The Five Satins

Much like some other doo wop groups of the fifties, the Five Satins are known for a song that epitomized the sound but didn’t make a huge hit on the charts.  And yet, “In The Still Of The Night” continues to be played and loved today.

It all started in 1953 in New Haven, CT, where young high schooler Fred Parris formed a group called the Scarlets.  By the time 1954 came around, the group had jelled with Parris, Al Denby, Ed Martin, Jim Freeman and pianist Jesse Murphy .  They called themselves the Five Satins.

Within a year they had recorded a song that Parris had written in the basement of a local church entitled “In The Still Of The Night.”  It was released in the Spring of 1956 on Standard Records but, as was often done by small labels in the fifties, the recording was leased out to Ember records shortly after.  “In The Still Of The Night” debuted on the Cashbox chart at number 46 on August 25, 1956, and would spend nine weeks on the list, the highest spot being number 32 on September 22. 

But before Fred Parris could enjoy the group’s success, Uncle Sam had called on him and he was drafted into the Army while radios across the country played his song.  Sent to Japan, he didn’t return to the US until 1958, and a different lineup for the Five Satins.

“In The Still Of The Night” is a beautiful ballad which includes a combination of lead vocal by Parris with a soaring falsetto behind the chanting of the bass in the doo wop style. 

While Parris was in Japan, Bill Baker joined the group and they scored one more fairly successful record, “To The Aisle.”  Parris formed another group and the Five Satins went through various incarnations over the coming years.  Despite a new awareness of “In The Still Of The Night” occasioned by promotion by Art Laboe in the early sixties, the Five Satins never scored a hit again.

 

The Monotones

In 1955, in a housing project in Newark, New Jersey, seven teenagers came together to form a doo wop harmony group.  They had been thrilled by the sound (and the success) of groups like the Cadillacs, The Heartbeats, and other successful groups, and they felt they had the talent to be hits too.  Seventeen year old Charles Patrick and his brother James headed up the group.  They worked hard, practicing in the rec room of the projects, and singing in the choir at the New Hope Baptist Church, where other talented singers such as Dionne and DeeDee Warwick, Charles’ cousins, also sang.

In 1956, they got their first big break, singing the Cadllacs’ hit song “Zoom” on Ted Mack’s Amateur Hour.  They got the needed recognition, but lost an important part of the group.  Charles’ brother James was wooed away to a rival group, the Kodaks, who had appeared on the same show.

Charles and the boys persevered.  In the coming months he would pen the song “Who Wrote The Book of Love,” later to be shortened to just “Book of Love.”  And then, in the summer of 1957, they recorded a demo of the song and sent it to various record labels.  A couple of them, Fury and Atlantic, were interested in the song but wanted it for their own performers.  But one record producer, Bea Casilon, owner of Hull Records, took a chance on the group and signed them.  They recorded “Book of Love” in September of 1957.

Released in December of 1957 on Hull subsidiary Mascot Records, the recording took off.  Soon it was more than little Hull could handle, so Casilon licensed it to the bigger Chess records, who released it on their subsidiary Argo, which released it nationally in February 1958.  Debuting at number 49 on the Cashbox chart on March 22, 1958, it was to remain on the chart for fifteen weeks, it’s last appearance on April 19th.

Although the group recorded many more songs, not only for Chess but other labels as well as Hull, they never released a hit like “Book of Love” again.  Finally, at their last recording session in February of 1962, they decided to call it quits and disbanded.

Patience and Prudence

In the summer of 1956 Mark McIntyre, a bandleader, songwriter, and arranger, heard his daughters singing a song they had learned at summer camp the year before.  It was a tune named “Tonight You Belong To Me,” and McIntyre, who had seen his way around Hollywood for some years, recognized the song as a Billy Rose compostion from the twenties.  It had a good sound, however, and McIntyre thought it would be a good song for a cabaret singer he was working with.  He took the idea to Liberty records, a fairly new label that was looking for hits, and while there recorded his daughters, ages nine and twelve, performing the song as a personal keepsake.

The dub made its way to Ross Bagdasarian, who was soon to be known as David Seville and make lots of money for Liberty via his recording of “Witch Doctor.”  Bagdasarian passed it on to Si Waronker, who headed up Liberty, and he made plans for the girls to come to the studio for a more arranged recording.  Adding overdubs to the girls’ voices, making it sound like there were more than two Patiences and Prudences, the recording was released and became an instant success.  Debuting on the Cashbox national chart at number 38 on August 11, 1956, “You Belong to Me” was to reach number four nationally on October 6, and finally spend twenty weeks on the Cashbox top fifty.

