RetroTrash

RAY CONNIFF







NOTES ON THE ABOVE
Ray was born in 1916 in Massachusetts to a music-orientated family, and started practicing playing the trombone as a boy before graduating to a proper band, the Musical Skippers in Boston. It was here where he learnt to arrange music before heading for New York to see if he could make it big. In next to no time he was performing with the likes of Artie Shaw, Bob Crosby and Glen Gray before World War II took his musical career in another direction, arranging for the Armed Forces Radio Services in Hollywood. Finding himself at a loss after the war he decided to concentrate on working out what was it that made certain songs hits, and others misses. Thinking he could come up with a magical formula that would work each time, Ray settled on his idiosyncratic arranging style and proved its effectiveness for Columbia by arranging Band of Gold by Don Cherry, Just Walkin' in the Rain by Johnnie Ray, Singing the Blues by Guy Mitchell, and a host of others. Through this he achieved some acclaim which gave him a lot more musical muscle, allowing him to record under his own name. His debut LP, 'S Wonderful hit the top 20 and stayed there for nine months, winning an award with more to follow in 1957, 1958 and 1959. With this success, Ray branched out and started touring the world, performing in such places as the Royal Albert Hall in London and even the White House in Washington. By the time he reached his 85th birthday Ray had sold over 70 million albums, recorded one hundred odd albums, won a host of awards and was still going strong up till his death in 2002 in San Diego. He had been in the recording business for over 65 years, signed to some of the top major labels like Columbia, CBS, and Sony and had even signed a new deal in 1997 with three labels. After his death he left a legacy of records which now stack up most second-hand record shop shelves, and can be found liberally scattered up and down the charity shops of this country. Most of them, like Wunderlich and Kaempfert, have girls on the covers. But unlike them two, most if not all feature close up shots of the face. Not that we have anything against this, it's just that we like to see if the face matches the figure. The above albums, believe it or not, are only a small selection. There are many more, some pretty boring and not worthy of this collection. Others, more fitting and in line with the trash aesthetic, I will be adding soon. For the time being feast your eyes on the above and ponder this: is Ray prettier than any of the above? If you think no, then that's probably the reason the record labels decided to flog his merchandise using girls rather than an image of Ray himself. My favourites have to be the Happy Beat of Ray Conniff, with it's fun image, and Ray Conniff and His Orchestra with the girl in the bikini, which seems to be totally out of keeping with the rest. In fact, it looks like it should be on a Top of the Pops cover, and, funnily enough, it is—in a way. See volume 80 of that series. To view larger images use the Database
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