Barcarole at night
Barcarole in der Nacht is the title of a hit that was composed as Slowfox by Werner Scharfenberger and the text of which comes from Kurt Feltz . Sung by the American singer Connie Francis , the song became a number one hit in the German charts in 1963. Scharfenberger's melody has nothing to do with Jacques Offenbach's Barcarole from Hoffmann's stories from 1881.
Emergence
Connie Francis sang successful German-language hits since 1960. While their last production, Wenn du gehtst, ran successfully through the German charts, their American record company MGM Records prepared a new German-language recording with the song Barcarole in the night of February 5, 1963. This took place in the recording studio of the Sahara Hotel in Las Vegas under the direction of the German producer Gerhard Mendelson . Mendelson was actually the producer of the German record company Polydor , but had already looked after Connie Francis for her first German-language production Die Liebe ist ein Stranglespiel, after Polydor started selling MGM records as a sub-label in Germany in 1959 . Werner Scharfenberger had already composed the successful titles once I come back (1961) and when you go for Connie Francis . Text author Kurt Feltz has worked with Scharfenberger for years, both of whom had recently written successful hits such as Sweety for Peter Kraus or Hot Sand for Mina . Feltz 'Barcarole is a very tearful song in which Pierro, who has passed away, is weeping: "His name is Pierro, and there is someone else he loves."
The new single with the title Barcarole in der Nacht with the catalog number MGM 61078 did not come onto the market until May 1963, until then when Wenn du Gehst was still in the charts. The song Colombino intended for the B-side had already been produced on April 13, 1962 in the Austrophon Studio in Vienna .
successes
The German music magazine Musikmarkt first mentioned Barcarole that night in its hit parade for June 1963 as the best newcomer in fifth place. In the July hit parade, the title was in first place, then it was listed until November 1963. This gave him a term of 24 weeks. In the weekly music box of the youth magazine Bravo , Barcarole lasted 18 weeks during the night and took first place twice. That brought the song fourth in the annual music box in 1963.
Cover versions
In the same year as MGM, two other record companies released Barcarole on their own singles that night . The label Tempo , which specializes in cover versions , released the title with Charlotte Marian on the B-side of the single No. 900. The cheap label Starlet had the song by the only 14-year-old Mary Roos on the single 2158. At the same time, the lyricist Stig Rossner wrote a Swedish text entitled Det är kärlek jag vill ha , which was published by Metronome with the Swedish singer Ann-Louise Hanson . In 1965, a version called Mattiin maijaan , sung by Veikko Tuomi, was released on Odeon in Finland .