The Johnston Brothers
The Johnston Brothers were a British vocal troupe best known for their 1955 number one hit, Hernando’s Hideaway .
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Band history
As a "project" in the charts
The Johnston Brothers were not brothers and originally just another project by Johnny Johnston , who led the vocal group The Keytones from 1948 with changing singers . (Among other things , Cliff Adams was a member of the Keytones for a while before founding the Stargazers .) The line-up of the two combos was fluid; the main difference was that the Keytones had a female voice (including Pearl Carr and Jean Campbell for a long time ). Another important difference: unlike the Johnston Brothers , the Keytones never had a chart hit.
The "brothers" were at founding Johnny Johnston, Alan Dean and Denny Vaughan; they made recordings for Decca Records under this name from 1949 . Their first record was the title melody of the film Jenny (Portrait of Jennie) , and even before the introduction of the official recordings - sales hit parade they were very successful in the sheet music charts with songs such as That Lucky Old Sun , Tennessee Waltz and Blowing Wild . Soon they were also singing the backing vocals for various vocal stars such as Reggie Goff, Lita Roza and Suzi Miller . Their harmonic hits in the style of the Four Aces or the Stargazers brought them their first official chart hit, Oh, Happy Day, in April 1953 .
The number one hit
In 1954 the musical The Pajama Game (by Richard Adler and Jerry Ross based on the novel 7 1/2 Cents by Richard Bissell ) had great success on Broadway . Two of the songs from this musical became too often-covered standards of the 1950s - Hey There ( US number-one 1954 for Rosemary Clooney ) and Tango Hernando's Hideaway (US number-two 1954 for Archie Bleyer and his orchestra). Johnnie Ray released both songs as the A and B sides of a single; in Great Britain the Johnston Brothers did the same . While Ray's A-side Hey There rose to number 5 in Great Britain and Northern Ireland and the B-side “only” rose to number 11, Hey There by the “brothers” didn't make it into the charts - but Hernando's hideaway became theirs for them single number one hit. The four singers at this most successful time were Johnny Johnston, Frank Holmes, Harry "Miff" King and Eddie Lester.
More Achievements
Another of her bestsellers was the single No Other Love , the cover of a 1953 US hit for Perry Como, which however became a number one hit in the UK in a version by Ronnie Hilton . The Johnston Brothers also celebrated success with two medleys, Join In and Sing Again and Join In and Sing (No. 3) , in which they interpreted popular hits such as Sheik of Araby , Yes Sir, That's My Baby , Charleston or Alexander's Ragtime Band .
Johnny Johnston
Johnny Johnston (actually John Reine, * 1919 , † June 10, 1998 ) founded the music publisher Michael Reine Music together with Mickey Michaels after the Second World War , which also published its own songs. He was the founder of the Keytones and the Johnston Brothers . With changing singers, Johnston was also responsible for the vocal groups The Johnston Singers or The King's Men , who provided the choral singing for recordings by various artists in the 1950s (including Vera Lynn , Pearl Carr or Jimmy Young and Billy Cottons Orchestra). He wrote hits for other 1950s stars; one of his most famous works was The Wedding of Lili Marlene , a "continuation" of the international German world war hit Lili Marleen .
From the second half of the 1950s, Johnston switched to composing and producing advertising jingles - in this area of advertising on television and radio he became one of the most sought-after experts. For brands such as Kleenex , Heinz , Shell and many others, Johnny Johnston Jingles Ltd. in his own Cine Tele Sound - Studio sound for advertising clips - there were about 4,500 jingles altogether until he retired from working life. Johnston was considered the King of the Jingle in the industry .
literature
- David Roberts (Ed.): Guinness World Records - British Hit Singles . 14th edition. London 2001, ISBN 0-85112-156-X .
- Tim Rice , Jo Rice, Paul Gambaccini , Mike Read: The Guinness Book of 500 Number One Hits , Enfield 1982, ISBN 0-85112-250-7 .
- Rice / Rice / Gambaccini: The Guinness Book of Number One Hits . 2nd edition. Enfield 1988, ISBN 0-85112-893-9 .
- Frank Laufenberg , Ingrid Laufenberg: Frank Laufenberg's Rock and Pop Lexicon , Volume 1. 5th Edition, Düsseldorf / Munich 2000, ISBN 3-612-26206-8 .
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ Charts UK
- ↑ Based on the version of the Guinness Book of British Hit Singles . In the Charts of Record Mirror was Hey There quoted in 1955 seven weeks in October / November, with maximum placement space 11. Source: Tony Jasper: The Top Twenty Book , 5th edition, London, 1991, ISBN 0-7137-2208-8