Variety (February 1954)

Vedncwhy, February 24, 1954 MIJSIC Scoreboard TOP TALENT AND TUNES Compiled from Statistical Reports df Distribution Encompassing the Three Major Outlets Coin Machines Retail Disks Retail Sheet Music Qis Published in the Current Issue nr S(ll€ * ,trenflth °* th * Artists and Tunes listed hereunder is ar ™ f ? d Lm^ThnaoR ,t ^ tiCaX SV ® tem comprising each of the three major sales outlets enw ^ are u ? orre x lated with data from wider sources, which are exclusive th «« findings denote the OVERALL IMPACT d* SCOTe % f ' 00 ™** in the case of talent (disks, coin machine*}; and three wags in the case of tunes (disks, coin machines, sheet music). Tin Pan Alley Cook’s Tour Continued from page 42 POSITIONS This Last Week Week 1 3 TALENT ARTIST AND LABEL TIJNE DORIS DAY (Columbia) . Secret Love EDDIE PISIIER (Victor).......,.. |?, h ' M >’ Pa P a / Many Times JO STAFFORD (Columbia) Make Love To Me DEAN MARTIN (Capitol)..... ....... That’s Amore • ■ . < > : * > TONY BENNETT (Columbia). PATTI PAGE (Mercury) . ... GEORGIE SHAW (Decca) FOUR ACES (Decca) ........ GAYLORDS (Mercury) FRANK SINATRA ^Capitol). (Strati tfer T n .Paradise ) Rags To Riches . (Changing Partners ) Cross Over The Bridge Till We Two Are One : (Stranger In Paradise *') Heart Of Mv Heart ...... Vine Came The Grape .,.... Young At Heart POSITIONS . This Last Week Week TUNE TUNES (•ASCAP. fBMI) TUNE . . PUBI.ISHF.R .•SECRET- LOVE Remick *OH, MY PAPA. Shapiro-B •STRANGER IN PARADISE Fraiik •THAT’S AMORE ; " Paramount (-CHANGING PARTNERS p or gie •MAKE LOVE TO ME ’ Melrose •FROM THE VINE CAME THE GRAPE Randy-S •HEART OF MY HEART , ^ Robbins •TILL WE TWO ARE ONE ........ Shapiro-B i YOUNG AT HEART . ...... .Sunbeam HETAH. SHEET BEST SELLERS —— ISahiety ——- Survey of retail sheet music best sellers based on reports obtained from leading stores in 13 cities and showing com- parative sales rating for this and last week . * ASCAP t BMI National Ratine This Last wk. wk. Title and Publisher <5 "I 3 g Q u 4) Li ’u ' CJ 09 C JS ■ .<2 O « 'X fc I J .2 2 £ £ 1 l s SC fc S T' . 1 ^ £ u B *T 1 i < . ■■ s a •£ $ S 1 4 I 1 ° 2 l 4) O X; 1 1 . ^Stranger in Paradise (Frank) , 2 2 2 *014 My Papa (Shapiro-B).... 4 3 4 ^Secret Love (Remick)....,; 3 J * 3 tChanging Partners (Porgie).' 1 5 5 ♦ThaUs Amore (Paramount).. 8 6 ~ 6 »Heart of My Heart (Robbins). 5 11 Mine Came Grape (Randy-S). . 8 8 *TiH Two Are One (Shapiro-B) 6 .9 15 fYoung at Heart (Sunbeam)., 7 _*Q 11 *Hfake Love To Me (Melrose). V. 11 7 *Ebb Tide (Robbins).. ■. 12 9 tRicocbet (Sheldon)..... .. .. 13 ... »TiU Then (Pickwick)...-... 10 IV •, * Answer Me, Love (Bourne).. ♦. 15 10 *Racs to Riches (Saunders).. 8 3 10 it 8 ..V .. 5 5 * •. 1 ■■.. • .• 7 10 4 I o -o ■tg- o, g 3 tt et 3 I 1 £ • •O* ..3 .MM x S- o- 2 11 1 6 2 3 3 4 6 5 3 5 2 5 "7 .. 6 4 7 . 10 9 10 10 8 . i .. 8 10 <K ' ' c. o T J 1 g £ S T £ O A S *s L I A i .3 p V T O li i S-■ N g Z l J (C; S 5 3 110 1 2 105 3 6 102 2 I 83 4 4 65 6 5 60 ■ 31 10 10 2 9 .. .. 22 .. ... 20 9 18 I monologs on Coral (being a Uni- versal flimsier, naturally Milton Rackmil segued him to the Decca- Coral family), but the jui-y is still out with the rotund con\edian, as it is with “Deacon” Andy Griffith’s first four sides for Capitol, “Foot- ball” and “Romeo & Juliet.” Mil- ton Berle couldn’t click monblog- irig on wax, even at his height as “Mr. Television,” and Wally Cox’s try last year was an equal missout (both Victor), despite the indus- try’s tall memory of how many millions Moran & Mack (“The Two Black Crows”) once sold on plat- ters. • Disk Showmanship The disk showmanship continues apace, as it has