Gary Lewis born 31 July 1945

Gary Lewis (born Gary Harold Lee Levitch; July 31, 1945) is an American musician who was the leader of Gary Lewis & the Playboys. 

Gary Lewis is the son of Jerry Lewis and singer Patti Palmer. His mother, who was performing at the time with the Ted Fio Rito Orchestra, intended to name him after her favorite actor, Cary Grant, but her son became "Gary" as the result of a clerical error. He received a set of drums as a gift for his 15th birthday in 1960. When he was 18, Lewis formed the band "Gary and the Playboys" with four friends. Joking at the lateness of bandmates to practice, Lewis referred to them as "playboys", and the name stuck. 

Lewis was the drummer, and Dave Walker was the singer and guitarist. Gary's mother was quietly funding the purchases of equipment as they believed Gary's father would not support the band financially. Without the Lewis cachet, the band was relatively anonymous. Even though he lived down the street from the Lewis family, producer Snuff Garrett was not aware of the band until a mutual friend, conductor Les Brown, informed him that the group was appearing at Disneyland and that Garrett should give them a listen. 

Seeing an opportunity to capitalize on the Lewis name, Garrett put the band into the studio to develop, still financed by Gary's mother. Garrett pushed Lewis to improve his drumming skill, even getting Buddy Rich to tutor him, and, more importantly, made Lewis the singer and therefore the focal point of the group. By Lewis' own admission, his natural singing voice was not one of his strengths, and Garrett employed overdubbing techniques in the studio to enhance it. "This Diamond Ring" hit number one on the Billboard Hot 100 on February 20, 1965, making Lewis an instant star. Besides The Lovin' Spoonful, the group was the only act during the 1960s to have its first seven Hot 100 releases each reach that chart's top 10. 

                                    

In addition to "This Diamond Ring", his hits include "Count Me In," the only non-British Commonwealth record in the Hot 100's top 10 on May 8, 1965, (number two); "Save Your Heart for Me" (number two); "Everybody Loves a Clown" (number four); "She's Just My Style" (number three); "Sure Gonna Miss Her" (number nine); and "Green Grass" (number eight). Of "Everybody Loves a Clown", Lewis says he composed the song as a gift for his father's birthday. He believed the song was too good, so instead of giving it as a gift, he recorded it. 

Gary with The Beatles

By 1966, Lewis was exclusively singing, replaced on the drums by, among others, Jim Keltner. His career was put on hold when he entered the U.S. Army as a draftee in January 1967, and he served during the Vietnam War era with the Eighth Army in Seoul, South Korea, until 1968. Lewis has stated that he was reluctant to go to Vietnam, but he credits the Army with being the time when he "grew up". 

On his discharge, Lewis immediately returned to recording, reaching the top 40 one last time with a top 20 remake of Brian Hyland's "Sealed With A Kiss", but unable to regain his group's earlier momentum. Lewis continued touring, eventually marketing the band as a nostalgia act. He also appeared and performed on many of his father's Labor Day telethons for the Muscular Dystrophy Association. A brief attempt at starting a new band called Medecine, with Bill Cowsill of the Cowsills in 1974, was not successful. Lewis owned a music store for some years in the 1970s and developed a drug habit. By 1985, he was well enough to join the nine month “Happy Together” tour, with other groups, including the Turtles, the Buckinghams and the Grass Roots. 

He continued to play with various incarnations of the Playboys, generally featuring no other original members. In January 2012, Lewis released a new single, "You Can't Go Back". In the summer of 2013, Lewis, along with a group of 1960s musicians including Gary Puckett (Gary Puckett & The Union Gap), Chuck Negron (formerly of Three Dog Night), Mark Lindsay (former lead singer of Paul Revere & the Raiders), and The Turtles featuring Flo & Eddie, toured 47 cities in Paradise Artist's "Happy Together" tour. 

As of 2022, Gary Lewis and the Playboys are still touring the world on their own and occasionally with other popular acts of the 1950s, '60s, and '70s. The group performs on cruise ships, at casinos, festivals, fairs, and corporate events. 

