The Toppermost of the Poppermost - UK Number Ones : part 1 - The 50s

[daf]

For those of you who are watching in black and white, its . . .

26.  Winifred Atwell - Let's Have Another Party - part 1



From : 28 November 1954 – 1 January 1955   
Weeks : 5
Flip side : Let's Have Another Party - part 2

Una Winifred Atwell was born in Tunapuna in Trinidad and Tobago on 27 February 1914 . . . or 27 April 1910 (nobody's quite sure!) She played the piano from a young age and achieved considerable popularity locally, playing for American servicemen at the Air Force base.

Atwell left Trinidad in the early 1940s and travelled to the United States to study with Alexander Borovsky and, in 1946, moved to London, where she had gained a place at the Royal Academy of Music. She became the first female pianist to be awarded the academy's highest grading for musicianship. To support her studies, she played rags at London clubs and theatres.

She caught the eye of entrepreneur Bernard Delfont, who put her on a long-term contract. She released three discs that were well received. It was her fourth disc that catapulted her to huge popularity in the UK. A complex arrangement called "Cross Hands Boogie" was released to show her virtuoso rhythmic technique, but it was the B-side, a 1900s tune written by George Botsford called "Black and White Rag", that was to become a radio standard, and later the theme to the BBC Snooker on the TV series 'Pot Black'.

When Atwell first came to Britain, she initially earned only a few pounds a week. By the mid-1950s, this had shot up to over $10,000. By 1952, her popularity had spread internationally. Her hands were insured with Lloyd's of London for £40,000 (the policy stipulating that she was never to wash dishes). She signed a record contract with Decca, and her sales were soon 30,000 discs a week. She was by far the biggest selling pianist of her time, selling over 20 million records.

She was the first black person to have a number-one hit in the UK Singles Chart and is still the only female instrumentalist to do so.

"Let's Have Another Party" was a 1954 ragtime composition, which became a number one hit in the UK Singles Chart for the pianist Winifred Atwell. It is a composite of several pieces of music, and was a follow up to Atwell's successful hit "Let's Have a Party" of the previous year.
The music was written by Nat D. Ayer, Clifford Grey, James W. Tate, Ray Henderson, Mort Dixon and others. It was produced by Johnny Franz and first entered the UK chart on 26 November 1954 for an eight-week run, spending five of those weeks at number one.

The medley included parts of the following tunes :
side 1 -
Somebody Stole My Gal    
Where My Baby Is Tonight    
When The Red, Red, Robin    
Bye, Bye Blackbird    
The Sheik Of Araby    
Another Little Drink    
side 2 -
Lily Of Laguna    
Honeysuckle And The Bee    
Broken Doll    
Nellie Dean    

On This Day :

30 November : A four-kilogram piece of the Hodges Meteorite crashes through the roof of a house and badly bruises a napping woman in Sylacauga, Alabama, in the first documented case of an object from outer space hitting a person.   
12 December : Live transmission of the BBC's ground-breaking adaptation of Nineteen Eighty-Four, starring Peter Cushing, takes place on UK television.
25 December : The Tourists' Annie Lennox & Robin Campbell from UB40 born
29 December : The very first British-animated film, Animal Farm, premieres

[blackcockerel]

It's a Christmas cockney knees-up! Now you're talking!

[Satchmo Distel]

David Whitfield and Winifred Atwell both died in Sydney, Australia.

Atwell recorded under her maiden name despite living under her married name Levisohn on official records like the electoral register.

Travel records show her dob as 27.4.1915.

First black solo No. 1 - yes but only if you discount Nat King Cole's huge popularity in 1950-51, as reflected in sheet music No. 1s. Then you could go back to hugely popular groups The Ink Sports and Mills Brothers in the war years.

Vera Lynn in 1954 - really a throwback hit; war nostalgia like the films of that period. No more Top 10 hits after 1954 and off the singles chart completely since 1957, although a posthumous hit can't be ruled out even though singles no longer exist as such.

[daf]

Travel records show her dob as 27.4.1915.

Ooh - a third option!

Here's the note about it on wiki :

There is some uncertainty over her date and year of birth. Many sources suggest 27 February 1914, but there is a strong suggestion that her birthday was 27 April. Most sources give her year of birth as 1914, but her gravestone states that she died at the age of 73, suggesting that she was born in 1910.

