Whistlin' Past the Graveyard Trivia Quiz

Answer: Ivy Jo Hunter

In music circles it was well known that Martha Reeves always tried to complete a recording in a single take. One day in May of 1964 she felt she had done justice to a new song she'd been handed. As she completed the take there came an apologetic request from the control room, asking Martha to do one more take as they'd forgotten to turn on the tape. A fired-up Reeves completed the second take but, this time, there was a decided edge to her voice. As she finished, she looked up at the control room to see a beaming Ivy Jo Hunter high fiving his co-writers.

The song, to which he'd written the wonderful back beat that would send punters rushing to the dance floor, was "Dancing in the Street" and he'd just bluffed Martha Reeves into producing the recording of her life.

Hunter was introduced to the Motown label in 1963 and, from the outset, he knew what he wanted out of his songs. He was not prepared to follow the so called "Motown Sound" and he made it clear that he would not be writing the same song twice. As a consequence, he would produce classics such as the sorrow laden ballad, "Ask the Lonely" (1965) for the Four Tops, the ruggedly featured "You" (1968) for Marvin Gaye, the high emotion of "Behind a Painted Smile" (1966) for the Isley Brothers and, of course, the vivacity of "Dancing in the Streets" among others.

As an artist, Hunter was largely ignored by the label, finally releasing the single "I Remember When (Dedicated to Beverley)" in 1970 but the anticipated album never arrived. That year Motown shifted its operations to Los Angeles, which left Hunter stranded in Detroit. He continued working as a session musician and producing the odd collaboration. He would enjoy a slight resurgence in 2012 when rapper Trick Daddy had a hit with "The Children's Song", which was a take on Hunter's "Hold On (to Your Dream)".

Answer: Coolio

Coolio was born Artis Ivey Jr and, when he was eleven years old, his mother moved to Compton, a notoriously gang ridden area of Los Angeles, the same town that saw the rise of the combative hip-hop group NWA.

Despite the upbringing, Coolio's approach was much more lightweight than that of his compatriots (NWA). This was clearly evident on his 1995 hit "Gangsta's Paradise", whose lyrics about the short life of a brutal criminal remained somewhat hidden behind the poppy melody that Coolio had produced. The song appeared in the 1995 film "Dangerous Minds" and earned Coolio a Grammy. It also helped propel his first three albums - "It Takes a Thief" (1994), "Gangsta's Paradise" (1995) and "My Soul" (1997) - to each selling a million copies across the globe.

From this point though, Coolio's star, as a rapper, began to fade significantly. He managed to remain in the public eye through regular appearances in films and television game shows and reality programmes.

Answer: Robin Bachman

At the age of eighteen Robin, better known as Rob or Robbie, Bachman was invited to play drums for the band Brave Belt, by his older brother Randy. He would contribute the song "Summer Soldier" (1972), which would appear on the band's second album.

A short while later the band changed its name to Bachman-Turner Overdrive, who would go on to record a string of Top 40 albums and singles between 1973 and 1976. The most famous of these was "You Ain't Seen Nothing Yet" (1974). Robbie's contributions to the band's successes included writing their 1975 hit "Roll on Down the Highway", which peaked at number 14 on Billboard's Hot 100, and designing the band's iconic "gear" logo, which graced the cover of the band's self-titled 1972 album. It would also lead to their fans being nicknamed "gearheads". Robbie would be inducted into Canada's Music Hall of Fame in 2014.

Answer: Anita Pointer

When you think of the Pointer Sisters it is highly likely that you will recall any number of their disco flavoured dance hits from the late 1970s and early 1980s. Tracks on which Anita sang the lead vocals included "Fire" (1978), "I'm So Excited" (1982), "Slowhand" (1981) and "Yes We Can" (1973). With that in mind, it may surprise that before any of that success, Anita shared in a Grammy Award with her sisters for Best Country Performance by a Duo or a Group. This was as a result of their 1973 hit "Fairytale" of which Anita was the writer. It also saw the band become the first black female group to perform at the Grand Ole Oprey.

Anita would release her first solo album in 1987 and, along with her sisters, would receive a star on Hollywood's Walk of Fame in 1996.

Answer: Huey "Piano" Smith

At his peak, Huey Smith was the epitome of the New Orleans R&B sound. His rollicking and infectious piano playing drew on influences such as the boogie woogie hammerings of Meade Lux Lewis, the jazz stylings of Jelly Roll Morton and the rhythm and blues sound of Fats Domino. It would culminate in his signature tune "Rockin' Pneumonia and the Boogie Woogie Flu". The single sold over a million copies in 1957 and it opened the door to a string of hits such as "Free, Single and Disappointed" (1958) "Genevieve" (1959) and "Beatnik Blues" (1960).

During that period, he'd been contracted to Ace Records, but he soon had a massive falling out with them, which centred on his own composition "Sea Cruise" (1959). Smith had recorded it and, while he was away touring, Ace overdubbed the voice of Frankie Ford onto the recording. The song was a hit for Ford and Smith missed out on significant earnings from what was, essentially, his own work. Smith left to work with Fats Domino at Imperial Records, however, the hits failed to follow him.

