Jazz Pop Smash Hits of the 1950s and 1960s

[Rabshakeh]

We had a bit of chat around the Swingle Sisters and Bach-done-jazz type records a few months ago, and I wondered what other smash hits of the jazz and jazz-adjacent world there were in the 1950s and 1960s? The sort of stuff that was not actually targeted at jazz fans, but more at your general normie consumer.

I'm thinking of records like 

Swingle Sisters - Place Vendôme

Kai Winding Featuring Kenny Burrell – !!! More !!! (Theme From Mondo Cane)

Frankie Laine And Buck Clayton And His Orchestra – Jazz Spectacular

Les Elgart And His Orchestra – Sophisticated Swing 

I guess that some classics would also fall into this category too, like At The Pershing, Getz' samba records, Hello Dolly, Sinatra's Capitol records, etc.

This is really out of historical interest, more than a request for recommendations.

Edited August 27, 2022 by Rabshakeh

[Teasing the Korean]

Erroll Garner - Concert by the Sea

Dave Brubeck - Time Out

Getz & Gilberto

Stan Getz & Charlie Byrd - Jazz Samba

Edited August 27, 2022 by Teasing the Korean

[T.D.]

The tune Killer Joe by the Jazztet (written by Benny Golson) might qualify in the latter category. I recall it got really big in the '70s, perhaps late '60s.

[Teasing the Korean]

Ramsey Lewis - The In Crowd and Wade in the Water

[T.D.]

3 minutes ago, Teasing the Korean said:

Ramsey Lewis - The In Crowd

For sure!

[Teasing the Korean]

24 minutes ago, T.D. said:

For sure!

For a long time, this was in every thrift store, right beside Whipped Cream & Other Delights and Merry Christmas from Firestone Tires!

Edited August 27, 2022 by Teasing the Korean

[JSngry]

56 minutes ago, T.D. said:

The tune Killer Joe by the Jazztet (written by Benny Golson) might qualify in the latter category. I recall it got really big in the '70s, perhaps late '60s.

Through the Quincy Jones version, yes. 

 

[Rabshakeh]

These are great. Alpert and Quincy exact examples.

Trying to think of more, justly forgotten, stuff though.

[JSngry]

About that Quincy album, by the time I got around to buying it, middle 70s, it had a Gold Record sticker put on it.

Swiss Movement was huge, too. Huge.

 

Eddie Harris could have a hit, "Exodus", "Listen Here", this one, he even got on Soul Train!

 

[GA Russell]

Dick Clark played Chet Baker on American Bandstand.

 

[JSngry]

Celebrity Bowling, Baby!

 

 

[felser]

This went to #1 on the pop charts in 1968:

 

This was huge and still sounds great almost 50 years later:

And of course...

 

Edited August 28, 2022 by felser

[JSngry]

10 minutes ago, felser said:

This went to #1 on the pop charts in 1968:

 

 

 

 

I got VERY cynical about Masakela and that record when I stumbled across the LP in a cutout bin ca. 1972 or os...

 

Mr. Bull – Mr. Bull No. 4

But better, imo is Mr. Bull No. 3, if only for the intro!

 

[felser]

14 minutes ago, JSngry said:

I got VERY cynical about Masakela and that record when I stumbled across the LP in a cutout bin ca. 1972 or so

I LOVE the vocal version by the Friends of Distinction which went top 5 in 1969.  They also had two other great hit singles, "Going in Circles" in '69 and "Love or Let Me Be Lonely" in '70.  A more daring Fifth Dimension (and I like both groups a lot, I realize YMMV on both counts).

 

[T.D.]

1 hour ago, felser said:

I LOVE the vocal version by the Friends of Distinction which went top 5 in 1969.  They also had two other great hit singles, "Going in Circles" in '69 and "Love or Let Me Be Lonely" in '70.  A more daring Fifth Dimension (and I like both groups a lot, I realize YMMV on both counts).

 

Weird...I vividly recall the Friends of Distinction rendition, and even hear it occasionally to this day. But I never heard the Masakela version of the tune. 

[Big Beat Steve]

16 hours ago, Rabshakeh said:

We had a bit of chat around the Swingle Sisters and Bach-done-jazz type records a few months ago, and I wondered what other smash hits of the jazz and jazz-adjacent world there were in the 1950s and 1960s? The sort of stuff that was not actually targeted at jazz fans, but more at your general normie consumer.

