One last quiz on Billboard hits from 1960

Answer: My Heart Has a Mind of Its Own

Don't you just hate it when your brain tells you one thing but your heart tells you another! Clearly that's Connie's issue here.

The other songs listed for your consideration were other big hits for Francis: "Who's Sorry Now" was her first solo charting success at Number Four in 1958; "Many Tears Ago" was her follow-up to the song featured here and reached Number Seven, the same chart rung that "Breakin' In a Brand New Broken Heart" achieved a few months later in 1961.

The song was written by the prolific team of Howard Greenfield and Jerry Keller, denizens of the famous Brill Building. Among their bigger hits were "Everybody's Somebody's Fool" which was Francis' first Number One hit just a couple of months earlier, "Venus in Blue Jeans", a Number Seven success for Jimmy Clanton and "Run to Him" by Bobby Vee which peaked at Number Two.

Francis would have one more Number One hit, "Don't Break the Heart that Loves You" in 1962 before her top 40 charting successes came to an end in 1964. She and Brenda Lee were the dominant female R&R artists in the early 1960s.

"My Heart Has a Mind of Its Own" was the 15th biggest hit of 1960 based on Billboard's ranking system.

Answer: Wild One

Bobby Rydell (nee Robert Riderelli) was born in Philadelphia in 1942 and started performing, with his father's approval, as a four-year-old drummer. By 1951, he was a regular on Paul Whiteman's TV show and later drummed for a local group that also featured Frankie Avalon on trumpet. Signing his first recording contract in 1957, it took a couple of years of failed releases before he scored with "Wild One" written by the team of Appel, Mann and Lowe.

Rydell churned out a steady stream of charting hits that usually peaked between 10 and 20 on the Hot 100 until the end of 1963 with his final Number Four hit "Forget Him". As with so many of his contemporaries who shot to stardom in that era, the British Invasion had a devastating effect on his recording career. He would have no further Billboard action of any consequence but fortunately for him, he had already gotten involved in acting with a prominent role in the 1963 film "Bye Bye Birdie". Over the years since then, he has juggled his acting career with regular performances on the "oldies" night club circuit.

Answer: Burning Bridges

Jack Scott (nee Giavanni Scafone, Jr.) was born in Windsor, Ontario in 1936 and moved with his parents across the river to Detroit, Michigan ten years later. It was there that he began to forge his career in music at the dawn of the Rock & Roll era in the mid-1950s being credited as the first white R&R recording artist from Detroit to achieve success. Success in this instance consisted of four top ten Hot 100 hits: "My True Love", a Number Three hit in 1958; "Goodbye Baby", at Number Eight in 1959; and the two hits in 1960 mentioned in the question, "What in the World's Come Over You" and "Burning Bridges" at Number Five and Three respectively. Of the four chart entries he had in 1961, the highest any of them charted was at Number 83 and he subsequently seemed to slip into complete and total obscurity.

Listening to his songs today, they tended to be melancholy in nature, performed in a deep baritone register befitting his lyrical themes. His back-up singers, The Chantones, were excellent but they too emphasized the lower end of the music scale. If he continued to write and perform songs of this ilk, I wonder if the listening and buying public just became weary of the angst and gloom.

I noted with interest that in a review in 1990, Dave Marsh, an editor with The Rolling Stone Record Guide, stated that Jack Scott was "undeniably the greatest Canadian rock and roll singer of all time." He also was a Michigan resident and conceivably somewhat biased in this view. Of course, I'm unaware of the criterion Marsh used in coming to that conclusion, but speaking as a Canadian, I don't share that hyperbole and can think of a least half a dozen others who would fit the label more aptly.

Answer: I Want to Be Wanted

If you're an expert at identifying Number One hits, your task was much easier as "I Want to Be Wanted" was the only chart topper listed. All the other choices were Brenda Lee hits and we'll recap them now. "Emotions" peaked at Number Seven in 1961, "All Alone Am I" worked its way up to Number Three in 1962, while "I Wonder" could do no better than Number 25 in 1963. Of those other 1960 hits alluded to in the question, her Top 40 debut was the Number Four "Sweet Nothin's" followed by her first Number One hit, "I'm Sorry". Her third Top 40 listing was the Number Six "That's All You Gotta Do".