[machotrouts]

Can't argue with a megamix.

Probably not many people would get "who was the first black person to have a UK #1 single?" in a quiz. A mean quizmaster could follow it by asking several questions with the same answer – first black woman, first black instrumentalist, first female instrumentalist. Just a quiz where every answer is Winifred Atwell. Maybe throw in "first Trinidadian woman" and deduct points from everyone who says Nicki Minaj. By the way there's an implict "to have a UK #1 single" after all of those. I'm not saying she was the first black woman ever to have lived. I don't know who was, to be honest. Embarrassing gap in my history knowledge. Sorry.

(Nat King Cole's 'Smile' was beaten to #1 by Don Cornell's 'Hold My Hand'. And yet nobody in this country is prepared to talk about reparations?)

[purlieu]

That's my favourite so far.

[daf]

It's full of Cadbury goodness, but very small and neat, its . . .

27.  Dickie Valentine - Finger Of Suspicion ("with The Stargazers")



From : 2 – 8 January 1955 (1)
      + 16 – 29 January 1955 (2)
Weeks : 3
Flip side : Who's Afraid (Not I, Not I, Not I)

'Dickie Valentine' was born Richard Maxwell on 4 November 1929 was an English pop singer in the 1950s.

His first acting job was at age only three when he appeared in the 1932 British comedy film Jack's the Boy starring Jack Hulbert and Cicely Courtneidge.

While he was in his late teens, he was singing at the Panama Club one night when music publisher Sid Green saw him and brought him to the attention of bandleader Ted Heath, and on 14 February 1949, he was signed by Ted Heath to join his band, singing alongside Lita Roza and Dennis Lotis. He was voted the Top UK Male Vocalist in 1952 while singing with the Ted Heath Orchestra, the most successful of all British big bands,and again after going solo in 1954.

"The Finger of Suspicion (Points at You)" was written by Paul Mann and Al Lewis

Al Lewis was an American lyricist, songwriter and music publisher. He was most active during the 1920s working into the 1950s. During this time, he most often collaborated with popular songwriters Al Sherman and Abner Silver. Among his most famous songs are "You Gotta Be a Football Hero" and "Blueberry Hill" - co-written in the 1940s with Larry Stock, and becoming a top 6 hit for Fats Domino in 1956.

On This Day :

6 January : Rubber-Faced Rib-tickler, Rowan Atkinson, born in Consett, County Durham.         
7 January : In Canada, the opening of parliament is broadcast on television for the first time.
17 January : USS Nautilus, the first nuclear-powered submarine, puts to sea for the first time, from Groton, Connecticut.
18 January : Kevin Costner, US actor, producer and director, born in Lynwood, California
26 January : Eddie Van Halen from The Van Halen Band (feat. Van Halen David Lee Roth) born in Amsterdam, Netherlands

[gilbertharding]

What an odd song.

"You've no idea who I am, but someone made me feel like this and I think it was you. I'm calling the police."

You don't get people called Dickie Valentine any more, do you?

Travelling to his next gig at the Double Diamond Club in Caerphilly, Wales, he was killed outright in a car crash on a single lane bridge at Glangrwyney, near Crickhowell, Wales on 6 May 1971, at the age of 41, together with pianist Sidney Boatman and drummer Dave Pearson, aged 42.

The coroner's inquest revealed the car in which the three were travelling to have been driven in excess of 90 mph at time of impact, and that Valentine, who was driving his wife Wendy's Hillman Avenger, with which he was unfamiliar (he was awaiting delivery of his new customised car), had lost control of the vehicle while attempting to take a (clearly marked) dangerous bend. Valentine had travelled on that stretch of road many times and was familiar with its hazards. It was thought Valentine's attention might have been distracted by conversation with his friends, in addition to fatigue (the crash having happened at 4:20am). There was also heavy fog in the area. The coroner returned a verdict of 'death by misadventure'. Valentine is interred at Slough Crematorium.

Shame he wasn't driving more Caerphilly, eh readers?

[machotrouts]

"Someone broke into my heart and stole a beat or two. The finger of suspicion points at you."

