Eugene Church born 23 January 1938

Eugene Church (January 22, 1938 – April 3, 1993) was an American R&B singer.

Eugene R. Church was born in St. Louis, but was raised in Los Angeles, where his father was pastor at a church at 5th Avenue and West Adams. Around 1955, Eugene became friends with Jesse Belvin, who already had released several records on different 

Church & Belvin

labels. Jesse showed him the finer points of vocal harmony and songwriting. The duo first recorded together in 1956, under the name The Cliques ("Girl In My Dreams", Modern 987).

After a solo single for Specialty in 1957 ("Open Up Your Heart"), Church sang background vocals on such Belvin recordings as "Beware" and "Deacon Dan Tucker". The latter song was the inspiration for Eugene's biggest hit, "Pretty Girls Everywhere", which made the Top 40 (# 36) in 1959. Church claims that the late Tommy "Buster" Williams, another member of Jesse Belvin's inner circle, inspired the song when they were out driving around in Church's car. 

Church with The Turks AKA The Fellows

"There were these pretty women walking up and down the sidewalk, and Buster said, 'Man, look at this, pretty girls everywhere!' I knew right then we had a song title." "Pretty Girls Everywhere" (also a # 6 R&B hit) was his first record for Leon Rene's Class label. Originally intended for Bobby Day, who was not interested, it was credited to "Eugene Church and the Fellows", though the background singers also included the female group The Dreamers.

                            

The house band for Class Records was the Googie Rene Combo, which included the illustrious trio of Plas Johnson (tenor sax), Rene Hall (guitar) and Earl Palmer (drums). Eugene's follow-up Class single, "Miami"/"I Ain't Going For That" also did well (# 14 R&B, # 67 pop) and saw a UK release on London HL 8940, after London 

had inexplicably withheld "Pretty Girls Everywhere" from the UK public. After two more singles for Class and one for Rendezvous (a label also co-owned by Leon Rene), Church moved to the King label in 1961.

The first King single, "Mind Your Own Business" (still with involvement from Messrs Hall, Johnson and Palmer) peaked at # 19 on the R&B charts, but it was to be Eugene's last chart entry. Four further King singles followed in quick succession, produced by Johnny Otis, but sales were very limited.

By 1963, Church (who had relocated to Texas) was ready to join the ministry. Over the next four years he sang nothing but gospel music. In 1967 he recorded one last single ("Dollar Bill") for the World Pacific label, before embarking on a study to become a beautician. Eugene opened his own beauty parlour, from which he made much more money than he had ever seen as a recording artist. 

Church (left) in 1992 with Richard Berry

Still, the attraction of the entertainment business had never disappeared completely, and in the early 1990s, Church returned to Los Angeles, went back to secular music and toured the oldies circuit, which also brought him to Britain. But before he could make a real comeback, Eugene Church died of cancer on April 16, 1993, aged 55. As an innocent victim of the insidious Aids virus, he never lived to see a compilation of his work on either vinyl or CD.

(Compiled and edited mainly from the liner notes of  The Very Best Of Eugene Church by Stuart Colman.)

Bibi Johns born 21 January 1929

Bibi Johns (born Gun Birgit Jonsson, January 21, 1929 in Arboga, Sweden) is a Swedish singer, film actress and artist.

Bibi Johns, the daughter of a haulage contractor, who grew up in the small Swedish town of Arboga, started her musical career at the age of 13, when she won her first singing contest at a Children's Day event.

After finishing school, she applied for an art school to become an advertising artist. In Stockholm she came into contact with the musical show group Vårat gäng , where she debuted in 1946  and then came to tour with for a year and a half. She took singing lessons and toured the homeland as a vocalist with the Swedish jazz bands of Carl-Henrik Norin and later, Thore Swanerud.

Johns travelled to the U.S. in 1951 and secured a recording contract with RCA Victor through Gordon Jenkins where she got her artist name of Bibi Johns. 

She toured the U.S. and was a winner on the television talent show Chance of a Lifetime, then used the prize money to finance her return trip to Sweden. There she met a producer from the German Electrola label who convinced her to cut some German-language recordings for the German market, where "Bella Bimba" and "Gipsy Band" became big hits. She continued to record in Germany and appeared in German movie musicals throughout the '50s

                             

Bibi Johns was the first in the line of Swedish schlagersangerers who made success in Germany, and it is mainly her time in Germany during the 1950s and 60s that gave her fame.

