Category: Monthly

Welcome to our first Xmas around these parts, December 1950. Hopefully close enough to the season back in the real world that you feel like an early listen to some festive tunes.

The songs of December, 1950

Actually only four different Xmas songs made it into the top 20 across the course of December, 1950. But there were no less than 3 versions of Gene Autry’s break-out hit, “Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer” as well. Apparently not everyone bought a copy in 1949!

December, 1950 Top 20 Hits

A Bushel And A Peck,Margaret Whiting / Jimmy Wakely
A Bushel And A Peck,Perry Como / Betty Hutton
All My Love,Bing Crosby
All My Love,Guy Lombardo / Bill Flanagan
All My Love,Patti Page
Be My Love,Mario Lanza
Christmas In Killarney,Dennis Day
Frosty The Snowman,Gene Autry
Goodnight Irene,Weavers & Gordon Jenkins
Harbour Light,Guy Lombardo / Kenny Gardner
Harbour Lights,Bing Crosby
Harbour Lights,Ray Anthony / Ronnie Deauville
Harbour Lights,Sammy Kaye / Tony Alamo / Kaydets
I’ll Always Love You,Dean Martin
I’ll Never Be Free,Kay Starr / Tennessee Ernie
My Heart Cries For You,Guy Mitchell
Nevertheless,Mills Brothers
Nevertheless,Paul Weston / Norman Luboff Choir
Nevertheless,Ralph Flanagan / Harry Prime
Nevertheless,Ray Anthony / Ronnie Deauville
Oh Babe,Kay Starr
Orange Coloured Sky,Nat King Cole / Stan Kenton
Patricia,Perry Como
Rudolph The Red Nosed Reindeer,Bing Crosby
Rudolph The Red Nosed Reindeer,Gene Autry
Rudolph The Red Nosed Reindeer,Spike Jones
Tennessee Waltz,Guy Lombardo / Kenny Gardner
Tennessee Waltz,Les Paul & Mary Ford
Tennessee Waltz,Patti Page
The Roving Kind,Guy Mitchell
The Thing,Phil Harris
Thinking Of You,Don Cherry
Thinking Of You,Eddie Fisher
White Christmas,Bing Crosby

We’ve supplemented the pop top 40 with the top 10 R&B from one week this month – not a Xmas tune on it, which may be a negative or a positive depending on your level of festive spirit.

You can listen to the full playlist on Youtube via this link or embedded below:

This month in history

We’ll leave it up to a single video to capture the times this month, a 5 minute news reel from the UK that captures imagery of Xmas being celebrated around the world. All together now, “awwwww!”.

What’d Sadie think?

We first mentioned Xmas back in our February, 1950 post when we talked about how the classic “Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer” tune had only just been released a few months earlier for Xmas 1949. And how he was attempting to replicate the success with an Easter tune, “Peter Cottontail”.

Then in August we noted that, according to Billboard magazine, the battle for Xmas had already begun with a range of new hits being recorded and exclusive deals with department stores being inked to get them to worm into consumer’s consciousness. Well it worked for 4 tunes.

Bing Crosby’s version of Irving Berlin’s “White Xmas” was a hit right throughout the forties and as popular in 1950 it seems. Gene Autry’s cover of Rudolph again charted, but so did versions from Bing and Spike Jones. We’ve included the Spike version as it uses character voices to tell the story so it’s great for kids. But I’d go for the Crosby version with a glass of whisky on a cold winter’s night myself.

Gene wasn’t resting on his Xmas laurels, oh no – he had another go at it with “Frosty The Snowman”. Which had the help of an animated TV version:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7SocOdoXKYY

This helped it chart as high as number 7 over Xmas, but it never topped Rudolph’s highest place of number 3. It was actually another novelty song, “The Thing” (which we charted last month) that made it to number 1 for most of the month. With the Xmas number one being Patti Page’s decent, but not very festive tale of infidelity, “Tennessee Waltz”. At least it wasn’t an X-Factor act’s song back then! (Sadie I’ll explain in a decade’s time…)

The other Xmas tune was Dennis Day’s “Christmas in Killarney” – a twee Irish-American number that I couldn’t recommend. Aside from the Xmas tunes I’d definitely listen out for “A Bushel And A Peck”, another great duet by by Margaret Whiting and Jimmy Wakely (from “Guys and Dolls”, which had its first hit run on Broadway that year). And “Rocking with Red” by Piano Red, from the R&B charts, which apparently popularised the term “rock and roll” in some parts of the states and definitely has a kick.

Sadie was particularly attentive this week, she’s 3 months old now – happy quarterversary sweetie! She particularly enjoyed mum and dad singing along to Frosty and Rudolph – we think… And also seemed to love Perry Como’s “Patricia”, which does indeed have a sweet melody.

And of course, Xmas also means we’ve reached the end of our very first year. Thanks for those who have been following along for the last 3 months of real time, and new followers – welcome! Here’s to a 1951 of great times, from me and Jimmy Durante…

p.s. If you really love Xmas, don’t worry – we’ll be back to the season by early February in 2020 time! In the meanwhile listen to this month’s full playlist on Youtube via this link.

Coincidences abound this week. Not only are we listening to the music of November, 1950 in November of 2020 but this happens to be my dear mother’s 70th birthday. Yes, the spanning years encompass her whole life. Happy birthday mum!

