"Java" #4 2/29/1964 Bonus

Trumpeter Al Hirt was famous in his hometown of New Orleans when he covered this one, making it a #1 easy listening hit and a Top 5 on the pop charts in late February '64. It was written and first recorded as a piano-based song by another Big Easy music legend, Allen Toussaint. Famed Nashville piano man Floyd Cramer also covered this. Big Al owned a popular jazz club in the French Quarter and was an original minority owner of the NFL's New Orleans Saints.

Al Hirt - Java

"The Tip Of My Fingers" #43 8/27/1966

Including this Top 5 country record, Eddy Arnold had 147 entries on that chart, more than anyone except George Jones. He was one of the first to take that genre uptown, without the twang and with a much more polished "Nashville Sound" in an effort by country labels to appeal to pop audiences. They used to call this style "countrypolitan." Today's song was done by numerous folks over the years (Roy Clark's version is quite good) and was written and originally recorded in 1960 by "Whispering" Bill Anderson.

Eddy Arnold - The Tip Of My Fingers

The Beatles' Last Concert

On August 29, 1966, the Beatles' last concert occurred at Candlestick Park in San Francisco. (I'm not counting the impromptu rooftop appearance during the '69 "Let It Be" sessions.) Even in late summer it was a cold, windy, foggy night at the Stick. In a bit of irony one of the opening acts, Bobby Hebb, performed his hit "Sunny." The 45,000 seat ballpark was just over half full because allegedly the fire marshal limited ticket sales, but that has never been confirmed. There wasn't any big announcement - the Fab Four figured it would gradually dawn on people they would do no more live appearances. Knowing this was their last public show, the boys took selfies on stage with real cameras, mind you. The craziness of performing on four continents, working virtually nonstop for over five years with just one break of any length, having to arrive and depart the shows in armored cars, and constantly being mobbed by shrieking fans finally caught up to them and pushed John, Paul, George and Ringo to quit touring. On the flight home to England, George said, "That's it, then. I'm not a Beatle any more." Of course that didn't happen, but that's how the guys felt. They took three months off before starting work on their "Sgt. Pepper" masterpiece. In 2014 Paul returned to Candlestick to play the last concert prior to its demolition.

"Alfie" (Cher) #32 8/27/1966

From the soundtrack of "Alfie," the Bacharach/David title song had a checkered history. This version by Cher from the closing credits barely made the Top 40, while the bigger hit by Dionne Warwick (which wasn't in the film) wouldn't appear for another nine months. Yet another version for the British movie release became a hit in the UK, done by Dionne's nemesis Cilla Black. The flick was remade in the early 2000's with Cher recording an updated theme. It was pulled from the new soundtrack and her effort was replaced by Joss Stone after audiences at advance screenings broke out in uncontrollable laughter.

Cher - Alfie

The Beatles' Penultimate Live Gig 8/28/1966

The next-to-last Beatles concert took place August 28, 1966 at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles. As happened a lot on this US tour, a number of seats were empty - 10,000 short of a full house of 56,000 on this night. The wild scene after the show was more pronounced than usual this time. The getaway car couldn't pass through the outfield gates due to the screaming masses overrunning security, so it spun around and the boys made a mad dash into the dugout and the Dodgers' clubhouse. They even tried to sneak out in an ambulance, but couldn't. They finally left several hours later with lots of police assistance, and departed the next day for San Francisco and their last-ever gig.

"Summertime" #10 8/27/1966

Today we feature a very different interpretation of a George Gershwin song from 1935's "Porgy and Bess." According to Wikipedia there are something like 25,000 recordings of this tune. Janis Joplin's take is wonderfully compelling but none are quite like Billy Stewart's version here, which contains several freelance passages - definitely unusual for the rock charts at the time. Billy crossed paths with Marvin Gaye when they grew up singing in Washington, DC, and was discovered by Bo Diddley.

Billy Stewart - Summertime

"See You In September" #3 8/27/1966

An end-of-summer song done originally in 1959 by a Pittsburgh vocal group called the Tempos. Bobby Vinton was in a forerunner of that outfit. It was covered numerous times, but the hit version featured today was by the Happenings. They sounded somewhat like the Tokens ("The Lion Sleeps Tonight"), who didn't mind since they owned the Happenings' record label. The Four Seasons' producer Bob Crewe was also behind the controls here. I like this one!

Happenings - SeeYou In September