In the early 1960s, she came home to Sweden to tour the public parks and play a revue at Liseberg. At home she now got record successes with songs such as Leka with the fire, the wedding and Bibbi's Bossa Nova.

In the 1970s, Bibi Johns was mostly on television. She moderated her own TV shows like "Do you know Miss Johns", "Too young to be blonde" and "The old wave". During 1970 to 71 she was co-presenter and singer in the 13-part English entertainment series "Rolf Harris Show" at the BBC, London. At home in Sweden, she was the presenter of the Melodifestivalen 1983.

Bibi Johns has also made a career as an artist. In 1975 she started at an art school in Munich and has since had exhibitions in Munich, Cologne, Baden-Baden, Bad Homburg, Hanover and Stuttgart.

Johns was married twice. Once in the 1950s for a short time with an American. Her second husband was the director Michael Pfleghar from 1960 to 1962. Pfleghar was later married to the Danish singer Wencke Myhre. After that, Bibi Johns spent some years with pianist Peter Jaques, with whom she performed together 

in the musical "The Key Carousel". From 1974 to about 1990 the composer Rob Pronk was her life companion and from 1997 to 2010 she lived with the 40 year younger pianist Alex Racic .

Shortly before her 85th birthday Bibi Johns had released another album, a collection of Swedish folk songs.Although she does not sing anymore, music is still the most important thing in her life, said the election Bavarian, who lives in Pullach near Munich, opposite the German Press Agency. Despite being 90 years old, Bibi Jones still drives a car and loves to talk to friends via computer, even in her native Sweden.

(Edited mainly from Wikipedia (translation) & My Hit World @ /www.mdr.de) 

Here's a medley from a 1973 TV show. Songs included are Bella Bimba, Zwei Herzen im Mai and Es ist nur die Liebe.

Slim Whitman born 20 January 1924

Ottis Dewey Whitman Jr (January 20, 1923 – June 19, 2013), professionally known by stage name Slim Whitman, was an American country music, western music and folk music artist singer-songwriter and instrumentalist known for his yodeling abilities and his smooth, high, three-octave-range falsetto in a style christened as "countrypolitan". He stated that he had sold in excess of 120 million records.

Although once known as "America's Favorite Folk Singer", he was consistently more popular throughout Europe, and in particular the United Kingdom, than in his native America, especially with his covers of pop standards, film songs, love songs, folk tunes, and melodic gospel hymns.

As a child, Slim Whitman (born Ottis Dewey Whitman Jr.) became infatuated with music and learned to yodel listening to Montana Slim and Jimmie Rodgers records. At age 17, he married 15-year-old Geraldine Crist, a preacher's daughter. The newlyweds moved to a 40-acre farm south of Jacksonville, Florida, where Whitman worked as a meat packer. While working in the plant, he suffered an accident and lost two fingers on his left hand. After the accident, he began working in a Tampa shipyard.

During World War II, Whitman served in the U.S. Navy, where he learned to play guitar. Following the war, he returned to the shipyard and also joined a local minor-league baseball team, the Plant City Berries. Whitman remained with the team through 1948, but then began building a singing career at several Tampa radio stations, eventually creating a backup band, the Variety Rhythm Boys.

Slim Whitman got his first big break after Colonel Tom Parker -- who was managing Eddy Arnold at the time -- heard him singing on radio station WFLA. Parker landed a contract with RCA for Whitman by the end of 1948. After reluctantly complying with the label's request to change his first name to "Slim," he released his 

first single, "I'm Casting My Lasso Towards the Sky" -- eventually to become his theme song. He made his national debut on the Mutual Network's Smokey Mountain Hayride in the summer of 1949, and the following year joined The Louisiana Hayride. Despite his national exposure, Whitman's career wasn't making much of an impact, and he was forced to take a job as a part-time mailman.

                           

In the early '50s, he released a cover of Bob Nolan's "Love Song of the Waterfall," which became his breakthrough hit, peaking at number ten on the country charts; the follow-up single, "Indian Love Call," made him a star, peaking at number two on the country 

charts and crossing over into the pop Top Ten. Both sides of his next single -- "Keep It a Secret"/"My Heart Is Broken in Three" -- were also major hits and he continued to have a string of Top Ten hits into the mid-'50s.

In 1955, his title song for the film Rose-Marie became a smash on both sides of the Atlantic; following its success, Whitman joined the Grand Ole Opry, and then went to Britain in 1956 as the first country singer to play the London Palladium. Throughout the late '50s and early '60s, he had a string of British hits, including "Tumbling Tumbleweeds," "Unchain My Heart," and "I'll Take You Home Again Kathleen."