The songs of November, 1950

In honour of my mother we’ll focus our trip back in time this week to New Zealand of 1950. Though first let’s see what was on the Billboard pop charts for the month:

November, 1950 Top 20 Hits

A Bushel And A Peck,Margaret Whiting / Jimmy Wakely
A Bushel And A Peck,Perry Como / Betty Hutton
All My Love,Bing Crosby
All My Love,Guy Lombardo / Bill Flanagan
All My Love,Patti Page
All My Love,Percy Faith
Bonaparte’s Retreat,Kay Starr
Can Anyone Explain,Ames Brothers
Goodnight Irene,Weavers & Gordon Jenkins
Harbour Lights,Bing Crosby
Harbour Lights,Guy Lombardo / Kenny Gardner
Harbour Lights,Ray Anthony / Ronnie Deauville
Harbour Lights,Sammy Kaye / Tony Alamo / Kaydets
I’ll Always Love You,Dean Martin
I’ll Never Be Free,Kay Starr / Tennessee Ernie
Mona Lisa,Nat King Cole
Nevertheless,Mills Brothers
Nevertheless,Paul Weston / Norman Luboff Choir
Nevertheless,Ralph Flanagan / Harry Prime
Nevertheless,Ray Anthony / Ronnie Deauville
Oh Babe,Kay Starr
Oh Babe,Louis Prima / Keely Smith
Orange Coloured Sky,Nat King Cole / Stan Kenton
Our Lady Of Fatima,Kitty Kallen / Richard Hayes
Patricia,Perry Como
Play A Simple Melody,Bing Crosby / Gary Crosby
Sam’s Song,Bing Crosby / Gary Crosby
Tennessee Waltz,Patti Page
The Thing,Phil Harris
Thinking Of You,Don Cherry
Thinking Of You,Eddie Fisher

A few new songs, which we’ll get to later, and a few new covers. There seems to be an inverse correlation between songs we love and ones that get multiple versions, but there we go!

To supplement the charts I’ve managed to dig up some tunes that would have been on the airwaves in New Zealand at the time. Still no sign of actual charts from New Zealand of 1950 but the signs are these songs would have been on high rotate (more on that later). Big thanks to Carl down in New Zealand who did some sleuthing and pointed me in the right direction.

Finding versions of NZ releases online proves harder than US releases, so I’ve had to go for a quartet of songs by the same artist, Mavis Rivers. Luckily she’s brill so no worries there. Plus a couple of others I could dig up.

“Blue Smoke” – Pixie Williams
Mavis Rivers – I’ll String Along With You
Mavis Rivers – Dear Hearts And Gentle People
Mavis Rivers – Candy and Cake
Henry Rudolph’s Harmony Serenaders w/ Soloist John Hoskins – Dreamers Holiday
The Kiwi Concert Party Orchestra – Mr. &Mrs. Millionaire
Mavis Rivers – Farewell Samoa

You can listen to the full playlist on Youtube via this link or embedded below:

This month in history

If New Zealand feels a long way away for those of us in the northern hemisphere even today, imagine what it was like with the communications technology of the 1950s. Even as a child, in the ’80s, I can remember the only direct contact with the UK being phone calls which had a multi-second delay on them as they pinged up and down via Satellite making us feel truly at the bottom of the world.

Only three years before, in 1947, New Zealand had adopted the statue of Westminster gaining more autonomy over its own government – but it was still very much looked towards the UK for most things.

Though perhaps increasingly less so when it came to the arts, or pop-culture at least, as post-war US began its assault on western airwaves. You can see this in a NZ magazine of the time, Screen Parade, touted as “The best pictorial movie magazine” – which heavily featured American films.

You can read a few pages of this November, 1950 issue online including profiles on Vivien Leigh, Errol Flynn and a review of musical “Annie Get Your Gun”.

Mum was born on a Sunday, so the first newspaper edition published after she was born was the Monday edition. Below is part of the cover of the Otago Daily Times, November 20, 1950. You can read it online.

I’m obviously biased, but its always the adverts that catch my attention the most when diving back into old titles – so revealing! Literally in this case…(or not, “no bulge” – different times).

But I think we can all agree this is a brilliant article:

If you want a bit more of a peek into 1950’s New Zealand then Ngā Taonga, New Zealand’s audiovisual archive, have an excellent online repository. This 14 minute advert for a home perm is as hilariously fake as this 5 minutes footage from a wedding is real.

And this short clip of children at a primary school doesn’t seem too different from my own country school in NZ in the ’80s, so I assume when mum started school a few years later it looked very similar. 1950 was also the centenary of the European settlement of that area of New Zealand and is captured in an audio re-enactment.

There’s no contemporary music that I can find in their archives for the year but there are some great radio shows showcasing traditional Māori songs. Such as this Radio New Zealand recording of a visit by boys from Te Aute College near Napier in April, 1950. Or this short radio documentary on Ngā Pao Me Ngā Pakiwaitara A Te Iwi Māori (Song And Story Of The Māori).

What’d Sadie think?

Television hadn’t yet arrived in New Zealand in 1950. It was was only demo’d that year, before trials began a couple of years later – not really getting rolled out till the end of the decade. Plenty on that history here. But as a consequence, we can assume, radio and music was even more important in the cultural milieu.

Here’s the radio programmes being broadcast on November 20, 1950:

3YA in Christchurch is the station in mum’s hometown. Really a pity I couldn’t find a recording of the “Christchurch Highland Pipe band” to include on the playlist.

