In December 1957 the Fidelitys traveled to New York City in the hopes of landing a slot on the Apollo Theatre's famed amateur showcase -- instead, Apollo bandleader Reuben Phillips agreed to manage the Fidelitys, securing them an audition with booking agent Ben Bart of the firm Universal Attractions. Bart in turn landed the Fidelitys an audition with Baton Records, which signed the quintet on the spot -- their debut single, a reading of the Harold Barlow/Lew Harris chestnut "The Things I Love," followed in February 1958, consciously evoking the Platters with its sophisticated, gossamer approach.

The single went on to reach the number 60 spot on the Billboard pop charts, and in June the Fidelitys resurfaced with another oldie, Andy Razaf and Eubie Blake's "Memories of You" -- although its release was celebrated with a weeklong stint at the Apollo, the single failed to match the success of its predecessor, missing the charts altogether.

The Fidelitys' third Baton effort, "Captain of My Ship," appeared in the autumn of 1958, coinciding with another week at the Apollo, but when it too failed to earn attention from radio and retail the group's momentum ground to a halt. Baton owner Sol Rabinowitz shuttered the label in the spring of 1959, shortly thereafter teaming with Morty Craft to co-found the new SIR imprint -- the Fidelitys issued the Irving Berlin-penned "Marie" on SIR that July, again to little notice.

"Walk with the Wind" followed in the fall, and in early 1960 the group made its final Apollo appearance.

"This Girl of Mine" appeared that spring, and in August the Fidelitys issued their swan song, "Wishing Star," also the last gasp of the struggling SIR. When Smith was drafted into the military in 1962, lead Kenny French signed on his absence, and the Fidelitys continued performing live until the close of the decade. In 2005, the surviving members (Thorpe, Smith, Newton, and French) revived the group for a handful of Albany-area dates. ~ Jason Ankeny, All Music Guide

http://www.answers.com/topic/the-fidelitys
http://home.att.net/~freebizak/Fidelitys/fidelitys.html

Songs :

    
Walk With The Wind              Memories Of You

   
Captain of My Ship                Only to you

    
The Things I Love                 Where In The World

Discography :

1962 - Wild Childhood / Waddle (Roulette 4448)
1964 - Big city boy / Watch your step (Bobsan 1000)


Song :

   
Watch your step                   Big city boy

Personnel :

Fred Hulme

Dick Muse

Nick Ticich

Noel Schwertfeger

Bob Gaymor

Discography :

The Pennants
1961 - Don't Go / Workin' Man (World 102)
1961 - Darling How Long (unreleased)

The Laurels (7)
1989 - Don't Go / Darling How Long (World 102 blue wax)

    
Rochell Henderson                                                Johnny Wyatt

The group took their demos to Hunter Hancock of KGFJ, then one of the hottest R&B deejays in L.A. Hancock had started his own label, Swingin' Records in 1959 and scored a hit with "There Is Something On Your Mind" by Big Jay McNeely.

Hancock tested out their song "Once Upon A Time" on his show by playing their acetate and the studio phones started ringing immediately. Released in October 1960 on Swingin' 623, "Once Upon A Time" slipped into Billboard's Hot 100 in February 1961, eventually reaching # 26.

The feminine sounding lead on this doowop number was by Johnny Wyatt. The record was not in keeping with the group's image : not only was Rochell not the lead, "Rochell" wasn't even a girl. The group got plenty of work out of their hit, but when both follow-ups flopped, the group switched to the Challenge label in 1962.

On "Every Night" they were backed by the Champs, but this ballad didn't sell either, in spite of a good Billboard review.

   
Johnny Wyatt

Their best record came in 1963, but it never stood a chance, as it was not even the A-side. "Annie's Not An Orphan Anymore" (Challenge 9191, written by Dave Burgess of the Champs) was a mid-tempo rocker that confounded its 1963 release date by harking back to an earlier era, with a "fat" sax sound. It was co-produced by Gary Usher and Mike Borchetta. The A-side was what you could call a proto-funk recording, "Let's Run Away And Get Married", that crashed on takeoff.

T.C. Henderson, Rochell Henderson, Johnny Wyatt, without Mel Sasso

Four older cuts were released in 1963 on two singles, including an odd arrangement of "Big Boy Pete", before the Candles were snuffed out. Johnny Wyatt went on to record as a solo vocalist and had releases on Challenge, Magnum and Bronco. Jay Warner writes in his otherwise excellent Billboard book of American singing groups (1992) that he was the leader of the soul group Johnny and the Expresions, but that was Johnny Matthews. Johnny Wyatt died in December 1983 at the age of 45. Rochell and the Candles were a typical one-hit wonder group with an atypical image.

