Format Details: Jewel Case
Release Date: 25 February 2002
Label: Ace Records
Packaging Type: Jewel Case
No of Units: 1
Barcode: 029667183628
Description
Fabulous 50s female harmonies including the hits 'Mr Sandman', 'Lollipop' and 'Born To Be With You' featured in the recent TV car commercial Anyone who appreciates fine harmony singing will find pleasure and treasure in this new budget priced collection by the Chordettes, America's top female group of the 50s. With their imaginative vocal arrangements, their pure a cappella barbershop versions of standards and their surprisingly effective teen-orientated rock'n'roll, the Chordettes' often breath-taking harmonies lines still have the power to entrance. Formed by tenor Jinny Osborn in 1949 (whose father was national president for The Society For The Preservation And Encouragement Of Barbershop Quartet Singing In America Inc) the Chordettes - Janet Ertel, Carol Bushman and lead singer Dorothy Schwartz - got their in 1949 winning an audition for a spot on Arthur Godfrey's prestigious Talent Scouts daily TV show. Godfrey pronounced them "air worthy" and "truly radiophonic" and the girls began a four-year stint as Godfrey regulars, sticking to a traditional a cappella barbershop repertoire and even cutting some records for Columbia. Unsurprisingly they also became the new stars of the barbershop convention circuit, and when Dorothy left the Chordettes in 1951, she was replaced by barbershopper Lynn Evans from Youngstown, Ohio. Godfrey, dubbed "King of the Casual Communicators", insisted the girls stay pure barbershop, but his musical director, orchestra leader Archie Bleyer, disagreed. When Bleyer quit Godfrey's show to concentrate on his new record company Cadence (with its first star Julius LaRosa, who'd been sacked 'on air' by Godfrey in 1953), he was also courting Janet Ertel. The inevitable happened: the Chordettes signed with Cadence and left Godfrey, though paying tribute to the kindness of their first mentor "He was like a little father to us", recalled Lynn Evans. Archie and Janet wed and the bond between the Chordettes and Cadence strengthened. Bleyer began recording the girls using simple arrangements in order not to clutter the vocals, and in 1954 their second single Mr Sandman rocketed them to major chart success. The sensational Chordettes' vocal arrangement plus the saucy flavour imparted by translating it from a man's to a girl's plea, kept Mr Sandman perched atop the US Hot 100 for seven weeks. From 1954 to 1961 Bleyer (whose other protoges were to include Andy Williams, the Everly Brothers and Johnny Tillotson) found the songs, wrote the arrangements and produced the Chordettes' sessions. "He really has to get most of the credit," says Lynn. His efforts resulted in a string of hits for the group, whose overall sound, combining innocence and wholesomeness with a certain knowingness and sophistication, appealed equally to adults and moonstruck teenagers. Born To Be With You in 1956 hit the Top 10 in America and Britain, while Just Between You And Me (US #5) a year later was featured by the girls on the very first American Bandsta
Tracklisting
Young Jessie
Wynonie Harris
Willie Hightower
Willie Headen
Wayne Cochran
Wanda Jackson
Wanda Jackson
Walter Horton
The Chordettes