We’re able to hazard a guess at what pop music was popular by looking at the catalogue of New Zealand record label TANZA (‘To Assist New Zealand Artists’) which was the first NZ owned independent label, issuing its first 78 in 1949 and ceasing operation in 1959. 

That first record was “Blue Smoke” written by Ruru Karaitiana and sung by Pixie Williams, becoming the first record wholly produced in New Zealand from composition to pressing. You can read the fascinating 10 year story from composition to recording online. It would make its way out of New Zealand – being recorded by Dean Martin no less in 1951.

It’s a lovely tune and the first I’ve included on the playlist this week after the main pop charts. Meanwhile, Mavis Rivers was featured heavily on releases on the label for the first couple of years of its life – hence why I’ve included four this week. She disappears from their roster only because, Samoan born, she then moved to the USA (where Sinatra apparently called her the “purest voice in jazz”) and had a career spanning several decades. You can read a bio here.

She’s introduced as a performer at Auckland’s first jazz concert, in August 1950 with quite the compliment:

“Well I never thought I’d live to see the day when I was happy to introduce a female vocalist, there are only two that don’t give me a pain in the ear, one of them is Jo Stafford, but the other is Mavis Rivers”

– Peter Young, Jazz Concert, Auckland Town Hall, August 1950

Moving right along.. Jo Stafford of course has featured on our charts already so that part is at least a nice comparison. As have two of the songs Mavis Rivers sings – “Dear Hearts and Gentle People” and “Candy and Cake”. It looks like most of the label’s songs were covers of American hits – hardly surprising given how often these were also covered back in the USA! Her versions are excellent.

As is the cover of “A Dreamer’s Holiday” by Henry Rudolph’s Harmony Serenaders, also released on TANZA. This featured in our charts, performed by Perry Como at the time, earlier in 1950.

There’s a couple of new entries on the USA charts worth mentioning this month. First is “Oh Babe”, a real feisty jazzy number, by Kay Starr – who is turning in a real favourite of ours, as mentioned last month. And “The Thing” by Phil Harris which is a novelty song that tells the story of a box the singer finds on the beach. Suffice to say, the thing is a MacGuffin, which is one of the wife and I’s favourite pop-cultural tropes.

I end the playlist, and this entry, on Mavis Rivers’ original “Farewell Samoa” (release dates are given between 1950 and 1952 for this) as mum spent some time growing up there as a child and it’s performed in English and Samoan. Absolutely lovely.

Happy Birthday from Sadie, Emily and I, Tessa! Love you! And to all, enjoy the playlist of November, 1950.

At the curious 4 times speed we’re progressing though the past at, we’ve arrived at October, 1950 already. Before we know it, it’ll be Xmas. But until then we have the hits of Autumn to listen to. So let’s get to it!

The songs of October 1950

“Goodnight Irene” continues its dominance with the number 1 placing right across the month. Which must have driven Nat King Cole crazy, with his version of “Mona Lisa” sitting consistently one spot beneath it the whole while. And then there’s the quantity over quality approach of “All my Love” as four different versions vie for the high spot but never go beyond 7th as they “split the vote”. Here’s all the tunes that cracked the top 20 across the month…

October, 1950 Top 20 Hits

All My Love,Bing Crosby
All My Love,Guy Lombardo / Bill Flanagan
All My Love,Patti Page
All My Love,Percy Faith
Bonaparte’s Retreat,Kay Starr
Can Anyone Explain,Ames Brothers
Goodnight Irene,Weavers & Gordon Jenkins
Harbour Lights,Guy Lombardo / Kenny Gardner
Harbour Lights,Sammy Kaye / Tony Alamo / Kaydets
I’ll Always Love You,Dean Martin
I’ll Never Be Free,Kay Starr / Tennessee Ernie
La Vie En Rose,Tony Martin
Mona Lisa,Nat King Cole
Music Maestro Please,Frankie Laine
Nevertheless,Paul Weston / Norman Luboff Choir
No Other Love,Jo Stafford
Orange Coloured Sky,Nat King Cole / Stan Kenton
Our Lady Of Fatima,Kitty Kallen / Richard Hayes
Our Lady Of Fatima,Red Foley
Patricia,Perry Como
Play A Simple Melody,Bing Crosby / Gary Crosby
Sam’s Song,Bing Crosby / Gary Crosby
Thinking Of You,Don Cherry
Thinking Of You,Eddie Fisher
Tzena Tzena Tzena,Weavers / Gordon Jenkins

And because it’s getting cold here in London we needed something with a little more rhythm to keep us warm so we’ve supplemented the breezy ’50s mainstream hits with a top 10 R&B chart from October:

You can listen to the full playlist on Youtube via this link or embedded below:

This month in history

November 2020 is far too full of political machinations and stress right now so let’s look at the lighter side of history in October, 1950.

On the 2nd of the month the comic strip “Peanuts”, by Charles M. Schulz, was published for the first time. The first strip shows two children, a boy and a girl, sitting on the sidewalk. The boy, Shermy, says, “Well! Here comes ol’ Charlie Brown! Good ol’ Charlie Brown … Yes, sir! Good ol’ Charlie Brown.” When Charlie Brown is out of sight, Shermy adds, “How I hate him!” In the second Peanuts strip the girl, Patty, walks alone, chanting, “Little girls are made of sugar and spice … and everything nice.” As Charlie Brown comes into view, she slugs him and says, “That’s what little girls are made of!”.