Dik (Black Cat Rockabilly Europe)

http://www.doowopy.de/old/02page/C/eCandles.html
http://www.soulfulkindamusic.net/jwyatt.htm
http://www.rockabilly.nl/references/messages/rochell_and_the_candles.htm


Songs :

    
Once Upon A Time                Beg Of My Heart

    
A Long Time Ago                    So Far Away

The Primettes aka The Supremes (4) (Detroit)

Personnel :

Betty McGlown

Mary Wilson

Diana Ross

Florence Ballard

Discography :

The Primettes
1961 - Tears of Sorrows / Pretty baby (Lu pine 120)

Al Garner & the Primettes
1966 - All i need is you  (Relic LP 8008)

Biography :

Founded in Detroit, Michigan in 1959, The Supremes began as a quartet called The Primettes

Founding members Florence Ballard, Mary Wilson, Diana Ross and Betty McGlown, all from the Brewster-Douglass public housing project in Detroit, formed The Primettes as the sister act to The Primes (with Paul Williams and Eddie Kendricks, who would go on to form The Temptations).

Barbara Martin replaced McGlown in 1960, and the group signed with Motown the following year as The Supremes. Martin left the act in early 1962, and Ross, Ballard and Wilson carried on as a trio.
http://www.answers.com/topic/the-primettes



Songs :

    
Pretty baby                             Tears of Sorrows



CD :






MP3 :

The many Majestics groups and discographies get confused; there was the group from Miami, FL, that recorded "Cave Man Rock" on Marlin Records and others with the name. The Miami group's recordings are often lumped with the Majestics from Detroit, MI, but there's no connection. And there might have been two different groups with that name from the Motor City.

Two future Contours sang with the Majestics, who recorded for Contour Records, part of Bob West's Lupine conglomerate. Billy Gordon, Joe Billingslea, and others recorded "Hard Times" b/w "Teenage Gossip," in 1960. Some recordings before the Contour release are sometimes attributed to these Majestics. Since both were from Detroit, historians like to link this group with the Majestics that recorded "Oasis" in 1962 on Chess Records; it was co-written by Willie Ewing, a major figure in the Majestics' short career. Thomas Mealey (listed as Meatley in B.M.I.), Pedro Maneka, Maurice Fagin, and Warren Harris were the Majestics who next backed Johnny Mitchell on two Chex singles.

The label credits read Johnny Mitchell & the Majestics on "Give Me a Cigarette" b/w "Shoppin' and Hoppin'" (1961) and a second single, "So I Can Forget" (1962). Without Mitchell, the Majestics recorded for Chex "Unhappy and Blue" b/w "Treat Me Like You Want" later in 1962. These were followed by "Lonely Heart" b/w "Gwendolyn" (1962) and "Baby" b/w "Teach Me to Limbo," in 1963.

Most of the songs were co-written and produced by Ewing, a Detroit writer/producer with 39 titles registered with Broadcast Music Incorporated. A hot Detroit group, the Majestics, like so many others, never caught a break. Fagin and Harris, along with Richard Street and Sandra Fagin, formed the Monitors and recorded for Motown from 1965 to 1968. Ewing is a born again Christian and a pastor in Detroit, and his wife Brenda Diane Ewing has released a gospel CD. ~ Andrew Hamilton, All Music Guide


Songs :

   
Lonely Heart                         Baby


    
Teach Me How To Limbo              Gwendolyn



CD :

Members:

Eugene Sanchez (Lead & Tenor)

Victor Velez (First Tenor & Lead)

Johnny Velez (Second Tenor)

Angelo Maurino (Falsetto & Baritone)

Joffrey Green (Bass)



Discography :

1963 - I Love My Baby / Pains In My Heart (Ritz 17003)
1963 - Listen Lover (unreleased)
1963 - Thanks Magic Moon (unreleased)
1963 - Each Other's Love (unreleased)

Biography :

This group got together at Manhattan's Seward Park High School in 1959. They enjoyed making many local live appearances.
They were taken to Bell Sound Studios in New York to record for their Manager who wanted to produce their recordings and ultimately sell it to London Records.

