Ray Stevens and the High School Band

Hello Ray Stevens fans!! One thing you may notice about this fan created blog entry is that, other than the pictorial timeline, I rarely mention Ray's high school years and the band he formed. The reason for this is because of how very little information there is...and what information that exists online is shared on multiple websites to the point that I've never felt it necessary to write a blog entry focusing on his high school band. In other words, with such little information, there's not enough to construct a blog entry. However, a couple of weeks ago on January 12th, Ray posted an image on his social media pages. The image was a photo of himself and his band, The Barons. The photo caption described it as a photo from 1954, when Ray was 15, and it identified the other members of the band, too. In that photo the credited musicians are: Ray Stevens (piano/vocalist); Alan Becker (saxophone); Donald Adams (trumpet); and Don Klett (drums). You can see the photo, which is too large to copy here, by clicking this LINK. I could've saved the photo and then re-sized it...and replaced the larger image with a re-sized copy...and I may do that...but as of now I hadn't. The image of Ray I decided to use in this blog entry is from his years as a disc jockey/host of 'The Record Hop' on WGPC radio in the mid 1950's during the same time period that he was leading The Barons. 

Now, here's where the confusing part comes up. If you're a long time fan of Ray's and know a lot of information about him then you know that Ray's birthname is Harold Ray Ragsdale. He went by the name, Ray Ragsdale, during his childhood and especially in his teen years. He was known as Ray Ragsdale throughout his high school years in Albany, Georgia and Atlanta, Georgia. When you see the photo you'll notice that his stage name, Ray Stevens, is visible on a banner behind him and below the drummer. "Silver Bracelet" is advertised above his name...a song that became his first commercial single in 1957 on Prep Records. If the photo is from 1954 then his name should've been Ray Ragsdale and there wouldn't have been any advertisement for "Silver Bracelet" since that song didn't come along, commercially, until 1957. However, it's possible "Silver Bracelet" had been part of The Baron's set-list in 1954 but it still doesn't explain 'Ray Stevens' on the banner instead of 'Ray Ragsdale'. Ken Nelson, once Ray arrived at Prep Records/Capitol Records in 1957, suggested the name change to 'Ray Stevens'. 

When you read Ray's 2014 memoir, titled Ray Stevens' Nashville, he mentions that he recorded the song three times. He recorded it the first time in his high school's cafeteria. He then recorded it in a more professional setting with record promoter/publisher/producer, Bill Lowery. Ray then recorded it a third time with Ken Nelson as record producer. The third recording is what shown up on vinyl on Prep Records in 1957. The photo identified as 1954 is likely a photo from sometime in 1957/1958 with the musicians correctly identified but with the wrong year given. In his memoir Ray credits The Barons consisting of Bob Duggleby (trumpet); Bill Garrison (saxophone); and Terry Coleman (drums). So, I'm assuming the musicians he credits in his memoir were part of the original Barons line-up of the mid '50s whereas the musicians credited in the January 12th photo on Ray's social media pages are from the final years of the band's existence.  

Ray Stevens audio clip: "Tingle"...

Hello all...earlier today on Ray Stevens social media one of his early recordings was uploaded. If you keep a list of single releases from Ray Stevens or are familiar with the official singles discography then you'll probably be familiar with the song, "Tingle". This teenage love ballad, or some may simply refer to it as teen pop, was typical for the time period...most love ballads carried the sound you'll be hearing when you listen to the embed of "Tingle". Ray wrote the song and it appeared originally as the B-side of "Five More Steps". The songs were released by Prep Records, a subsidiary of Capitol Records, in 1957. In fact, this release was the follow-up single to Ray's debut on vinyl, "Rang Tang Ding Dong" / "Silver Bracelet". If you visit the YouTube page for the official upload of "Tingle" found on Ray's YouTube channel you'll see some commentary over there including one from somebody who isn't too sure it's Ray Stevens. I don't think the person making the comment realized the song was being shared from Ray's official YouTube channel...had they realized it I don't think he would've said such a comment. I left some comments over there...including a link to this fan created Ray Stevens blog page. If you're a long time fan of Ray's as I am you're no doubt familiar with "Tingle" but I've embedded it anyway...

