Two-Hit Wonders - More from 1960-64 Quiz

Answer: Johnny Angel

This fluffy ode to puppy love was "Johnny Angel". "Johnny Loves Me" was her other Top 40 hit, the follow-up which peaked at Number 21. "Johnny Get Angry" was a Number Seven hit for Joanie Sommers while "Johnny Jingo" also peaked at Number 21 for Hayley Mills. Johnny was the hot name in 1962 as all of these songs charted that year.

Fabares was born in Southern California in 1944 and is the niece of actress Nanette Fabray. Notice the similarity in last names - Nanette changed hers! Starting at the age of ten, she had appeared in several movies and TV shows before landing that plum role on the "Donna Reed Show" in 1958. That gig lasted for seven years after which she starred in three Elvis movies; "Girl Happy", Spin Out" and "Clambake". She married music producer Lou Adler in 1964, a union that lasted only a couple of years although they did not divorce until 1980. Her career as an actress stalled somewhat from the mid 1960s until 1989 when she was cast as Craig T. Nelson's wife on the successful TV series "Coach".

During those fallow years between starring TV roles, she gave no consideration whatsoever to resuming her singing career. After her first two hits, subsequent efforts barely made the middle ranges of the Hot 100 and she never really thought of herself as a singer. Her recordings were stimulated by the production company of the "Donna Reed Show" to give it publicity and recognizing that, she played along for the fun of it.

Following the demise of "Coach" in 1997, Fabares has withdrawn somewhat from the entertainment business. Ill health played a role in that decision. In 2000, she required a liver transplant but more importantly, she has been devoting much of her energy to social activism, primarily raising awareness and funding to combat Alzheimer's Disease, a cause she is joined in with Mike Farrell of "M*A*S*H" fame, her husband since 1984.

Answer: I'm Gonna Knock on Your Door

"(Girls, Girls, Girls) Made to Love", a composition of Phil Everly, was Hodges' other Top 20 hit at Number 14 in 1962. "Dreamin'" was performed by Johnny Burnette peaking at Number 11 in 1960 while "Wake Up and Love Me" barely made the Hot 100 at Number 93 for April Stevens and Nino Tempo in 1974.

Hodges made his acting debut at the age of ten in the original Broadway production of "The Music Man" in 1957 playing Marian the Librarian's kid brother Winthrop Paroo. Two years later, he made his film debut in "A Hole in the Head" starring Frank Sinatra, then in 1960, he played the lead role in "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" also starring Tony Randall and Archie Moore. Now a movie star, he was immediately qualified for becoming a recording artist and with due credit, his two hits were good fun and not bad at all. After his two initial successful recordings, Hodges only mustered up one more Hot 100 entry with his rendering of "New Orleans" which peaked at Number 44 in 1965. Meanwhile, his film career also stalled with a few scattered TV and film appearances throughout the 1960s. At the end of the decade, he was drafted into the military and served in a non-combative role until his discharge. Now in his early 20s, Hodges became disillusioned with Hollywood and the entertainment industry in general so he returned to his native Mississippi, enrolled at the U. of Southern Mississippi and graduated with a B.A. in Psychology and an M.S. in counseling. He served as a mental health counselor for the rest of his working career although he continues to dabble as a song writer in his spare time.

Answer: Easier Said Than Done

In 1962 in Okinawa, Japan, a couple of marines got together and formed a little musical combo. When they both were transferred to Camp LeJeune in N. Carolina, they recruited a couple of other jarheads to form a quartet. One evening at the NCO club, they heard another colleague, Anita Humes, singing and they recognized that she might be the lead singing missing link that could make them an exceptional group. With her on board and armed with a song composed by a couple of other leathernecks," Easier Said Than Done", they earned a recording contract and shortly thereafter, topped the charts. Talk about a meteoric rise!

Being a musical group while in the military poses unique problems. Within weeks of this song charting and before they could even record their follow-up, one member of the group was transferred elsewhere and they were reduced to four. Touring in support of the song was impossible and this would be an issue indefinitely. Nevertheless, they did have good success with their follow-up, "A Walking Miracle", written by the same fellows who composed "Easier Said Than Done" but subsequent efforts were fruitless. Rather than battle the barriers that were holding them back as a recording entity, they disbanded in 1964, less than eighteen months after their genesis. Humes did assay a solo career following her discharge without any significant success but the rest of the group seems to have abandoned any notions of pursuing a career in music.

Answer: Handy Man

"Handy Man" was the debut hit for Jones and he followed it up with "Good Timin'".