Imagine someone trying to chat you up like that. The finger of suspicion, mate? What the fuck? You want me thinking about your fingers, specifically? Trying to crowbar your fingers in there, are you? Fuck off pervert

I mean, I'm familiar with it as a phrase, but it's so strangely contrived. Like a deranged label head told the writers "You have to write a song called 'The Finger of Suspicion'. Try not to make it fucking weird" and this was just the best they could do.

[purlieu]

"I fancy you. This is very suspicious." Not a great perspective.

[daf]

Are you going to Scarborough Fair? Parsley, Sage, its . . .

28.  Rosemary Clooney - Mambo Italiano



From : 9 - 15 January 1955 (1)
        + 30 January – 12 February 1955 (2)
Weeks : 3
Flip side : We'll Be Together Again

Clooney left Columbia Records in 1958, doing a number of recordings for MGM Records and then some for Coral Records. Finally, toward the end of 1958, she signed with RCA Victor Records, where she stayed until 1963. In 1964, she went to Reprise Records, and in 1965 to Dot Records.

She joined the presidential campaign of close friend Robert F. Kennedy, and heard the shots when he was assassinated on June 5, 1968. A month later, she had a nervous breakdown onstage in Reno, Nevada, and was hospitalized. She remained in psychoanalytic therapy for eight years afterwards.

Upon her recovery from a nervous breakdown, Clooney signed with United Artists Records in 1976 for two albums. Beginning in 1977, she recorded an album a year for the Concord Jazz record label, which continued until her death in 2002.

"Mambo Italiano" is a popular song written by Bob Merrill in 1954 for the American singer Rosemary Clooney.

Merrill reportedly wrote it under a recording deadline, scribbling hastily on a paper napkin in an Italian restaurant in New York City, and then using the wall pay-phone to dictate the melody, rhythm and lyrics to the studio pianist, under the aegis of the conductor Mitch Miller, who produced the original record. Alongside Merrill, 'Lidianni' and 'Gabba' are also listed as writers of the song, corresponding to the pseudonyms of the Italian lyricists Gian Carlo Testoni and Gaspare Abbate, respectively.

Merrill's song provides an obvious parody of genuine mambo music, cashing in on the 1954 mambo craze in New York while at the same time allowing Miller to set up a brilliant vehicle for Clooney's vocal talents. It is also a late example of an American novelty song in a tradition started during World War II by the Italian-American jazz singer Louis Prima, in which nonsense lyrics with an Italian-American sound are used in such a way as to present a benignly stereotyped caricature of Italian-American people as likable, slightly brash, pleasure-loving folk.

The nonsense lyrics were a comic jumble of Italian, Spanish, Neapolitan dialect and gibberish words.
A number of Italian words are deliberately misspelled ("Giovanno" instead of "Giovanni", and "e lo che se dice" which is a cross between the Italian "e quello che si dice" and the Spanish "y lo que se dice" with the same nonsense meaning: "and what it is said").
Other words are in Italo-English slang: (goombah, literally godson/godfather but more broadly fellow countryman, and 'jadrool', a stupid person, closely related to cetriolo, Italian for "cucumber", but in Sicilian dialect meaning jackass. The word tiavanna is invented.

Inevitably, Dean Martin had a crack at it, as well as some real Italians : Carla Boni scored a major hit with her version of 1956,  and the same year, Renato Carosone, a singer and band leader from Naples, recorded a successful version that weaves in several fragments of Neapolitan song

On This Day :

9 January : Boris Shilkov breaks the World record in men's 5000 m speed skating, bringing it under 8 minutes for the first time.
10 January : Michael Schenker, German rock guitarist (Scorpions), born in Sarstedt, Germany
13 January : Trevor Rabin, rocker (Yes) born
15 January : British cargo ship Sudbury Hill runs aground off Bermuda but is refloated undamaged.
3 February : Kirsty Wark, British broadcast journalist born
9 February : 60,000 non-white residents of the Sophiatown suburb of Johannesburg, South Africa, are forcibly evicted.
9 February : In Italy, the Rome Metro opens to passengers.

[purlieu]

I'd probably enjoy that if I could hear it out of context of the dance version by Shaft. However, they totally ruined it for me, so I hated it.

[machotrouts]

My mum played the Dean Martin version of Mambo Italiano so much when I was a child that I am appalled to discover how much better the original is. Someone call the NSPCC's time travel department.