Brenda Lee first entered the Hot 100 in 1957 when she was all of 12 years old with two releases that reached pinnacles of Number 43 and Number 72 on that chart. However, once she got rolling, "Little Miss Dynamite" was a fixture on the Top 40 for seven years ultimately releasing 29 hits that made that grade and a total of 55 that achieved Hot 100 status between 1957 to 1973. In the late 1960s and thereafter, she focused on Country music and continued to record charting hits in that genre into the mid-1980s. Ultimately, she was accorded Hall of Fame honors in both genres.

Answer: Sailor

Although sung in German, in the middle of the song Lolita provides a spoken verse in English which spells out the theme.

"Sailor, sailor, your home is the deep blue sea
Your ship is your love and the stars are your best friends
And though you find your thrills in places far away from me
Just remember I'm always waiting when your journey ends"

The song was written by Warner Scharfenberger and Fini Busch and the English lyrics were provided by Norman Newell under the alias David West.

Lolita (nee Edith "Ditta" Einzinger) was a Vienna based "Schlager" singer who achieved international success with this recording. It was particularly popular in Norway and Sweden, topping their charts for nine and eleven weeks respectively, and in Canada, Number one for two weeks. It was Number Two in Germany and a top ten hit on virtually every other European and English-speaking country's chart... except, of course, in the U.K. where Clark's version held sway. It remained the highest charting German language song in Billboard history until Nena's "99 Luft Balloons" peaked at Number 2 in 1984.

Schlager music (translates to "hits" in English) is based on simple, but catchy, instrumental music. When lyrics are added, they tend to focus on love or other positive emotions and rarely stray to the "dark side". Basically, it's easy listening music and it grew in popularity in Germany shortly after WWII as perhaps national resistance to American "pop" and Rock & Roll music and remains popular to this day, much to the chagrin of many younger German music critics.

Lolita never made another charting appearance on Billboard but continued to have many hits in Central European countries and remained a popular cabaret chanteuse until 2005. She passed away of cancer in 2010 at the age of 79.

Answer: Volare (Nel Blu Di Pinto Di Blu)

The beauty of popular music in the 1950s and 1960s, and indeed for a couple of decades afterward, was its cosmopolitan nature as reflected by the Billboard charts. Songs sung in German, Italian, Spanish, French and even Japanese would periodically make an appearance and I believe it broadened our appreciation of music in its various genres.

"Volare" was an Italian song co-written and recorded by Domenico Modugno. It topped the Billboard Hot 100 for five weeks in 1958 and was deemed to be the "Song of the Year" by that publication. Dean Martin recorded a version that was essentially bilingual and it charted a creditable Number 12 that same year. Other than Rydell's version, "Volare" made a further chart appearance by Al Martino in 1975 with a version that stalled at Number 33.

Rydell's hit was one of the top 100 songs of 1960 finishing in the 58th slot.

Answer: Walk Don't Run

The Ventures, formed in 1958, were original members Don Wilson (rhythm guitar) and Bob Bogle (lead guitar), joined later by Nokie Edwards on bass and Howie Johnson on drums. By 1960, Bogle and Edwards had swapped instruments and in 1962, Don Taylor replaced Johnson and it was that lineup that became the most revered instrumental group of the 1960s.

"Walk Don't Run" was not an original composition of theirs. It was originally composed by a fellow named Johnny Smith but they first heard it on a Chet Atkins LP. They decided to record it themselves and it became the lead-in music for a local TV news program where it garnered the attention of a record executive who wanted to distribute it nationally. You know the rest.

The Ventures really didn't have a lot of success with their individually released singles. Of course "Walk Don't Run" charted those two times but their only other big hit was in 1969 with the Number Four "Hawaii Five-0". What they did very successfully, however, was create "concept" albums where they would incorporate individual tracks into a theme. An example from my own personal album collection was "The Colorful Ventures". Among the songs they covered were "Blue Moon", "Greenfields", "Yellow Bird" and "Cherry Pink and Apple Blossom White". Later album topics included surfing music, country classics, psychedelic music, music to spy by, and so on. This allowed them to drift with musical tastes and whims without being trapped in a style that would quickly become passé. As such, they sold millions of discs world wide including an estimated 40 million in Japan alone where they were particularly popular. Although all the original Ventures are now deceased, a continuous thread from those originals exists and the latest incarnation still tours worldwide with an emphasis, of course, in Japan.