Ray Stevens: 45 at 62...

Hello once again! Upon the time change earlier this morning I'm looking out the window at the darkness at 6:41am...before the time change the sun had already risen by this time of day. The time change is designed to make the spring and summer days have increased hours of sunlight, as far as I know, I don't really get into it that  much. I just spring forward and fall back simply because that's the way it is. The way it was for Ray Stevens in 1958, though, seen him releasing music on Capitol Records. He had previously issued some songs on a subsidiary label of Capitol, Prep Records, but in 1958 he issued several recordings on Capitol and they were produced by Ken Nelson. In total Capitol issued three singles on Ray in 1958 which adds up to six recordings (A-side/B-side). Their first single release was "Chickie Chickie Wah Wah", the subject of this blog entry. An audio clip of the song was uploaded onto YouTube this past Monday and I've embedded it below...



Capitol Records issued the single in May of 1958 with the B-side "Crying Goodbye" from the pen of Ric Cartey. A majority of the songs being recorded by Ray as well as the songs being written by Ray and recorded by other recording acts, and the songs Ray recorded but didn't write in this late '50s time period, were all published by Bill Lowery. Ric Cartey, for example, was a co-writer of one of Lowery Music's biggest copyrights, "Young Love", recorded by Sonny James and then recorded by Tab Hunter in addition to it being recorded first by Ric Cartey himself; years later Ray Stevens would record his rendition of the song and he reached the Country charts with it in 1975.

"Chickie Chickie Wah Wah", in the meantime, carries a very uptempo melody...the saxophone sets the mood. There's always been a tinge of rhythm and blues in Ray's pop music offerings...and a lot of that can be traced to the classic rhythm and blues groups and recording artists he grew up hearing and being influenced by in his earlier years. As most of you know the earliest recordings from Ray Stevens carry a heavy dose of rhythm and blues, catchy melodies/lyrics, and most were in the vein of the teen love ballad of that time period.

His next two single releases for Capitol in 1958 were: "Love Goes on Forever" / "Cat Pants" in August followed by "The Clown" / "School" in November. In the latter release Ken Nelson is credited as the record producer but he was not credited on Ray's first two single releases on Capitol. If you know your Ray Stevens history then you should be aware of the fact that Ken Nelson is the one responsible for urging Harold Ragsdale to come up with a stage name...after some thinking Harold came up with 'Ray Stevens'...and the rest is history.

Ray Stevens...CD import from the United Kingdom...

I came across an internet article about an hour ago indicating that an import CD on Ray Stevens is going to be released soon. The import, from the United Kingdom, has 31 tracks of Ray Stevens greatness. It consists of late '50s and early '60s recordings from Ray that have been commercially available before on long out of print collections...but never before in one comprehensive collection (or as close to comprehensive as you can get when you consider that his professional recordings date back to 1957).

The answer is "no", in case anyone may ask if there's ever been a detailed box set issued on his music. There has never, never NEVER been a career spanning box set of his recordings. It isn't for a "lack of hit songs" or anything...

Even artists that are referred to as pioneers in rock, pop, bluegrass, and country music and never had many or any 'radio hits' have had box sets released spotlighting their catalog of music. One of country music's earliest performers, Jimmie Rodgers, nicknamed The Father of Country Music (among other nick names) released music and had impact before there ever was a creation of a 'country music chart' in Billboard but yet there have been multiple box sets released on him.

The 31 track collection, though not a career spanning box set, assembles a good sampling of Ray's late '50s and early '60s recordings. Titled The Early Ray Stevens, it features eye catching cover art...but there's no information about the possible inclusion of liner notes or an essay of any kind. The music comes from his days at Prep, Capitol, and NRC (the first 15 tracks), and it includes the entire 1962 Mercury LP 1837 Seconds of Humor in addition to "Santa Claus is Watching You" and the single edit of "Ahab the Arab". The LP has 14 tracks on it and so you add up those 14, plus the 15 tracks from the late '50s/early '60s, and you get 29. Add in the single edit of "Ahab the Arab" and the holiday song and there you have the 31 tracks on the CD. America's Amazon site states that the CD is out of stock...it has a release date of April 11 (an error, obviously). On the United Kingdom Amazon site it has the CD available for pre-order but it isn't going to be released until April 22. If you feel comfortable purchasing items from overseas (I've done so only a couple of times) and you want some of Ray's earliest recordings on what appears to be a decently put together CD then visit the United Kingdom Amazon page located HERE and place an order.

You may be thinking to yourself: "...this is all great but what are the songs on the CD??!!"

I haven't forgotten...here's the 31 songs on the CD...

1. Rang Tang Ding Dong
2. Silver Bracelet
3. Cholly Wolly Chang
4. Five More Steps
5. Tingle
6. That's What She Means to Me
7. Chickie Chickie Wah Wah
8. Cat Pants
9. The Clown
10. The School
11. High School Yearbook
12. Truly True
13. What Would I Do without You
14. Sgt. Preston of the Yukon
15. Who Do You Love
16. Jeremiah Peabody's Green and Purple Pills
17. Teen Years
18. Scratch My Back
19. Ahab the Arab (single edit, Monaural)
20. It's Been So Long
21. Furthermore
22. Saturday Night at the Movies
23. Santa Claus Is Watching You
24. Loved and Lost
25. Ahab the Arab (LP version, Stereo)
26. Popeye and Olive Oil
27. Rockin' Boppin' Waltz
28. PFC Rhythm and Blues Jones
29. Rock and Roll Show
30. Julius Played the Trumpet
31. A Hermit Named Dave

If you want to see the CD's picture/cover art, click on the Amazon link above. The song's track list can be seen at the label's site. They also offer it for sale and they have both a United Kingdom and an American price list...click JASMINE LINK to be taken to their store page. They have the release posted as April 11, 2014 (11/04/14) but it should be April 22, 2014 (22/04/14).

In other Ray Stevens news...

Sitting right on the edge of 1,000,000 unique views is the Ray Stevens ballad "God Save Arizona". You want to know just how close to a million it is? It's sitting at 999,015 as of 9am this morning!!! Hopefully by later today, or soon, I'll be able to celebrate the video's entry into the million view club which already contains several other You Tube videos from Ray Stevens.

Since it's Friday, there's a new webisode of Rayality TV posted on Ray's You Tube channel. Here is Webisode 4 of the series...this segment is titled "Back at The Encore" and it's a little more than 5 minutes total...



Yesterday Ray posted a video clip of an appearance he made on a 1990 episode of Funny Business, a series of specials Charlie Chase hosted on The Nashville Network throughout the '80s and '90s.

I'm not embedding it because the audio playback is super low...you'll have to increase your computer's speakers a lot in order to hear it. It's a shame about the audio because it's a really good appearance...most of it takes place on the golf course...and later on Ray performs "Can He Love You Half as Much as I?" (a single of his in late 1986 and into early 1987). Here's a LINK to the video clip...turn up your volume!

Ray Stevens: Nostalgia Valley, Part 40...

One of the finest teen pop love ballads from Ray Stevens came along in 1967 on "Answer Me, My Love". This was among the several single releases that Monument Records issued on Ray Stevens throughout the mid and late '60s that never appeared on any full-length album. The love ballad was accompanied with the catchy sing-a-long "Mary, My Secretary" on the single release. Neither song would appear on any album until some 25 years or so later. "Answer Me, My Love" would appear in 1996 on a CD re-issue of Ray's 1968 Monument album, Even Stevens. That re-issue is on the Varese Sarabande label. Fans and music consumers in general may recognize that label as being prolific in it's treatment of Ray's catalog of music through the years. Varese, for a short period of time, was responsible for keeping Ray's earliest recordings for Monument and Barnaby in print. I researched their first release on Ray being the 1996 Even Stevens re-issue followed by the re-issue of 1969's Gitarzan. Those 1996 releases were soon followed by The Country Hits Collection, All-Time Greatest Hits, and 12 Hits in 1998, 2001, and 2002 respectively. The All-Time release features the super rare "Sgt. Preston of the Yukon" from 1960.

"Mary, My Secretary", also from 1967, wouldn't appear on any album until a 3-CD project titled The Incredible World of Ray Stevens came along. As mentioned in earlier blog entries, this title was released twice...both featuring 3 CD's...but the material was different on each collection. The overseas release features 30 recordings and the America release features 36 recordings. Also, the international release was a packaging of 3 previously issued CD's in one collection while the America release contained songs that appear to have been chosen at random on the first 2 CD's while the third CD is his 1987 release, Crackin' Up. To be clear, "Mary, My Secretary" appears on the 36 track version of The Incredible World of Ray Stevens which you see in the image above. I took this picture a few minutes ago and if you click this picture link you'll see the picture of Ray that was used for the 30 song version. You'll notice right away both releases have nearly the same art design and lettering concept but the images of Ray are different. As far as "Answer Me, My Love" goes, it doesn't appear on this collection...only "Mary, My Secretary" does. I think a lot of Ray Stevens fans agree with me that there needs to be proper CD or Mp3 releases of his Monument catalog. So far two of his studio albums for the label have been issued in their entirety: 1968's Even Stevens and 1969's Gitarzan. Several of his single-only releases for the label have become available in limited quantity on various limited release CD's through the years...all of those releases have long been out of print.

The Monument album that continues to get overlooked is 1969's Have a Little Talk With Myself. I've always felt for the longest time that the reason for the continued omission of that album is due to it's extremely topical feel. Nearly all the songs on that particular album are tied to the pop sounds and social messages of the late '60s...but recently I started to think that the bigger reason the album has never made it to CD or Mp3 in more than 40 years is that several of the songs may be tied up in copyright battles or other legal issues. If so, that could explain why his versions of quite a few of those songs have not seen the light of day during the last 43 years. Also, the license fees for those songs may be enormously expensive today as compared to back then which can also explain why there's been no Have a Little Talk With Myself re-issue. He covers the Beatles, Joe South, Bob Dylan, Blood Sweat and Tears, The 5th Dimension, The Cowsills...just to name a few...acts that certainly defined that era of pop/rock music. The songs that appear on the 1969 album are as follows:

1. I'll Be Your Baby Tonight
2. But You Know I Love You
3. Aquarius
4. The Fool on the Hill
5. Sunday Mornin' Comin' Down
6. Spinning Wheel
7. Games People Play
8. Help
9. Hair
10. Hey Jude
11. The Little Woman
12. Have a Little Talk With Myself

As you can see from the track list, this is the album that featured his version of a brand new song at the time, "Sunday Mornin' Comin' Down". The song was written by Kris Kristofferson. Ray's recording was the first in a long line of recordings by other artists...most notably the hit recording by Johnny Cash in 1970. Ray issued his version as a single in 1969...which, of course, gave Ray the distinction of being the first major recording artist to issue it as a single in addition to being the first artist to record it. Ray's image was in sharp contrast with the song's lyrics...and to this day, when asked about the song, Ray refers to the image factor being a key ingredient in whether the same song can become a hit twice depending on whose singing it. Ray put a lot of production into his recording, too, while the Cash version was minimal in production but heavy on dramatics. I like both versions...but being a Ray Stevens fan I always point out that he introduced the song to the music world even if Johnny Cash had the bigger hit with it. Ray's version reached the lower half of the pop chart and the Top-60 on the country chart in 1969...his first ever appearance on a country music chart. "The Little Woman" and "Have a Little Talk With Myself" were written by Ray...the uptempo title track became a country music chart hit, too.

Ray's biggest area of exposure came with his many appearances on the Andy Williams Show. Soon after, Ray departed from the Monument label. Ray was one of the most popular guests on Andy's program and due to this he was picked to be the host of a summer TV show in 1970 which aired during Andy's time-slot on NBC. Ray had by this time joined the Barnaby Records roster in 1970, a label owned by Andy Williams. Ray remained a frequent guest on Andy's television programs through 1970 and into 1971. Decades later the two of them became major attractions in Branson, Missouri. Andy owned and appeared in his Moon River Theater while Ray appeared at his own Ray Stevens Theatre. Ray owned and operated his theater from 1991 through the end of the 1993 season. When he stopped appearing at the theater he ventured off into other aspects of the music and entertainment business. A lot of his 1990's releases were home video projects. He would later perform a series of concerts at the Wayne Newton Theater. Sandwiched between his closing down of his theater in 1993 and the concerts at Wayne Newton's theater was the release, in 1995, of his home video movie, Get Serious!. The movie runs 1 hour, 50 minutes. The movie went without a title during it's first months of production and was known by the acronym: LFSDCMV. The acronym stands translates to the following: Long-Form Story-Driven Comedy Music Video. Later this year Ray will appear in a string of concerts saluting the life and career of Andy Williams. The concerts featuring Ray will take place in October...click Here to read all about it.

