break in 1935 when his mother persuaded a local singing group called the 3 Flashes to let him join. Baritone Fred Tamburro stated that “Frank hung around us like we were gods or something”, admitting that they only took him on board because he owned a car and could chauffeur the group around. Sinatra soon learned they were auditioning for the Major Bowes Amateur Hour show, and “begged” the group to let him in on the act. With Sinatra, the group became known as the Hoboken Four, and passed an audition from Edward Bowes to appear on the show. They each earned $12.50, and ended up attracting 40,000 votes to win first prize—a six-month contract to perform on stage and radio across the U.S. Sinatra quickly became the group’s lead singer, and, much to the jealousy of his fellow group members, garnered most of the attention from girls.
Continue reading →
#34: Mr. Lucky by Henry Mancini
City: Hull, QC
Radio Station: CKCH
Peak Month: June 1960
Peak Position in Hull ~ #1
Peak position in Vancouver ~ #15
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #21
YouTube: “Mr. Lucky”
Enrico Nicola Mancini was born in Maple Heights, Ohio, in 1924. Both his parents were Italian immigrants to the USA. At age eight Enrico learned to play the piccolo. He later studied at the Juilliard School of Music. When he turned 18 he enlisted in the United States Army he met Glenn Miller at basic training. Owing to a recommendation by Miller, Mancini was first assigned to the 28th Air Force Band before being reassigned overseas to the 1306th Engineers Brigade in France. In 1945, he helped liberate the Mauthausen-Gusen concentration camp in Austria. In 1946, he became a pianist and arranger for the newly re-formed Glenn Miller Orchestra, led by ‘Everyman’ Tex Beneke. (Glenn Miller was declared missing in action after his plane disappeared over the English Channel in December 1944). In 1952, Henry Mancini joined Universal Studios’ Universal-International music department. In 1952 he scored music for The Raiders, and in 1953 for The Glenn Miller Story.
Continue reading →
#39: House Of Bamboo by Earl Grant
City: Hull, QC
Radio Station: CKCH
Peak Month: May 1960
Peak Position in Hull ~ #4
Peak position in Vancouver ~ did not chart
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #88
YouTube: “House Of Bamboo”
Lyrics: “House Of Bamboo”
Earl Grant was born in a small town in southeastern Oklahoma in 1931. Grant attended four music schools, eventually becoming a music teacher. He augmented his income by performing in clubs during his U.S. Army service, throughout which he was stationed in Fort Bliss, Texas. Grant signed with Decca Records in 1957. His first album was released in 1958 titled The Versatile Earl Grant. His first single “The End” reached #7 on the Billboard Hot 100 on October 13, 1958. It would be his only Top 40 hit on the Billboard Hot 100. “The End” subsequently appeared in the motion pictures Iron Maze (1991), Days of Tomorrow (1993), and A Dirty Shame (2004), and the TV show Lovecraft Country (2019).
Continue reading →
#16: The Walls Have Ears by Patti Page
City: Hull, PQ
Radio Station: CKCH
Peak Month: May-June 1959
Peak Position in Hull ~ #1
Peak position in Vancouver ~ #55
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #77
YouTube: “The Walls Have Ears”
Lyrics: “The Walls Have Ears”
Patti Page was born on November 8, 1927. The New York Times writes “She was born Clara Ann Fowler in Claremore, Oklahoma, the second youngest of 11 children of a railroad laborer. Her mother and older sisters picked cotton. She often went without shoes. Because the family saved money on electricity, the only radio shows Miss Page heard as a child were Grand Old Opry, The Eddie Cantor Show and Chicago Barn Dance.”
Continue reading →
#1: With Open Arms by Jane Morgan
City: Hull, PQ
Radio Station: CKCH
Peak Month: September 1959
Peak Position in Hull ~ #1
Peak position in Vancouver ~ #42
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #39
YouTube: “With Open Arms”
Lyrics: “With Open Arms”
Florence Catherine Currier was born in 1924 in the suburbs of Boston. Her family moved to Florida when she was four-years-old. When she was five, Florence started taking voice lessons as well as piano. In the summertime, she was a child actor in theater productions at the Kennebunkport Playhouse in Kennebunkport, Maine. The Playhouse was founded by her brother. At the age of 17, in the summer of 1941, she was listed as the Treasurer of the Kennebunkport Playhouse. During her years at school, she competed in singing competitions with other students across Florida and the Southeast. Upon graduating from high school in Daytona Beach, she was accepted into the Juilliard School of Music in Manhattan. She had plans to become an opera singer, and studied opera at the school.