For the record, "Red River Rock" was a Number Five hit for Johnny and the Hurricanes in 1959, The Champs took "Tequila" to Number One in 1958 while "Apache" hit Number Two for Jorgen Ingmann in 1961 on the Hot 100. It topped the U.K. charts by The Shadows, Cliff Richards' supporting band.

Answer: Georgia

That Number One song was "Georgia On My Mind" as recorded by Ray Charles. It was not a new song, originally written by Hoagy Carmichael (music) and Stuart Gorrell (lyrics) in 1930. They were ensconced in an apartment during a cold, blustery night in New York City when their thoughts drifted to what it might be like that moment in Georgia. Carmichael suddenly remembered that the great jazz saxophonist, Frankie Trumbaur, encouraged him to someday write a song about Georgia and so that's what Carmichael and Gorrell did! Carmichael recorded it himself later that year with guitarist Eddie Lang and cornetist Bix Beiderbecke in what was reputed to be the latter's last recording session. Their version did not chart at that time but another version by Trumbaur did reaching Number Ten. Apropos!

It was recorded by many others thereafter culminating in Charles' hit rendition in 1960. In March of 1979, Charles performed the song for the state's General Assembly as part of a ceremony regarding civil rights legislation being enacted in that state. A month later, that Assembly officially designated it as the State Song.

Answer: The Bismarck

The Bismarck and its sister ship, The Tirpitz, were the two largest battleships ever built by Germany and among the largest ever produced by a European country at the time. Although the song suggests that The Bismarck was a menace to the Allies and creating havoc on the high seas, it was, in fact, on its maiden voyage and this was its first conflict. In its initial engagement with the British navy in the Denmark Strait, it was heavily damaged but after sinking the British battleship, The Hood, it managed to slink away and headed for occupied France to effect repairs. It was spotted by some obsolescent British Swordfish biplane torpedo bombers and by absolute fluke, one managed a direct hit on its rudder thus rendering the steering mechanism inoperable. Now a sitting duck, it was bombarded relentlessly by several British ships and sunk May 27, 1941. Essentially, The Bismarck was in operation during the war for a grand total of eight days!

The Tirpitz also failed to survive the war. On November 12, 1944, it was hit directly by two large 12,000 pound bombs dropped by British Lancaster bombers off the coast of Norway. It capsized almost immediately and subsequent explosions caused its total destruction.

The Graf Spee was a German cruiser that was scuttled in the harbor of Montevideo, Uruguay, subsequent to one of the first significant sea battles of WWII in the South Atlantic in December 1939. It was heavily damaged during the conflict with three British vessels and the ship's captain took this course of action rather than risk it being captured by the British upon its repair.

The Hindenburg was a famous dirigible that caught fire and was destroyed while attempting a landing in New Jersey on May 6, 1937.

Although the song did achieve that rather lofty chart position on the Hot 100 at Number Three, it didn't have the longevity on the charts to secure enough points to make the list for Top 100 Billboard yearly rankings for 1960. However, Horton himself wasn't quite done yet. Later that year, his hit "North to Alaska" soared to Number Four and finished the year as the 9th biggest hit of 1960.

Answer: an itsy bitsy, teeny weeny, yellow polka dot bikini

In the early 1960s, the bikini bathing suit was still something of a rarity, at least in North America. This song is credited by some observers as popularising it among those with the "attributes" to make it appealing. Simultaneously, a raft of beach movies featuring this bathing option were also becoming popular at the time and it didn't take long for the bikini to become perfectly acceptable beach attire.

Brian Hyland was only 16 years old when this song was recorded so perhaps it was befitting that his debut was styled in the "teeny bopper", bubblegum rock genre... which he apparently abandoned immediately! He was a periodic charting presence throughout the 1960s but only had two more significant hits. "Sealed With a Kiss" achieved Number Three status in 1962 on both the Hot 100 and the British singles chart while "Gypsy Woman" also went to Number Three on the Hot 100 but stumbled to Number 42 abroad. He continued to record throughout the balance of the 20th Century without success but also maintained an active touring presence around the world. While doing research for this quiz, I spotted a video of Hyland on YouTube performing in Germany in 2017. Unfortunately, he doesn't seem to have an active web page so it's hard to know if he still is on the road and where he might be performing in the future.