John Harper's Singapore 50s Music Trail: Part Two

"For this second part, I'll be looking at the influences I encountered on the journey to Singapore and during our time there between 1957 and 1959.

During 1957 to mid 1958 we would go for family meals in Changi Village to either Tong Sing's Restaurant or next door to the air conditioned Milk Bar. The Milk Bar had a juke box and my father would often get up and put some money in and choose a few records. Most embarrasing, even to this day was Max Bygraves singing about those blue and pink toothbrushes. He thought he was putting something amusing on for my brothers an me. Fortunately he realised after only a few times that we were not amused.

1950s Changi Village, Singapore

His other choices always included Harry Belafonte, "Banana Boat Song" and his all time favourite "Island In The Sun". I think "Island In The Sun" was a favourite of the whole family because it more or less summed up our pleasure of being on a beautiful island in the sun that we all loved. Two others I remember from that juke box were "Tequila" and "Yakkety Yak".

A 50's juke-box playing vinyl records

This is where saxophones are beginning to raise their voices and I start to hear them and become interested in the saxophone, never did get round to learning to play one though! However my niece Deborah is a brilliant saxophonist, she actually played the saxaphone as she came down the aisle when she got married!

My own favoured instrument is the guitar and I have played bass guitar in a beat group (mid 60s term there) and played rhythm guitar in a few folk scenarios. With electric guitars I like a nice clean but twangy sound with bags of echo but do enjoy the sound of a good acoustic guitar played in a folky style. I think the twangy sound hit me when I first heard Duane Eddy playing "Rebel Rouser", it also has some evocative saxaphone working away contrapuntaly. Listening to it today it strikes me how it has a lot of amplitude tremolo and bags of echo.

Young Connie Francis

It was at this time that I became aware of vocal harmonies though I probably could not have described how it was done, my understanding of chords was to come a couple of years later from a school music lesson and when I took up playing the guitar. Liking of folky and country styles of music probably came from hearing Slim Dusty, mentioned in part one.

*Probably the greatest exponents of vocal harmony were the Everly brothers with "Bye Bye Love", "Wake Up Little Susie" and "Bird Dog". On the female front there are some nice harmonies going on on some of Connie Francis' records. I don't know whether this is another person singing with Connie or whether it is a second part sung by Connie and dubbed, However it was done, the effect is melodic and provides a warm richness to the music. Notable hits of this time, to me, were "Stupid Cupid" and "Who's Sorry Now".

Tommy Steele - British Pops late 1950s

Elvis appeared on the scene during these years and some of the favourite songs to sing on the bus to school along with the Everly Brothers "Bye Bye Love" were "Teddy Bear" and "Wear My Ring Around Your Neck". Also in there was Tommy Steele's "Singing The Blues". I think Sam Cooke's "Only Sixteen" was released just before we left to return back to the UK but might have been after we arrived back in England.

The Everly Brothers recorded album in mid 1966 but it didn't sell well.

In the third part I'll be looking at the rest of 1957 covering August to December which is the time we arrived back in England, just before the August Bank Holiday, our time in a transit hotel in Blackpool and our moving to Yorkshire."

Original article: John Harper Copyrights Reserved.

Same Cooke

(*It was at this time of the decade when vocal duets like The Blue Diamonds from Holland, The Cyclones comprising Siva and James Choy hit the Singapore stage with their own rendition of songs in harmony. Following the popular trend there were a few ladies who were called the "Connie Francis of Singapore". Up to this day no one really knows who owns the title or if there was ever such a singing competition honouring this singer with the clear diction and powerhouse vocals. Andy Lim.)

Images: from Google.