But I promised light hearted, which on reflection Peanuts often wasn’t – on October 5 rumours that an atomic war had started set off a panic when blasts sent manhole covers as high as five stories above the street in Brooklyn, NY and sent blue flames into the air. Luckily they were just gas explosions at four sewers in the borough and nobody was injured. Light-er?

Perhaps a laugh at the expense of big media? In a lesson on backwards compatibility, that many tech manufacturers are still failing to heed, on the 11 the U.S. Federal Communications Commission issued the first license to broadcast television in colour, to CBS. It would be abandoned only a year later, in large part because its signal could not be picked up on ordinary black and white television sets without the purchase of an adapter that would cost at least fifteen dollars (equivalent to almost $150 today). So that’s where Steve Jobs got the idea from.

My childhood favourite, C. S. Lewis’s novel The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, the first of The Chronicles of Narnia series, was published this month in the U.K. The rest of the series would be published over the next half decade with the final book, “The Last Battle” being issued in 1956. Which was all light-hearted adventure for me reading them in the ’80s, till I hit the final volume aged 8 and realised it was all a Christian allegory and that I’d been suckered. (Sadie, we’ll read Philip Pullman’s “His Dark Materials” series instead. )

Finally, on the 20th, Tom Petty was born in Gainesville, Florida and will find his way into these pages again in a decade’s time. Till then Tom…let’s see what we thought of what as charting in October, 1950.

What’d Sadie think?

New to the charts this month is “Orange Coloured Sky” by Nat King Cole. It’s no patch on his cover of “Mona Lisa”, but is a kind of fun song seemingly based on a bad pick-up line:

I was walking along
Mindin’ my business
When out of the orange colored sky
Flash! Bam! Alakazam!
Wonderful you came by

“Orange Coloured Sky” by Nat King Cole

There’ll be a bunch of versions of the tune before the year is out so clearly 1950’s USA liked it a lot more than we did. Meanwhile there’s four versions of “All my love” in the charts already, and the Bing Crosby version I’ve included this week is the best so far. It’s also Crosby’s third hit in the charts this month – the other two being “Play a Simple Melody” and “Sam’s Song” both duets with his son.

But it’s the two Kay Starr songs that continue to chart, “I’ll Never Be Free” and “Bonaparte’s Retreat” that are Sadie and my favourite tunes for a dance along currently.

Perry Como’s “Patricia” is very forgettable but did make me wonder what portion of ’50s tunes are simply named after a woman. That might be something interesting to chart over time. Mental note!

Over in the R&B chart Lowell Fulson’s “Blue Shadows” is at number 1 and it’s got a great groove. Though it also has lyrics that are just a little too ’50s:

If you got a good woman, you better take my advice
Yes and treat her like an angel, keep her home at any price

“Blue Shadows” by Lowell Fulson

The ‘blue’ references in the R&B chart continue with Louis Jordan’s “Blue Light Boogie” which is a great dance number. And the tunes only get a little more sultry and soulful from there with a trio of great tunes, all of which feature a decent saxophone part – “Anytime, Anyplace, Anywhere”, “Everyday I have the blues” and “Teardrops from my Eyes”

Tune of the chart though has to be Percy Mayfield’s, “Please Send Me Someone to Love” which will make its way to number 1 in a few weeks, and is a sly mix of social commentary and love song:

Heaven please send to all mankind,
Understanding and peace of mind.
But, if it’s not asking too much
Please send me someone to love.

“Please Send Me Someone to Love” by Percy Mayfield

Well I had intended to keep it light, but then I came across this advert in Billboard and was intrigued enough to investigate:

There’s not actually a lot I can find online about this. But apparently Private John J McCormick was killed in action in the Korean War in August of 1950 and his “last letter” home was published in newspapers across the USA. Country singer Tex Ritter then put the letter to a tear-jerker song which I’ve embedded below.

Perhaps fittingly McCormick was born in Pennsylvania, a state that has been very much a metaphorical battleground back here in 2020 this past week.

Also found in the same issue was this ad:

I wondered if Punk arrived a little earlier than I thought, but no! It’s a halloween song, that doesn’t make the charts but which might be a useful way to end the month on a lighter note:

And when you’re done with that you can listen to the full October playlist on Youtube via this link if you’ve not already started.

Welcome to September, 1950 – a safe place to shelter from the ongoing madness that is US Politics as election week arrives in the “land of the free (refill)”.

The songs of September, 1950

A new version of “Count Every Star”, courtesy of Dick Haymes & Artie Shaw makes it one of the most covered songs in the charts this month. But there’s also a number of brand new songs on the block, even while “Goodnight Irene” enjoys another full month at number 1. So let’s just jump straight into listening to the hits of September 1950 shall we…