Their Only release came out on Ritz in 1964.
The record did nothing as this was the time the Beatles were getting popular and the Vietnam war was raging. The Group, disenchanted, broke up.


Songs :

   
I Love My Baby                     Pains In My Heart

Personnel :

Fred Martin (Lead)

Joe Indelicato

Lynn Holthaus

Ed Breamer



Discography :

1961 - To Love in Vain / The Beginning of Love (Fraternity 889 / Saxony 2003)
N/A - Little Baby (Saxony) (Unreleased)
N/A - That's the Way (Saxony) (Unreleased)
N/A - The Prayer (Saxony) (Unreleased)



Biography :

The members of the Twi-Lighters met in the military with Fred Martin at lead, joined by Joe Indelicato, Lynn Holthaus and Ed Breamer. The Twi-Lighters favored close harmony and could "rumble" with any doo-wop group of the day.

Their first release, "To Love in Vain," was written by Paul Trefzger and released on the Fraternity label in October of 1961 (Fraternity 889). That track and its flip "The Beginning of Love," were recorded by Paul and Bud at a small Cincinnati studio in Mariemont, and received reasonable airplay, leading to The Twi-Lighters working a TV dance party and record hop appearances.

That success gave Paul and Bud the confidence to establish Saxony Records.


Songs :

     
The Beginning of Love                   To Love in Vain

Biography :

The Marcels were a successful racially integrated doo-wop group known for turning beloved American classical pop songs into rock and roll. The group formed in 1959 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, with lead Cornelius Harp, bass Fred Johnson, Gene Bricker, Ron Mundy, and Richard Knauss.

The group was named by Fred Johnson's younger sister Priscilla, after a popular hair style of the day (the Marcell wave). In 1961 many were shocked to hear a new version of the ballad, "Blue Moon" that began with the bass singer saying, "bomp-baba-bomp" and "dip-da-dip." Still, the record sold a million copies and is featured in The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll.

   
The disc climbed all the way to number one in the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 and UK Singles Chart. In their U.S. homeland, additional revivals in the same vein as "Blue Moon" - "Heartaches" and "Melancholy Baby" - were less successful, although the former peaked at No. 7 on the Billboard Hot 100 and eventually sold over one million copies worldwide. The group had two other singles that hit No. 78 and No. 58 on the same chart.

In August 1961, due to problems encountered in the Deep South while touring because of the group being bi-racial, the white members, Knauss and Bricker left and were replaced by Allen Johnson (brother of Fred) and Walt Maddox. Mundy left soon after, leaving the group a quartet.

   
In 1962, Harp and Allen Johnson left, and were replaced by Richard Harris and William Herndon. There was a brief reunion of the original members in 1973. The group made several recordings in 1975 with Harp back on lead.

   
Original member Gene Bricker died in 1983. Allen Johnson died in 1995.
By the early 1990s the group included Johnson, Maddox, Harris, Jules Hopson, and Richard Merritt.

The group split around 1995. Fred Johnson formed his own group with new members, while the other four members recruited new bass Ted Smith. Maddox won a lawsuit against Sunny James Svetnic, the manager of Johnson's group, for trademark infringement in 1996. Svetnic died in 2002.
Johnson reunited with Harp, Mundy, and Knauss in 1999 for the PBS special Doo Wop 50 with a fifth member.

http://home.att.net/~freebizak/Marcels/marcels.html
http://home.earthlink.net/%7Ev1tiger/marcels.html

Videos :

 
Merry Twist-mas

Songs:

    
Really Need Your Love           My Love For You




CD :




MP3 :

Lawrence Brice (Lead)

Robert Thomas

Gilbert Joseph

Maurke Allen



Discography :

1958 - My love and your love / Marvella (Rhythm 125)

Biography :

These Spinners were not the famous detroit Spinners, but rather the west coast Pittsburg, CA (SF/Oakland) group, as played on KDIA.

Don Barksdale

It was Rhythm Records "The Boss in the Bay" #125, it was an Oakland label owned by college basketball hall of famer and legendary KDIA-AM (the "choice voice of the Bay")(Lucky 13....1310 on the dial) Don Barksdale.

Members included Lawrence Brice, Gilbert Joseph (baritone), Robert Thomas, and Maurice Allen. Co-writers were Brice and Joseph.
They became onehit wonders with the Doo Wop song 'My love and your
love'.



Their Songs :

   
My love and your love                   Marvella