Bobby Darin – The Ultimate Listener’s Guide: Commemorative 50th Anniversary Edition

Today (November 25th, 2023) sees the publication of the The Ultimate Listener’s Guide to the career of Bobby Darin. I want to take this opportunity to tell you a little about the book, and how it came to be.

Those of you who bought the 2nd edition, published back in 2018, will probably remember that I said quite clearly in that book that there wouldn’t be a 3rd edition. However, some things happened that meant it was sensible to go back on that promise. The first of these was covid. I spent the first lockdown making a video essay/documentary about early film. In the second lockdown, I started work on a sessionography for Bobby Darin. For those of you that don’t know, a sessionography compiles information about each recording session: time, place, musicians, songs recorded, their composers, the number assigned to the recording by the record label, how and when it was first released, and (in my case) where alternate takes etc can be found.

Many great musicians already have very detailed sessionographies completed. For example, Elvis Presley has one in a book called A Life in Music by Ernst Jorgensen, and there is also an indispensable website by Keith Flynn, with everything listed that you could possibly imagine. We know everything about Elvis’s recordings that we could possibly wish to know. Alas, the same isn’t true for Bobby. The new official website doesn’t even have a complete list of his albums.

There were previously two sessionographies of Bobby: one on the Praguefrank website, and the other by Jan-Jaap Been. I really want to take time out to thank them for their work. While those sessionographies are now somewhat out of date (in that they don’t include more recent releases), they were (and still are) huge achievements that have laid the groundwork for someone like me to come along and build on.

The problem with this endeavour for Bobby is that so much information is still not known – especially regarding musicians in some sessions, but also even dates of sessions are uncertain – but I have done everything I can to bring together everything we do know about Bobby’s recordings. There are still gaps, but I have been honest where we don’t know something, rather than make guesses. There’s a lot of misinformation online about Bobby, and I’d rather say we’re unsure of something rather than add to it. The session information in the new book looks something like the following – it is then followed by the kind of critiques and information that owners of a previous edition will already expect.

I’d like to take this opportunity to thank Kenneth Kelly Jr. and David Ortoleva for all the information they passed on to me regarding alternate takes that have been issued through the years, and for providing me with the audio of some of them.

So, when the session info was getting close to being finished, my plan was to issue it as a 100 page book that could sit on the shelf alongside the 2018 edition of the “Listener’s Guide.” And then something weird happened – unreleased Bobby recordings started appearing in the most unlikely of places, most notably various auction sites. There was an inexplicable flurry of them over a period of eighteen months or so. While they all remain unreleased for now, I was given access to them by the new owners for the purposes of this book, meaning I could add in analysis of music that not only have we not heard before, but also didn’t know existed! There are some significant (and historical) surprises among them, and I hope you will get to hear them in the not-to-distant future, but it was great to be able to include them in the book so that it is already up to date when they find their way out into the Bobby world. And so, bearing in mind the new musical material AND the sessionography AND it being the 50th anniversary of Bobby’s passing, the decision was made to re-release the book.

Another sample page:

The decision was made to include everything that Bobby recorded that has been included on audio-only releases (official and unofficial). So, for example, the duet with Judy Garland from The Judy Garland Show is included because it was released on the Judy Duets CD album. Some might be surprised to see the inclusion of the songs from the Seeing is Believing DVD, but just the audio did actually get its own release in a digital album back in 2006, and so those songs are included within the book (both in session information and critique/analysis). I have also included info on all of Bobby’s officially-unreleased audio recordings that we know of, such as the 1959 recording at the Hollywood Bowl, and radio recordings from 1960 and 1966. As stated earlier, I have gone into details about unreleased material when it was made available to me.

It is now a rather hefty tome – A4 size. 135 images. 540 pages. 225,000 words!! It’s been a long (and sometimes very trying) endeavour, particularly with technical proofing issues delaying the book’s release by about two months. All but two images from the previous edition have been retained, and some new ones added. The book is being published in hardback and paperback options. I recommend the hardback (although I get less royalties from it!), but Amazon have about a 4 week delay on dispatching that in the USA, hence why I have also done a paperback option. There are no hardback delays outside of the USA. 

And so, at this point, I release this commemorative 50th anniversary edition of the book into the wild! Many thanks to everyone who helped me during the writing of this or the previous editions, especially Karin Grevelund, Matt Forbes (whose cover design is stunning), Alex Bird, and L. Vergara Herrero. I really hope you like it, and that you feel it does Bobby’s legacy justice.

Bobby Darin: A Sessionography, Part 1

Welcome to the first in a series of posts that aim to be an updating of the various Bobby Darin sessionographies. There has been some great work done on this in the past by Dik de Heer and on the Praguefrank website, but neither have been updated for some time, and to my knowledge there has been no complete sessionography for Bobby yet compiled. This one of mine isn’t complete either, but it tries to pull together all the information that is “out there” as well as my own research.

So, I cannot stress enough: all credit to those who came before me in this endeavour, and everyone who has been kind enough to help with this project.

My own attempts at this is ongoing. This first part takes us from Bobby’s first session in March 1956 through to the Plain Jane session in December 1958 – his last before the That’s All LP, which was clearly the beginning of a new chapter.

The layout of the session is as follows: Each song occupies two lines. Matrix and/or master numbers are on the left of the first line, then the title of the song, and finally where the song was first released. The second line contains the composers of the song and then the record number and release date of the first issue of the song.

(updated January 16th, 2021)

The Decca Years

All of the following sessions were for the Decca label, and record numbers are for Decca releases, unless otherwise stated.

The ATCO Years, part 1: 1957-1958

All of the following sessions were for the ATCO label, and record numbers are for Decca releases, unless otherwise stated.

Bobby Darin on TV

This list of television appearances by Bobby Darin does not pretend to be complete.  It is compiled via reference to internet databases; archives; websites; the books of Jeff Bleiel and Al DiOrio; and new research of newspapers and magazines from the period.  Thanks are also due to the members of the Bobby Darin Fan Club and Bobby Darin Appreciation groups on Facebook for providing extra information.

Song lists are not always complete.  When no note follows the title of a programme, this indicates that the nature of Bobby’s participation in the show is not known or song titles are unavailable.  Despite these issues, this is by far the most complete and accurate list of Bobby Darin TV appearances yet compiled.  Broadcast dates may have varied in different parts of the U.S.  Where appropriate (and possible), local TV stations are listed when the shows in question were regional broadcasts.

Stage Show.  March 10, 1956.

Rock Island Line

The Big Beat.  July 19, 1957.  WNEW-TV.

Talk to Me Something

American Bandstand.  December 17, 1957.

The Dick Clark Saturday Night Beechnut Show.  May 31, 1958.

Splish Splash

The Dick Clark Saturday Night Beechnut Show.  July 19, 1958.

Early in the Morning; Splish Splash

The Bob Crosby Show.  August 23, 1958.

Splish Splash

The Dick Clark Saturday Night Beechnut Show.  November 1, 1958.

Queen of the Hop

The Dick Clark Saturday Night Beechnut Show.  November 29, 1958.

Queen of the Hop

The Dick Clark Saturday Night Beechnut Show. January 10, 1959.

Queen of the Hop

Buddy Bregman’s Music Shop.  January 11, 1959

There is a possibility that the date of broadcast was actually January 18.

Phil McLean’s Saturday Afternoon Bandstand.  February 7, 1959

Plain Jane

Record Hop.  March 21, 1959.  KMSP-TV.

The Perry Como Show.  April 18, 1959.

Dream Lover; I Got a Rose Between My Toes/What’s a Matter Wit’ Me (part of a medley with Perry Como and Lou Carter)

Juke Box Jury.  May 1, 1959.  WNTA-TV

The Dick Clark Saturday Night Beechnut Show.  May 2, 1959.

Dream Lover

The Ed Sullivan Show.  May 31, 1959.

Dream Lover; Mack the Knife

The Big Beat  July 9, 1959.  WNEW-TV

Host.

Dance Party.   July 17, 1959.  KPIX-TV

The Big Beat.  July 19, 1959.  WNEW-TV

The Jerry Lester Show.  July 31, 1959, KTTV. 

The Buddy Deane Show.  July, 1959.

Jukebox Jury.  August 7, 1959.

Dance Party.  August 8, 1959.  KPIX-TV

The Dick Clark Saturday Night Beechnut Show. Aug 22, 1959.

Dream Lover; Mack the Knife

Record Hop at Steel Pier.  August 29 & 30, 1959. 

Live TV broadcast of Bobby’s on-stage performances.

The Ed Sullivan Show.  September 6, 1959.

Swing Low Sweet Chariot/Lonesome Road/When the Saints Go Marchin’ In; By Myself/When Your Lover Has Gone

The Peter Potter Show.  September 16, 1959.

Guest host.

An Evening with Jimmy Durante.  September 25, 1959.

Mack the Knife; That’s All; Bill Bailey Won’t You Please Come Home (with Jimmy Durante); Personality (with Jimmy Durante)

Hennessey.  October 5, 1959.

“Hennessey meets Honeyboy Jones.”  Acting role.

The Louis Jourdan Timex Special.  November 11, 1959.

Mack the Knife; Never Set Your Laundry Out in Tuscaloosa/Ida, Sweet as Apple Cider (with Louis Jourdan); Time Will Never Change (with Louis Jourdan, Jane Morgan, and Abbe Lane); Unidentified/Bye Bye Love/Witch Doctor/Unidentified (with Louis Jourdan, Jane Morgan and Abbe Lane)

George Burns in the Big Time.  November 17, 1959.

Clementine; I Ain’t Got Nobody (with George Burns)

NBC Sunday Showcase.  November 29, 1959.

Taped broadcast of the Grammy Awards ceremony, at which Bobby was a winner.

This is Your Life.  December 2, 1959.

Subject.

The Big Party.  December 3, 1959.

The Ed Sullivan Show.  January 3, 1960.

That’s the Way Love Is; Beyond the Sea; You Make Me Feel So Young/You’re the Top (with Connie Francis)

March of Dimes.  January 16, 1960.

The Ed Sullivan Show.  February 28, 1960.

Clementine, By Myself/When Your Lover Has Gone; Mack the Knife (parody in French); International Show (with rest of the cast)

The Arthur Murray Party.  March 8, 1960.

The Dick Clark Saturday Night Beechnut Show.  March 19, 1960.

Mack the Knife; Clementine

Sunday Night at the London Palladium.  April 10, 1960.  (UK)

Some of these Days; Swing Low Sweet Chariot/Lonesome Road

 Cool for Cats.  April 22, 1960.   (UK)

Clementine

This is Bobby Darin.  April 23, 1960. (UK)

Mack the Knife; Guys and Dolls; The Gal that Got Away; My Funny Valentine; Beyond the Sea; Clementine; By Myself/When Your Lover Has Gone; I’m Just a Country Boy (with Duane Eddy); Have Mercy Baby (with Clyde McPhatter)

What’s My Line.  June 5, 1960.

Mystery guest.

The George Burns Show.  June 7, 1960. 

My Funny Valentine.

The Dick Clark Saturday Night Beechnut Show.  June 11, 1960.

Bill Bailey, Won’t You Please Come Home; I’ll Be There

Coke Time.  June 27, 1960.

All I Need is the Girl; Chattanooga Choo Choo/Goody Goody/Amapola/Oh! Look at Me Now/Flying Home/I’ll Never Smile Again/Marie/I’ve Heard That Song Before (with Pat Boone, Paul Anka, Frankie Avalon)

The Dick Clark Saturday Night Beechnut Show.  September 10, 1960.

Splish Splash; Mack the Knife (highlights from previous shows)

Dan Raven. September 23, 1960.

“The High Cost of Fame.”  Acting role.

The Bob Hope Show.  October 3, 1960.

Artificial Flowers; Two Different Worlds (with Patti Page); Thanks for the Memory/Mack the Knife/Two Sleepy People (with Bob Hope); Bill Bailey/Splish Splash/Alice Blue Gown (with Bob Hope)

American Bandstand.  December 13, 1960.

Artificial Flowers; Christmas Auld Lang Syne (Bobby co-hosts).

This is Your Life: Connie Francis.  January 9, 1961.

Guest.

Phillies Jackpot Bowling.  January 30, 1961.

Celebrity Contestant

Bobby Darin and Friends.  January 31, 1961.

I Got Rhythm/I Got Plenty of Nothin’; I Have Dreamed; Some People; Lucky Pierre (with Bob Hope); I Wish I Were in Love Again (with Joanie Summers); Bill Bailey Won’t You Please Come Home (with Bob Hope and Joanie Summers)

What’s My Line.  February 26, 1961.

Mystery guest.

The Jackie Gleason Show.  March 17, 1961.

Lazy River; When Irish Eyes are Smiling; Rock Island Line (archive footage)

The 33rd Annual Academy Awards.  April 17, 1961.

Presenting role.

Here’s Hollywood.  February 5, 1962.

Interview

At This Very Moment.  April 1, 1962.

Bill Bailey Won’t You Please Come Home (with Jimmy Durante)

The Ed Sullivan Show.  May 6, 1962.

This Could Be the Start of Something Big; Toot Toot Tootsie Goodbye/Don’t Worry About Me; I Got a Woman/What’d I Say/When the Saints Go Marchin’ In

President Kennedy’s Birthday Salute.  May 16, 1962

Mack the Knife

The Tonight Show.  October 3, 1962.

The Merv Griffin Show.  October 4 or 18, 1962.

The Mike Douglas Show.  October 17, 1962.

Weekend.  October 27, 1962.

Jerry Lewis Show: From This Moment On.  November 17, 1962

Bobby plays piano and drums with Henry Mancini’s orchestra

Here’s Hollywood.  November 22, 1962.

The Bob Hope Show. November 29, 1962.

All of Me

What’s My Line.  December 9, 1962.

Mystery guest.

Password.  January 6, 1963.

Celebrity contestant role.

Ballance Teen Topics. Unknown date, January 1963.

The Steve Allen Show.  January 29, 1963.

The Jerry Lester Show.  February 3, 1963.

The Steve Allen Show.  February 9, 1963.

This may be a repeat of the January 29, 1963 show, and it may simply be a mistake in a TV guide. However, it is listed here in case it is neither of the above.

Hollywood ’63.  February 17, 1963.

The Art Linkletter Show.  February 18th, 1963.

Darin at the Grove.  February 22, 1963.

Hour long TV special featuring Bobby in rehearsal, interviews, and ending with a live broadcast of the start of Bobby’s show on opening night.

The Linkletter Show.  March 12, 1963.

The Dinah Shore Chevy Show.  April 14, 1963.

Blue Skies; Long Time Man; Work Song; When You’re Smiling (with Dinah Shore and Andre Previn);  Everybody’s Doing It/Let’s Do It; Let’s Fall in Love; (with Dinah Shore and Andre Previn); Bidin’ My Time/Lazy Afternoon/If I Had My Druthers (with Dinah Shore and Andre Previn); Empty Pockets Filled with Love (with Dinah Show and Andre Previn)

Clay Cole at the Moonbeam.  July 20, 1963.

Interview

The Jerry Lewis Show. October 19, 1963.

Hello Young Lovers; Some of these Days; One for my Baby (impersonations).

The Ralph Pearl Show.  November 3, 1963.

Interview.

The Jerry Lewis Show.  November 9, 1963.

Audience member.

The Judy Garland Show.  December 29, 1963.

Michael Row the Boat Ashore; I’m on My Way Great God; Sentimental Journey/Blues in the Night/Goin’ Home/Chattanooga Choo Choo/Some of these Days/Toot Toot Tootsie Goodbye/I Know That You Know/I’ve Been Working on the Railroad/Lonesome Road (with Judy Garland)

Hollywood Backstage.  Late 1963.

Interview.

The Jack Benny Show.  January 28, 1964.

As Long as I’m Singing

Here’s Edie.  February 6, 1964.

This Nearly Was Mine; Mack the Knife/Moon Faced and Starry Eyed/Surghaya Johnny/Here I’ll Stay/Bilbao Song/Alabama Song (with Edie Adams)

What’s My Line.  February 9, 1964.

Guest panellist.

The Object Is.  February 10, 1964.

Contestant or panellist

I’ve Got a Secret.  February 17, 1964.

Celebrity contestant

The 36^th Annual Academy Awards.  April 13, 1964.

Nominee.

Wagon Train.  October 4, 1964.

“The John Gillman Story.”  Acting role.

Bob Hope Presents the Chrysler Theater.  October 9, 1964.

“Murder in the First.”  Acting role.

American Bandstand.  October 17, 1964.

Interview.

The Andy Williams Show.  December 7, 1964.

Hard Hearted Hannah; You’re Nobody ‘til Somebody Loves You/Real Live Girl/When You’re Smiling/Style/Three of a Kind (with Andy Williams and Robert Goulet)

The Andy Williams Show.  January 11, 1965. 

Once in a Lifetime; There’s No Business Like Show Business/A Lot o’ Livin’ to Do/Put on a Happy Face/I Believe in You/She Loves Me/Together/The Sweetest Sounds/Get Me to the Church on Time/You are Woman/Hello Dolly (with Andy Williams and Vic Damone); To Be a Performer (with Andy Williams and Vic Damone); Leader of the Pack (with Vic Damone and the Osmonds).

What’s My Line.  January 31, 1965.

Guest panellist.

The Match Game.  February 1-5, 1965.

Team captain.

Burke’s Law.  April 7, 1965.

“Who Killed Hamlet?”  Acting role.

The Ed Sullivan Show.  June 20, 1965.

Bobby appears briefly with other stars presenting an “anniversary cake” and singing Happy Birthday.

The Andy Williams Show.  September 13, 1965.

That Funny Feeling; Pleasure Doing Business (with Andy Williams and Robert Goulet); Little Girl/The Most Beautiful Girl in the World/When I’m Not Near the Girl That I Love/A Fellow Needs a Girl/Thank Heaven for Little Girls/The Girl That I Marry/The Girl That Married Dear Old Dad/There is Nothing Like a Dame (with Andy Williams and Robert Goulet); An Honest Man (with Andy Williams and Robert Goulet)

The Red Skelton Show (aka: The Red Skelton Comedy Hour).  September 21, 1965.

That Funny Feeling; Sunday in New York (with Jackie & Gayle).

The Steve Lawrence Show.  October 11, 1965.

The Danny Kaye Show.  Planned airdate: November 3, 1965.

Get Me to the Church on Time; Gyp the Cat; Fascinatin’ Rhythm (with Danny Kaye)

The above songs are what was planned for Bobby’s involvement. For reasons unknown, he withdrew from the show at a late stage, and was replaced by Pat Boone.  Publicity photos of Bobby, Danny Kaye and fellow guest Carolyn Jones had already been taken and distributed.

The Merv Griffin Show.  Unknown date, 1965.

What’d I Say (instrumental)

The Andy Williams Show.  January 10, 1966.

Gyp the Cat; This is the Life (with Andy Williams and Eddie Fisher); Do-Re-Mi (with Andy Williams and Eddie Fisher); On a Wonderful Day Like Today (with Eddie Fisher)

Jackie Gleason and his American Scene Magazine. February 26, 1966.

Mack the Knife.

Run For Your Life.  March 7, 1966.

“Who’s Watching the Fleshpot?” Acting role.

The Best on Record.  May 16, 1966.

Wayne and Shuster Take an Affectionate Look at George Burns.  July 15, 1966.  (Canada)

Guest.

Mickie Finn’s.  July 28, 1966.

Mame

The planned airdate of this show was July 21, but it was postponed for a week for reasons unknown.

The Andy Williams Show.  October 9, 1966.

Mame; I Taught Him Everything He Knows; Girl Medley (with Andy Williams and Anthony Newley)

Ready, Steady, Go! November 4, 1966. (UK)

If I Were a Carpenter

Top of the Pops.  November 10, 1966. (UK)

If I Were a Carpenter

The Roger Miller Show.  November 14, 1966.

Hits medley; Clementine (with Roger Miller)

United Nations All-Star Gala.  November 25, 1966. (UK)

This was a concert in Paris, with an edited version screened on UK TV later that evening. Other versions were screened in other countries under different names.

Hollywood Backstage.  2 episodes.  Unknown dates, 1966.

The Kraft Music Hall:  Rodgers and Hart Today.  March 2, 1967.

The Lady is a Tramp; I Wish I Were in Love Again (with Count Basie); Any Old Place (with Petula Clark); Falling in Love with Love (with Diana Ross and the Supremes); Mountain Greenery (with full cast)

The Joey Bishop Show.  April 25, 1967.

Bobby Darin in London (aka: Something Special). 20 May, 1967

Don’t Rain on My Parade; A Quarter to Nine; Once Upon a Time; I Wish I Were in Love Again; Mack the Knife; If I Were a Carpenter; One for my Baby (impersonations); The Girl Who Stood Beside Me; Funny What Love Can Do; What’d I Say; That’s All

Dateline: Hollywood.  July 3, 1967.

Interview

Dream Girl of 1967.  August 14-18, 1967.

Guest judge.

The Tonight Show.  August 31, 1967.

Spotlight (UK).  August 1967.

This UK show has been listed online within an itinerary of Bobby’s live performances in 1967, which also states that Bobby gave live shows in Britain around the same time. This author has found no evidence that this visit to the UK happened.  See:  http://www.jussta.com/bobby-darin-world-tour-1967.html.

The Kraft Music Hall:  Give My Regards to Broadway.  October 4, 1967.

Yankee Doodle Dandy; Always Leave ‘em Laughing; Give My Regards to Broadway (probably ensemble number); You’re a Wonderful Girl (with Liza Minnelli).

The Tonight Show.  November 13, 1967.

First Annual All-star Celebrity Baseball Game.  November 28, 1967.

Player.

The Kraft Music Hall:  A Grand Night for Swinging.  January 10, 1968.

Talk to the Animals; Mack the Knife; Drown in My Own Tears;  Long Time Movin’ (with Bobbie Gentry); Nothin’ Can Stop Us Now (with Bobbie Gentry and Bobby Van)

The Danny Thomas Show.  January 15, 1968.

“The Cage.” Acting role

The Mike Douglas Show.  January 29 – February 2, 1968.

The Tonight Show.  February 15, 1968.

The Jerry Lewis Show.  February 27, 1968.

Talk to the Animals; Sixteen Tons; Epicurian Delight (with Jerry Lewis and Jane Powell)

And Debbie Makes Six.  March 7, 1968.

Medley; Sylvia’s Mother (with Debbie Reynolds)

Originally scheduled to be shown on November 19, 1967, but postponed due to a technical strike.

 The Merv Griffin Show.  March 27, 1968.

Rowan and Martin’s Laugh-in.  October 14, 1968.

Mack the Knife (parody) (duet with Artie Johnson)

The Jerry Lewis Show.  October 29, 1968.

Long Line Rider; Change

Sydney Tonight.  November 20, 1968.  (Australia)

Bobby Darin at the Silver Spade.  November 26, 1968. (Australia)

Mack the Knife; Let the Good Times Roll; If I Were a Rich Man; Talk to the Animals

Leonetti and Friends.  December 19, 1968 (Australia)

Archive footage from the previous month.

Sydney Tonight.  December 25, 1968 (Australia)

The Joey Bishop Show.  December 28, 1968.

Upbeat.  January 18, 1969

Long Line Rider

The Kraft Music Hall:  The Sounds of the Sixties.  January 22, 1969.

Let the Good Times Roll; Splish Splash; Take a Whiff on Me; Long Line Rider; If I Were a Carpenter (with Stevie Wonder); I’ll Be Your Baby Tonight (with Judy Collins)

The Dean Martin Show.  February 20, 1969.

Long Line Rider; I’m Sitting on Top of the World/There’s a Rainbow ‘Round My Shoulder/Toot Toot Tootsie Goodbye (with Dean Martin)

Upbeat.  February 22, 1969.

Long Line Rider

The Joey Bishop Show.  May 13, 1969.

Della!  August 11, 1969.

The Tonight Show.  August 21, 1969

The Barbara McNair Show.  September 28, 1969.

Hey Jude

This is Tom Jones.  October 2, 1969.

Distractions (Part 1) (part 1); Aquarius/Let the Sunshine In (with Tom Jones)

The Tonight Show.  November 5, 1969.

Della!  November 13, 1969.

Burlesque is Alive and Living in Beautiful Downtown Burbank.  Planned airdate:  November 24, 1969.

Burbank Burly-Q (with Carl Reiner and Goldie Hawn); Mack the Knife (incomplete); I Love Lance (probably with Carl Reiner and Goldie Hawn); Beautiful Ladies (with full cast)

This special was due for broadcast on the above date, but was cancelled a few days before. It has never been broadcast within the USA.  It was shown in Australia on August 17, 1971.

Della!  January 28, 1970.

Philbin’s People.  May 29, 1970.

Disco 2.  June 13 or 14, 1970. (UK)

The Golden Shot.  June 14, 1970. (UK)

Late Night Line-up.  June 16, 1970 (UK)

This was primarily a discussion programme

The Roy Castle Show.  June 20, 1970 (UK)

At Maggie’s Place.  June 1970 (UK)

Exact date unknown.

The Mike Douglas Show.  July 27 – July 31, 1970.

If I Were a Carpenter;  And When I Die; Long Line Rider; Bridge Over Troubled Water; Everybody’s Talkin’; Splish Splash; City Life; Mack the Knife; My Funny Valentine; Put a Little Love in Your Heart (with Mahalia Jackson); You Smiling Now/Bill Bailey Won’t You Please Come Home (with Mike Douglas); Got My Mojo Working (with Little Richard)

The Jerry Lewis MDA Telethon.  September 6, 1970

The Andy Williams Show.  September 19, 1970.

Mack the Knife

The Flip Wilson Show.  September 24, 1970.

Melodie; Who Takes Care of the Caretaker’s Daughter (with Flip Wilson and Roy Clark)

The Darin Invasion.  October 1970.  (Canada)

Higher and Higher; Hi-De-Ho; If I Were a Carpenter; Simple Song of Freedom; Pick a Pocket or Two/Reviewing the Situation; I Ain’t Got Nobody (with George Burns); A Long Long Time (accompanying Linda Ronstadt)

The Flip Wilson Show.  November 20, 1970.

Higher and Higher; Country and Western Medley (with Flip Wilson and Charlie Pride)

The Flip Wilson Show.  December 17, 1970.

Gabriel; Paddlin’ Madelin’ Home/Row, Row, Row (with Flip Wilson); Noises in the Street (with Flip Wilson and Sid Caesar)

Celebrity Bowling.  January 16, 1971.

Contestant

The Flip Wilson Show.  January 21, 1971.

Lazy River; If I Were a Carpenter; Toot Toot Tootsie, Goodbye (with Flip Wilson

Goin’ Back to Indiana.  September 19, 1971.

Comedy role

Ironside.  October 5, 1971.

“The Gambling Game.”  Acting role.

Cade’s County.  November 28, 1971.

“A Gun for Billy.”  Acting role.

The Merv Griffin Show.  December 27, 1971.

The Flip Wilson Show.  January 13, 1972.

Mack the Knife; Simple Song of Freedom; One of Those Songs (with Flip Wilson)

Night Gallery.  February 9, 1972.

“Dead Weight.”  Acting role

The Dick Cavett Show.  February 28, 1972.

The Tonight Show.  March 6, 1972.

The 14^th Annual Grammy Awards. March 14, 1972

Presenter of award

The David Frost Show.  March 16, 1972.

For Once in my Life; Mack the Knife; If I Were a Carpenter; Worried Man/Splish Splash/unknown jazz number (on drums)

Engelbert with the Young Generation.  March 19, 1972.

Mack the Knife; If I Were a Carpenter; Blowin’ in the Wind (with Nancy Wilson and Engelbert Humperdinck)

Easter Seals Telethon.  April 1972.

Tumwater Caravan.  May 24, 1972. 

The Tonight Show.  July 24 and July 25, 1972

Guest host.

The Bobby Darin Amusement Company.  July 27, 1972.

Can’t Take My Eyes Off You; What Now My Love; You Are My Sunshine/Got My Mojo Working; Niki Hoeky/Proud Mary/Polk Salad Annie/Never Ending Song of Love (with Bobbie Gentry); I Ain’t Go Nobody (with George Burns).

While this was the first show broadcast, it wasn’t the first one recorded. In the show broadcast on August 17, 1972, Bobby clearly states that it is the first show.  Mack the Knife is sung as Bobby exits at the end of each show.

The Bobby Darin Amusement Company.  August 3, 1972.

Charade; Beyond the Sea; Sail Away; You and Me Babe (with Debbie Reynolds)

The Bobby Darin Amusement Company.  August 10, 1972.

I’ll Be Your Baby Tonight; For Once in My Life; You’ve Got a Friend (with Dusty Springfield)

The Bobby Darin Amusement Company.  August 17, 1972.

Spinning Wheel; If I Were a Carpenter; Mack the Knife; I’ll Never Fall in Love Again (with Donald O’Connor); Bridge Over Troubled Water (with Dionne Warwick)

Mack the Knife is sung to completion on this occasion but not on other episodes.

The Bobby Darin Amusement Company.  August 24, 1972.

Higher and Higher; Strangers in the Night; Simple Song of Freedom; Let It Be Me (with Claudine Longet)

The Bobby Darin Amusement Company.  August 31, 1972.

That’s All; Artificial Flowers; Work Song; Happy Together (with Florence Henderson)

The Bobby Darin Amusement Company.  September 7, 1972.

Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?; Talk to the Animals; Side by Side by Side (with The Smothers Brothers)

The Irish Rovers.  November 13, 1972.  (Canada)

Beyond the Sea; Simple Song of Freedom; If I Were a Carpenter

Video evidence suggests that Bobby appeared on two episodes of the series, but that both segments were recorded at the same time.

The Sonny & Cher Comedy Hour.  November 19, 1972.

Sail Away; Whiffenpoof Song (parody as part of a skit)

A Matter of Time.  December 1972.

Host

The Bobby Darin Show.  January 19, 1973.

Once in a Lifetime; Sweet Caroline; A Quarter to Nine; Happy; Hey Lolly Lolly Low (with Burl Ives); Something (with Dyan Cannon) San Francisco (with cast)

Mack the Knife is sung as Bobby exits at the end of each show.

The Bobby Darin Show.  January 26, 1973.

Born Free; Caravan; I’ll Be Your Baby Tonight; Bridge Over Troubled Water; St Louis Blues (partial); If Not For You (with Helen Reddy); The Trolley Song (with cast)

The Tonight Show.  January 29, 1973.

The Bobby Darin Show.  February 2, 1973.

Hello Young Lovers; Artificial Flowers; Happy; Fire and Rain; Give My Regards to Broadway; Paddlin’ Madelin’ Home/Row, Row, Row (with Flip Wilson); All I Have to do is Dream (with Petula Clark)

The Tonight Show.  February 6, 1973.

You Are My Sunshine/Got My Mojo Working/Splish Splash

The Bobby Darin Show.  February 9, 1973.

Lover Come Back to Me; King of the Road; If; Lonesome Road; Light My Fire (with Nancy Sinatra); Bill Bailey, Won’t You Please Come Home (with Red Foxx); My Kind of Town (with full cast)

The Bobby Darin Show.  February 16, 1973.

This Could Be the Start of Something Big; Dreidel; Sixteen Tons; Swinging on a Star (with Charlene Wong); Ain’t No Mountain High Enough (with Freda Payne); unknown duet (with Taj Mahal).

The Bobby Darin Show.  February 23, 1973.

Don’t Rain on My Parade; Song Sung Blue; Higher and Higher; Alone Again Naturally; Basin Street Blues (partial); Never My Love (with Cloris Leachman); Muskrat Ramble (with cast)

The Bobby Darin Show.  March 2, 1973.

It’s Today; Mame; Once Upon a Time; Two of a Kind (with Donald O’Connor); Let’s Do It (with Elke Sommer); Give a Little Whistle (with Charlene Wong)

Midnight Special.  March 16, 1973.

If I Were a Carpenter; Dream Lover/Splish Splash/Roll Over Beethoven

The Bobby Darin Show.  March 23, 1973.

Some People; Climb Every Mountain; Help Me Make it Through the Night; I Get a Kick Out Of You; I Know an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly (with Charlene Wong); Baby I Need Your Lovin’ (with Dusty Springfield)

The Bobby Darin Show.  March 30, 1973.

As Long As I’m Singin; Brooklyn Roads; I’ve Got You Under My Skin; If I Were a Carpenter; You’ve Got a Friend (with Connie Stevens)

The Bobby Darin Show.  April 6, 1973.

Charade; I’ll Remember April; Here’s That Rainy Day; I’ll Be Seeing You; Beyond the Sea; Happy Together (with Leslie Uggams)

Beyond the Sea was taken from the taping of the final episode in the series, edited, and inserted into this episode.

The Bobby Darin Show.  April 13, 1973.

There’s a Rainbow ‘Round My Shoulder‘; Cry Me a River; Let the Good Times Roll; And the Band Played On (partial); After the Ball (with full cast)

Bobby Darin Show.  April 20, 1973.

Get Me to the Church on Time; Shilo; Come Rain or Come Shine; Guys and Dolls; There’s a Hole in my Bucket (with Carol Lawrence); Words (with Carol Lawrence); High Hopes (with Charlene Wong); Let Me Call You Sweetheart/Volare/Just an Old Fashioned Song/It’s DeLovely (with Carol Lawrence)

The Bobby Darin Show.  April 27, 1973.

For Once in My Life/Once in a Lifetime; Help Me Make it Through the Night; Can’t Take My Eyes Off You; Bridge Over Troubled Water; Midnight Special; Lonesome Whistle; You Are My Sunshine/Bo Diddley/Splish Splash/Roll Over Beethoven; Just Friends/Something to Remember You By/Skylark/Spring is Here/Long Ago and Far Away (with Peggy Lee)

American Bandstand 20^th Anniversary Show.  June 23, 1973

Unknown (probably archive footage)

Bobby Darin at Decca

The following is adapted from the book “Bobby Darin: Directions.  A Listener’s Guide,” available from all Amazon sites in paperback and Kindle format.

Some singers find their voice the very first time they set foot inside a recording studio, and record some of their greatest work during their early years.  Elvis Presley is probably the best example of this, recording the classic That’s All Right at his very first professional recording session.  This was not the case for Bobby Darin, however.  In fact, it was over two years after he entered a studio before he recorded his breakthrough single, Splish Splash.  Prior to that, Bobby seemed to be constantly in search of his own sound, with many of his early records adopting the styles and mannerisms of other singers of the period.  He needed something to make him stand out from the rest of the would-be pop stars trying to carve themselves a career in the mid-1950s, and that something was his own identity.  Nowhere is this more noticeable than during the eight sides he recorded during his short tenure with Decca.

Probably March 6, 1956: Studio Session

Bobby Darin’s first session under his own name was in early March 1956, in New York.  He was nineteen years old at the time.  Bobby and his songwriting partner Don Kirshner, a fellow ex-student from Bobby’s high school, had already had some limited success by this point, having their songs recorded by the likes of LaVern Baker, Bobby Short, and, most notably, Connie Francis.  The recording of that song by Francis, My First Real Love, in February 1956 had seen Bobby take part in the actual session, although there seems to be some confusion as to whether it was as drummer or as one of the backing vocalists.  Two singles from the March 6 date were released:  Rock Island Line/Timber and Silly Willy/Blue Eyed Mermaid.  A month later, Cash Box featured a picture of Bobby from the recording date, together with A&R director Milt Gabler and musical director Jack Pleis.[1]  Theoretically, Pleis should have been a good match for Bobby, but sadly he didn’t get the chance to draw on his jazz background due to the nature of the songs chosen.

Bobby’s arrangement of Rock Island Line seems somewhat inspired by the types of recordings that Johnny Cash was making at the time at Sun Records (Cash would record his own version of the song in 1957).  The structure and instrumentation of Darin’s version is close to that used in Lonnie Donegan’s version, which hit the US charts just a couple of weeks after Bobby recorded his, but had been a hit in the UK earlier in the year.   The recording is hardly essential Darin, and today is really just of historical importance.  He sounds inexperienced and unconvincing and, perhaps more importantly, the performance sounds somehow inauthentic.  It is as if he is trying to be something he isn’t, which is, in many ways, exactly what was happening.  This wasn’t Darin’s natural milieu, and this is a fatal error within folk music, a genre that is built around authenticity.  Despite this, there are no signs of nerves from the young teenager whose vocal is somewhat exposed, being backed by just an acoustic guitar and drums.

The B-side of this first single finds Darin turning from a cross between folk and country to a full-on Frankie Laine impression.  Timber is a faux-work song written by Bobby with Don Kirshner and “George M. Shaw.”   Shaw was actually the pseudonym of  George Scheck, the manager of Connie Francis who had helped Bobby and Don get some of their songs recorded, and had got Bobby his recording contract at Decca and was now managing him.  Timber was firmly in the Laine mould and finds him accompanied by backing vocals and percussion-heavy instrumentation.  It is a better performance than Rock Island Line, and the arrangement cleverly uses a series of fake-endings before the actual conclusion of the song.  It sees Bobby for the first time approaching the type of material that would be the basis of his masterful Earthy! LP six years later, and the song wouldn’t have been out of place on that record had he chosen to re-record it.

Just over a week after the session, this first single was released and Billboard magazine included a short review of the two sides.  Bobby would no doubt have been extremely happy when he read that the “new artist shows solid promise,” and that his performance of Timber had “spirit and song savvy in evidence.”[2]   Interestingly, Billboard compared the song to Ghost Riders in the Sky, and the review in Variety also picked up on the fact that Darin had yet to find his own sound, writing that his version of Rock Island Line “is compelling, even if Darin sounds as if he’s been listening to Harry Belafonte a shade too much for his own good.”[3]   Cash Box was probably the most enthusiastic, saying that Rock Island Line was “an exciting folk type song that looks like an all out hit, [and] is treated to a colourful reading by Bobby Darin.”[4]  Timber was described as “another beaty song (sic) with an exciting folk flavor [that] is dramatically executed here by the talented youngster.  Lad has a fascinating sound and comes over zestfully.”[5]  Darin was also getting noticed outside of the usual trade magazines, with one writer in a local newspaper stating that “Decca is proud as punch of two new additions: vocalist Roberta Sherwood and teenager Bobby Darin.  Both look like hot stuff.”[6]

Also recorded at the same session was a song that saw Bobby turning his attention to the novelty rock ‘n’ roll material with which he would eventually find stardom.  Silly Willy was no Splish Splash, however.  Much of the problem with the song is the awkward transitions between the two different tempos and rhythms that the song employs.  It is a shame, for there is much to enjoy in Darin’s performance, but the various elements simply do not gel together in the way that they should.

Silly Willy is interesting, however, in that it provides us with our first audible clue that Bobby wanted to be more than just a pop singer.  While the number is credited to the same writing team as Timber, it has its roots in a 1920s risqué jazz number about a drug-addicted chimney sweeper called Willie the Weeper which, in turn, provided the inspiration for Minnie the Moocher, which Darin would record a few years later.  The lyrics of the first verse of Silly Willy and Willie the Weeper are so similar that it’s clear that Bobby knew the more obscure song and was drawing from that rather than the better known Minnie the Moocher.  The first verse of Willie the Weeper reads:

Have you heard the story, folks, of Willie the Weeper? / Willie’s occupation was a chimney sweeper / He had a dreamin’ habit, he had it kind of bad /Listen, let me tell you ’bout the dream he had.

Silly Willy barely changes the lyrics at all:

Listen to the story about Willy the Weeper / Willy the Weeper was a long time sleeper / He went to sleep one night and dreamed so bad / Now let me tell you about the dream that little Willy had.

What is remarkable here is not the fact that Bobby Darin “borrowed” lyrics from an older song (this was not a rare occurrence in pop music at the time), but that he knew the lyrics to Willie the Weeper at all.  Most of the well-known recordings, such as those by Louis Armstrong and George Lewis, were instrumentals – possibly with good reason due to the song’s repeated references to “dope” and taking “pills” – and so one has to wonder where Bobby heard the lyrics in the first place.  If nothing else, it shows just how wide his knowledge of popular music was even at the tender age of nineteen.

The B-side of Silly Willy was Blue Eyed Mermaid.  If Timber saw the singer performing in the Frankie Laine style, then this number sees a move towards Guy Mitchell in a song that has a kind of fake sea shanty feel.  A line or two of the verses steal the melody of Ghost Riders in the Sky, although this time this was no fault of Bobby himself as he was not the writer of the song.  As with its predecessor, the single failed to make the charts.  Billboard wrote of Silly Willy that the “young singer comes up with a fast and furious bit of nonsense about Silly Willy and his dream…Excitement could kick off juke spins.”[7]  It was not unnoticed that Blue Eyed Mermaid stole part of its melody from Ghost Riders in the Sky, but it was still said that “the side is right in the groove with current favour and will bear watching.”[8]

Another song, Rock Pile, written by Darin in collaboration with Kirshner and Shaw/Scheck, is also listed as having been recorded at these sessions.  It has never been released, and it is unclear whether the song was merely attempted and then aborted or if a master take was completed.

*

On March 10, 1956, Bobby made his national TV debut on Stage Show, a programme hosted by bandleaders Tommy and Jimmy Dorsey which had helped to catapult Elvis Presley to fame during his four appearances on the show.[9]  Darin sang Rock Island Line, and it didn’t go well.  Bobby told the story in 1972 on an episode of The David Frost Show:

“What happened was that I had forgotten all the lyrics. I covered Lonnie Donegan’s record of Rock Island Line.   I was with Decca at the time. They said, “We have a record here and it’s going to be a smash, we’ll get a cover record.” In those days, you did that. […] I learned it on a Monday, recorded it on a Tuesday evening, and then did The Jackie Gleason Show on a Saturday evening.[10]  I really wasn’t sure of the lyrics, and they weren’t about to serve my myopic condition and so therefore they couldn’t give me cue cards. So I devised my own which was on the palm of my hand. […]  At the end of the show everyone knew what I was doing, of course, except my sweet Mama who said, “You were wonderful, I never saw anyone use his hands like that.”

After the Stage Show appearance, Bobby didn’t appear on television again for over a year.  He did, however start making live appearances to promote his recordings.  While there is relatively little known about his concert work in 1956, he was involved in rock ‘n’ roll revues such as the one as the University of Detroit on April 15, where he appeared alongside The Four Aces and The Four Coins, among others.  In May 1956, he appeared at The Purple Onion, Guilford, Indiana, as the headliner, giving three shows nightly for a week.  On May 8, three days after finishing at the Purple Onion, he was performing at the annual concert of the Music Operators of America (MOA) convention – a four hour which also featured Nat ