The Chevrons On The Don K Reed CBS FM Radio Show 1988
The Chevrons were a United States pop group who recorded the hit record "Lullabye" in 1960. The band featured lead singer Terry Cashman, best known for his baseball songs, notably "Talkin' Baseball", then known by his born name, Dennis Minogue. The group disbanded when John "Marty" Trautman, co-founder of the group, was drafted by the U.S. Army on December 11, 1962.
The Chevrons formed in the Inwood Section of upper Manhattan in 1958. The group consisted of tenor lead singer Dennis Minogue (Cashman), lead baritone/baritone John "Marty" Trautman, second tenor Gary Giordan, first tenor Frank Williams, and bass, Raul Al Conde. Conde was formerly a member of The Spirals from Washington Heights, New York, who recorded "Little Girl" and "School Bells" c. 1958 for George Goldner's End Record Label.
The Chevrons' first recording on Bob Shad's Brent label was "That Comes With Love" b/w "Don't Be Heartless", followed by "Lullabye" b/w "Day After Forever". The success of "Lullabye" landed them an appearance on Dick Clark's American Bandstand on June 24, 1960. "Lullabye" was followed by an album on Time Records called Sing-Along Rock N' Roll, which consisted of covers of twenty-six hit songs arranged in sing-a-long format. Several songs - including "Little Star", "Come Go With Me" and "Little Darlin'" - were released off the album as singles.
Marty Trautman's sister Marion Trautman worked at an advertising company as creative producer. In 1960 she got the Chevrons to do a TV commercial for one of the companies clients, as a Barbershop Quartet, for a hair tonic product called (Dandy Hair Tonic) which was shown on National Television CBS which was one of the sponsored commercials for The Million Dollar Movie at the time.
When The Chevrons disbanded, Conde went on to form another group called The Holidays (c. 1961), recording two songs he had written for the group,"New Orleans" and "Life" on the Sabina label, owned and produced by The Belmonts.
In 1967, Dennis Minogue aka Terry Cashman teamed up with Gene Pistilli and Tommy West on Paramount Records to form the pop-folk group Cashman, Pistilli and West. Their successful debut album, Bound to Happen (1967) included the Cashman and Pistilli composition "Sunday Will Never Be the Same", a summer 1967 hit for Spanky and Our Gang.
Cashman and West later recorded the album Tale of Two Cities (American City Suite) on Dunhill records, and produced several hits for Jim Croce.
Terry Cashman was honored at the Baseball Hall Of Fame for his song "Talkin' Baseball" (Willie, Mickey and the Duke) on July 23, 2011.
The Chevrons reunited in July 1988, to appear as guests on the "Doo-Wop Shop" hosted by Don K. Reed Show on WCBS-FM. In 1999, The Wop Ding A Ling collection of New York doo-wop from the late 1950s and 1960s included "Lullabye" and "Don't Be Heartless".
On December 25, 2011, co-founder John "Marty" Trautman (Johnny '56) died at his home in Coppell, Texas, a suburb of Dallas. His final professional singing gig was earlier that month.
Raul (Al) Conde contributed a short story written about his real-life experiences growing up as a kid in Washington Heights NYC during the 1940s, 1950s, and 1960s to Heightsmemories.com. Boris Riabov, a documentary filmmaker, happened to read the essay and asked Al Conde if he could make a short documentary based on his true life story. The documentary was made and it is called (Through A Kids Eyes) Part 1, Part 2 Which can be watched on YouTube.com. An edited version was taken from the documentary, also was made called Recalling The RKO Coliseum In Washington Heights NYC seen on YouTube.com.[citation needed]
Doo-wop is a genre of rhythm and blues music that originated in African-American communities during the 1940s, mainly in the large cities of the United States, including New York, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Chicago, Baltimore, Newark, Detroit, Washington, D.C., and Los Angeles. It features vocal group harmony that carries an engaging melodic line to a simple beat with little or no instrumentation. Lyrics are simple, usually about love, sung by a lead vocal over background vocals, and often featuring, in the bridge, a melodramatically heartfelt recitative addressed to the beloved. Harmonic singing of nonsense syllables is a common characteristic of these songs. Gaining popularity in the 1950s, doo-wop was "artistically and commercially viable" until the early 1960s, but continued to influence performers in other genres.
The Flamingos are an American doo-wop group formed in Chicago in 1953. The band became popular in mid-to-late 1950s and are known for their 1959 cover version of "I Only Have Eyes for You". They have since been hailed as one of the finest and most influential vocal groups in pop and doo wop music history. In 2001, the band was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
The Teenagers were an American music group, most noted for being one of rock music's earliest successes, presented to international audiences by DJ Alan Freed. The group, which made its most popular recordings with young Frankie Lymon as lead singer, is also noted for being rock's first all-teenaged act. They were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1993.