With the success of “Tonight You Belong to Me,” Waronker brought the girls back into the studio and recorded an upbeat song entitled “Gonna Get Along Without You Now,” in which the message was “got along without ya before I met ya, gonna get along without you now,” a message of female independence.  This record debuted at number 48 on November 24, 1956, while “Tonight You Belong to Me” was still enjoying success and charting that same week at number thirteen.  “Gonna Get Along Without You Now” lasted twelve weeks on the charts, dropping off in February of 1957.  With that, Patience and Prudence joined the ranks of those we remember from the fifties.

Being about the age of the girls in 1956 (nine), this writer remembers well not only the success of the girls, but how the very idea that other girls so young could be so successful, seen on tv…even appearing on the Ed Sullivan Show!  And, deep down inside, I was also a little bit jealous.  They always seemed so pretty, dressed in frills and petticoats, hair just right.  How I wished I could be just like Patience and Prudence!

The Channels

In February of 1956, a group of very young men from Harlem went to the famous Apollo theatre in New York to compete in a talent show.  They were of the type called “street corner singers,” groups of young men who vocalized, often with harmony, on a type of song soon to be labeled “doo wop.”  And that day, in which the boys took on two other singers from another group, would mark the genesis of what this writer feels is the best doo wop song ever recorded.  And it didn’t even chart nationally.  Not even number 100.

The boys, Larry Hampden, Billy Morris and Edward Doulphin noticed that another group was singing that day, a group named the Lotharios, and their lead singer, 15 year old Earl Michael Lewis, and their bass, Clifton Wright, would be perfect for them.  By the end of the evening, they were the Channels.

Whether they walked into Bobby Robinson’s record store, or he contacted them, soon they were under contract to Whirling Disc records, owned by Robinson.  On June 26th of 1956, they gathered in the studio and recorded the record for which they will always be remembered–“The Closer You Are.”

Although it never charted nationally, it was a hit in various locales throughout the nation.  Alan Freed played the heck out of it in New York, and it was very successful in the boys’ home town.  The song, characterized by the bass lead in (which was unusual then) and the soaring tenor of Earl Lewis, “The Closer You Are” is, in my opinion, the epitome of doo wop.  The song itself is not musically compliacated (doo wop usually isn’t), the lyrics are nothing to remember, but the pure sound of it is doo wop.  Namely, a romantic, slow tempo song which was perfect for slow dances at the hop, your arm on you beau’s shoulder and dreaming of the future.

Mickey & Sylvia

Mickey & Sylvia was an American R&B duo,^[1] composed of Mickey Baker and Sylvia Vanderpool, who later became Sylvia Robinson. They were the first big seller for Groove Records.^[2]

Mickey was a music instructor and Sylvia one of his pupils. Baker was inspired to form the group by the success of Les Paul & Mary Ford. They had a Top 20 hit with “Love Is Strange” in 1956, which sold over one million copies and was awarded a gold disc.^[3] The duo eventually bought their own nightclub, established a publishing company, and formed their own record label. Although Mickey & Sylvia disbanded by the end of the 1950s, they continued to record together on an infrequent basis until 1965, when Mickey quit the music industry in the United States.

The reasons for the disbandment have not been made entirely clear. Some sources have chronicled that Baker tired of life on the road and other aspects of the commercial music business. Others say that Baker was angered by the increasing highly-publicized racial tensions between blacks and whites in the southern United States at around this time.

Mickey had a successful career as a session musician before moving to Paris, France, where he remained for the rest of his life. Sylvia had a hit record in 1973 with “Pillow Talk,” and later assisted in the formation of the Sugar Hill rap label. Sylvia died in 2011 and Mickey died in 2012. Mickey wrote the very well known guitar instruction series, the Mickey Baker Jazz Books.

 

“Love Is Strange,” their only song to chart in the top 15, debuted with the new year on the Cashbox top 40 on January 5, 1957.  It stayed on the chart until September of that year, reaching the highest spot of number 11 during the summer.

Duane Eddy

On June 7, 1958, a new record crashed the Fab Forty at KFWB in Los Angeles. Debuting at number 31, Duane Eddy’s “Rebel Rouser” introduced a man whose name would soon become synonomous with “guitar.” The record was not only a rocker, but was branded forever by its “twanging” sound. All summer long in 1958 “Rebel Rouser” rocked LA, finally dropping off the Fab Forty on September 6th. The “twanging” trademark of Eddy’s playing would go on to dominate the guitar instrumental tunes of the late fifties and early sixties that included such groups as the Ventures and the Surfaris. “Rebel Rouser” was released on small label Jamie Records, but soon led to a contract with RCA Victor. Following this debut hit were memorable discs such as “Ramrod” (1958), “Peter Gunn” and “Forty Miles of Bad Road” (1959), and “Because They’re Young” in 1960.