Although he was experiencing great success in the U.K., Whitman's career was in neutral in the U.S. After 1954's "Singing Hills," he had only two Top 40 hits in the course of a decade. In 1965, he bounced back into the country Top Ten with "More Than Yesterday." For the next few years, he had a series of minor country hits, including "Rainbows Are Back in Style" (1968), "Happy Street" (1968), and "Tomorrow Never Comes" (1970). Throughout the early '70s, he continued to have minor hits, but in 1974, he retired from active recording.

In 1979, Whitman filmed a television commercial to support Suffolk Marketing's release of a collection of his greatest hits. On the strength of the commercials, All My Best sold four million records and became the best-selling television-marketed album in history. After its success, the label released Just for You in 1980, 

and The Best in 1982. Between 1980 and 1984, Whitman had a small run of minor hits, highlighted by 1980's number 15 hit "When." In the late '80s, he returned to television-marketed albums, releasing Slim Whitman: Best Loved Favorites in 1989 and 20 Precious Memories in 1991.

During the '90s, Whitman recorded infrequently but continued to tour successfully, particularly in Europe and Australia. His final release, Twilight on the Trail, appeared in 2010, and he died three years later of heart failure at the age of 90.

(Compiled mainly from a bio by Sandra Brennan @ AllMusic)

Shelley Fabares born 19 January 1944

Michele Ann Marie "Shelley" Fabares  born January 19, 1944) is an American actress and singer. She is best known for her roles as Donna Reed's daughter Mary Stone on The Donna Reed Show (1958–63) and as Hayden Fox's love interest (and eventual wife) Christine Armstrong on the sitcom Coach (1989–97). She was Elvis Presley's co-star in three films.

Shelley Fabares is one -- and maybe the best -- of a handful of young actresses/singers who emerged from the end of the 1950s through the mid-'60s, in an attempt to extend television stardom into action on the pop charts. Most didn't last, and none made the impact of their rivals, the singers who tried acting (Connie Francis, Sandy Stewart, Lulu, etc.), but Fabares did score a huge hit with "Johnny Angel."

The Donna Reed Show: (clockwise from bottom left) Paul Petersen, Donna Reed, Carl Betz, and Shelley Fabares, 1958

Shelley Fabares was born on January 19, 1944 in Santa Monica, California, to a family that already had a background performing (her aunt is Nanette Fabray, the actress best remembered for movies such as The Band Wagon), and she began working as a dancer and model while still a child. By the mid-'50s, she had appeared in such movies as Never Say Goodbye and Summer Love. In 1958, Fabares won the role of Mary Stone in the ABC television series The Donna Reed Show -- the show was a hit, 

and over the next five years, in tandem with former Mouseketeer Paul Petersen, who played her brother Jeff on the show, Fabares was one of the most visible and popular young performers on television, and the quintessential TV "daughter."

The series was produced by Columbia Pictures Television, and the two young performers were asked to try working with the studio's label, Colpix Records. Although the demos failed to impress the label's executives, Donna Reed Show producer Tony Owen (Reed's husband) insisted that they try and make a proper record, and even financed the recording session himself with producer Stu Phillips (The Monkees, Battlestar Galactica) at the helm.

                      

Fabares' debut release, "Johnny Angel," reached number one on the Billboard Hot 100 in April 1962 and peaked at number 41 in the UK. It sold over one million copies and was certified gold. It is regarded today as a quintessential "girl group" record. She released an album, Shelley!. "I was stunned about that, to put it mildly," she later said. "After all, I never could sing." This was 

followed by a second album, The Things We Did Last Summer (album), which included two hit songs "Johnny Loves Me" (no. 21) and "The Things We Did Last Summer" (no. 46).

None of her subsequent records ever came close to her first hit, but Fabares recorded for the next three years, in between acting assignments that included movies with Elvis Presley (Girl Happy, Spinout, Clambake), releasing three modestly successful singles ("Johnny Loves Me," "The Things We Did Last Summer," "Ronnie, Call Me When You Get a Chance") and a pair of albums (Shelley, The Things We Did Last Summer). To Fabares, who never conceived

of a singing career for herself and wasn't entirely comfortable in that role, these recordings were all a lark, but they constituted little more than a footnote to her early career.

Despite her indifference to recording, Fabares' first husband was producer Lou Adler. She didn't remain in the music business, and even her acting career had stalled at the end of the '60s. 