Jim & Ingrid Croce is the second studio album by American singer-songwriter Jim Croce, the only one performed as a duo with his wife Ingrid. It was originally released in 1969 and has been subsequently re-released with alternate titles such as Bombs over Puerto Rico, Another Day, Another Town and Approaching Day.
"Sh-Boom" is an early doo-wop song by the R&B vocal group The Chords. It was written by James Keyes, Claude Feaster, Carl Feaster, Floyd F. McRae, and William Edwards, members of The Chords, and published in 1954. It is sometimes considered the first doo-wop or rock 'n' roll record to reach the top ten on the pop charts, as it was a top-10 hit that year for both the Chords and The Crew-Cuts. In 2004, it was ranked No. 215 on Rolling Stone's "Top 500 Best Songs of All Time".
Terry Cashman is an American record producer and singer-songwriter, best known for his 1981 hit, "Talkin' Baseball". While the song is well recognized today and allowed Cashman the chance to meet the featured players, it was all but ignored by typical Top 40 radio during its chart life, making only the Billboard Adult Contemporary chart.
"Tears on My Pillow" is a doo-wop song written by Sylvester Bradford and Al Lewis in 1958. The composition was first recorded by Little Anthony and the Imperials on End Records and was that group's debut recording under that name. Their original recording of the song became a Billboard top-10 hit, peaking at No. 4, No. 3 in Canada, and was the Imperials' first million-seller. It was also a two-sided hit, with its flip side, "Two People in the World," also becoming a major hit. Although it remains one of the Imperials' signature songs, "Tears on My Pillow" has been extensively covered, including a No. 1 in the UK Singles Chart version by Kylie Minogue in January 1990.
The Jive Five were an American doo-wop group. They are best known for their debut hit single, "My True Story" (1961), the Nickelodeon bumper jingles in the 1980s and 1990s, and the fact that they outlasted most of their musical peers by re-modeling themselves as a soul group in the 1970s and beyond.
Ruben and the Jets was an American rock and roll band from Los Angeles, California. The band originated as an alias for The Mothers of Invention, Frank Zappa's band, to release Cruising with Ruben & the Jets (1968). Later, musician Rubén Guevara Jr. continued the band with his own lineup. Guevara's "Jets" recorded two albums, For Real! (1973) and Con Safos (1974).
The Chords were an American doo-wop vocal group formed in 1951 in The Bronx, New York, known for their 1954 hit "Sh-Boom", which they wrote. It is the only song they created that reached mainstream popularity.
"I Only Have Eyes for You" is a romantic love song by composer Harry Warren and lyricist Al Dubin, written for the film Dames (1934) when Dick Powell introduced it. Several successful recordings of the song were made in 1934; later, there were charted versions by the Flamingos (1959) and Art Garfunkel (1975).
Jukin' is the debut album by The Manhattan Transfer. Released on Capitol Records in 1971, it was also the only album by the first version of the group, which consisted of Tim Hauser, Erin Dickins, Marty Nelson, Gene Pistilli, and Pat Rosalia.
"Get a Job" is a song by the Silhouettes released in November 1957. It reached the number one spot on the Billboard pop and R&B singles charts in February 1958, and was later included in Robert Christgau's "Basic Record Library" of 1950s and 1960s recordings, published in Christgau's Record Guide: Rock Albums of the Seventies (1981). The song celebrates the virtues of securing gainful employment.
"Talkin' Baseball " is a 1981 song written and performed by Terry Cashman. The song describes the history of American major league baseball from the 1950s to the beginning of the 1980s. The song was originally released during the 1981 Major League Baseball strike, and was inspired by a picture of the three outfielders of the title together. The original sheet music for the song is a part of the Cooperstown Collection, and Cashman was honored at the 2011 Hall Of Fame weekend.
The Solitaires were an American doo-wop group, best known for their 1957 hit single "Walking Along". Although they never had a national chart hit, they were one of the most popular vocal groups in New York in the late 1950s.
"Little Darlin'" is a popular Top 40 song, made famous by the Diamonds.
Thomas Picardo Jr., known professionally as Tommy West, was an American record producer and singer-songwriter.
Spanky and Our Gang is the debut album by Spanky and Our Gang, released on August 1, 1967. The album was released by Mercury Records and included three songs that were released as singles. These were "Sunday Will Never Be the Same", their biggest hit, which reached number Number 9 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 chart in the summer of 1967, "Making Every Minute Count", which reached Number 31, and "Lazy Day", reaching Number 14.
"It's Too Soon to Know" is an American doo-wop ballad by Deborah Chessler (1923–2012), performed first by The Orioles. It was number one on the American Rhythm and blues charts in November 1948. It is considered by some to be the first "rock and roll" song, and described by others as "the first rhythm and blues vocal group harmony recording".
"All for the Beatles" is a song written and released in 1964 by Harry Nilsson and John Marascalco. It was released as a single with the alternative title "Stand Up and Holler" under Nilsson's pseudonym Foto-Fi Four and was packaged with a synchronized standard 8 mm film of The Beatles first arriving in the United States in 1964.
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