Ray Stevens and the Silver Bracelet...

The one and only Ray Stevens made his way into a recording studio 55 years ago...at the age of 18...to record a series of songs. One of those songs, "Silver Bracelet", was released as a single on the Prep label, a subsidiary of Capitol Records. The year was 1957! Ray recorded for Prep in 1957, Capitol in 1958, and from 1959 through 1961 he was with the NRC label. He released quite a few teen pop ballads and uptempo rocker songs during the late '50s and he performed on quite a few sessions along the way. His session work greatly expanded in the '60s as he moved onto Mercury Records and then Monument Records. The time period being 1961 through early 1970. The session work continued in the '70s but not as consistently as it had been primarily because from 1969 onward Ray became a superstar with music that hit with all music brands: pop, country, adult-contemporary, gospel, plus he was testing the waters with an international market during this same time period. His singles were popping up in Canada, Europe, Asia, Australia...with several singles making the Top-20 and Top-10 on foreign music charts. The extra time for session work predictably had vanished as Ray's fame grew and he became more and more in-demand for concerts and TV appearances.

However, no matter how big Ray Stevens eventually became once he joined Mercury Records in 1961, there's still the musician/producer/arranger/writer side of him that nobody should ever forget....for he still produces, arranges, and plays piano and, or, keyboards and synthesizers on his CD's to this very day. Ray Stevens is a true Renaissance Man whose career extends well beyond the handful of novelty songs that a general public is most familiar with.

These series of anniversary blogs that I've been writing since the first of January are leading up to the much anticipated release of Ray's 9-CD Encyclopedia of Recorded Comedy Music. The release, originally set for January 2012, will now be released in February. I'm really excited to hear Ray's take on a lot of the novelty songs by other artists through the years...and I'm also excited to get the book that'll spotlight all the songs and feature history and other information. According to a radio interview in 2011 the songs will go in alphabetical order starting with songs that begin with the letter "A" and not stop until the end of the alphabet. It's going to be a fascinating collection!

It's Saturday morning...well...Saturday afternoon. As I've discussed elsewhere, white promo singles used to be commonplace amongst radio stations. As the decades went by the singles found their way into the public domain. As you can see on the label, the actual song was produced by Shelby Singleton with orchestra conduction by Jerry Kennedy. The Merry Melody Singers are given credit on the single as well. Several blogs ago I saluted the single turning 50 this year...a Golden Anniversary...and I also praised the song's importance in Ray's career. There have been several versions of the song issued through the years...which is highly understandable considering that record labels own the recordings that artists make and if a label doesn't keep a recording in print then the artist has no choice put to re-record the song(s) in an effort to keep the song(s) in print and available. 1962 was the original year for "Ahab the Arab" while a couple of years later an impromptu version performed on a program hosted by Ralph Emery made an appearance on an obscure vinyl album released by Mercury Records. Ralph is heard at the beginning and the end of the song. In between you have the song itself with some alternate lyrics heard only in that performance. I don't know if this performance is an audio cut from one of Ralph's mid '60s television programs or if it's taken from any number of package shows that used to be commonplace in country music during the '50s through the early '70s where a lot of country artists would travel together, along with an emcee (typically a radio or TV personality) and they'd perform shows. George Strait in more modern times did something like that with his Festival concerts in the late '90s. Anyway...this version with Ralph Emery's announcing can be found on The Best of Ray Stevens. In 1969 the more familiar recording of "Ahab the Arab" was included on the Gitarzan album. I say more familiar because it's that recording which appears on countless compilation albums and it's been the recording that was kept in print the longest during the '70s, '80s, and '90s. A fourth recording arrived in 1995 when the music video came along for his Get Serious! movie. In my Ahab tribute blog I covered a lot of this same information but I thought to bring it back again considering it was several blogs ago.