Answer: Vivienne Westwood

In 2022 Sky Arts would rank Vivienne Westwood as the fourth most influential artist in Great Britain from the previous fifty years. In the late 1970s, with her then partner, Malcolm McLaren, the manager of the punk rock band The Sex Pistols, she forged a synthesis between fashion and punk rock music that managed to bring both into a mainstream market. The pair had opened a store in London named The SEX Boutique, which helped define the fashion of the pink rock movement.

Westwood would prove to be more than a one-trick pony, winning British designer of the Year on three separate occasions, opening, initially, four stores in London before spreading herself across Great Britain and then the globe. A strong political campaigner, she was not averse to having her stores promote her stances on climate change, civil rights and nuclear disarmament. In 2006 she was recognized for her work when the Queen appointed her a Dame Commander of the British Empire.

Answer: Barrett Strong

Barrett Strong came into prominence with his 1959 hit "Money (That's What I Want)". The song was penned by Berry Gordy and Janie Bradford and it lays claim to being one of the first hit songs for the fledgling Motown label. However, Strong was a notable songwriter as well and he shared the credits, with Norman Whitfield, for such hits as "Heard It Through the Grapevine" (1967), "War" (1969), "Just My Imagination (Running Away With Me)" and "Papa Was a Rolling Stone" (1972). Strong, along with Whitfield would be inducted into the Songwriter's Hall of Fame in 2004.

Answer: Renee Geyer

Renee Geyer, who once described herself as "a white Hungarian Jew from Australia sounding like a 65 year old black man from Alabama", was one of her country's finest jazz and soul singers. She spent ten years in the United States as a sought after session singer, by the likes of Joe Cocker, Sting, Jackson Browne and Bonnie Raitt, but struggled for solo success over there.

Her fortunes were significantly better in Australia and New Zealand where she hit with "Heading in the Right Direction" (1975), Stares and Whispers" (1977) and her iconic cover of James Brown's "It's a Man's Man's Man's World" in 1974.

Her ultimate recognition would come in 2005 when she was inducted into Australia's ARIA Hall of Fame.

Answer: Thom Bell

Jamaican born Thom Bell was one of the early pioneers of what came to be known as the "Philly Sound" in the late 1960s and early 1970s. What held him in good stead, and influenced the lush, symphonic sounds he would create, was his early training as a classical pianist and, he claimed, his lack of exposure to "this thing called rock and roll".

He initially performed as a session musician for the Cameo-Parkway label, and then toured with Chubby Checker as his conductor. In 1967 he met William Hart, front man for the Delfonics and, together, they wrote the band's two biggest hits in "La La (Means I Love You)" (1968) and "Didn't I (Blow Your Mind This Time)" (1970). These were extraordinarily ornate ballads that Thom would also produce for the band.

As a producer he would work with the likes of Dusty Springfield, Elton John and Deneice Williams. He was pivotal to the O'Jays and their 1972 hit "Backstabbers", resurrected the careers of The Spinners by overseeing their hits "Could It Be That I'm Falling in Love" (1972) and "One of a Kind (Love Affair)" (1973). He received a Grammy in 1974 for his collaboration with Dionne Warwick on the song "Then Came You", which also topped the Billboard Hot 100 that same year. He would be inducted into the Songwriter's Hall of Fame in 2016.

Answer: Burt Bacharach

Among the songwriting fraternity, Burt Bacharach represents songwriting royalty. He composed a stream of classic songs, many with lyricist Hal David, that continue to endure through the decades.

Bacharach once said that "if a melody comes too easily to me, I don't think it's any good. I turn it upside down and look at it in the middle of the night". It's little wonder then that his songs are filled with unconventional rhythms, phasing that is somewhat off beat and numerous shifting time signatures. What makes him a genius is that he was able to collate all this into something that was, not only listenable, but pure commercial gold.

His partnership with Hal David commenced in the 1950s at the famous Brill Building and, after their breakthrough hit, "The Story of My Life" (a 1957 hit for Marty Robbins), the partnership blossomed, and the hits did not abate. Another fruitful partnership was born in the 1960s when Bacharach discovered a young session singer named Dionne Warwick for whom the pair created numbers such as "Walk on By" (1963), "Anyone Who Had a Heart" (1964), "I Say a Little Prayer" (1967) and "I'll Never Fall in Love Again" (1968) among others. These songs would sell in excess of 20 million copies and would produce 22 Top 40 hits.

1969 proved to be one of the pair's biggest years culminating in their song "Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head" featuring in the film "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid" and winning the pair an Academy Award. By 1973 the pair would have a falling out over their sharing of profits and rarely worked together again. Bacharach would enjoy a renaissance in the 1980s, initially with his new wife, Carole Bayer Sager, and then a reunion with Dionne Warwick with "That's What Friends Are For" in 1985. His popularity would continue into the 1990s after collaborations with Elvis Costello, who paid tribute to him on his passing stating that "I'm not ashamed to say that I did love this man for everything that he gave".