(Edited from Wikipedia)

 

Ed "Kookie" Byrnes born 30 July 1932

Edward Byrne Breitenberger (July 30, 1932 – January 8, 2020), known professionally as Edd Byrnes, was an American actor, best known for his starring role in the television series 77 Sunset Strip. He also was featured in the 1978 film Grease as television teen-dance show host Vince Fontaine, and was a charting recording artist with "Kookie, Kookie (Lend Me Your Comb)" (with Connie Stevens). 

Byrnes, who was born Edward Byrne Breitenberger in New York City, came from a poor family. His alcoholic father died when he was 13. Byrnes worked a variety of jobs, but he yearned for an acting career. At 17, he began to work as a photographer's model and was drawn into male hustling with wealthy older men that introduced him to a "strange world" of "art, wealth, sadism, limousines, sex for money, theater and fine restaurants," Byrnes wrote in his 1996 autobiography, " 'Kookie' No More." 

Still pursuing acting, in 1955 he drove to LA "with a few hundred dollars and a dream of making it big in the entertainment business," his son wrote. Byrnes was best known as Kookie on the private-detective series "77 Sunset Strip," which ran from ran from 1958 to 1964. Byrnes played a hip parking attendant at a Hollywood nightclub who helped out with cases. He was known for his hipster lingo, including the catch phrase "Baby, you're the ginchiest!"When he wasn't making wisecracks, Gerald Lloyd "Kookie" Kookson III was lovingly combing his well-greased hairdo. 

At the peak of his popularity, Byrnes received more than 15,000 fan letters a week, exceeding the record that Warner Bros., the studio behind 77 Sunset Strip, had ever received for any star (yes, more than even Errol Flynn and James Cagney). The actor said he once appeared on 26 magazine covers in one week alone. "Kookie, Kookie (Lend Me Your Comb)," a novelty record he recorded with Connie Stevens, sold more than 1 million copies and rose to No. 4 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart in May 1959. However, Byrnes chafed under a contract that cost him the chance of several roles in movies such as "Ocean's Eleven." 

                                   

He walked off the show in the second season, demanding a bigger part and better pay, and retreated into a heavy drinking period. He returned in an “upgraded” role in May 1960, with Kookie now a partner in the agency and sporting a coat and tie. After 77 Sunset Strip ended its six-season-run in 1963, Byrnes moved to Europe to star in a string of spaghetti Westerns and spy thrillers. He sporadically returned to Hollywood to capitalize on his Kookie notoriety. 

He appeared in dozens of movies which included Reform School Girl (1957), Darby’s Rangers (1958), Marjorie Morningstar (1958), Life Begins at 17 (1958), Up Periscope (1959), Yellowstone Kelly (1959), Beach Ball (1965), Michael Apted’s Stardust (1974) and Troop Beverly Hills (1989). He also appeared on episodes of several TV shows, including "Fantasy Island" and "Murder, She Wrote." In 1975, Byrnes was hired to host a new game show called "Wheel of Fortune" and filmed two pilots, but the job eventually went to Chuck Woolery. In the 1978 John Travolta movie "Grease," he played Vince Fontaine, the suave host of the "National Bandstand" TV dance show. 

Byrnes was married from 1962-71 to actress Asa Maynor (she played the stewardess in the famous Twilight Zone episode “Nightmare at 20,000 Feet,” starring William Shatner).  The marriage ended in divorce. Byrnes also struggled with alcohol and drug addictions for years before managing to kick them which he detailed in his 1996 autobiography, Kookie No More. 

Byrnes had a small role in the Erin Moran TV film Twirl (1981) and the lead in Erotic Images (1983) with Britt Ekland. Byrnes also appeared in Mankillers (1987); Back to the Beach (1987); Party Line (1988) and Troop Beverly Hills (1989).  Later appearances included parts in: Unhappily Ever After; Rags to Riches; Mr. Belvedere; Empty Nest; Burke's Law (the revival); Adam-12, Kung Fu: The Legend Continues and Murder, She Wrote. In 1987 he appeared on the sitcom Throb in the role of Bobby Catalina, a washed-up singer, and performed his trademark "Kookie" song. 