I'm thinking of records like 

Swingle Sisters - Place Vendôme

Kai Winding Featuring Kenny Burrell – !!! More !!! (Theme From Mondo Cane)

Frankie Laine And Buck Clayton And His Orchestra – Jazz Spectacular

Les Elgart And His Orchestra – Sophisticated Swing

Make that Swingle SINGERS please, anyway! (The late Ward Lamar says thanx! )

As for the other examples you name, I am not so sure the Frankie Laine/Buck Clayton LP was suich a smash hit at the time ...
IMO the Les Elgart example you name would be in quite a different league from what you see others have named in their posts to this thread. More an example of the latter-day big bands of jazz/swing-cum-pop in the 50s and early 60s, of which there were quite a few. The Buddy Morrow big band must have had bigger sales with "Night Train" that Jimmy Forrest did with his original (or other R&B covers did). AFAIK other big bands of that kind included Jerry Fielding, Ralph Marterie and Ralph Flanagan, for example.

Other jazz tunes that the "normie consumers" were exposed to should also include the jazz signature tunes to certain radio (or TV?) shows that must at least have "softened" the attitude of some listeners towards jazz. One that was big here on radio in Southern Germany for a LONG time was Horst Jankowski's version of the Basie tune "Cute" - recorded in 1961 for Metronome and used regularly on the SDR radio at least until the mid-70s as the signature tune for regular live broadcasts (including concerts beyond jazz) from the radio station concert hall.

BTW, as for Britain, how about some of the "jazz-adjacent" recordings of the Basil Kirchin Band during that period? Or Ray Ellington or some of the Tony Crombie recordings (not including his own take on R'n'R here)? I understand they made an impact in the pop market too?

Edited August 28, 2022 by Big Beat Steve

[BillF]

[felser]

 

 

[Big Beat Steve]

1 minute ago, felser said:

 

Yes, that one too. But as I recollect this was more seen as "former jazzman Jankowski has gone pop now" over here and much less so as a jazz tune that has made it into the pop charts. Rather like someone aiming at the Bert Kaempfert clientele ...
But of course in the end that's a matter of taste and of where you set your boundaries of jazz.

[felser]

10 hours ago, T.D. said:

Weird...I vividly recall the Friends of Distinction rendition, and even hear it occasionally to this day. But I never heard the Masakela version of the tune. 

May be that your local A.M. station chose not to play it, and the Friends of Distinction version made the Masakela version instantly obsolete for golden oldies formats.  I didn't hear "Eve of Destruction" until a few years later, as my family lived in Alabama in 1965, and it seemingly got banned there, likely for the line "You talk of all the hate there is in red China, but turn around and look at Selma, Alabama".  Not that it wasn't true...

1 minute ago, Big Beat Steve said:

Yes, that one too. But as I recollect this was more seen as "former jazzman Jankowski has gone pop now" over here and much less so as a jazz tune that has made it into the pop charts. Rather like someone aiming at the Bert Kaempfert clientele ...
But of course in the end that's a matter of taste and of where you set your boundaries of jazz.

Agreed in retrospect, had no knowledge of him at the time apart from the song. That scenario actually seems to perfectly fit the criteria TTK set in the first post.  As far as Jankowski in the USA, that cut is the only time he was ever on the radar of much of anyone in the USA pop or jazz worlds.  

[Big Beat Steve]

Yes I realize this perspective was bound to be quite different over here because he had made jazz recordings from late 1956. And some of these records were popular (relatively speaking) to the extent that you even stood a chance in later decades of finding an occasional EP at fleamarkets.

Re- all, and Re-Eddie Harris' "Exodus" and similar 45 pop hits from the jazz field, how about

Ray Bryant - "Madison Time"?

It must have been big enough over here to remain in print as a 45 from the time Philips handled Columbia in Europe until the time everthing on Columbia became CBS.

 

Edited August 28, 2022 by Big Beat Steve

[JSngry]

13 hours ago, felser said:

I LOVE the vocal version by the Friends of Distinction which went top 5 in 1969.  They also had two other great hit singles, "Going in Circles" in '69 and "Love or Let Me Be Lonely" in '70.  A more daring Fifth Dimension (and I like both groups a lot, I realize YMMV on both counts).

 

Philemon Hou did not write that song. I hope he did right with all the money he got from having his name on it. 

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[DMP]

There were a couple versions of ‘Gravy Waltz’....

And, of course, Shelly Manne’s ‘My Fair Lady’ - that was in a lot of ‘50”s LP collections. Did anyone mention ‘Walk on the Wild Side, part l?’

[GA Russell]

15 hours ago, felser said:

May be that your local A.M. station chose not to play it, and the Friends of Distinction version made the Masakela version instantly obsolete for golden oldies formats.  I didn't hear "Eve of Destruction" until a few years later, as my family lived in Alabama in 1965, and it seemingly got banned there

There were three songs not played on New Orleans radio at that time.

Barry McGuire - Eve of Destruction
Dion - Abraham, Martin and John
Janis Ian - Society's Child

[soulpope]

Horace Silver "Song For My Father" ....