I always listen to my commentators so when on November 11, 2022 Michael Padgett wrote: “Whenever I see one of these Best of Whatever Decade compilations I wonder if everyone has forgotten the Fifties. So much great music–Elvis, Orbison, Everly Brothers, Little Richard, Chuck Berry, Fats Domino, and so many others I can’t recall right now. The Fifties might not equal the Sixties or Seventies, but it beats the hell out of any other decade since,” I searched my shelves for some 1950s music. The Time-Life CD The Rock ‘n’ Roll Era: 1959 suddenly appeared after waiting 20 years or so for me to listen to it.
Back in 1959, I was just 10 years old but starting to listen to music on the radio frequently. “Teenager in Love” by Dion and The Belmonts delighted me. Years later, Diane and I lived on Belmont Court East and Belmont Court West (two different houses!). Loved The Drifters’s songs especially “There Goes My Baby” and “Sweets for My Sweet.” And the silky smooth “Come Softly to Me” by The Fleetwoods still charms me.
Do you remember these songs from the Fifties? Any favorites? GRADE: A
TRACK LIST:
| Track | Artist | Title | Composer | |
| 01 | The Coasters | Charlie Brown | Jerry Leiber, Mike Stoller | |
| 02 | Dion And The Belmonts | A Teenager In Love | Doc Pomus, Mort Shuman | |
| 03 | The Fiestas | So Fine | Johnny Otis | |
| 04 | Ritchie Valens | Donna | Ritchie Valens | |
| 05 | Bobby Darin | Dream Lover | Bobby Darin | |
| 06 | The Crests | 16 Candles | Luther Dixon, Allyson R. Khent | |
| 07 | Lloyd Price | Stagger Lee | Lloyd Price, Harold Logan | |
| 08 | Ray Charles | What’d I Say (Parts 1 And 2) | Ray Charles | |
| 09 | LaVern Baker | I Cried A Tear | Al Julia, Fred Jay | |
| 10 | Fats Domino | I Want To Walk You Home | Antoine Domino | |
| 11 | Phil Phillips | Sea Of Love | Phil Battiste (Phil Phillips) | |
| 12 | Frankie Ford | Sea Cruise | Huey Smith | |
| 13 | The Coasters | Poison Ivy | Jerry Leiber, Mike Stoller | |
| 14 | Wilbert Harrison | Kansas City | Jerry Leiber, Mike Stoller | |
| 15 | Bill Parsons | The All-American Boy | Bill Parsons, Orville Lunsford | |
| 16 | Clyde McPhatter | A Lover’s Question | Jimmy Williams, Brook Benton | |
| 17 | Santo And Johnny | Sleep Walk | Ann Farina, John Farina, Santo Farina | |
| 18 | The Drifters | There Goes My Baby | Benjamin Nelson, Lover Patterson, George Treadwell | |
| 19 | Lloyd Price | Personality | Lloyd Price, Harold Logan | |
| 20 | The Bell Notes | I’ve Had It | Ray Ceroni, Carl Bonura | |
| 21 | The Impalas | Sorry (I Ran All The Way Home) | Harry Giosasi, Artie Zwim | |
| 22 | The Fleetwoods | Come Softly To Me | Gary Troxel, Gretchen Christopher, Barbara Ellis |
I was only 11 at the time so most of these I know after the fact, although The Bell Notes and Bill Parsons don’t ring a bell. I like a few of these but most of the 50’s stuff I like is not here-Chuck Berry, Bo Diddley, Everly Brothers, Roy Orbison, Elvis, Johnny Burnette. Some maybe absent due to cost. Sea Cruise, There Goes My Baby, are probably my two favorites here. The ones that border on doo wop my least favorite. Didn’t like doo wop then and don’t like it now. If we didn’t have doo wop then we would never have had to listen to The Four Season’, Frankie Valli whine his way through a number of top ten hits a few years later.
And I do like Dion but prefer his later songs like Runaround Sue and The Wanderer.
I’ve never been a fan of Frankie Valli, either, but I love a whole lot of doowop.
Todd, Bill Crider was a huge doowop fan like you!
Steve, if I recall, Jeff and Jackie Meyerson saw Dion perform in the past year or so. When I review another 1950s compilation, I’ll try to find one with Berry, Diddley, Orbison, Elvis, etc.
Yes, we did! And Dion still looks and sound terrific, plus he is still writing and recording new music, often with people like Springsteen. Now bad for 83. Other than “I Wonder Why” I do agree with Steve about prefering his “Runaround Sue” era songs to the earlier stuff.
Jeff, both Dion and Dylan look great…but sound terrible today.
I was two years old (and living in England), so I never knew these songs until I got older and was listening to “oldies radio” (which, in the 1970s, meant songs that were—gasp!—almost 20 years old!). I like many of the songs here, especially the bluesy stuff from Fats Domino and Wilbert Harrison.