in its signally sky- rocketing postwar years. There is much thought and ingenuity put into almost every major, recording although, for all the enterprise, there will crop up mis judgments because of the constant struggle to strike that public nerve. The net- work of' disk jockeys is the daily proving ground to determine if “it’s gonna break for a hit,” and so they try. Pee Wee Hunt clicks with a re- vival of “O,” so Sammy Kaye is trying it with "Y”—and for insur- ance backs it with another Italo-in- fluenced pop, “Bella Bella Donna Mia.” The Axel StordahU (June Hutton) could have cut down their current “Gee” to “G” and continue the souped-up alphabetic bid for tlie Hit Parade, and recently there was a pop titled Fittingly Peggy Lee and Victor Young’s Decca disking of “Where Can I Go Without You?”, which they coauthored, is superior to Vic- tor’s Wyoma Winters’ version, Which is more hillbilly, despite the usually suave Henri Rene musical background: Victor Young &. His Singing Strings .give but with lush instrumental versions of (he "Glenn Miller Story” love theme (by Henry Mancini) backed by “Geraldine,” an original. The major labels’ a&r execs, arc not Wanting for personal artistic achievements, as witness Colum- bia’s Mitch Miller and Percy Faith mating on “The River” and “Edel- ma,” two • instrumentals, wherein Miller does the oboe and-English horn solos; and Victor’s Henri Rene takes to his equally trade- marked musette accordion on ‘’Sea- shells” and “Madcap,” his current instrumental entries. Not to be outdone, and in fact registering re- soundingly, are Paul Weston^ ver- sions of “Autumn in Rome” and “Indiscretion,” themes froni the ' Italian-made “.Indiscretion of An American Wife.” The showmanship continues with the obvious film-disk hookups; Tfic' “Glenn Miller” pic has been given muiti-coverages, and Guy Mitch- ell's “Red Garters” excerpts, a Col disk of the Par pic in which he appears. Tony Bennett recourses to the upcoming Sigmund Rom- berg-Leo Robin legit musical, "The Girl In The Pink Tights”; Tommy Leonetti on Capitol is reviving the Rudof Friml-Irving Caesar stand- ard, “And Still I Love you” (good); Lcs Baxter had turned in another lush coupling on Cap in “Atlantis” and "Flirtation Waltz”; and Col is giving ; Frank Parker the full | treatment with a pop ballad called "Parker’s Lament” (Engvick-Wiid- er), which might incline to limit j it to himself as a "theme” song 1 ( despite its general appeal as a ‘ pleasing ballad. „ Doris Day (Col) also recourses ' j to the new Romberg musical (tunes I presumably from the trunk of the : j late, great operetta composer). Vic- i : tor, having snared The Voices of ’ I Waller Schumann is giving him 1 the full treatment with "Haunted < House” (Schumann-Robert Wells). < Incidentally, it is notable that i there is no copyright on songsmith- , ing talent A guy called Cy Cobcn > ; bids fair to outstrip Roy Acuff and ‘ | Hank Williams for his hillbilly- 1 type of song output. And whoever \ ! Johnny Richards and Carolyn i ! Leigh may be, they’ve done, noth- ^ ling but give Frank Sinatra | "Young-At-Heart” which may pos- ] sibly prove to be one of his big- . gest hits. (Sunbeam Music, a BMI J firm, is the publisher, and they’d i be smart to anchor the Richards- ‘ i Leigh team). * s j And so it goes. Joan Javits, t ! niece ot New York’s Congressman c (Jacob K. Javits, and Phil Springer t seem to be suddenly prolific; they c gave Earth# Kltt “Lovin’ Spree”, t a neo-hillbilly tune, . backed by Dave Mann and Boh Hilliard’s ^ r • “Somebody Bad Stole De Wedding i Bell”, a calypso, on Victor. It’s • going to be a tossup which