Rosemary Clooney probably has the best two #1s so far, right? The pre-chart "Come on-a My House" isn't as good as either of them, but it is the second best song to begin with "Come on a" after "Come on a Cone" by Nicki Minaj.

George Clooney's aunt, if that fact hasn't come up yet. (Nicki Minaj, obviously, not Rosemary Clooney.)

[daf]

"Come on-a My House"

Interestingly, Sparks weren't the first to play around with this title for it's pun-tastic potential :

The album's title ('Kimono My House') is a pun on the title of the song "Come On-a My House", made famous by Rosemary Clooney. The pun has a precedent, however, in the title of the track "Kimona My House" on jazz guitarist Dick Garcia's 1956 album A Message from Garcia.

He probably meant Kimono, . . . though, it turns out a 'Kimona' is also an exotic garment . . . so who knows! :

Most Visayan lowland people wear the typical Kimona, a type of Baro't Saya blouse matching with a knee-length skirt. Kimona is typically a transparent piece of clothing made of pineapple fiber while the skirt is usually either floor-length or knee-length printed with the Patadyong pattern.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fashion_and_clothing_in_the_Philippines#Kimona_and_Patadyong

This pun ain't big enough for the both of us!

[Satchmo Distel]

Rosemary Clooney probably has the most famous nephew of any singer to reach No. 1 (George Clooney).

[machotrouts]

That's nothing on Nicki Minaj's nephew (George Clooney).

[The Culture Bunker]

Rosemary Clooney probably has the most famous nephew of any singer to reach No. 1 (George Clooney).

Pretty famous son too. Who didn't get the Clooney good looks, bless him.

[daf]

Everyone's favourite Indian nosh-up, its . . .

29.  Ruby Murray - Softly, Softly



From : 13 February – 5 March 1955
Weeks : 3
Flip side : What Could Be More Beautiful

Ruby Florence Murray (29 March 1935 – 17 December 1996) was born near the Donegall Road in south Belfast, Northern Ireland.

Her voice's distinctive sound was partly the result of an operation on her throat in early childhood. She toured as a child singer and first appeared on television at the age of 12, having been spotted by producer Richard Afton.

Murray was signed to Columbia and her first single, "Heartbeat", reached No. 3 in the UK Singles Chart in December 1954. "Softly, Softly", her second single, reached number one in early 1955. That same year Murray set a pop chart record by having five hits in the Top Twenty in one week.

The 1950s was a busy period for Murray, during which she had her own television show, starred at the London Palladium with Norman Wisdom, appeared in a Royal Command Performance (1955), and toured the world.

Murray appeared in her only film role, as Ruby, in A Touch of the Sun, a 1956 farce with Frankie Howerd and Dennis Price. A couple of hits followed later in the decade; "Goodbye Jimmy, Goodbye", a No. 10 hit in 1959, was her final appearance in the charts.

Murray's popularity led to her name being adopted in Cockney rhyming slang as a rhyme for "curry".

"Softly, Softly" is a popular song orginally written in French as "La tamise et mon jardin" by Mark Paul and Pierre Dudan. The song was given English lyrics by Paddy Roberts.

Produced by Norrie Paramor, Ruby Murray's version reached No. 1 in the UK Singles Chart for three weeks in February and March 1955.
Other recordings were made in 1955 by Jaye P. Morgan and by Alma Cogan.

On This Day :

15 February : Hugh Padgham. English record producer and audio engineer (Police, XTC, Genesis), born in Amersham, Buckinghamshire
23 February : Howard Jones, rock pianist/vocalist, born in Southhampton
27 February : Garry Christian, English singer, born in Liverpool
2 March : Claudette Colvin, a fifteen-year-old African-American girl, becomes the first person arrested for resisting bus segregation in Montgomery, Alabama, when she refuses to give up her seat to a white woman as demanded by the driver.
5 March : Elvis Presley makes his television debut on "Louisiana Hayride" carried by KSLA-TV Shreveport.

[Satchmo Distel]

Murray was a one-year wonder, a bit like Frankie in 1984; chart domination for a calendar year then not much after.

https://www.officialcharts.com/artist/1577/ruby-murray/

[machotrouts]

Was sat here thinking, how the fuck is this, of all records, reminding me of Siouxsie and the Banshees, then remembered that they have a song called 'Softly'. I don't know, do they sound similar? They both have "Softly" in the title, and both, in what is probably not an extraordinary coincidence, sound soft. I don't know. I like 'Softly, Softly' but I think that might just be because I'm mentally remixing it as a shoegaze record or something.

