The group later did a remake for a Carnegie Hall appearance and it was the arrangement and style of that production which would later influence another hit version “The Lion Sleeps Tonight” by “The Tokens. The Weavers cut the song for Decca in early 1952 and experienced a hit – landing at number 14 on the Billboard pop charts of the time. Seeger re titled the song calling it “Wimoweh” which is strictly a phonetic attempt at the original song’s repeated chant of “uyembube” – a Zulu language word which wasn’t clear to Seeger and so the substitute word. folk singer Alan Lomax came across a copy of “Mbube” and introduced the song to Pete Seeger – then a member of the folk group “The Weavers”. Now we jump ahead to the year 1950 in another continent far away, the United States in North America. (Listen to the Evening Birds’ 1939 version below) Pete and Company He continued to compose and invent and expand on vocal styles – one of which an impressionable falsetto which he would become associated with. The Evening Birds would go their separate ways in 1948. The song took off in South Africa selling tens of thousands of copies over the next decade in that country as well as among the black population of Great Britain. On the first couple of takes, the Evening Birds rendered the song with chants and tonal harmonies – completely spontaneous – what would be termed “call and response”.īut then, on a third take, Soloman suddenly improvised a string of lyrics complete with melody – which would come to be known to us as the opening line to a song for the ages, which would be translated later to “In the jungle, the mighty jungle, the lion sleeps tonight”. It was during one of these that Soloman and friends improvised a tune with minimal lyrics which they would title “Mbube” which translates to “Lion”. Soloman managed to get some studio recording time at Gallo, doing several sessions. In 1939, Soloman found employment with a South African record label, Gallo Record Company, working as a record packager. Soloman put a new lineup – all friends which also had moved into Johannesburg from their home village of Pomeroy. This was a short-lived project which dissolved in less that two years. He continued on with his music while in Johannesburg forming his own group called “The Evening Birds”. Skipping ahead, Soloman made his way to the city of Johannesburg at the age of 21 to seek employment. He became musically involved at an early age and often performed with friends a local gatherings, weddings and the like. Soloman Linda was born in 1909 in South Africa near the village of Pomeroy. I noticed the notation in Whitburn’s book that song writing credits for “The Lion Sleeps Tonight” were given to a certain Soloman Linda” – not Weiss and company. Next I looked up the song’s chart history in Joel Whitburn’s book “Top Pop Singles 1955 – 2002” (a little outdated but good enough for me). I was looking at the 45 – RCA catalog number 47-7954 – And there is that “A Hugo & Luigi Production” logo, and the composing credits of “Weiss, Peretti and Creatore”. I was reading up a little on the New York City composers (and cousins) Hugo Peretti and Luigi Creatore, wondering how these two came to having their very own logo to display during their time with RCA Victor Records, where they migrated to after their stint as part owners at Roulette Records, where they served as production men and composers.Īnd so naturally I came across notations of their musical endeavors, one being producing the smash hit record by RCA Victor group, The Tokens – “The Lion Sleeps Tonight” (#1 for three weeks in 1961/1962).
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