September, 1950 Top 20 Hits

All My Love,Patti Page
All My Love,Percy Faith
Bonaparte’s Retreat,Gene Krupa / Bobby Soots
Bonaparte’s Retreat,Kay Starr
Can Anyone Explain,Ames Brothers
Count Every Star,Dick Haymes / Artie Shaw
Count Every Star,Hugo Winterhalter
Count Every Star,Ray Anthony / Dick Noel
Goodnight Irene,Frank Sinatra
Goodnight Irene,Weavers / Gordon Jenkins
Harbour Lights,Sammy Kaye / Tony Alamo / Kaydets
I Wanna Be Loved,Andrews Sisters / Gordon Jenkins
I’ll Always Love You,Dean Martin
I’ll Never Be Free,Kay Starr / Tennessee Ernie
I’m Forever Blowing Bubbles,Artie Shaw / Gordon Jenkins / Chorus
La Vie En Rose,Bing Crosby
La Vie En Rose,Tony Martin
Mona Lisa,Nat King Cole
Mona Lisa,Victor Young / Don Cherry
Music Maestro Please,Frankie Laine
No Other Love,Jo Stafford
Nola,Les Paul
Our Lady Of Fatima,Kitty Kallen / Richard Hayes
Patricia,Perry Como
Play A Simple Melody,Bing Crosby / Gary Crosby
Sam’s Song,Bing Crosby / Gary Crosby
Thinking Of You,Don Cherry
Third Man Theme,Anton Karas
Third Man Theme,Guy Lombardo
Tzena Tzena Tzena,Mitch Miller
Tzena Tzena Tzena,Vic Damone
Tzena Tzena Tzena,Weavers / Gordon Jenkins

You can listen to the full playlist on Youtube via this link or embedded below:

This month in history

With the US election next week here in 2020 we will soon find out if a mad man will spend another 4 years running that country. Back in 1950 this month, a man who had actually been certified insane but held no such power, John Crabb, a 59-year-old immigrant from Denmark, was freed from the Topeka State Hospital, where he had been held since 1930. The poor chap had threatened a fellow restaurant worker who had “hit on” his girlfriend which had him locked up in jail, and then due to his temper and poor english, wound him up in a mental hospital for two decades. Meanwhile, Trump will no doubt continue to make inappropriate passes on women whatever mansion he’s holed up in come 2021…

The migration of ears and eyes from Radio to TV continued this month as the game show “Truth or Consequences” made its debut on US network TV after having been a successful radio programme for a decade. Given the premise of the show was for contestants to partake in some silly stunt, the format somewhat more suited a visual medium at any rate. But I guess when all you had was radio?

And why wouldn’t TV continue to win fans with innovations like the “laugh track”. Yes, this much maligned but even more utilised, technique was introduced to television viewers with the premiere of The Hank McCune Show, a situation comedy, on the NBC television network this month. The story of the “Laff Box” and the man behind it, Charles Douglass, is well worth a read – apparently he dominated the fake laughs of the next decades, with a “high tech” box he wheeled from recording studio to studio to add the merriment after they had been recorded. You can see it in action below:

This month the first advertisement for a credit card also appeared, with an ad in the New York Times for Diners Club that was headlined “Say ‘Charge It” at any of the fine restaurants listed below!”. The concept of a credit card started a year earlier when the founder forgot his wallet when dining and had to (“oh the shame”) have his wife drive to the restaurant and pay. The first card was simply made of cardboard and only a few New York restaurants accepted it as payment. If like me, you’ve just learnt why “Diner’s Club” was so called…welcome.

I’m old enough to still remember, “the circus coming to town”. The actual circus, elephants ‘n’ all, with nary an objection on account of “animal’s rights”. Whilst I enjoyed them as I child as an adult I’m not sorry to have them consigned to the “what were we thinking” bin of humankind’s mistakes for the most part. But in 1950 they were still a major, front page, feature of the entertainment industry. Like this story, where the fact that Ringling has cut its train down from 80 carriages to 60 is deemed worthy of the front page. Yes, they not only had a whole train of their own but it was probably longer than the town I grew up in. (Shout outs to tiny Maungaturoto, New Zealand).

What’d Sadie think?

It’s not going to last forever, so forgive my repetition while I have the opportunity… another great clarinet solo in a song this month! In this case its Artie Shaw on the aforementioned new version of “Count Every Star” with Dick Haymes. I’m looking forward to a bit more rock ‘n’ roll as the decade moves on, but i’ll miss the woodwind in pop songs when it does.

But no need to this month as “I’m Forever Blowing Bubbles”, again with Artie Shaw, is in the charts with a great rendition of the 1919 song. One that has featured in numerous movies over the years, as well as being West Ham United football club’s supporter song. Apparenly due to some historical likeness between a player in their ’20s lineup and a boy in a soap commercial – that story is worth a read.

New charting song, “Harbour Lights” by Sammy Kaye is great. Apparently it’s the most popular version of the tune, of the many that came out around now, and will make its way to number 1 sometime soon. Well, when “Goodnight Irene” has finished is mammoth run anyway.

In a cross-over between the history section of June, 1950 and the charts, apparently “Harbour Lights” appeared in an episode of M*A*S*H (“Your Retention, Please”) when Klinger, while nursing a broken heart, plays the song over and over again on a jukebox. Aww!

“I’ll never be free” is a cross-over duet from the country charts by Kay Starr and Tennessee Ernie Ford and a great tune at that. But you know us and duets with attitude – love ’em! You can see the pair reprise the song some three decades later in 1979 in the video below:

“All my love” enters the charts with 2 versions, but by next month this will double by the looks. I originally had the Percy Faith version, but it was so chill I thought it was an instrumental version at first, so I switched it out for a punchier Patti Page version that is actually pretty decent.

Frankie Laine can’t let a week go by without a hit in the charts, and “Music Maestro Please” is another decent one. The spoken intro has that cool lounge bar singer vibe that pairs well with a whiskey. “And a drink, a tall one. Tonight Henry i could do with a chaser, for my blues…”

Reading through issues of Billboard each week I continue to find the adverts in the form of “letters” written by artists truly curious. Now, I understand its a trade publication and this is a chance to ingratiate themselves with DJs and distributors to push their songs up the charts – but they’re hilarious to read in retrospect. Here’s the Andrew Sisters, who have a nice tune “I Wanna Be Loved” in the charts this month, thanking readers for their string of recent hits.

Which is only half as weird as this one…the children of singer Red Foley asking DJs to be kind to their upcoming Xmas songs. Looks like they have a foot in either camp of the Frosty vs Rudolph battle we mentioned last month.

On that note, Sadie says, “I hope you enjoyed Daddy’s blogpost this week” and we’ll see you all again in 7 days time. Until then…enjoy the playlist for September, 1950.

Welcome to August, 1950 – the Korean War is in full effect and “Goodnight Irene” by The Weavers has just started its 13 week assault on the number 1 spot in the American pop charts.

The songs of August, 1950

Nat King Cole’s version of “Mona Lisa” was top of the charts for all of July, and held on for one week in August before being bumped off by another feisty lady, Irene. That said, it stayed firmly at number 2 for the rest of the month, showing its popularity.

28 hits made it into the top 20 across the month – 18 actual original songs in all. There are as many songs in the charts with multiple versions, as there are with just one in fact. I could happily have more covers of “Mona Lisa” but could do with less of “Tzena, Tzena, Tzena” if I’m to be honest.

Following some feedback (that’s readers!) I’m including the full list of hits in this post for those who don’t want to have to pick through the Youtube playlist. They’re in alphabetical order not chart order:

August, 1950 Top 20 Hits

Bewitched,Doris Day
Bewitched, Gordon Jenkins / Bonnie Lou Williams
Bonaparte’s Retreat, Gene Krupa / Bobby Soots
Bonaparte’s Retreat, Kay Starr
Can Anyone Explain, Ames Brothers
Count Every Star, Hugo Winterhalter
Count Every Star, Ray Anthony / Dick Noel
Goodnight Irene, Frank Sinatra
Goodnight Irene, Weavers & Gordon Jenkine
Hoop-Dee-Doo, Perry Como / Fontane Sisters
I Wanna Be Loved, Andrews Sisters / Gordon Jenkins
I Wanna Be Loved, Billy Eckstine
La Vie En Rose, Tony Martin
Mona Lisa, Nat King Cole
Mona Lisa, Victor Young / Don Cherry
No Other Love, Jo Stafford
Nola,Les Paul
Play A Simple Melody, Bing Crosby / Gary Crosby
Sam’s Song, Bing Crosby / Gary Crosby
Sam’s Song, Joe Fingers Carr
Sentimental Me, Ames Brothers
Sometime, Mariners
Third Man Theme, Anton Karas
Third Man Theme, Guy Lombardo
Tzena Tzena Tzena, Mitch Miller
Tzena Tzena Tzena, Vic Damone
Tzena Tzena Tzena, Weavers & Gordon Jenkins
Vagabond Shoes,Vic Damone

You can listen to the full playlist on Youtube via this link or embedded below:

This month in history

This would become another newsletter entirely if I started delving into the topic that was undoubtedly dominating the news of the time – the Korean war. So we’ll put that aside for now and dip back in and out as the weeks go by.

It being the end of summer in the UK, people were keen for a dip in the sea. Spurred on by the Daily Mail newspaper a competition broke out to swim the English channel in the fastest time. On the 8th of the month Florence Chadwick of the United States swam the channel in 13 hours, 22 minutes, breaking the women’s record set in 1926 as well as becoming only the 3rd woman to finish the feat. And then on the 22nd Abd El Rehim of Egypt broke the 24-year-old record for fastest crossing by finishing in 10 hours and 53 minutes.

It was also a month for the birth of innovators. On the 8th, as Florence was swimming the channel, Ken Kutaragi, future Chairman and CEO of Sony Computer Entertainment, and “The Father of the PlayStation” was being born in Tokyo. The Playstation 5 is due to be released in November, 2020 – 26 years after Kutaragi birthed the first model – by time Sadie is able to grip a controller we’ll probably be onto the 6th model though.

And then on the 11th Steve “Woz” Wozniak, co-founder of Apple Computer, was born in San Jose, California. We’ll be onto the iPhone 20, and listening to music from the ’80s by time Sadie has her first smartphone… unless she’s a very persuasive girl.

Speaking of, Sadie is just starting to be able to focus and track objects so we tried to see if a cartoon could captivate her attention this week. Which is timely as on the 19th of the month in August 1950 the tradition of Saturday morning children’s TV began in the USA with the premiere on the ABC network of two live shows, Animal Clinic and Acrobat Ranch.

I tracked an episode of the latter down here and it appears to be what it says on the tin, a cast of acrobatic folk doing “don’t try this at home” feats on a Ranch – before the latter expression was invented I suspect. Interestingly it seems to be a case of nominative determinism, or literal inspiration, as the “Acrobat” in the name actually refers to the footwear brand that sponsored the show as well as the action.

What’d Sadie think?

Doris Day’s, “Bewitched” has definitely become our favourite version of the song so it’s in the playlist again this month. Only this week did I notice her backing band is named, “The Mellomen” which feels apt, not just for this song but, thus far, the overall energy level of the hit parade from the 1950s.

We first heard “Bonaparte’s Retreat” last month and I was into the Kay Starr version and the back story in equal amounts. Like any good 1950’s hit one version was followed by another… alas, the Gene Krupa (and his “Chicago Jazz Orchestra”) included this week is frankly terrible. Apparently Gene was a jazz drummer and band leader of some note but nothing can rescue the dire vocals – make a retreat of your own and press skip!

A new version of “Count every star” this week, by Ray Anthony and his Orchestra. It’s alright, but mostly it made me reflect on how long the instrumental intros were on so many pop songs at the time. These days they jump straight into a hook to stop people hitting the Spotify skip button, but clearly ’50s audiences were less likely to twiddle the station knob as it were.

I can’t believe its August and we’ve only come to our first Sinatra song of the year, a cover of “Goodnight Irene”. Apparently he was in a career slump around this point – personally I prefer his version of the song to the one that would sit at number 1 for 13 weeks.

I suspect I’m missing a few references via unrecognised colloquialisms. “turtle doving” was one of those till I looked up the full lyrics to The Andrew Sister’s “I wanna be Loved”,

I feel like acting my age!
I’m passed the stage of merely turtle-doving!
I’m in no mood to resist
And I insist the world owes me a loving!

“I wanna be loved” by The Andrew Sisters

So apparently its not referring to my and the wife’s favourite festival cocktail then, noted!

Favourite new track of the week is Tony Martin’s cover of Edith Piaf’s hit from the ’40s, “La vie en rose”, which even manages to keep a verse in French – très chic!

And yes, after picking a dud last week, I added Nat King Coles excellent version of “Mona Lisa” to the playlist this week. The charts have spoken!

Les Paul is a guitar legend, but by 1950 his eponymous solid body guitar was not yet in production at Gibson. Though he was using experimental versions, originally based on a train rail of all things, and pioneering multitrack recording techniques – some of his guitar tracks were even recorded at half speed and playing back at double speed in the final mix. Which explains,

why this advert for “Nola”, in this month’s charts, is described as featuring his “new” sound. To be honest, I’m not a big fan of this particular song – but his contributions to music technology are remarkable.

And in closing, the music press of the time tells us Xmas is coming, even in August – with chatter beginning about what will be the Xmas hit of the year. In 1949, as discussed in the February post, Gene Autry won the season with the premier of, now classic, “Rudolph the red nosed reindeer”. Apparently the millions of units this sold made for a land rush in 1950 with a number of tunes vying for top spot and big budgets being put behind making tunes the “exclusive” Xxmas tune in the key department stores. One of the newcomers being talked about already is, “Frosty, the Snow Man” which sounds like it might do OK…

But before we get to Xmas, go listen to this month’s tunes!

As London goes down into an extra level of Covid-19 lockdown we escape to July, 1950 to see what is popping.

The songs of July, 1950

BEWITCHED,Bill Snyder
BEWITCHED,Doris Day
BEWITCHED,Gordon Jenkins / Bonnie Lou Williams
BEWITCHED,Larry Green / Honeydreamers
BONAPARTE’S RETREAT,Kay Starr
COUNT EVERY STAR,Hugo Winterhalter
GOODNIGHT IRENE,Weavers & Gordon Jenkins
HOOP-DEE-DOO,Perry Como / Fontane Sisters
I WANNA BE LOVED,Andrews Sisters / Gordon Jenkins
I WANNA BE LOVED,Billy Eckstine
MONA LISA,Art Lund
MONA LISA,Nat King Cole
MONA LISA,Victor Young / Don Cherry
MY FOOLISH HEART,Billy Eckstine
MY FOOLISH HEART,Gordon Jenkins / Sandy Evans
NOLA,Les Paul
PLAY A SIMPLE MELODY,Bing Crosby / Gary Crosby
SAM’S SONG,Bing Crosby / Gary Crosby
SAM’S SONG,Joe Fingers Carr
SENTIMENTAL ME,Ames Brothers
SENTIMENTAL ME,Russ Morgan
SOMETIME,Mariners
THIRD MAN THEME,Anton Karas
THIRD MAN THEME,Guy Lombardo
TZENA TZENA TZENA,Mitch Miller
TZENA TZENA TZENA,Vic Damone
TZENA TZENA TZENA,Weavers & Gordon Jenkins
VAGABOND SHOES,Vic Damone

A few new songs slipped into the top 20 this month, but the repetition rate was still awfully high as discussed last month. “Bewitched” had one less version charting – 4; but 3 versions of “Mona Lisa” and of “Tzena, Tzena, Tzena” and 5 other songs with a couple of versions each kept the variety low-ish. So we’ve supplemented the 16 unique songs of July’s primary pop charts with ten from the “Country and Western” juke box charts.

Here the only repetition was in artist, with Ernest Tubb having 3 different songs ringing out in saloons around the states.

You can listen to the full playlist on Youtube via this link or embedded below:

This month in history

July, 1950 is the month that the Korean War dragged in assorted countries from around the globe. I wasn’t aware that my own homeland, New Zealand, was one of the first to send troops in to support the USA, with the HMNZS Pukaki and HMNZS Tutira departing on July 3 to join the fracas.

And where there wasn’t actual war against the “communist creep” there was anti-commie propaganda in full effect, with the launch of Radio Free Europe. Beginning July 4, 1950 it would transmit 30 minutes of American programming to Czechoslovakia from a 7,500 watt short wave transmitter located at Lampertheim in West Germany. Music became part of the broadcast over time – which was the portion of the radio transmission least likely to be blocked by the Soviets apparently. Missing a trick in how important cultural products are in winning hearts and minds.

In interesting births this month – Huey Lewis, American musician and frontman of Huey Lewis and the News was born on the 5th of July. Huey is probably best known for “Power of Love” from the film “Back to the Future” which is, of course, set in the 1950s and shows the reaction of middle America to “rock n roll” at one point. We’ll come to a song from that in 7 years or so.

Also born this month was English billionaire businessman and founder of the Virgin Group conglomerate, Richard Branson. Who would start out in the music world with a single record store before branching out into Cola and space travel… amongst other things that actually made money. Space travel got an actual boost (pardon the pun) this month with Cape Canaveral in Florida, the home of future space mission launches, being used to launch a rocket for the first time on the 24th.

A full 5 years after the end of World War II, on July 10, the United Kingdom Food Minister Maurice Webb announced that rationing of soap would end in September of that year. Since 1942, households had been permitted only three ounces of soap, per person, per week. Which doesn’t seem so bad when you do the math and realise thats 75% of a typical bar of soap, but then again that would have been used for a lot more than just a lather in the shower back then I assume.

And on July 17th, the 8063rd Mobile Army Surgical Hospital (M.A.S.H.) was activated by the states in Korea, the division referenced in the TV show of the same name, as reminisced on last month.

The music industry was’t oblivious to all the war news this month, with concerns expressed in Billboard that an all-out war effort would impact on record production as the story below illustrates. Luckily for us, that eventually never came about.

What’d Sadie think?

“Goodnight, Irene” is a 20th-century folk standard, which Lead Belly first recorded in 1933. A year after his death, The Weavers recorded a version that charted this month and was one of the biggest songs of the year. I love the original but this one loses the gut wrenching rawness in amongst a thick group arrangement and substantially waters down the lyrics. This verse is totally tossed,

I asked your mother for you
She told me that you was too young
I wish dear Lord that I’d never seen your face
I’m sorry you ever were born

“Goodnight, Irene” – Lead Belly

And the lines about a self-induced morphine death were probably rightly considered too harsh for a mainstream audience at time, but then again,

Sometimes I live in the country
Sometimes I live in town
Sometimes I take a great notion
To jump into the river and drown

“Goodnight, Irene” – The Weavers

Is in both versions. Apparently Time magazine called this version “dehydrated” and “prettied up” – but that didn’t stop it spending 13 weeks at number 1.

I’m big enough to admit when I get it wrong. And i got it wrong choosing the Art Lund version of “Mona Lisa”. Written for the Paramount Pictures crime film “Captain Carey, U.S.A.” it won the Oscar for Best Original Song this year. But it was the Nat King Cole version that spent 5 weeks at number 1 not the soundtrack version. It’s a great song, whichever version, but I’ll include the Cole one in August’s playlist while it’s still charting.

Billy Eckstine has one delicious baritone voice which “I wanna be loved” shows off to full effect. It’s not a brilliant song, but as a voice showcase it makes me wonder where the baritone voices have gone amongst the tenors and falsettos of modern pop. I’m looking at you Justin Timberlake…(we’ll get to that in about 10 years Sadie).

“Play a simple melody” by Bing Crosby with his son Gary was recorded before the latter wrote a highly critical autobiography of his father, decades later. It’s an alright song but hardly a passing of the torch between generations.

“Hoop-de-doo” is still in the charts and still nonsense, but it’s become a song Sadie and I like to dance along to, so there’s the power of repetition and a simple catchy melody in effect.

Vic Damone has two charting songs during July, “Tzena, Tzena, Tzena” and “Vagabond Shoes”. The latter is fine but unremarkable. The former had three versions on the charts in July and was notable for being the first, and last, Hebrew song on the pop charts. But like “Goodnight, Irene” the lyrics were watered down. Who adapted it for the 1950s? The Weavers strike again. Clearly a successful technique of theirs. The full story of the song is well worth a read.

The country charts sound exactly how you expect a 1950’s country chart to sound – full of lost love and dead dogs. And completely owned by Ernest Tubb one week, with 3 songs on the charts – “Throw your love my way”, “I love you because”, “Give me a little old-fashioned love.”. I’m surprised a man that successful had to beg so many ways for a little lovin’…

They’re all pretty interchangeable ditties, if I had to choose one it would be “Give me a little old-fashioned love.” mostly because it makes me wonder what this new-fashioned love he’s contrasting this with is…?

My pick song of the country charts has to be Hank Williams, “Why Don’t You Love Me” because, well, Hank Williams. And he does longing better than Tubb does in any of trio his songs,

Well, why don’t you be just like you used to be
How come you find so many faults with me
Somebody’s changed so let me give you a clue
Why don’t you love me like you used to do

“Why Don’t You Love Me” – Hank Williams.

But I have to say, the design of this advert for another charting song, “Enclosed, one broken heart”, by Eddy Arnold from a Billboard issue this month is a visual delight that endeared me to the tune before I even heard it.

And on that note I leave you with a month’s worth of hits to listen to in an easy 1 hour, 12 minute playlist of pop.