Down Under and one over

All from down under with one from over our heads.

From Kiwiland -

Fourmyula - with the song voted as the greatest NZ popular song of of last century - Nature. Excellent song from this great Upper Hutt (where I lived for a number of years with both my children being Upper Huttians) group, with the simply superb Wayne Mason.
The Best song of the Century ?? - an excellent song but headed off by Blue Smoke in my opinion. I would rate Pokarekare Ana as the greatest but was it a 'Pop' song?? So my top 3 are Pokare, Blue Smoke and Nature.
Also they sing another great hit Come go with me.

Johnny Devlin with 5 minutes more & Susie Darling
Ray Columbus & the Invaders with She's a mod - the first NZ pop song to top the Oz charts.

And the Aussies -
Frank Ifield - Abdul Abulbul Amir
Deltones - Come a little bit closer

And not an Aussie but an Oz song - Michael Holiday and Little Boy Lost. Other versions were posted on 6 April and 23 June this year.

And the one from over - well overhead John Stewart (ex Kingston Trio) with his song honouring the man who walked on the moon 40 years ago last month Armstrong.

Listen here and not up there when, on a July afternoon, a man named Armstrong walked upon the moon.

Double

Two from Englebert - Ten guitars (the NZ national anthem, well it is when we are partying) and Please release me

Rick Nelson - Never be anyone else but you

Listen.

PAUL ANKA

Here we have the great Canadian singer born 1941 who started with Diana and is almost operatic in many of his songs.

Let the Bells keep ringing, Dance dance on little girl, Tonight my love tonight, I love you baby.

SATURDAY SIX

Saturday and we have six except for Tab Hunter in which case it is 99 Ways.
Plus Sue Thompson with Willie Can
Anthony (or Tony) Perkins taking a Moonlight swim
David Garrick - Dear Mrs Applebee
Harry Belafonte with the song from the film of the same name Island in the Sun.
Matt Flinders (the Ozzie born in Egypt) with Butterfly

Click **** to listen to six greats.

ALL JAYS AGAIN

All Jays again here.

John D Loudermilk - Calling Dr Casey from the TV show of the same name which was never screened in NZ. I saw Vince Edwards, who was the star of the show, in a B movie several years before he became famous and his performance in that film always stuck in my mind as I thought he was excellent. Looking up his films on the Net it was probably 1958's Murder by Contract.

Johnny Preston with an updated version of Running Bear the great Big Bopper written hit.
Jerry Wallace - Primrose Lane
Jeff Beck - Hi ho silver lining. Several years ago I heard an interview with Ray of Dr. Hook and this was one of his favourites.
Jimmy Rodgers - Woman from Liberia & The wreck of the John B

THE GRAND PRIX OF GIBRALTER

Today we have the multi talented Sir Peter Ustinov present, in two parts, his one man comedic tour-de-force (or should that be farce) of The Grand Prix of Gibralter. Simply the most wonderful comedy - up with the Goons. It seems incredible that it is a one man show with all the different voices. I bought this LP more years ago than I can remember.

I remember another skit I saw on TV when he explained how up until he was 7-8 years of age he thought he was a car and he then spent 20 minutes giving a comedy solo about his life as a child car.
Sir Peter Ustinov was born Peter Alexander Freiherr von Ustinov in 1921 . He was a mixture of Russian, French, Italian, German, Ethiopian stock. They of course also came from a Jewish background so his father, known as Klop, was a spy for MI5 against the Germans although in the First World War he fought for the Luftwaffe against the RAF.

During the Second World War Peter was the batman for the actor David Niven. Although Niven could have sat out the War in America he didn't hesitate to throw in his US acting career to return to Britain to take up a commission in the British Army where he became a highly decorated officer.

Sir Peter won numerous awards - Oscars, Bafta's, Emmys and many others. Listen to his genius here. He was a man of many parts, actor, playright, author, producer, commedian, raconteur, and a dozen other talents. Later in life he became an Ambassador for the United Nations.

MORE C & W

Starting with Leroy Van Dyke (born 1929) and his Auctioneer song written about his cousin. This is not the original hit version but one done for an LP I have of Big World of Country Music and it has a stack of violins playing towards the end. Also Leroy sings today Walk on By. I have previously posted his German/English version.

The ever wonderful Everly's with Don Gibson's Just one time.
Gene Autry & Jo Stafford - My Heart Cries For You. The big hit being Guy Mitchell.
Bob Wills with Faded Love.

(link in Mondays post)