[daf]

And he drove the fastest Sarsaparilla Float in the West, its . . .

30.  Tennessee Ernie Ford - Give Me Your Word



From : 6 March – 23 April 1955
Weeks : 7
Flip side : River Of No Return

Born Ernest Jennings Ford (February 13, 1919 – October 17, 1991), Tennessee Ernie Ford was an American singer and television host who enjoyed success in the country and Western, pop, and gospel musical genres. Noted for his rich bass-baritone voice and down-home humor, he is best remembered for his hit recording of "Sixteen Tons".

Ford began his radio career as an announcer at WOPI-AM in Bristol. In 1939, the young bass-baritone left the station to study classical singing at the Cincinnati Conservatory of Music in Ohio. A First Lieutenant, he served in the United States Army Air Corps in World War II as the bombardier on a B-29 Superfortress flying missions over Japan.

After the war, Ford worked at radio stations in San Bernardino and Pasadena, California. At KFXM, in San Bernardino, Ford was hired as a radio announcer. To differentiate himself, he created the personality of "Tennessee Ernie", a wild, madcap, exaggerated hillbilly. He became popular in the area and was soon hired away by Pasadena's KXLA radio. He also did musical tours. The Mayfield Brothers of West Texas, including Smokey Mayfield, Thomas Edd Mayfield, and Herbert Mayfield, were among Ford's warmup bands, having played for him in concerts in Amarillo and Lubbock, during the late 1940s.

He released almost 50 country singles through the early 1950s, several of which made the charts. Many of his early records, including "The Shotgun Boogie" and "Blackberry Boogie", were exciting, driving boogie-woogie records featuring accompaniment by the Hometown Jamboree band which included Jimmy Bryant on lead guitar and pioneer pedal steel guitarist Speedy West. "I'll Never Be Free", a duet pairing Ford with Capitol Records pop singer Kay Starr, became a huge country and pop crossover hit in 1950.

He became a household name in the U.S., largely as a result of his portrayal in 1954 of the 'country bumpkin', "Cousin Ernie", on three episodes of I Love Lucy.

"Give Me Your Word" is a popular song written by George Wyle and Irving Taylor in 1954. The biggest selling version, recorded by Tennessee Ernie Ford, was released on 31 May 1954 by Capitol Records in the United States, and reached number 1 in the UK Singles Chart in March 1955.

The Flipside 'River of No Return' (by Ken Darby & Lionel Newman) was first performed by Marilyn Monroe in the film of the same name.

Monroe nearly drowned while filming the Western in Jasper, Canada. She had donned chest high hip waders during rehearsal to protect her costume. She slipped on a rock, the waders filled with water, and she was unable to rise. Mitchum and others jumped in the river to rescue her but her ankle was sprained as a result.

In later years, Monroe claimed River of No Return was her worst film . . . probably due to that twisted ankle.

On This Day :

12 March : Charlie Parker, 34, US saxophonist died
15 March : "Colonel" Tom Parker becomes Elvis Presley's manager.
20 March : 'Blackboard Jungle' is premièred in the United States, making a hit out of "Rock Around the Clock" by Bill Haley & His Comets.
31 March : Angus Young, rock guitarist (AC/DC) born in Glasgow, Scotland
5 April : Winston Churchill resigns as Prime Minister
5 April : 'Moonraker' (James Bond novel #3) published
5 April : Janice Long (Radio DJ & TOTP Presenter) born in Liverpool
6 April :  Anthony Eden becomes Prime Minister of the United Kingdom
16 April : Sir Laurence Olivier's film version of Shakespeare's Richard III, is released in the UK.
17 April : Pete Shelley (Buzzcocks), born in Leigh, England
18 April : Albert Einstein, 76, German-born physicist, died

[machotrouts]

How can you have a voice that deep and still sound like you've got a stinking cold?

[buzby]

And he drove the fastest Sarsaparilla Float in the West, its . . .

30.  Tennessee Ernie Ford - Give Me Your Word

Tennessee Ernie was another favourite of my dads, daf. Nice lush orchestral arrangement on this  The soon-to-come Sixteen Tons is his best single though.

