Previously
unreleased television performances
with Dinah
Shore & Brenda Lee
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Legend has it that the seventh son of a seventh son is
possessed of magical powers. Well, whether or not that is
true, there is no doubt that seventh son of a seventh son
Perry Como charmed his listeners for many years with his
own special brand of magic. The son of Italian
immigrants, he was the first of their thirteen children
to be born an American citizen ~ which birth took place
on 18th May, 1912 in Canonsburg, Pennsylvania. Keeping
faith with their own national roots, his parents Pietro
and Lucia named him Pierino, so the name Perry was a
logical diminutive.
His beginnings were not auspicious as regards a career in
show business, for his eleventh birthday saw him already
apprenticed to a local barber. His talent and his love of
music came through, however, and in 1933 he relinquished
his scissors and razor to take up an offer to sing with
the band of local musician Freddy Carlone. In 1936 he
left Carlone to join Ted Weems, staying with the band
until it broke up in 1942. During his time with Weems, he
cut a few sides in the recording studios and also
appeared on the "Beat The Band"
radio show. So it was that he came to the notice of the
talent-spotters and as a result got his own radio on CBS
and, in 1943, a recording contract with RCA Victor. The
rest is musical history: over the years he has had a
string of hits, including such numbers as
"Dig
You Later", "Prisoner of Love", "All
Through the Day", "I Surrender",
"Chi-Baba Chi-Baba", "A - You're
Adorable", "Don't Let The Stars Get In Your
Eyes", "Round and Round", "Magic
Moments" and a host of others.
Although he scored his share of triumphs in the Forties,
it was in the Fifties that his name truly became a
household word. Having tried the movies without success,
with the sponsorship of several companies he fronted a
television show which became one of the most successful
on the small screen, running from 1955 to 1963. Following
the last series of the show he retreated somewhat from
the limelight but re-emerged in the seventies to give his
career a new lease of life with several more big-selling
singles.
He was still singing in the late eighties. Hardly
surprising, for his voice, never strained, and relaxed to
the point of being the butt of kindly-meant jokes, barely
changed over the many years of his long career. Where
other, more dynamic singers came on the scene, produced
their vocal fireworks and were quickly burnt out and back
in obscurity, he kept to his quiet, laid-back style and
so preserved his voice and the admiration of his record
buyers and fans. His easy style apart, though, it was a
good voice, always melodic, and always on the note, as
the tracks on this compilation will demonstrate.
The songs in this collection were taken from television
and radio broadcasts, and cover a period of something
less than two years. The programme begins with one of his
big hits, "Juke Box Baby", followed by
the old classic, "You Made Me Love You".
Another of his hits follows, "Round and Round
". This recording was taken from a radio show
of February 1957 , when he and Dinah Shore were voted
best male and female vocalist by the Disc Jockeys of
America.
Dinah Shore's guest appearance doing a solo spot in this
collection is included for several reasons. One reason is
that their chat is so easy-going and natural, and is a
pleasure to hear. At the point when this particular show
was transmitted, Dinah's own television career was
growing increasingly successful, but unlike that of her
host, Perry Como, it was still limited to the
fifteen-minute format. Their jokes about the limitations
imposed are almost certain to bring a smile, so we
decided to keep Dinah's solo number in tact ~ not that
anyone really needs an excuse to take the chance of
including her talent on a compilation. The song she
performs after Perry's somewhat muddled intro is
"Come
Rain or Come Shine", a Johnny Mercer ~ Harold
Arlen composition that she sang many times during her own
long career. After her solo she and Perry go straight
into a duet of "You're Getting to Be a Habit With
Me", the lyrics rewritten to take cognizance of
their respective television shows.
A regular spot on the Perry Como show was a medley of
songs, chosen as the result of the hundreds of letters of
request that arrived at the studios every week. The
medley would be introduced by his backing singers with a
little verse beginning: "Letters, we get
letters, we get stacks and stacks of letters . . ."
So
the next track offers one such medley, comprising
"Somebody
Loves Me", then, following
"Remember
Me?" sung by his vocal group, a solo of
"Lover,
Come Back to Me".
Brenda Lee ~ or as she became known:
Little Miss
Dynamite ~ was just starting to make a name for
herself in the fifties, and here she appears as a guest
on Perry's show, singing with him the old favourite,
"Life
Is Just a Bowl of Cherries". They are backed by
an organ accompaniment from a very talented youngster,
Glenn Derringer.
After one of Como's big hits,
"Don't Let the
Stars Get In Your Eyes", he sings the beautiful
Cole Porter standard, "I Concentrate On
You". This performance came not from one of his
own TV shows, but from one of Dinah Shore's when,
switching roles, he appeared as her guest on her very
successful Chevy show. "I'm Following You" is a
duet from the pair, and where the laid-back Como usually
performed his songs with the minimum of physical effort,
during this number he dances with his hostess ~ actually
going so far as to lift her. 'Wow,' she says
with a wry comment on her weight,
'you're strong!'
"All At Once You Love Her" is a
Rodgers and Hammerstein song that came from their
Broadway show "Pipe Dream".
An unlikely subject for a musical, the story was an
adaptation of John Steinbeck's novel
"Cannery Row", a tale of
no-hopers, tarts, dreamers and drop-outs. The show was
not a success, but a few really good songs came out of
it. This is perhaps the best. It's a beautiful
composition, and as sung here, with a gentle Latin beat,
it suits Como down to the ground. It is followed by
"There's
No Place Like Home for the Holidays", complete
with a rousing square-dance.
"Cindy, Oh Cindy!" ~ delivered in
typical Como style ~ is followed by another duet with
Dinah Shore: "You Must Have Been a Beautiful
Baby". After it comes another medley, this time
comprising "I Love You Truly", and
"When
Your Hair Has Turned to Silver".
"When
You're Away" is a fine song, and Como treats it
in just the right way. Unfortunately, a little electrical
interference briefly occurs on the master of this
recording, but we felt it was better to have the track
with the minor flaw than not to have it at all. We hope
the listener will agree.
The
"Partners"
medley, with guest
Dinah Shore duetting again, is a truly fine piece of just
that ~ partnership. Over such songs as
"Partners",
"You Were Meant for Me":, "Pretty
Baby", "Jealous" and "For Me and My
Gal" they blend so well, and are so in tune in
every possible way, that one wonders why they never made
a studio recording together. After all, they were both
under contract to the same record company. A lost
opportunity, one might say.
"No Other Love" , another Rodgers and
Hammerstein composition, and one of Como's big hits, is
followed by "My One and Only Heart".
The final track is "Bless this House",
a song wonderfully suited to his soft mellow tones.
But Perry Como had other qualities apart from excellent
pitch, a heartfelt approach to a lyric and a smooth and
easy style. In all his work he also comes over as
sincere, a genuine good fellow. And by all accounts he
was exactly that.
Bernard Taylor
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