Continue reading →
#2: Chanson D’Amour by the Fontane Sisters
City: Hull, QC
Radio Station: CKCH
Peak Month: July 1958
Peak Position in Hull ~ #1
Peak position in Vancouver ~ did not chart
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #12
YouTube: “Chanson D’Amour”
Lyrics: “Chanson D’Amour”
The Fontane Sisters were a trio of sisters. They were Bea (born 1915), Geri (born 1921) and Marge (born 1917) Rosse, all from New Milford, New Jersey. Bea and Marge started out singing for local functions, doing so well that they were urged to audition in New York City. Originally they performed as a trio with their guitarist brother Frank, under the name the Ross Trio (Rosse with the “e” omitted). The group auditioned for NBC and was soon sent off to work in Cleveland, Ohio. When they returned to New York in 1944, Frank was drafted into the Army. He went to France and was mortally wounded by a German sniper. Geri, who had just finished school, took her brother’s place, making it an all-girl trio. The sisters first performed together as The Three Sisters. Sheet music of two of their songs, “I’m Gonna See My Baby”, and “Pretty Kitty Blue Eyes”, was published by Santly-Joy in 1944.
Continue reading →
#3: Round The Bay Of Mexico by Harry Belafonte
City: Hull, QC
Radio Station: CKCH
Peak Month: October 1959
Peak Position in Hull ~ #1
Peak position in Vancouver ~ did not chart
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ did not chart
Peak Position Dutch Singles Chart ~ #11
YouTube: “Round the Bay Of Mexico”
Lyrics: “Round The Bay Of Mexico”
Harold “Harry” George Bellanfanti Jr. was born in 1927 in New York City. He lived with one of his grandmothers in Jamaica from 1932 to 1940. In the 1940s, he worked as a janitor’s assistant, during which a tenant gave him, as a gratuity, two tickets to see the American Negro Theater. He fell in love with the art form and befriended Sidney Poitier, who was also financially struggling. At the end of the 1940s, Belafonte took classes in acting at the Dramatic Workshop of The New School in New York City. His classmates included Tony Curtis, Bea Arthur, Marlon Brando, Sidney Poitier, and Walter Matthau. He launched his recording career as a pop singer on the Roost label in 1949, but quickly developed a keen interest in folk music, learning material through the Library of Congress’ American folk songs archives. Along with guitarist and friend Millard Thomas, Belafonte soon made his debut at the legendary jazz club The Village Vanguard. In the 1949-50 season, Belafonte was a regular on the all-black variety show Sugar Hill Times on CBS.
Continue reading →
#38: Chiquita Mia by Clu Gulager
City: Hull, QC
Radio Station: CKCH
Peak Month: April 1961
Peak Position in Hull ~ #6
Peak position in Vancouver ~ did not chart
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ did not chart
YouTube: “Chiquita Mia”
Lyrics: N/A
William Martin Gulager was born in Holdenville, Oklahoma, in 1928. He was a from the Cherokee tribe. His Cherokee nickname was given to him by his father for the clu-clu birds (known in English as martins, like his middle name) that were nesting at the Gulager home at the time of his birth. From the age of 16, from 1946 to 1948, Gulager served in the United States Army at Camp Pendleton near San Diego. He later studied acting in Paris, France, before returning to America in 1952. On September 26, 1956, Gulager appeared in The United States Steel Hour about the friendship between two baseball players. In the fall of 1957, he took a part in a Civil War-themed episode of The Alcoa Hour. In 1958 he appeared as Roy Carter in the episode “The Return of Roy Carter” in the TV show Have Gun Will Travel. In the spring of 1959, he appeared in an episode of The Lawless Years, about the Roaring Twenties. That fall Gulager appeared in an episode in the Cold War-themed TV show Five Fingers. As well, he appeared in episodes of Wagon Train, Riverboat, Back Saddle, Playhouse 90, Laramie, Wanted Dead Or Alive, Westinghouse Desilu Playhouse, and Alfred Hitchcock Presents.
Continue reading →
#4: Oklahoma! by Ray Conniff Orchestra
City: Hull, PQ
Radio Station: CKCH
Peak Month: July 1959
Peak Position in Hull ~ #1
Peak position in Vancouver ~ did not chart
Peak Position on Cashbox Top 100 Best Sellers ~ did not chart
YouTube: “Oklahoma!”
Lyrics: “Oklahoma!”
Joseph Raymond “Ray” Conniff was born in Attleboro, Massachusetts, in 1916, long known as “The Jewelry Capital of the World” for all of its jewelry manufacturers. He studied music arranging from a course book. In 1938, he played trombone on “Livery Stable Blues”/”High Society” with Bunny Berigan And His Orchestra. This was the first of three singles he was in the recording studio with Berigan on in the late ’30s. In 1940, he wrote “Prelude in C Major” for Artie Shaw, and later the “Feather Merchant’s Ball” for Teddy Powell and His Orchestra. Conniff served in the U.S. Army in WWII, and joined the Artie Shaw and His Orchestra. In 1942, he wrote “Just Kiddin’ Around” for Shaw, which became at Top 30 hit. Ray Conniff played trombone on several sides for Art Hodes and His Chicagoans, Jerry Jerome and His Cats And Jammers, Yank Lawson’s Jazzband, Bob Crosby and His Orchestra, and the Cozy Cole Orchestra. He wrote songs for Ray Linn’s Hollywood Swing Stars, Harry Hayes And His Band, Sonny Burke and His Orchestra, and the Billie Rogers Orchestra. He also variously wrote, arranged and played on songs recorded by Harry James and His Orchestra.
Continue reading →