side L .will dominate as the "selling” side, : both being that good. > Miss Kitt is g good example of intelligent handling within RCA ■ Victor’s a&r department and/or within herself; Even her "Bad ; Eartha” album has wisely kept the ; s.a. aspects at a minimum, with result that “C’est Si Bon”, "Santa • Baby” and others to date are gen- erally pafatable and generally ac- ceptable. This is in direct anti- thesis to embarrassing dialectic takeoffs as above indicated. The vet Mann-Hilliard writing team is in high again, and so are Bobby Melliri and Fritz Relchel, and Jack Fulton-Lois Steele in the "new writer” category. Even Milton Berle, who has more than a couple- of good songs to his ASCAP credit, lias turned out a good one, "You’re All That I Need”, for newcomer Charlie Applewhite (Decca). (It’s notable how many femmes now are songsmithing; was a time When Carrie Jacobs-Bond, Mabel Wayne, Dolly Morse, Ann Ronell, Sylvia Dee, Peggy Lee and Dorothy Fields > were the few dominant dirndl Berlins). To complete the current; platter appraisal there is a potent cheese- cake quartet in Jane Russell, Con- nie Haines, Beryl Davis and Della Russell, with their sprightly church hymns, both Coral sides being la- beled "Make A Joyful Noise. Unto The Lord” (proceeds of the platter to various religious groups), and mimic Mel Blanc does his comedy stuff for Capitol. Potent Pop Parade It's a potent pop parade of new potentials, and only a most cursory sampling, The orthodox versions- are primed for the respectlvejnar- kets of established artists, although it is now trade-accepted that there’ ain’t no such thing. From now-: where a nobody can and frequently . does outsell the established star.' The problem for the latter is to : keep pace with the advenlurousi upstarts who may sing it in Italian, or play it in Braille. But generally it’s in good taste. The reference above to the r&b; (rhythm & blues) plotters—a fancy latterday cognoipen for what the trade used to call “race” records —is something unto itself. There, are instances there where the' single-entendre in the -lyric!.?) con- notations would make Dwight Fiske .sound like Elsle^Dinsmorc. But in the main; the business which sells .platters into the millions, and broadcasts them Into . millions of homes, is pretty shrewd in its judgment, so that whether for home or tavern consumption there is nothing awry. * Longhair music, which has made rapid strides in the disk field over the past five years, is steadily growing as staple radio program- ming fare. According to a survey of some 1,500 radio outlets made by Broadcast Music, Inc., stations are now using an average of 6.4 hours of classical music per week. That compares with 5.75*hours dur- ing 19u3 and less than that in pre- vious years. A majority of the stations also indicated that they plan to use more longhair music in (he future, while only 50 outlets stated *t,hat they would reduce the time alloca- tion. Of the 1,500 stations polled, onjy 316 said that they did not use concert music. Increased use of classical music is due largely to BMI’s intensive "cultural” push on the airlanes. BMI issues a concert pin-up sheet which lists the availability of new recordings and also provides scripts to accompany the music. New Kitt ‘Faces* Album To Be Based on 20th Pic RCA Victor is issuing a special ' “New Faces” album featuring the six tunes Eartha Kitt warbles in the 20th-Fox Cinemascope filmusi- cjjJ. Victor previously had issued the original Broadway cast album ol the musical as well as individual etchings by Miss Kitt. Album is expected to hit the market within three , weeks. ¥ ■