| "A Summer Song" | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
 Dutch release | ||||
| Single by Chad & Jeremy | ||||
| from the album Yesterday's Gone | ||||
| B-side | "No Tears for Johnnie" | |||
| Released | July 1964 | |||
| Recorded | June 1964 CTS Studios | |||
| Genre | ||||
| Length | 2:38 | |||
| Label | Ember (UK) World Artists Records (US) | |||
| Songwriter(s) | Clive Metcalfe, Keith Noble, Chad Stuart | |||
| Producer(s) | Shel Talmy | |||
| Chad & Jeremy singles chronology | ||||
| ||||
"A Summer Song" is a 1964 song by the English pop music duo Chad & Jeremy. The song was written by Clive Metcalf, Keith Noble and Chad Stuart.
Like the duo's breakthrough selection, "Yesterday's Gone", "A Summer Song" is a reminiscence of a summer romance. However, "A Summer Song" eschews the Merseybeat sound of "Yesterday's Gone" in favour of a gentler folk-influenced arrangement, with the lyrics also being wistful in tone.
On The Steel Pier Radio Show, Stuart recalled that his collaborators on "A Summer Song", Clive Metcalfe and Keith Noble, were a musical duo linked to Pink Floyd with whom he and Jeremy Clyde had become friendly, and that "A Summer Song" was written and composed in Stuart's flat in London: "We were sitting around jamming on four chords and we came up with 'A Summer Song'." Clive Metcalfe wrote the melody late one night and Keith later added lyrics. Metcalfe said: "We performed it one night at Tina's (a Bistro in Piccadilly London) when Chad was visiting. Chad liked the song and later re-wrote the middle, and we all reworked the lyrics, as you hear it today". [4] "We never thought 'Summer Song' could possibly be a single," Chad recalled another time. "It was just a pretty, romantic song. Or so we thought...you never can tell, can you?" [5]
The selection was one of a number to be included on the Yesterday's Gone album recorded at CTS Studios Bayswater in June 1964 under the production auspices of Shel Talmy, with Johnnie Spence conducting the orchestra. [6]
"A Summer Song" was issued in both the UK and the U.S. in July 1964. The UK single version opens with Chad and Jeremy trading vocals while the U.S. single features unisonant singing throughout. [7]
"A Summer Song" was played on Juke Box Jury and guest-judge Ringo Starr assessed the track as a "miss" (i.e., flop), with no U.S. hit potential. [8] Indeed, in the UK, where Chad & Jeremy's "Yesterday's Gone" had been a mild hit, followed by the unsuccessful "Like I Love You Today", "A Summer Song" did not reach the charts; possibly because it was released on a very small label and was largely unobtainable in the shops. An article in New Musical Express complained of that fact. However in, the United States, following the near-Top 20 success of "Yesterday's Gone", the track afforded the duo their career record, reaching #7 on the Billboard Hot 100 the week of 17–24 October 1964. [9] "A Summer Song" also went to #2 for six weeks on the Adult Contemporary chart. [10] It is considered one of the signature songs of the British Invasion. [8] When Gary James asked him about it, Stuart suggested: "The American market was bigger. [...] You'd never hear something that sweet in the British charts. [...] For some reason in America it worked." [11]
"A Summer Song" also reached #6 in Canada and #49 in Australia. [12] The selection is featured on the soundtracks of the films Rushmore (1998), The Princess Diaries (2001), and Men in Black 3 (2012), and was used in the "ESPN's Sports Heaven" commercial that aired during Super Bowl XL. It also appeared in a 2019 TV commercial for Coors Light.
The Lettermen recorded "A Summer Song" for their August 1965 Capitol Records album release The Hit Sounds of the Lettermen, produced by Steve Douglas. The Lettermen made a second recording of the song for "Alive" Again...Naturally, a 1973 Capitol Records release which the group self-produced with Ed Cobb. Both versions of "A Summer Song" by the Lettermen abridged the original three word title to "Summer Song." [13]
Skeeter Davis's RCA Victor album release, Singin' in the Summer Sun, which Chet Atkins and Felton Jarvis produced, included Davis' version of "A Summer Song". The album was recorded in January 1966 at RCA Victor Studio in Nashville, Tennessee, for release that June. [14]
In the summer of 1967, the Doodletown Pipers had an Easy Listening hit with their remake of "A Summer Song", produced by Stu Phillips. The Epic Records release reached No. 29 on the Easy Listening charts, affording the group their only chart appearance. [15] Also in 1967, the Memories, an Irish group, who became a top showband attraction and scored eight domestic chart hits, remade "A Summer Song" as their debut single, released on Rex Records. [16]
A version of "A Summer Song"1 by Laila Kinnunen was issued by Mediamusiikki in 2000 on the compilation CD Muistojen Kyyneleet, which featured selections Kinnunen had recorded with the Erkki Melakoski (fi) orchestra for the Yleisradio TV series Kuukauden Suositut. Kinnunen's performance of "A Summer Song" was prepped to air in that series' 1966 season. [17]
The 1998, Narada album Songs From an English Garden, by David Lanz, features an instrumental version of "A Summer Song". [18]
New York based folkie Christine Lavin included the song on her 1986 LP Beau Woes and Other Problems of Modern Life.