[kalowski]

Tennessee Ernie was another favourite of my dads, daf. Nice lush orchestral arrangement on this  The soon-to-come Sixteen Tons is his best single though.

Sixteen Tons is brilliant. One of those songs that makes you wonder how you got through life without it.

[purlieu]

Softly, Softly - crikey, this is full-on lullaby territory. No thanks.
River of No Return - I had both tabs open and did a cross-fade and this sounded like an extension of Softly, Softly. It's a bit better. The chorus is a lot more atmospheric here.

[daf]

Everyone's favourite Sleazy Parper, its . . .

31.  Perez Prado - Cherry Pink And Apple Blossom White



From : 24 April – 7 May 1955 
Weeks : 2
Flip side : Maria Elena - Rumba

Dámaso Pérez Prado (December 11, 1916 – September 14, 1989) was a Cuban bandleader, organist, pianist and composer who also made brief appearances in films. He is often referred to as the "King of the Mambo".

Pérez studied classical piano in his early childhood, and later played organ and piano in local clubs. For a time, he was pianist and arranger for the Sonora Matancera, Cuba's best-known musical group at the time. He also worked with casino orchestras in Havana for most of the 1940s.

In 1949, Perez moved to Mexico to form his own band and signed a recording contract with the Mexican division of RCA Victor.
In 1950 arranger Sonny Burke heard "Qué rico el mambo" while on vacation in Mexico and recorded it back in the United States as "Mambo Jambo". The single was a hit, which led Pérez to launch a US tour. His appearances in 1951 were sell-outs and he began recording US releases for RCA Victor.

Pérez was the composer of such famous pieces as "Mambo No. 5" (later a UK chart-topper for both Lou Bega in 1999 and animated character Bob the Builder in 2001) and "Mambo No. 8". At the height of the mambo movement in 1955, Pérez hit the American charts at number one with a cha-cha-chá version of "Cherry Pink and Apple Blossom White". This arrangement, featuring trumpeter Billy Regis, held the spot for 10 consecutive weeks, sold over one million copies.

"Cherry Pink and Apple Blossom White" or "Cerezo Rosa" or "Ciliegi Rosa" or "Gummy Mambo", is the English version of "Cerisiers Roses et Pommiers Blancs", a popular song with music by Louiguy written in 1950. French lyrics to the song by Jacques Larue and English lyrics by Mack David both exist, however, Perez Prado's recording of the song as an instrumental with his orchestra was the most popular version.

Perez had first recorded this title for the movie Underwater! (1955), where Jane Russell can be seen dancing to the song. Billboard ranked this version as the No. 1 song of 1955. The most popular vocal version in the U.S. was by Merry Man Alan 'a' Dale, reaching No. 14 on the chart in 1955.

On This Day :

2 May : In the UK, the Delph Donkey passenger train service is withdrawn from stations between Oldham and Delph.
5 May : West Germany becomes a sovereign country recognized by France, the United Kingdom, Canada, and the United States.
6 May : The Burmese ship SS Pyidawtha runs aground and is wrecked in the Bay of Bengal, off Cheduba Island.

[blackcockerel]

One of my favourites of the 50s, this. Loved Sixteen Tons, too.

[machotrouts]

A perfect sonic representation of a drunken stagger. A trumpet that keeps losing its balance, stopping the music, and then just about getting back on its feet, trying to keep up appearances. Music to make a disgrace of yourself to.

Mind you, it's surely a failure at evoking the floral imagery of its title – it sort of is delicate, but only in as much as it sounds like it's a feather touch away from throwing up. Sounds weird when you hear Alan Alda (I see, looking back at daf's post, that I have his name wrong, but it's too late to backspace now) singing about the gentle sighs and caresses of spring with that same melody-warping slur. Could be a song about falling into plants, perhaps.

[purlieu]

Yeah, that's pretty fun. Totally with machotrouts' interpretation of it.

Of course, it's got nothing on Steven Stapleon's tribute to Mr. Prado. But that's not quite number one material.

[buzby]

Cherry Pink and Apple Blossom White is another case  of a UK cash-in to gazumphs the US original (though in this case the UK version was released a month after HMV had released Prado's original version here). I won't spoil it for daf, but I prefer the production on the uK rip-off.