Word: calypsos
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...Singers tried to best each other at songs whose tunes were simple, and whose lyrics were black & white (or sometimes red) versions of current events. The result was not always good singing or good logic, but it had some of the spontaneity and enthusiasm of the competitive chants of calypso singers in Trinidad (TIME...
Most spot commercials are either obnoxious or vapid. Chiquita Banana, sung to a catchy, Calypso-style tune, is so different that listeners actually like it. Last week, after more than eight months on the air, it had become the undisputed No. i on the jingle-jangle hit parade. Its composers, Garth Montgomery and Len Mackenzie (of Batten, Barton, Durstine & Osborn), not unmindful of the famed banana smash of the early 1920s, decided to doll up their lyrics, and give them a try as a popular song...
...general lustiness of the lyrics might corrupt the youth of the land. As sung in Trinidad, in its native state, the song might have been censored with more cause. Rum & Coca-Cola burgeoned on the Port-of-Spain waterfront in 1943. Its composer was a stocky Negro calypso singer named Rupert Grant, known for professional purposes as "Lord Invader." For Rum & Coca-Cola he took a tune, with alterations, from a popular Trinidad paseo (two step), and dogged out some doggerel...
Amsterdam, who describes himself as a "well-dressed hangover" has a well-stuffed musical memory. He is the son of Max Amsterdam, who plays with the San Francisco Symphony. Morey has explained: "The tune is calypso, of course, and then again it's not. It's really just an old Jewish melody with maracas [rhythm gourds] added...
...watered-down, scrubbed-up version, tailored to Tin Pan Alley standards, Rum & Coca-Cola was plugged at Manhattan's Paramount Theater by a blond singer named Jeri Sullavan. It quickly became the biggest selling calypso song in history. Last week the Pepsi-Cola Co. was reportedly urging Rum & Coca-Cola's Manhattan publishers and Decca's Jack Kapp to make recordings with "coca" changed to "pepsi...