Variety (December 1954)

52 MUSIC P^RIETY Wednesday, December 15, 1954 Wexler Folding Syndicate Disk Sales Operation The year-old experiment by El- liot Wexler to initiate a wide- spread distribution of disks in chain food stores and kindred syn- dicate outlets has now ended*with the folding of his company. Music Merchants Inc. Wexler disclosed that he was liquidating the busi- ness after “dropping a bundle” in his effort to pioneer new disk out- lets. Wexler stated that his business ; didn’t make the grade because he couldn’t get the right kind of deals from most of the major compa- nies. Columbia Records granted i Wexler a subdistributorship under which he received a favorable price break to service the chain stores, with a 100% return privilege. Such coinpanies as RCA Victor. Deeca and Capitol, however, refused to give Wexler any such arrange- ment. Wexler recently sued Decca and Capitol, which have factory-owned branches in New York, for alleged conspiracy to put him out of busi- ness by discriminatory price poli- cies. Wexler stated that this suit would be pressed despite his exit from the chain store operation. W’exler is the brother of Paul Wexler. Columbia Records vice- prexy over sales. Yacht Club Routines To Four Lads; Adler Assist The Four Lads, Columbia Rec- ords combo, have leased over 200 special material songs and routines from the repertoire of the Yacht Club Boys. Charlie Adler, one of the origi- nal Yacht Club Boys, is currently coaching the Lads in the use of the material for niteries. Colum- bia is also propping an album with the Lads framed around the Yacht Club Boys repertoire. pj&RTETt Scoreboard OF TOP TALENT AND TUNES Compiled from Statistical Reports of Distribution Encompassing the Three Major Outlets Coin Machines Retail Disks Retail Sheet Music as Published in the Current Issue NOTE: The current comparative sales strength of the Artists and Tunes listed hereunder is arrived at under a statistical system comprising each of the three major sales outlets enu- merated above. These findings are correlated with data from wider sources, which are exclusive with Variety. The positions resulting from these findings denote the OVERALL IMPACT de- veloped from the ratio of points scored, two ways in the case of talent (coin inachines, retail disks) and three ways in the case of tunes (coin machines, retail disks and retail sheet music). POSITIONS This Last Week Week 1 1 2 4 3 2 4 3 5 7 6 5 7 6 8 10 9 8 10 9 POSITIONS This Last Week Week TALENT ARTIST AND LABEL TUNE CHORDETTES (Cadence) Mister Sandman JOAN WEBER (Columbia) Let Me Go, Lover fl Need You Now EDDIE FISHER (Victor) {Count Your Blessings (Fanny This Ole House ROSEMARY CLOONEY (Columbia) {Mambo Italiano Hey There (Papa Loves Mambo PERRY COMO (Victor) {Home for the Holidays (Things I Didn’t Do De CASTRO SISTERS (Abbott) Teach Me Tonight 'Shake, Rattle and Roll BILL IIALEY'S COMETS (Decca) {Dim, Dim the Lights Rock Around the Clock AMES BROTHERS (Victor) Naughty Lady of Shady Lane DON CORNELL (Coral) Hold My Hand rwiTi> »rrc /rv \ (Mister Sandman FOUR ACES (Decca) jit’s a Woman’s World TUNES (♦ASCAP. tBMI) TUNE PUBLISHER Ballroom Ops’ Figures Show Spotty Band Biz i { • Ballroom biz blew hot and cold last month, if some 53 name band reports submitted by dancery op. erators may be construed as a cross-section in the period from mid-October through mid-Novem- ber. Of 28 bands documented in National Ballroom Operators re- porting service, about 58% brought a profit for the ops, while the rest meant break-even biz or worse. Slightly over 30% of the name bands went into percentage, while 28% made money sans percentage for the ballrooms. Break-even class registered 15% and the losers 26%. Naturally the ops, figuring all name bands should make money every time out, consider the over- all picture cloudy. In many cases, however, bands were up against In- auspicious weather and stiff com- petish from other attractions. Of- ten, too, the failures were blamed on fact that certain name bands are not well enough known in cer- tain territories. Mitchell, Martino Wind Okay British Touring London, Dec. 14. After the longest tours ever car- ried out in Britain by top Ameri- i can recording stars, singers Guy Mitchell and A1 Martino fly back j to the States from London Airport tonight (Tues.). They came here last May and Martino has been here all the time, touring in variety and concerts. Mitchell, who appeared at the Royal Variety Performance at the London Palladium in November, ; only missed out for a week when he flew back to the States to make some records for American Colum- . bia. A reverse journey by a British singer was taken by David Whit- field, who flew out last week (6) i to appear on Ed Sullivan’s “Toast of the Town” tv show. 1 1 ♦MISTER SANDMAN Morris 2 2 fLET ME GO, LOVER Hill & Range 3 4 fTHIS OLE HOUSE Hamblen 4 6 ♦TEACH ME TONIGHT Hub-Leeds 5 5 "COUNT YOUR BLESSINGS Berlin 6 3 *1 NEED YOU NOW Miller 7 10 "NAUGHTY LADY OF SHADY LANE Paxton 8 7 ♦PAPA LOVES MAMBO Shapiro-Bernstein 9 8 *IF I GIVE MY HEART TO YOU Miller 10 9 ♦HOLD MY HAND ; Raphael DESIREE WE MEET AGAIN MILLER MUSK CORPORATION A WONDERFUL SEASONAL SONG St, .e ond Cahn'j w if Snow/" Iff IT$H0W“ LtTlTSHOWr CAHN MUSIC COMPANY MGM On Piano Kick With Five New Sets In line with the upsurge of pop piano packages, MGM Records is prepping five new keyboard albums for release at the end of this month. Album sets will be issued on longplay platters as well as on extended play disks. Keyboarders featured on the al- bums will be Dorothy Donegan, Van Smith, Jose Melis, Jack Kelly and Jack Fina. Fina’s package will spotlight the music of the late Ralph Rainger. Dore Schary, Metro’s v.p. in charge of produc- tion, has penned the liner notes for the Fina-Rainger set. Cadence N. Y. Huddles Cadence Records distributors in the east will converge on New York over the weekend (18-19) for a series of huddles with homeoffice brass. Confabs will be headed up by Archie Bleyer, label’s prexy. Cad- ence is celebrating its second anni of operation this week. Janies Chirp Quits Band For Florida, Radio-TV Hollywood, Dec. 14, After one year with the band, chirp Paula Gilbert ankles the Harry James payroll next Sunday (19) to head for Florida and a new radio-television career for the Flor- ida Citrus Assn. Singer has signed a sixmonth contract with Tom Moore Produc- tions to be starred in the “Florida Calling” program. Deal was set re- cently while she was touring Flor- ida with the James band. Latest DECCA R«l*as« STARS NEVER CRY b/w NOT TOO YOUNG TO HAVE MEMORIES CHARLIE APPLEWHITE Par. Mgf. Direction WYNN LASSNER WM. MORRIS AGENCY THE TOP 6 ON JgNDON CARA MIA 1486 David Whitfield with Mantovani SANTO NATALE isos David Whitfield THE FINGER OF SUSPICION ms Dickie Valentine MY SON, MY SON 1501 Vera Lynn and Frank Walr THE BANDIT 1470 Tha Johnston Brothari CUCKOO CRIES 1503 Frank Wait