Examining 1962's Ray Stevens...

In my previous blog entry I examined the year 1992 and today we'll journey 30 years prior to that in 1962! This is the year that is all-important in the career of Ray Stevens because it was 1962 that saw the debut of "Ahab the Arab". This single would tickle the funny bone of America and eventually peak inside the Top-5 of the Hot 100 pop chart. If that wasn't exciting enough the single also crossed-over and reached the Top-10 on the R&B chart. The single was reported to sell over a million copies...it was the third million selling single that Ray was a part of during a recording session at Mercury. Ray took part in the recording of "Wooden Heart" by Joe Dowell and "Walk on By", a huge hit for Leroy Van Dyke. The producer of Ray's material in 1962 was a man by the name of Shelby Singleton. In those days Ray wasn't the producer of his songs but he dabbled in arranging and session work and he slowly stepped into the producer's chair once he joined the Monument label. Ray wrote or co-wrote a large majority of his songs...something that would continue virtually non-stop through the early 1980's before he scaled back on his songwriting to maybe one or two per album.

The teenage love ballad "It's Been So Long" is the B-side of "Ahab the Arab". It's amazing that although the single sold in the millions because of the A-side nobody remembers the B-side...and perhaps one of the trade-offs in the early and mid '60s for Ray is that while he was becoming known in the pop music world as a novelty artist/comedy singer he was allowed to put serious, non-comical recordings as B-sides. Possibly someone out there would have thought to turn the single over and listen to the serious artist beneath the comical image...and perhaps there were people out there who in fact did listen to the single's B-side but certainly not enough people to garner attention to it...and so it would take several years before the serious side of Ray Stevens gained a widespread following.

Late 1962 saw the release of the holiday single, "Santa Claus Is Watching You". There is a longer version and then there is the edited version for radio stations. The longer version includes additional lyrics and features Ray describing the click-clack-click of the reindeer hoofs and the direction in which the reindeer are flying amongst other things. The radio edit cuts out this verse...but the edit is so obvious that those who are unaware that there are two versions could tell there was an edit in the recording. Ray's speech pattern jumps from mid-tempo to up-tempo in split second fashion in the radio edit that you're left wondering "was something cut out?".

The unedited recording of the song is on the Rhino collection, The Best of Ray Stevens. The single would peak in the Top-50 on the pop chart...it would get almost entirely re-written by Ray in 1985 and it's that recording most people are familiar with. The 1962 recording is much more directed at children while the 1985 update is geared toward the adults. The edited version can be found on All-Time Hits, issued by Mercury in 1996 as well as the 1970 compilation, The Best of Ray Stevens, that Mercury released. In addition to the 1997 collection from Rhino, the unedited 1962 version of the song can be found on You Tube...uploaded by a user named verycoolsound...and here it is...

Ray Stevens: Nostalgia Valley, Part 6

Walking through Nostalgia Valley today I decided to take a look at this CD once again. The collection was released back in 1996 as a cassette and a CD. The cassette copy featured 8 songs while the CD featured 11. The label in charge of it's release was Polygram Records, a division of Mercury. This meant, for those who are serious Ray Stevens fans, that the bulk of the material would be lifted from the early 1960's. This is one of the few collections released during this time period to feature original recordings and not the more widely distributed collections of re-recordings that are still floating around. 9 of the 11 songs featured on here were recorded for Mercury Records. There are 2 songs that come from the RCA label**.

1. Ahab the Arab; 1962
2. Butch Babarian; 1964
3. Funny Man; 1963
4. Harry the Hairy Ape; 1963
5. Jeremiah Peabody; 1961
6. My Dad; 1983
7. Santa Claus Is Watching You; 1962
8. Speed Ball; 1963
9. One More Last Chance; 1981**
10. Furthermore; 1962
11. Shriner's Convention; 1980**