In 1992, he played a fictionalized version of himself on Married... with Children, being a celebrity endorser for a time share and singing a revamped version of "Kookie" with the thrash metal band Anthrax. One of his final TV roles was a small role in the mini-series Shake, Rattle and Roll: An American Love Story (1999). Byrnes appeared during the Memphis Film Festival in June 2014; he was reunited with his former Yellowstone Kelly co-star Clint Walker. On January 8, 2020, 87 year old Byrnes died unexpectedly of natural causes at his home in Santa Monica, his son, San Diego TV news anchor Logan Byrnes, said on Twitter. 

(Edited from The Hollywood Reporter, Wikipedia & Star Tribune)

 

Joe Beck born 29 July 1945

Joe Beck (July 29, 1945 – July 22, 2008) was an American jazz guitarist who was active for over 40 years. 

Born in Philadelphia, Beck moved to Manhattan in his teens, playing six nights a week in a trio setting, which gave him an opportunity to meet various people working in the thriving New York music scene. By the time he was 18, Stan Getz hired him to record jingles, and in 1967 he recorded with Miles Davis. By 1968, at age 22, he was a member of the Gil Evans Orchestra. 

Beck played in a variety of jazz styles, including jazz fusion, post bop, mainstream jazz, and soul jazz, but also respected rock stylists and cross-over players (he was good friends with Larry Coryell) and briefly flirted with rock music styles himself in the late 1960s and early 1970s.  He recorded as a guitarist with Miles Davis on tracks like “Water On The Pond” and “Circle In The Round“. The tracks from that session were not released until later as it was the first Miles recorded with electric guitar and he was concerned about the reception. Miles would later blame Beck for being the reason the epic 26-minute track was unreleaseable, but according Ian Carr’s biography of Miles, Beck had been “given the role of repeating a short rhythmic figure throughout the entire performance” it sounds more that Miles was generally unhappy with the tracks than specifically about Joe. 

Joe first came to Creed Taylor’s attention while he recorded with Paul Desmond and with J.J. Johnson & Kai Winding on their A&M/CTI albums in late 1968. Beck was also a sideman for Don Sebesky’s self-titled “Don Sebesky & The Jazz Rock Syndrome“, produced by Esmond Edwards after Taylor had bailed on Verve to start CTI under the auspices of A&M. Thus, Beck had set course to become one of the more influential jazz-rock fusion guitarists of the era. 

Coincidentally, one of Beck’s more bizarre albums was recorded in late 1969, this time with another Creed Taylor alumni, Sabicas. By the time the album was recorded, Sabicas a Spanish born flamenco guitarist and composer was nearly 60-years old. Judged by many to be one of the greatest flamenco guitarists ever. He was certainly one, if not the most important person to popularize flamenco outside of Spain. 

In 1971, Beck left music for three years to become a dairy farmer, citing frustration with his career. In 1975 he released an eponymous album (upon which he simply referred to himself as "Beck") while recording the Esther Phillips album, What a Diff'rence a Day Makes, both for Kudu. Beck was subsequently reissued as Beck & Sanborn to cash in on the success of alto saxophonist David Sanborn. 

                                  

In 1978, he went for more of a rock sound by forming a band named "Leader". They performed in the Northeast and recorded demos at Sound Ideas Studios in New York City, but soon disbanded when the band's gear was stolen after a gig at Joyous Lake in Woodstock, New York. In the 1980s Beck recorded for DMP including with flautist Ali Ryerson.

By 1989 Beck returned to dairy farming, an ill-fated  investment that depleted most of his savings and by 1992 he returned to music at age 47, a little too old for the studio scene. He picked up his guitar and returned to playing what he called “real” music, touring Europe. In 1993, he was still on call and can be heard on James Brown’s “Funky Side of Town” from Brown’s Get On The Good Foot album. In 2000, he collaborated with guitarist Jimmy Bruno on Polarity, which extensively featured Beck's Alto guitar, and in 2008 on Coincidence with John Abercrombie. 

Beck worked as a sideman or session guitarist with a wide variety of well-known jazz, rock, and fusion musicians, including Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington, Buddy Rich, Woody Herman, Miles Davis, Maynard Ferguson, Howard Roberts, Tommy Tedesco, Larry Coryell, John Abercrombie, Tom Scott, Jeremy Steig, and Gábor Szabó. In mid-life Beck spent less time playing and worked more as a composer of commercial jingles and as an arranger, writing arrangements for Frank Sinatra and Gloria Gaynor. Joe also arranged and produced many records including projects for Frank Sinatra, Gloria Gaynor, and two albums for Esther Phillips including her hit single, "What A Difference A Day Makes". 