Jones was born in Montgomery, Alabama in 1937 and moved with his family to New York in the early 1950s. Like so many others there and then, he started singing with street doo-wop groups and by the middle of the decade, he formed and reformed a couple of groups and acted as lead vocalist. Eventually, he tired of the responsibilities related to group leadership and set out on his own in 1959. He teamed up with Otis Blackwell in composing "Handy Man" and I'm sure he was somewhat surprised that it became such a hit on his first try, perhaps doubly so when "Good Timin'" proved to be equally successful. It's hard to explain what went wrong after that but his next two releases could only stagger up to the mid-80s on the Hot 100 although they did do marginally better in the U.K. Then... nada anywhere! It wasn't for lack of trying as he continued to record the entire decade and his style of R&B remained popular over that period. One must assume it was either poor material or poor management. He continued to perform well into the new millennium. He passed away in August, 2012.

Answer: Theme From "A Summer Place"

None of the other choices were ever Number One hits.

Percy Faith was born in Toronto in 1907 and was a piano playing prodigy. He played the piano in theatres for silent films as a youth but had to give up playing after injuring his hands in a fire when he was 18. Turning to music arranging and conducting, he had his own program on CBC radio during the 1930s. When his program was axed, he moved to the U.S. and eventually gravitated to California where he served as musical director for Columbia Records while also conducting an orchestra that recorded easy listening pop music. He had several big hits in the early 1950s prior to the onset of the rock era, among them the Number Ones "Delicado" and "Song from Moulin Rouge". He arranged and orchestrated the music for most of Columbia's biggest recording artists during the 1950s and 1960s but other than the songs noted, most of the music he recorded was album material. The few that were released as singles usually stalled in the 60 to 80 range of the Hot 100. He passed away in 1976.

Theme From "A Summer Place" was composed by Austrian native Max Steiner and if you're not familiar with that name, you ought to be. He was responsible for composing, arranging or conducting the scores for over 300 movies. He frequently performed all three of those roles in the same film and his list of credits includes some of the greatest movies of all time: most of the Astaire/Rogers movies; almost all of Bogart's classic films of the 1940s; and most notably, "Gone With the Wind". The list is far too extensive to even consider itemizing a partial list beyond those noted. Suffice to say, he is often accorded the sobriquet of "the father of film music", a title justly earned. He passed away in Hollywood in 1971 at the age of 83.

Answer: Don't Let The Rain Come Down (Crooked Little Man)

Okay, I'll admit that this is a question where you pretty much had to know the answer to get it but I think it was popular enough at the time that most who lived through the era should remember it. The other possible answers (those without the parentheses) were actual song titles; "Beans in My Ears" was the other Serendipity Singers song which peaked at Number 30 in that same year of 1964. The other two titles, "Green, Green" and "Saturday Night", were Number 14 and 29 hits in 1963 for that rival group, The New Christy Minstrels.

As noted in the question, these super groups, so named because of their size (nine members for the Serendipity Singers), were really show groups in my opinion. Folk songs were included in their repertoire but pop songs, show tunes and other types of music probably comprised more of their material.

The "Crooked Little Man" part of the song was an old English rhyme dating back to the 1840s. It appears that the "Don't Let the Rain Come Down" component was added on as the chorus by the composers to give the song some added depth. Their other hit, "Beans in My Ears", might have charted a little higher except that it was banned for radio play in many jurisdictions. The song was actually a criticism of parents who weren't listening to their children... they were the ones who had "beans in their ears" but for most of the lyric, observations were made about why kids would do so. Clearly, such an activity could have serious consequences, hence the ban.

The arrival of the British invasion in 1964 and the subsequent changes in musical tastes of the public assured that the group would likely not have further popular charting success. However, their brand of entertainment nicely filled the niche for folks seeking nice voices singing nice songs. They joined other erstwhile folk groups in provided that type of entertainment such as The Brothers Four, The Limelighters and The Lettermen, all of whom have survived successfully into the new millennium. The current group of Serendipity Singers performs on cruises, trade shows and milieus of similar ilk but it's an entirely new group of ever shifting personnel. The last of the original members left the group in the late 1960s.

Answer: The Shoop Shoop Song

If you wanna know why it's called "The Shoop Shoop Song", click on this YouTube link - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B4KN6TFhy2I

Every time Betty sings "If you wanna know if he loves you so, it's in his kiss", the back-up group, the Opals from Chicago, sing "Shoop, Shoop, Shoop". So, it was officially entitled "The Shoop Shoop Song (It's in His Kiss)".