"Funny Man" is one of my favorite Ray Stevens songs...when it comes to the non-comical songs from this era. It was issued as a single in 1963 and it peaked below the Top-60 on the Hot 100. In spite of it's lack of commercial success, it's still a great recording. As I've touched upon time and again throughout the many entries of this blog, Ray has often remarked that he rarely made recordings that he thought would sell hundreds of thousands or millions of copies. His goal, according to vintage newspaper clippings and interviews I've uncovered, was to make the best recordings he could. This is why there was a lot of production in his later recordings in the '60s and beyond...he wanted his songs to sound as great to the ear as possible. Fortunately for us a lot of his singles became chart hits and they had just enough appeal, commercially, to allow him to continue to make the kinds of records he wanted to make. His Mercury recordings of the early '60s, several of which appear on this CD, serve as an introduction to the manic, zany recordings that were the epitome of early '60s novelty music. As most of you know, Ray's non-comical side went hand in hand with the funny songs, and "Funny Man" is one of those non-comical songs that tells the story of a man known for being a comic who hides his depression and sadness in an effort to please those who expect him to be a funny man.

Ray Stevens: 45 at 51

The fabulous Ray Stevens was recording for the NRC label during 1959-1960 and "My Heart Cries for You" was one of the singles that the label released. The song was the standard teenage pop heartbreak/heartache love ballad that was enormously popular at the time. I like the song and at various places Ray slips in a little Elvis Presley style vocalization. If someone today were to hear the song and the artist's name would be hidden from view not one person who isn't well-studied on Ray's career would identify the singer as Ray Stevens. The recording was released in 1959 when Ray was all but 20 years old. The producer of the song was a man by the name of Bill Lowery. It's Lowery who became instrumental in helping a group of Georgia singers and entertainers start their path to eventual super-stardom, with Ray being one of the several. There is a video montage of "My Heart Cries For You" on You Tube for those who want to hear the song for themselves. It's available on a very, very obscure ultra-rare CD titled Ray Stevens: The NRC Years that I stumbled on at an on-line auction site. The collection wasn't sold in stores and I don't believe it's in print anymore.  I may have written about this CD before but I've written so many I'm bound to duplicate some things, which is a huge understatement. Anyway...the CD doesn't even have a year of release on it. The catalog number is NRC-CD13 which is very obvious that this CD is the thirteenth in a series of releases on other artists on the NRC label. There are 11 recordings on here, 2 of those recordings are instrumentals. Ray, of course now, is known as a comedic singer and there's two songs on here that are in a novelty/funny category. One of the novelty songs is "Cholly Wolly Chang", a Chinese-laced recording spoofing rock and roll in China. One of the most repeated phrases in the song is "rock and roll Hong Kong!!!". The CD covers his stay with NRC which culminated in 1960 with the release of "Sgt. Preston of the Yukon". That particular song is the second of two on this CD that offer humor.

1. Sgt. Preston of the Yukon
2. Who Do You Love?
3. Happy Blue Year (instrumental)
4. High School Yearbook
5. Truly True
6. What Would I Do Without You?
7. White Christmas (instrumental)
8. My Heart Cries For You
9. Cholly Wolly Chang
10. Part of the Time
11. That's What She Means To Me

 

Ray Stevens: Little Boy Blue

Welcome to another blog entry in my Ray Stevens world. It's been awhile back and I don't recall if I posted about this or not but several months ago a couple of obscure songs from Ray Stevens appeared on You Tube. One of the songs, "Our Wedding Day", is a duet with a singer named Gini Hayes. There was another song, "Little Boy Blue", a solo release that I'm including in this blog. I have no idea what year this recording took place...only that it was during sessions for NRC, the label Ray recorded for during 1959 through 1960. It's published by Lowery Music and it's a rather young vocalization. To date there's only been something like 140 plays of the video since October and so that leads me to believe that it wasn't promoted much or it was a victim of bad timing. Sometimes a video upload will emerge but then a couple of hours later other uploads appear and push something else further down a page. I've seen uploads completely disappear from public lists even though they're still available for the public to watch. Due to the relatively low view total of this upload, I'm hoping to remedy that by including one of the songs in this blog...the quiet, piano laced "Little Boy Blue". The other song, the duet "Our Wedding Day" with Gini Hayes, is also available on You Tube.