Over the years, Joe was signed to contracts with Columbia, Polydor, Verve, Gryphon, CTI, and MGM Records. He played guitar on James Brown's singles and albums in 1974. The National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences honored Beck five times with its Most Valuable Player Award. Beck also recorded with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra in London, the Milan Philharmonic in Italy, and The Paris String Ensemble in France. 

Beck died July 22, 2008, in Woodbury, Connecticut, of complications from lung cancer. His album Get Me Joe Beck was posthumously released in 2014.

(Edited from Wikipedia & Creed Taylor Produced)

Mike Bloomfield born 28 July 1944

Michael Bernard Bloomfield (July 28, 1943 – February 15, 1981) was an American blues guitarist and composer. 

Michael Bernard Bloomfield was born  into a well-off Jewish family on Chicago's North Side. A shy, awkward loner as a child, he became interested in music through the Southern radio stations he was able to pick up at night, which gave him a regular source for rockabilly, R&B, and blues. He received his first guitar at his bar mitzvah and he and his friends began sneaking out to hear electric blues on the South Side's fertile club scene. 

Dismayed with the turn his education was taking, his parents sent him to a private boarding school on the East Coast in 1958 and he eventually graduated from a Chicago school for troubled youth. By this time, he'd embraced the beatnik subculture, frequenting hangout spots near the University of Chicago. He got a job managing a folk club and frequently booked veteran acoustic bluesmen; in the meantime, he was also playing guitar as a session man and around the Chicago club scene with several different bands. 

In 1964, Bloomfield was discovered through his session work by the legendary John Hammond, who signed him to CBS; however, several recordings from 1964 went unreleased as the label wasn't sure how to market a white American blues guitarist. In early 1965, Bloomfield joined several associates in the Paul Butterfield Blues Band, a racially integrated outfit with a storming, rock-tinged take on Chicago's urban electric blues sound. The group's self-titled debut for Elektra, released later that year, made them a sensation in the blues community and helped introduce white audiences to a less watered-down version of the blues. 

                                     

Individually, Bloomfield's lead guitar work was acclaimed as a perfectly logical bridge between Chicago blues and contemporary rock. Later, in 1965, Bloomfield was recruited for Bob Dylan's new electrified backing band; he was a prominent presence on the groundbreaking classic Highway 61 Revisited and he was also part of Dylan's epochal plugged-in performance at the 1965 Newport Folk Festival. 

Mike with Bob Dylan

In the meantime, Bloomfield was developing an interest in Eastern music, particularly the Indian raga form, and his preoccupation exerted a major influence on the next Butterfield album, 1966's East-West. Driven by Bloomfield's jaw-dropping extended solos on his instrumental title cut, East-West merged blues, jazz, world music, and psychedelic rock in an unprecedented fashion. The Butterfield band became a favorite live act on the emerging San Francisco music scene and in 1967, Bloomfield quit the group to permanently relocate there and pursue new projects. 

Bloomfield quickly formed a new band called the Electric Flag with longtime Chicago cohort Nick Gravenites on vocals. The Electric Flag was supposed to build on the innovations of East-West and accordingly featured an expanded lineup complete with a horn section, which allowed the group to add soul music to their laundry list of influences. The Electric Flag debuted at the 1967 Monterey Pop Festival and issued a proper debut album, A Long Time Comin', in 1968. Critics complimented the group's distinctive, intriguing sound, but found the record itself somewhat uneven. Unfortunately, the band was already disintegrating; rivalries between members and shortsighted management -- not to mention heroin abuse -- all took their toll. Bloomfield himself left the band he'd formed before their album was even released. 

He next hooked up with organist Al Kooper, whom he'd played with in the Dylan band, and cut Super Session, a jam-oriented record that spotlighted his own guitar skills on one half and those of Stephen Stills on the other. Issued in 1968, it received excellent reviews and moreover became the best-selling album of Bloomfield's career. Super Session's success led to a sequel, The Live Adventures of Mike Bloomfield and Al Kooper, which was recorded over three shows at the Fillmore West in 1968 and released the following year; it featured Bloomfield's on-record singing debut. 

Bloomfield, however, was wary of his commercial success and growing disenchanted with fame. He was also tired of touring and after recording the second album with Kooper, he effectively retired for a while, at least from high-profile activities. He did, however began writing and playing on movie soundtracks. He played locally and occasionally toured with Bloomfield and Friends, which included Nick Gravenites and ex-Butterfield mate Mark Naftalin. Additionally, he returned to the studio in 1973 for a session with John Hammond and New Orleans pianist Dr. John; the result, Triumvirate, was released on Columbia, but didn't make much of a splash. Neither did Bloomfield's 1974 reunion with Electric Flag and neither did KGB, a short-lived supergroup with Barry Goldberg, Rik Grech (Traffic), and Carmine Appice that recorded for MCA in 1976.

During the late '70s, Bloomfield recorded for several smaller labels (including Takoma), usually in predominantly acoustic settings; through Guitar Player magazine, he also put out an instructional album with a vast array of blues guitar styles, titled If You Love These Blues, Play 'Em as You Please. 

Unfortunately, Bloomfield was also plagued by alcoholism and heroin addiction for much of the '70s, which made him an unreliable concert presence and slowly cost him some of his longtime musical associations. By 1980, he had seemingly recovered enough to tour in Europe; that November, he also appeared on-stage in San Francisco with Bob Dylan for a rendition of "Like a Rolling Stone." However, on February 15, 1981, Bloomfield was found dead in his car of a drug overdose; he was only 37. (Edited from All Music & Wikipedia)

 

Cathie Taylor born 26 July 1944

Cathie Taylor (born July 26, 1944) is a Canadian-born singer of country music and later Gospel music who won two Academy of Country Music Awards and was a regular vocalist on several television series. 

Cathie Taylor, the daughter of Anne and Cecil Taylor, was born in Winnipeg, Manitoba on July 26, 1944. She has a sister and a brother. Taylor's father died when she was three years old, and her family moved to Vancouver, to live near a maternal aunt. When her sister received a scholarship to a teacher's training college in California her family moved to the United States. 

Taylor's first television performance was when she was 11-years-old, as a Mouseketeer on The Mickey Mouse Club.At the age of 13 she had her own radio show, The Cathie Taylor Show, on KPER in Gilroy, California. In 1959, when Taylor was fifteen years old, she signed a five year recording contract with Capital Records and recorded three folk albums for them. Billboard Magazine in 1960 said "Cathie Taylor is a young vocalist who handles folk songs in a fresh, modern style" and "Young thrush has sweet, pure vocal sound". 

                                  

Her early career was managed by Cliffie Stone. She was a guest performer on the June 30, 1961 episode of Five Star Jubilee. In 1962 Taylor was a cast member on The Roy Rogers and Dale Evans Show, and in 1963 she was a regular on The Tennessee Ernie Ford Show, and had a small music role in the 1963 film Hootenanny Hoot. She also appeared on Alfred Hitchcock and Lawrence Welk television shows. 

Cathie with Tennessee Ernie Ford

Taylor became a regular vocalist on the 1966 syndicated television series Gene Autry's Melody Ranch. During the same year she had a guest spot at Kraft Music Hall. In 1968 she was a regular singer during the final year of the daily Don McNeill Show (previously Don McNeill's Breakfast Club), broadcast from Chicago, Illinois. She appeared on the long-running radio show's final episode, on December 27 of that year. The Country Music Association Awards (CMA Awards) honored her as Most Promising Female Vocalist in 1966, and Top Female Vocalist in 1968. 

 In 1975, Cathie began singing on the "700 Club" for Christian Broadcasting Network and continued to do so for the next five years. She gave church concerts and recorded three gospel albums for Housetop Records. She started writing songs during this time and some were included in her gospel albums. She recorded additional CDs: "Songs My Mother Sang To Me: Generations", "Praising My Savior", "The Heart Of Christmas", & "Sing to the Lord A New Song". 

