SOUND
OF SILENCE
RAY
CONNIFF, THE SINGERS
SONGWRITER: PAUL SIMON
COUNTRY: U. S. A.
ALBUM:
HONEY
LABEL:
CBS
GENRE: INSTRUMENTAL
YEAR: 1968
Joseph Raymond Conniff (November 6, 1916 –
October 12, 2002) was an American bandleader and arranger best
known for his Ray Conniff Singers during the 1960s.
In 1959, Conniff started The Ray Conniff
Singers (12 women and 13 men, comprising mainly the Ron Hicklin Singers)
and released the album It's the Talk of the Town. This group brought him
his biggest hit: Somewhere My Love (1966). The album's title track's lyrics
were sung to the music of "Lara's Theme"
from the film Doctor
Zhivago, and it became a US top 10 single.
The
album reached the US top 20 and went platinum, and Conniff won a Grammy. The
single and album also reached high positions in the international charts (a.o.
Australia, Germany, Great Britain, Japan), while the first of four Christmas
albums by the Singers, Christmas
with Conniff (1959) was also successful.
Nearly
50 years after its release, in 2004, Conniff was posthumously awarded a
platinum album/CD. Other well-known releases by the Singers
included Ray Conniff's Hawaiian Album (1967), featuring the hit song
"Pearly Shells," and Bridge Over Troubled Water (1970), which
included Conniff's original composition "Someone", and remakes of
such hits as "All I Have to Do is Dream", "I'll Never Fall in
Love Again", and "Something".
Musically different highlights in Conniff's
career are two albums he produced in cooperation with Billy Butterfield, an old
friend from earlier swing days. Conniff Meets Butterfield (1959) featured
Butterfield's solo trumpet and a small rhythm group, and Just Kiddin'
Around (after a Conniff original composition from the 1940s), released in
1963, which featured additional trombone solos by Ray himself. Both albums are pure light jazz
and did not feature any vocals.
Postagens