A French rendering of "A Summer Song", entitled "Souviens-toi des nuits d'été", was released in 1965 by Frank Alamo on the Rivièra label. The B-side of Alamo's single "Qu'est-ce Que Peut Bien Faire Un Garçon", "Souviens-toi des nuits d'été" was also included on a four track EP and was subsequently included on the singer's 1966 self-titled album release. [19] "Souviens-toi des nuits d'été" was also recorded by Line Renaud, her rendition being included on a four-track 1966 EP, released by Disques Line. [20]
A Finnish rendering of "A Summer Song", entitled "Kesämuisto",1 was recorded by Eero ja Jussi & the Boys (with Jussi Raittinen and Eero Raittinen) for their 1991 Audiovox Records album release 3 Kitaraa (fi), and the selection was one of several on the album recorded at Ogeli Recording Studio between January and February 1991. [21]
American indie rock band, Surfer Blood, released a cover of the song on their 2017 album Covers. [22]
The Lettermen are an American male pop vocal trio whose trademark is close-harmony pop songs with light arrangements. The group started in 1959. They have had two Top 10 singles, 16 Top 10 singles on the Adult Contemporary chart, 32 consecutive Billboard chart albums, 11 gold records, and five Grammy nominations.
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Chad & Jeremy were a British musical duo consisting of Chad Stuart and Jeremy Clyde, who began working in 1962 and had their first hit song in the UK with "Yesterday's Gone" (1963). That song became a hit in the United States in the following year as part of the British Invasion. Unlike the rock-music sounds of their peers, Chad & Jeremy performed in a soft, folk-inflected style that is characterised by hushed and whispered vocals. The duo had a string of hits in the United States, including "Willow Weep for Me", "Before and After", and their biggest hit, "A Summer Song". After some commercial failures and divergent personal ambitions, Chad & Jeremy disbanded in 1968.
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"25 Minutes to Go" is a song by Shel Silverstein, from his 1962 album Inside Folk Songs.
I Remember Yesterday is the fifth studio album by American singer-songwriter Donna Summer. It was released on May 13, 1977, seven months after the release of her previous album. Like her previous three albums, it was a concept album, this time seeing Summer combining the recent disco sound with various sounds of the past. I Remember Yesterday includes the singles "Can't We Just Sit Down ", "I Feel Love", the title track, "Love's Unkind" and "Back in Love Again". "I Feel Love" and "Love's Unkind" proved to be the album's most popular and enduring hits, the former of which came to be one of Summer's signature songs.
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"Yesterday's Gone" is the title of a 1963 hit single by Chad & Jeremy. Although the English duo would have a string of successful records in the United States through the mid-1960s, this song was their only hit in their native land.
"Before and After" is a 1965 hit single by Chad & Jeremy. It was the duo's label debut on Columbia Records, released after Columbia acquired rights to all of the duo's post-January 1, 1965 recordings. The song was written by Van McCoy, then a staff writer for Columbia's publishing arm April Blackwood Music. Artie Wayne, professional manager of April Blackwood, placed "Before and After" with Chad & Jeremy, who recorded the song in March 1965 in the sessions for their album also entitled Before and After; Lor Crane produced these sessions at Columbia's New York City studios.
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Chad & Jeremy Sing for You is the second studio album by the English duo Chad & Jeremy. It was released in the United States in January 1965, and it was their last album to be released under World Artists. It is not to be confused with the British release of the same name, which contains different tracks. Another take on "What Do You Want With Me" was released on their next album, Before and After.
Yesterday's Gone is the debut studio album by English duo Chad & Jeremy. It was released in the United States in July 1964. The album contains three of their American hits: "A Summer Song", "Willow Weep for Me", and the title song, "Yesterday's Gone." The song "The Truth Often Hurts the Heart" was prominently featured in a January 1965 episode of the television program The Patty Duke Show, but was never issued as a single.
Yesterday's Gone: The Complete Ember & World Artists Recordings is a complete collection of all of Chad & Jeremy's music from the early years of their career, 1963 and 1964. It contains all of their recordings for Ember Records in the UK and World Artists Records in the US.
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