Ray Stevens: The Mercury Recordings

Although Ray Stevens officially recorded for Mercury Records for two years, 1961-1963, in that two year span he recorded quite a number of sessions. I've touched upon Ray's material for Mercury Records in other blog entries but I still like the way the picture sleeve of this CD looks. It takes snippets of pictures from the 1970 release, The Best of Ray Stevens, and pastes them onto a new background with an early 1980's picture of Ray. I don't have much information about how many recordings Ray did for Mercury...all I know is the material that's surfaced over the years...the material that was included on his first two albums 1,837 Seconds of Humor and This Is Ray Stevens, more specifically.



The Mercury Records material features the blend of pop, R&B, and novelty styles that would continue to be a big part of Ray's recordings. As the years went by he added country elements to his recordings. Through the years Ray's Mercury material has surfaced on a variety of LP's and tapes and CD's...and now MP3's. The above picture is the 1970 release featuring a more contemporary artist rendering of Ray...for whatever reason a lot of the Mercury subsidiaries like to put a modern-day picture of Ray Stevens on their releases when the material is clearly from the early '60s.



The album/CD above is called Ahab the Arab as well. A lot of the Mercury re-issues use the name of a song.

In 1989, Mercury/Polygram released an eight song collection called Funny Man which featured eight songs already found on the other Mercury collections. The album cover resembles the one above...a profile picture of Ray in the yellow/tan suit.

In 1996 Polygram released All-Time Hits which featured 8 songs on cassette and 11 songs on CD. The material wasn't all Mercury, though...but a good amount was. Two songs, "Shriner's Convention" and "One More Last Chance" were from 1980 and 1981...recorded for RCA Records. The other songs were recorded for Mercury. The picture of Ray was a contemporary one...



1. Ahab the Arab; 1962
2. Butch Babarian; 1963 {CD exclusive}
3. Funny Man; 1963
4. Harry the Hairy Ape; 1963
5. Jeremiah Peabody's Green and Purple Pills; 1961
6. My Dad; 1983
7. Santa Claus Is Watching You; 1962 {CD exclusive}
8. Speed Ball; 1963
9. One More Last Chance; 1981 {CD exclusive}
10. Furthermore; 1962
11. Shriner's Convention; 1980

Ray returned to Mercury Records in 1983. He recorded one album, Me, and released a few singles. I have no idea as to what caused it but this album was never really promoted or publicized much at all. Perhaps behind-the-scenes chaos or turmoil prevented the album from being properly publicized/promoted? Everyone knows that publicity is a big factor in the advertising of a single or an album...I've gone through the vintage news time-line archives for "Ray Stevens + 1983" and there's no real publicity for the album. The song, "My Dad", comes from that 1983 album and it's on the All-Time Hits collection above. It reached the country chart in 1984...before you can ask, I've already checked the news archive time-line for Ray in 1984 and there's no mention of Me. However, Ray appeared on an episode of Fall Guy and performed "A Piece of Paradise Called Tennessee"...so there was some kind of publicity for the album but nothing conventional. For more information on this album, seek my blog entry about it. The archive blog entries are located to the right of the blog...click on the arrow next to each month and the blog entries will drop down.

Chickie...chick...chick...Chickie...

This is a rare single from the late 1950's featuring Ray Stevens. The A-side is "Chickie Chickie Wah Wah" and the B-side is "Crying Goodbye". Oh yes, the A-side is definitely the way you may think it is. It's an up-tempo pop song geared toward the teenage audience of the time. The fact that there's a picture of Ray on the front of the single speaks volumes for an unknown artist at the time. I have the song...not the actual single that you see here. There's a You Tube video montage of the song. It has this bluesy feel...it isn't depressing, though...more rhythm and blues than straight forward blues. It has a consistent saxophone arrangement in addition to the catchy lyrics in the chorus of the song. It was probably an Atlanta, Georgia jukebox favorite in 1958...and it's a catchy little song...if you hear it you'll be going around for several days singing "chickie chickie chick chick chickie chickie wah wah" over and over...perhaps when you're walking you'll be thinking of the melody and find yourself stepping in rhythm? Just make sure you're not walking on mud because you'll be stepping high as you stroll along and you wouldn't want any mud from your shoes to fly up and hit your walking partner.