Deb, the “Oldies” station I listened to in the 1950s played a lot of Sinatra, Peggy Lee, and Bing Crosby.
I’d suggest the Fleetwoods (at least with this song) and the Ray Charles item are just on the other side of the pop line in the former’s case and that for the inarguable r&b in the latter (before that became an industry label for Black Rock), but they could both be called rock with a squint, and more unlikely stuff has been.
The Bell Notes (I’ve heard this one before, but not in several dogs’ years) and Parsons are the most obscure to me, as well, but there are none I hate, and most I at least like pretty well. Even the Darin is perhaps the best of his early career, if less infectiously goofy than “Splish-Splash”. “What’d I Say?” and “Kansas City” might just float to the top of any ranking, but the whole lot of them are not songs I’d flip past, even if I haven’t Needed to hear “Sleepwalk” or “Teenager in Love” again particularly urgently, and there are Even Better hits by the Drifters. But the night was certainly clare, as one of Lloyd Price’s takes puts it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F-ut2rAx14I
Todd, I find many of the TIME-LIFE CD compilations vary in quality, but this one is very listenable.
Good playlist. I remember the artists singing (ie, lip-syncing) some of these on Bandstand. Depending on what month of 1959, I was in either second grade or third .
Fred, I used to rush home to see AMERICAN BANDSTAND at 3:30 P.M. Loved the “Rate the Record” segment where almost all the songs “had a good beat.”
Thanks, George. I remember (and like) nearly all of these. I’d forgotten The Bell Notes, but remembered them when I heard “I’ve Had It”. The Fifties took me from 6 to 16, introduced me to rock music, and prepared me for the great music to come.
Michael, glad you approve of my choice of THE ROCK ‘N’ ROLL ERA: 1959. It was the first Fifties CD I found in my basement (which is chaotic). My early New Year’s resolution is to get more organized in 2023!
No doubt about it, some real gold here.
Dan, I totally agree with you! This was about the time Rock ‘N’ Roll artists started to sell enough records to earn a Gold Record.
I loved Dion and Bobby Darin and the Everly Brothers. But I also like The Shirelles, the first girl group I remember. Anything romantic. I would have only come upon it at the end of the decade. Some of these groups/singers I have never heard of.
Patti, Dion, Darin, and the Everly Brothers dominated the radio airwaves in this time period. But, then came The Beatles and the English Invasion and the music radically changed.
Yes! Of course I know ALL of them. Favorites? Sleep Walk, Sea of Love, Charlie Brown and Poison Ivy, so many. Any Leiber & Stoller song is worth listening t. I’ve always loved Fats Domino. We saw Frankie Ford live a couple of times (he was at the Madison Square Garden show after Katrina). Just saw Lloyd Price in TREME. He just died last year at 88 and looked and sounded great to the end.
For once you have an A list to me.
Jeff, yes, I think THE ROCK ‘N’ ROLL ERA: 1959 is worth an A grade. Great songs and great performers!
The Bill Parsons song was actually by Bobby Bare, but released under Parsons’ name when Bare was in the Army.
Jeff, you are a fount of Knowledge. I did not know about Bill Parsons/Bobby Bare switch!
And yes, like Bill Crider, I love doo wop.
Jeff, you’re in great doowop company with Bill Crider and Todd Mason!
This isn’t my favorite era for rock. I like a few of them, but won’t replay them, which is what I do with my favs.
I really started getting into music in the early 60s, Motown being a favorite source, until the British invasion.
Maggie, same here. I dimly remember some of these songs. But I really got into listening to music on my transistor radio in the early 1960s. Motown and the British Invasion thrilled me!
I was 16 then in 1949 and I had just got my own room in the cellar of the house my parents had built (really nicely sound isolated).
So when after using an AM radio from WW2 for many years (Volksempfänger) I got an old FM radio where I could listen to AFN (American Forces Network) all day and night – wonderful!
I like most of the songs on the CD,melodies like Oh Donna etc but my absolute favourite is the first 7 inch record I could afford to buy:
What’d I say part 1 and 2
You should have seen my sisters and my friends and other family members when I played this to them …
Fond memories!
Wolf, I wish I was there to see the looks on the faces of your sisters and friends when you played them “What I’d Say (Part 1 & 2”!
Sorry, of course this should have been 1959.
And other songs that I adored:
Sea of Love, Kansas City and many others that are not on this record.
Wolf, you many see/hear “Sea of Love” on this blog in the weeks ahead! Until recently, I didn’t know it was a Hal David song.
This is right in my wheelhouse! I turned 12 in late 1959 and had been a rock fan since the beginning! Doo-wop is great–pay no attention to any naysayers! The Fleetwoods (with an “s”) were a Northwest group and had a beautiful sound!
Bob, I loved The Fleetwoods even though WORDPRESS’s spellchecker keeps taking that final “s” away!