During the '70s, she resumed her career as an adult performer, appearing as a regular on series such as Forever Fornwood and One Day at a Time. She married actor Mike Farrell (M*A*S*H) in 1984 and has since emerged as a major television star again, as Craig T. Nelson's wife in the hit series Coach.

After Coach ended in 1997, Fabares voiced the role of Martha "Ma" Kent on Superman. In October 2000, Fabares received a life-saving liver transplant after being diagnosed with autoimmune hepatitis.

From 2004-2011 she produced the Screen Actors Guild Awards.

She and Farrell have also been very visible as activists, raising money and the public's consciousness on behalf of numerous causes, most notably Alzheimer's disease.

(Edited from Wikipedia & bio by Bruce Eder @ AllMusic)

Barbara Lynn born 16 January 1942

Barbara Lynn (born Barbara Lynn Ozen, later Barbara Lynn Cumby 16 January 1942 in Beaumont, Texas) is an American rhythm and blues guitarist and singer. Affectionately known as The Empress Of Gulf Coast Soul.

Barbara was a rare commodity during her heyday. Not only was she a female instrumentalist (one of the very first to hit the charts), but she also played left-handed -- quite well at that -- and even wrote some of her own material. Lynn's music often straddled the line between blues and Southern R&B, and since much of her early work -- including the number one R&B hit "You'll Lose a Good Thing" -- was recorded in New Orleans, it bore the sonic imprint of the Crescent City. Lynn was born Barbara Lynn Ozen in Beaumont, TX, on January 16, 1942; she played the piano as a child before switching to guitar, inspired by Elvis Presley.

In junior high, Lynn formed her own band, Bobbie Lynn and the Idols; at this point, her musical role models veered between bluesmen (Guitar Slim, Jimmy Reed) and female pop singers (Brenda Lee, Connie Francis). After winning a few talent shows and playing some teen dances, the still-underage Lynn started working the local clubs and juke joints, risking getting kicked out of school if she had been discovered. Singer Joe Barry caught her live act and recommended her to his friend, producer/impresario Huey P. Meaux, aka the Crazy Cajun.

With her parents' consent, Meaux brought Lynn to New Orleans to record at the legendary Cosimo's studio. Lynn cut a few singles for the Jamie label with the understanding that if none hit, she was to attend college instead of pursuing music right off the bat.

                            

In 1962, her self-penned ballad "You'll Lose a Good Thing" became a national hit, reaching the pop Top Ten and climbing all the way to number one on the R&B charts. Her first album (of the same name) was also released that year, featuring ten of her originals among its 12 tracks. Lynn continued to record for Jamie up through 1965,

 producing follow-up R&B hits like "You're Gonna Need Me" and "Oh Baby (We Got a Good Thing Goin')," the latter of which was recorded by the Rolling Stones in 1965.

In 1966, Lynn switched over to Meaux's Tribe label and cut "You Left the Water Running," which became something of an R&B standard and was covered by the likes of Otis Redding. In 1967, she signed with Atlantic and had another R&B hit with "This Is the Thanks I Get" early the following year; she also issued another album, Here Is Barbara Lynn, in 1968.

Lynn scored one last hit for Atlantic in 1972's "(Until Then) I'll Suffer," but by this point, she had several children to worry about raising; dissatisfied with her promotion anyway, she wound up effectively retiring from the music business for most of the '70s and '80s, though she did play the occasional low-key tour.

Lynn returned to music in the mid-'80s, touring Japan for the first time in 1984; she later cut a live album there, called You Don't Have to Go, which was eventually issued in the States by Ichiban. Lynn had managed to retain a cult following among connoisseurs of American soul and blues in several different pockets of the world, and toured internationally during the early '90s.

In 1994, Bullseye Blues issued her first full-fledged studio album in over two decades, So Good; Until Then I'll Suffer followed in 1996. Lynn later caught on with the respected blues label Antone's, 

The last new recording she made was "Blues and Soul Situation" in 2004. But with her distinctive guitar playing and her voice still sweet, Lynn has for years been a beloved draw on the oldies circuit nationally, with a particularly fervent following in east Texas.

She continues to reside in Beaumont, and was given a Pioneer Award by the Rhythm and Blues Foundation in 1999. Also in 2018 Lynn was honoured by the National Endowment for the Arts as an NEA National Heritage Fellow.  (Edited mainly from AllMusic by Steve Huey)

Jack Jones born 14 January 1938

John Allan Jones (January 14, 1938 - October 23, 2024) known professionally as Jack Jones, was an American actor and jazz and pop singer, popular during the 1960s. He was the son of actor/singer Allan Jones and actress Irene Hervey.