(Edited from Wikipedia & Discogs)

 

Jef Gilson born 25 July 1926

Jean-François Quiévreux (25 July 1926 – 5 February 2012), better known as Jef Gilson, was a French clarinetist, pianist, arranger, vocalist, composer and big band leader who played in a straight-ahead hard bop style and also made forays into Afro-jazz and free jazz. 

Gilson was born Jean-François Quiévreux in the Alsatian town of Guebwiller, in northeastern France. When Jean-François was 11, his father, a mining engineer and music enthusiast, uprooted the family to Paris after a work-related injury forced him to transfer into an office job. As a youth he claimed to have switched from playing piano to clarinet to fool his parents into thinking he was studying classical music and not jazz. Yet as a teenager living in the severe backdrop of Nazi-occupied France, Jean-François was already organizing secret jazz gigs in Paris with celebrated musician Claude Luter and trumpeter/novelist Boris Vian.

 Paris had been the European Shangri-La of jazz activity since American soldiers first brought the daring sounds to the city post-World War I. Attracted to the respite from racism and segregation that Parisian culture offered, African-American musicians forged an everlasting bond with the city. The liberation of Paris saw jazz return in a big way. Young Jef Gilson even found himself playing in U.S. Army centers to celebrate American troops. 

fter the war, Gilson threw himself back into mastering the piano. As an admirer of both Canadian cool jazz pioneer Gil Evans and bebop arranger Walter “Gil” Fuller, he took on the moniker of Gilson—“Gil’s son.” Heavily influenced by the Dizzy Gillespie Big Band, the young maestro was entranced by the forward-thinking sounds of bebop. It was a bold direction to take, as French jazz audiences were still feeling the more traditional New Orleans style. But Gilson, setting the tone for his entire career, opted to follow his own sonic interests. 

                                   

For this and other reasons, major success never quite crystallized for Gilson. By the 1950s, he’d started to lay down his compositions on wax but was also taking shifts in record stores and freelance jobs as a sound engineer to pay the bills. Gilson served behind the boards at Charles Delaunay’s Vogue label from its foundation in the early 1950s and for a period even ran his own record shop, Kiosque d’Orphée, on the rue des Beaux-Arts. In the back room, the musician built his own studio, recording French musicians like his old friend Vian and a young American named Lloyd Miller, who’s hailed these days for his research on Persian and Afghan music. 

Gilson enjoyed a diamond reputation among local jazzmen. His collaboration list reads like the record collection of any serious French jazz music collector: Henri-Claude Fantapié, Jean-Louis Chautemps, Eddy Louiss, Michel Portal, Jean-Luc Ponty, Bernard Lubat, Mino Cinelu, Henri Texier, Alby Cullaz, Jacques Di Donato, François Jeanneau, and others. 

His role as a key touching point for visiting American musicians and expatriates in Paris also saw him mix with legends like Bud Powell, Woody Shaw, Bill Coleman, Byard Lancaster, Nathan Davis, Philly Joe Jones, Ted Curson, Hal Singer, Butch Morris, Wayne Shorter, Ornette Coleman, Dizzy Gillespie, and John Coltrane. A career highlight came at the Festival d’Antibes, Juan Les Pins in 1965 when Gilson opened for Coltrane. 

Gilson took an interest in the early development of free jazz. His recordings, on which early compositions with tempo changes (such as Enfin!), bitonal layers and chromatic topics are included, first appeared on a mini label. Some of the harmonic function has been overridden in his compositions since 1964, without, being exclusively free jazz oriented (New Call from France, 1966). Commercial success did not materialize. In addition, in 1965 he joined the vocal sextet Les Double Six, first as and a member, later as its musical director, which he left in 1968 to teach music in Madagascar. 

In 1971 he returned and concentrated first on ethno jazz and later "total improvisation". In 1973 he founded his label, Palm, on which are especially the recordings with his orchestra Europamerica, and with Butch Morris. For this more arranged record, which started reflecting his achievements of free jazz, he was awarded the 1978 Prix Boris Vian. He also established a jazz school in Paris. 

In the 1980’s he ceased to perform while continuing to teach and became more important for helping the careers of other younger musicians than for his own playing.  Up to his final days he lived withdrawn in Ardèche. Gilson lived only to see the first shots of a surge of interest in his work before passing away on February 5, 2012.

(Edited from article by Dean Van Nguyen @ Bandcamp Daily, New Grove Dictonary of Jazz & Wikipedia)

Jodie Sands born 1927?

 Jodie Sands (born c. 1927) was a popular American singer of the 1950s and 1960s who had fleeting chart fame before descending into relative obscurity. 

Born Eleanor DeSipio in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Sands’s father was an opera singer, and she received classical training with the hopes of one day performing at the Met. By 1955, she was working the club and cabaret circuit in the northeastern United States and in Canada. Although little has been documented about her, the world first heard Jodie Sands on record in 1955.  She was one of handful of Philly singers propelled into the spotlight thanks to Bob Horn, the original host of Bandstand.  She was signed to the Teen label he co-owned with Artie Singer, a local voice coach and musician, Bernie Lowe and Kal Mann.  

At the time it was customary to have pop artists record cover versions of R&B tunes that were desperately trying to make it onto the charts.  Sands first etching was just that but with a twist.  "Love Me Always," the a-side, was a West Coast song by professional baseball player Arthur Lee Maye and his group, The Crowns.  The twist is that Bob Horn actually played his version on Bandstand and Jodie's cover was, in reality, only a local release.  Her second and final record for Teen, "Let Me Show You Around My Heart," was the b-side of "When You Dance" by The Turbans, another South Philly R&B group.  The next move for Sands would be the biggest and most important one of her career. 

                                   

Signing to Chancellor records in 1957, Jodie Sands immediately had her biggest hit, "With All My Heart."  Sporting a Mediterranean cha-cha beat thanks to label owners Bob Marcucci and Pete DeAngelis, "With All My Heart" was soon heard on every transistor radio in the US and was featured regularly on the now national American Bandstand with new host Dick Clark.  The song made it all the way to #15 on the pop charts garnering her numerous television appearances and a spot in the 1957 film "Jamboree" singing her next Chancellor release, "Sayonara."  

Her next recording "Someday (You'll Want Me to Want You)" barely made the Top 100 chart the following year, reaching No. 95, but did better in the United Kingdom, where it reached No. 14 in the UK Singles Chart. While the songs were not very rock and roll, their popularity put Sands in the spotlight at a time when many promoters were looking for a “girl singer” to round out their rock and roll bills. 

She became part of Alan Freed’s regular cohort of performers in 1957, appearing on the shows he produced at the Paramount Theater alongside stars like Chuck Berry, LaVern Baker, the Everly Brothers, and Frankie Lymon. She also toured to Hawaii with Jerry Lee Lewis, Buddy Holly, and Paul Anka. In 1957, she was cast in the quasi-concert film Jamboree, which featured several of rock and roll’s biggest stars, including Fats Domino and Jerry Lee Lewis. She also appeared in the film American Bandstand. Sands, who already operated in the same circles as Fabian and Frankie Avalon, appeared well-positioned to capitalize on the “teen idol” phenomenon of the late fifties and early sixties. 

After leaving Chancellor records she signed briefly with Thor Records, followed by a one off for Paris records and then 3 singles for ABC-Paramount in 1962, concluding her recording career. Sid Fisher (brother of Eddie Fisher) took an interest in her career and became her manager.  Jodie spent a few years doing nightclub work in the area and then retired, disenchanted and jaded from the cutthroat music world. She taught private voice lessons then later appeared on a 1973 Bandstand Reunion hosted by Ron Joseph and Pat Delsea. 

She also sat for a TV interview on Bob Horn's original set with Tony Mammarella and Sy "Pop" Singer.  Sands continued to perform in clubs until at least 1975 as reported by the Philadelphia Daily News when she was billed at the Holiday Inn, New Jersey, during September that year. 

Please note - According to Rate Your Music, Jodie died in 1996, although I haven’t found this information confirmed anywhere else. I think they have quoted one of the death notices for her siblings in 1996 and 2000, which refer to Jodie Sands by the name of Eleanor Ferro. 

(Edited from womeninrock project, Jimmy DePre blog, Wikipedia & last.fm)