The songs you most remember probably evoke pleasant feelings but could well also bring back sad memories. As we go through life, these tunes are usually linked to a new love, life-changing transitions, an incredible experience, major victory, and many times the year you graduated from high school or college.
iHeart radio compiled a Graduation Playlist. You select your year, and I picked 1958, where 47 songs appeared. I look at the top ten or hundred today and don't recognize any song. I recalled every one of those 47. Some of the more memorable:
- All in the Game, Tommy Edwards
- Nel Blu Dipinto Di Blu, Domenico Modugno
- To Know Him is to Love Him, The Teddy Bears (I did not know they were two guys and a girl--right)
- When, Kalin Twins (first time I ever saw them)
- Poor Little Fool, Ricky Nelson
I'm not sure what happened, but I next tried 1962 for my college graduation year, and nothing happened. I wonder if you can get only one year. It could well be that so many received this e-mail that the site got overloaded. So I clicked out of Safari, got a new page, found that iHeart e-mail, went to that page, found 1962, and on came 48 songs. Four favorites, mostly because I haven't heard them for some time:
- Mashed Potato Time, Dee Dee Sharp
- I Left My Heart in San Francisco, Tony Bennet
- Monster Mash, Bobby "Boris" Pickens
- The Twist, Chubby Checker
Theoretically, you can then click on those songs and they send you to another page where you can listen to the song, some with lyrics. Except nothing happened, possibly because too many people were trying to access those pages or maybe iHeart wants you to upgrade. So I went way out of my way and linked those entries to You Tube.
Finally, iHeart begins with the Year 1950, and here are three of my favorites:- Tennessee Waltz, Patti Page
- Goodnight Irene, The Weavers
- La Vie en Rose, Edith Piaf (what a life!!!)
Nearly five years ago I posted on:
However, my list includes the Baroque period of classical music, Broadway shows and post World War II Japanese music with a Hawaii connection:
- #10: Canon in D, Johann Pachelbel (that's him to the right)
- # 9: I'm Getting Sentimental Over You, Tommy Dorsey
- # 8: Over the Rainbow, Judy Garland
- # 7: Rock Around the Clock, Bill Halley and the Comets
- # 6: One Fine Day / He's So Fine, Chiffons--here with George Harrison because his My Sweet Lord was judged to be plagiarized from He's So Fine--he settled it all by buying the company that sued, and guilt was said to be subconscious plagiarism
- # 5: Anak, Freddie Aguilar, who married his 16 girlfriend when he was 60
- # 4: Honolulu City Lights, Keola and Kapono Beamer
- # 3: Some Enchanted Evening, Ezio Pinza
- # 2: Ghost Riders in the Sky, Vaungh Monroe
- # 1: Wakare No Isochidori, Francis Zanami, who wrote this song and died at the age of 34, the only tune that was first popular in Hawaii, then gained fame in Japan.
- As I glance at that list, I find it surprising that most of these songs bring back melancholic memories. I tend to play Beethoven's Wellington's Victory on a day when I have a monumental victory, and am uplifted by Debby Boone's You Light Up My Life, even though it might be the most panned tune of all time and has a sordid history.
Finally a few other entries from my posting of five years ago:
- The Baroque Top Ten was topped by Bach's Tocata and Fugue for Organ, with Canon in D at #2.
- Let me combine broadway and films. Here is a list of top 100 show tunes, with Tonight from West Side Story as #1. That was the 1961 movie version. Wikipedia has a compilation of compilations, and Judy Garland's Over the Rainbow seemed to be the most impressive of the lot.
- Billboard's Top 100 for the 1950's has Elvis Presley with Don't Be Cruel / Hound Dogas #1, Bill Haley and the Comets' Rock Around the Clock as #2 and Roger Williams' Autumn Leaves as #3, but the only early 50's song was Tommy Edwards' All in the Game at #31, which did not become popular until the later 50's.
- Here is a posting of Post World War II Japanese Music in Hawaii.
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