Betty was born in Greenwood, Mississippi in 1939 and grew up in a culture of Gospel music. She moved to Chicago at the age of 18 intent on establishing a career recording secular R&B music. It took six years but she finally made a small dent on the charts with a Number 51 recording of "You're No Good". It would later be revived by Linda Ronstadt in 1975 becoming Linda's sole Number One hit. "The Shoop Shoop Song", Betty's next release, established her in the business leading to a series of recordings with Jerry Butler with whom she recorded the Number Five hit "Let It Be Me", a cover of the Everly Brothers hit from 1960. Unfortunately, her record label, Vee-jay, folded in 1966 and Betty bounced from label to label trying to rediscover the earlier magic. Her second solo hit came in 1969 with "There'll Come a Time" charting at a respectable Number 26 on the Hot 100 but Number Two on the R&B chart. It looked like she was back but instead it was her last hurrah. Despite continuing to record throughout the 1970s, further success eluded her. She did receive some renewed attention when Cher recorded the song in 1990 and took it to Number 33 on the charts. By then, Betty had moved to Beloit, Wisconsin to live with her sister and immerse herself in church work. She passed away in 2001.

Answer: Down at Papa Joe's

I may be wrong, but I'm guessing that this may very well be the toughest question you will encounter in this series of quizzes. "Southtown, U.S.A." was their other hit.

The Dixiebelles' recordings were bouncy and fun with a Dixieland flavor to them. Those of you who are unfamiliar with their work, click on these links and enjoy.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pE7fIvkYhok and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UA7vUzaR430

Rumours persist that two groups of Dixiebelles existed. One was a studio group, an all white trio culled from The Anita Kerr Singers, who recorded the songs. Then, for tours, a trio of black girls was recruited to perform the songs on the road. The various websites I scour to access information do not validate this rumour. Instead, full credit is given to Mary Hunt, Mildred Pratcher, and Shirley Thomas as the Dixiebelles. Definitely all black, they were originally members of The Tonettes before becoming the Dixiebelles. After a third release failed to chart at all, differing stories exist as to the demise of the group. One suggests that the girls simply decided to break up and go their separate ways while another counters that their contract with Sound Stage 7 records was not being renewed leading to the group's decision to split. Splitting hairs I suppose but either way, they join a very select group of perfect two-hit wonders.

Answer: Little Millie Small

All your other choices were female singers who have had charting singles on the Hot 100 and who had names that could plausibly have been Jamaican in origin. You will probably never see those names again!

Millie Small started recording in her early teens in her native Jamaica, one of the first females to perform in the "ska" style. Discovered by Chris Blackwell of Island Records, he signed her to his label and relocated her to London to record there. She was 17 at the time. Although her legacy in terms of volume is small, that one big hit was gargantuan. At seven million units sold worldwide, it remains one of the biggest selling ska or reggae records in history. She never had any more hit records and perhaps her unique voice (I would describe it as squeaky) which may have been an asset originally, might have become tiresome to the public ear. She continued to tour and perform into the 1970s before largely retiring from the business.

Answer: Michael

The original title of the song was "Michael Row the Boat Ashore" but, for whatever reason, they truncated the title for this recording. The group had its genesis in 1958 when Dave Fisher, Steve Trott, Chan Daniels, Steve Butts and Bob Burnett, all freshmen at Wesleyan University in Connecticut, decided to while away their spare moments singing classic folk music. They were serious students and most of them except for Fisher, who was studying musicology, never contemplated a career in music. They did it for fun. Once they achieved such remarkable success, one would have thought they would've reconsidered their vocations but that wasn't the case. All the members graduated in 1962 and all made the Dean's list. In the fall of 1962, Trott left the group to attend Harvard Law School and was replaced by Gil Robbins. You might not have heard of him but he did sire a famous son, Tim of movie stardom. Butts and Burnett were attending graduate school and rejoined the group for recording sessions while other musicians took their place during concerts and tours. However, when they finally graduated in 1964 and decided to pursue their real careers, the group disbanded.

In 1987, the original members, except for Daniels who had passed away in 1975, reunited for a special series of concerts at their alma mater which led to a longer lasting reunion in 1990. All the group members were highly successful in their chosen careers but the music and the group was in their blood. They would meet several times a year, always on weekends, to perform concerts and appear at special events.

This is what they did when not performing. Fisher, the group's leader, looked after the group's affairs and wrote many songs for the movies and TV. Trott worked in law and ultimately became an Appeals Court Judge. Butts earned a Doctorate in Chinese Politics and served as an academic administrator for a number of mid-western institutions of higher learning. Burnett also graduated from Harvard Law School and had a long career in business law. Clearly, not your average band of goofs!

The group continued to perform regularly until 2010 when Fisher passed away. Burnett died the following year as did Gil Robbins, leaving only Trott and Butts as surviving original members. The loss of Fisher was particularly devastating for the group and they essentially suspended operations at that point.