Uploaded January 2015 | Updated September 2026, 35 minutes ago
ORCHESTRAL MANOEUVRES IN THE CHARTS - 1974
Song that entered the charts : " Love's Theme "
Performed by : The Love Unlimited Orchestra
HCP = 1 The song was written by Barry White.
XAVIER CUGAT
Cugat's family emigrated to Cuba when he was five. He trained as a classical violinist and played with the Orchestra of the Teatro Nacional in Havana. Cugat moved to New York somewhere between 1915 and 1918, where he had his first brush with success during the tango craze with a band called "The Gigolos." When the craze ended, the band folded, and he picked up odd jobs as a violinist. Eventually, he went to work for the Los Angeles Times as a cartoonist (Cugat's caricatures would later be syndicated by King Features). In the late 1920s, as sound began to be used in movies, he assembled another tango band that had some success in very early musical shorts. By the early 1930s, he began appearing with some incarnation of his group in feature films with such memorable titles as "In Gay Madrid."
Cugat took his band to New York to open the new Waldorf Astoria Hotel and it became the hotel's resident group. His success was as much due to his showmanship (he dressed the band in flaming red jackets and kept up a lively patter in between a steady flow of novelty numbers mixed with dance tunes. Cugat never had any regrets about his artistic compromises: "I would rather play Chiquita Banana and have my swimming pool than play Bach and starve."
He worked the LA-New York circuit regularly for most of the next 30 years, alternating hotel and radio dates with movie appearances. In 1940, he recorded the song "Perfidia" with singer Miguelito Valdes and had a huge hit. Cugat had few Top 10 hits, but he was never one to miss a trend, quickly turning out records to share in the success of the conga craze, the mambo craze, the cha-cha craze, the twist craze--you name it.
Cugat's later work is among his most interesting and listenable. His Mercury albums of the early 1960s feature some audacious stereo arrangements. "Cugie's Cocktails" is a must for your next lounge party, with all its cuts oriented about the cocktail theme ("Manhattan," "Cuba Libre," "Creme de Menthe," as well as several terrific originals). Switching to Decca in the mid-1960s, he put out a series of albums that fall somewhere between discotheque and Latin soul and include some excellent numbers
Cugat probably had more to do with the infusion of Latin music into the popular American scene than any other musician--Desi Arnaz and Perez Prado definitely followed in Cugat's footsteps.
FASCINATING RHYTHM
"Fascinating Rhythm" is a popular song written by George Gershwin in 1924 with lyrics by Ira Gershwin.
A large number of recorded versions exist. One of the rarest recordings is one by Joe Bari (a pseudonym of Anthony Dominick Benedetto, later better known as Tony Bennett) for Leslie Records in 1949 and issued as catalog number 919 with "Vieni Qui" as the flip side.
MHO
Well, yes indeed : guys like Xavier Cugat went along with the hypes and crazes of their times and tried not to miss "the money train" but one has to admit that, what they did, was top of the bill professionally speaking. Here's a great example where "Cugie" turns the classic Gershwin song of 1924 into a "hip" twist dance version. And he 'gets away with it" ! The arrangement is brilliant and doesn't leave anything to be desired. We tried our best with regard to the editing of this one but one should be aware that this recording was made in 1959.
Nevertheless : some spectacular listening is guaranteed here and, why not re-discover that sixties dance craze : the twist :-) ?
Whatever you decide to do : enjoy !
ORCHESTRAL MANOEUVRES IN THE CHARTS - 1974
Song that entered the charts : " Love's Theme "
Performed by : The Love Unlimited Orchestra
HCP = 1 The song was written by Barry White.
XAVIER CUGAT
Cugat's family emigrated to Cuba when he was five. He trained as a classical violinist and played with the Orchestra of the Teatro Nacional in Havana. Cugat moved to New York somewhere between 1915 and 1918, where he had his first brush with success during the tango craze with a band called "The Gigolos." When the craze ended, the band folded, and he picked up odd jobs as a violinist. Eventually, he went to work for the Los Angeles Times as a cartoonist (Cugat's caricatures would later be syndicated by King Features). In the late 1920s, as sound began to be used in movies, he assembled another tango band that had some success in very early musical shorts. By the early 1930s, he began appearing with some incarnation of his group in feature films with such memorable titles as "In Gay Madrid."
Cugat took his band to New York to open the new Waldorf Astoria Hotel and it became the hotel's resident group. His success was as much due to his showmanship (he dressed the band in flaming red jackets and kept up a lively patter in between a steady flow of novelty numbers mixed with dance tunes. Cugat never had any regrets about his artistic compromises: "I would rather play Chiquita Banana and have my swimming pool than play Bach and starve."
He worked the LA-New York circuit regularly for most of the next 30 years, alternating hotel and radio dates with movie appearances. In 1940, he recorded the song "Perfidia" with singer Miguelito Valdes and had a huge hit. Cugat had few Top 10 hits, but he was never one to miss a trend, quickly turning out records to share in the success of the conga craze, the mambo craze, the cha-cha craze, the twist craze--you name it.
Cugat's later work is among his most interesting and listenable. His Mercury albums of the early 1960s feature some audacious stereo arrangements. "Cugie's Cocktails" is a must for your next lounge party, with all its cuts oriented about the cocktail theme ("Manhattan," "Cuba Libre," "Creme de Menthe," as well as several terrific originals). Switching to Decca in the mid-1960s, he put out a series of albums that fall somewhere between discotheque and Latin soul and include some excellent numbers
Cugat probably had more to do with the infusion of Latin music into the popular American scene than any other musician--Desi Arnaz and Perez Prado definitely followed in Cugat's footsteps.
FASCINATING RHYTHM
"Fascinating Rhythm" is a popular song written by George Gershwin in 1924 with lyrics by Ira Gershwin.
A large number of recorded versions exist. One of the rarest recordings is one by Joe Bari (a pseudonym of Anthony Dominick Benedetto, later better known as Tony Bennett) for Leslie Records in 1949 and issued as catalog number 919 with "Vieni Qui" as the flip side.
MHO
Well, yes indeed : guys like Xavier Cugat went along with the hypes and crazes of their times and tried not to miss "the money train" but one has to admit that, what they did, was top of the bill professionally speaking. Here's a great example where "Cugie" turns the classic Gershwin song of 1924 into a "hip" twist dance version. And he 'gets away with it" ! The arrangement is brilliant and doesn't leave anything to be desired. We tried our best with regard to the editing of this one but one should be aware that this recording was made in 1959.
Nevertheless : some spectacular listening is guaranteed here and, why not re-discover that sixties dance craze : the twist :-) ?
Whatever you decide to do : enjoy !