By many measures, Jack Jones was the most popular crooner to emerge between the heyday of Elvis Presley and the rise of the Beatles. In the span of two years, he snagged two Grammys for Pop Male Performance -- "Lollipops and Roses" in 1962 and "Wives and Loves" in 1964 -- which was enough to lay a foundation for a career that lasted well into the 21st century. Although his charting hits dried up in the early '70s -- prior to that, he was a fixture on the Adult Contemporary charts, racking up the number one hits "The Race Is On," "The Impossible Dream (The Quest,)" and "Lady" between 1965 and 1967 -- he continued to perform in Las Vegas and on the road, making the occasional foray into pop culture, like when he sang "The Love Boat Theme" in 1980.

The son of singing actors -- on the night of his birth, his father Allan Jones recorded his hit "The Donkey Serenade" -- Jack Jones was born and raised in Los Angeles, California. He made his first foray into performing professionally through his father's revue at the Thunderbird Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas. After that, he recorded demos for Don Raye which helped him land a contract with Capitol in 1959.

This Love of Mine, his 1959 debut for Capitol, went nowhere and the label dropped him. Jones headed up to San Francisco, where he was spotted by Pete King of Kapp Records. 

                            

Signing Jones virtually on the spot, King had Jones' record and release "Lollipops and Roses" in 1962 and it turned into a major hit, eventually winning the Grammy for Pop Male Performance. "Wives and Lovers," a song written by Burt Bacharach and Hal David, was even bigger in 1964, reaching 14 on Billboard's Top 40 and winning another Grammy for Jones.

Jones' time on the pop charts didn't last long -- "Dear Heart" went to 30 in 1964, while his cover of George Jones' country classic "The Race Is On" went to 15 in 1965 -- but he continued to place in Billboard's Adult Contemporary charts through the '60s, notably hitting number one with 1966's "The Impossible Dream (The Quest)" and 1967's "Lady."

Jones moved from Kapp to RCA in 1967. His first album for the label was Without Her, named after a Harry Nilsson song he covered. This was a signal that his records for RCA would navigate the distance between the supper club and soft rock, a path that culminated in his 1972 tribute to Bread, Bread Winners. He'd 

continue to experiment with fads throughout the '70s, including dabbling in disco and covering Little Feat's "Dixie Chicken" in 1977, before he left RCA for MGM. Nobody Does It Better, his 1979 debut for the label, found Jones continuing to explore disco and it also contained "The Love Boat Theme," a proudly campy theme song for the romantic-comedy ABC anthology series.

I Am a Singer MGM folded after Jones released Don't Stop Now in 1980. Following this, he'd record sporadically -- he only released two additional albums in the '80s (1982's Jack Jones and 1987's I Am a Singer -- while concentrating on playing live shows at clubs across the world. He mounted a major-label comeback in 1992 with The Gershwin Album, but that was short-
lived: by 1997, he was signed to Honest, where he released the 
albums New Jack Swing and Paints a Tribute to Tony Bennett.

Over the next two decades, Jones kept up with his schedule of performing and occasionally recording, while also appearing on-stage and, on occasion, television. The mid-2010s saw him particularly active, as he had a cameo in David O. Russell's 2013 film American Hustle, did a voice-over for the Cartoon Network series Over the Garden Wall, and recorded the 2015 album Seriously Frank (Celebrating the 100th Birthday of Frank Sinatra). . The record was subsequently followed-up with a tour in Los Angeles and the United Kingdom in 2016. Jones commenced his 80th Birthday Celebration Tour in 2018.

Jones has been married six times. In the second half of the 1960s, Jones had a well-publicized relationship with actress Jill St. John and the two were briefly married. In the early 1970s, Jones married Gretchen Roberts. Subsequently, he was linked romantically to British actress Susan George. From 1976 to 1982, he was married to Kathy Simmons. From 1982 to 2005, he was married to British-born Kim Ely and they had a daughter, Nicole (born in 1991). The singer has another daughter, Crystal Thomas, from a former marriage to Lee Fuller. 

Jones lives with wife Eleonora in Indian Wells, in Riverside County, California. 

He continued to perform concerts around the world and remained popular in Las Vegas.   After a two year battle with leukemia, Jones died at Eisenhower Medical Center in Rancho Mirage, California, on October 23, 2024, at the age of 86. 

 (Edited from Wikipedia & AllMusic)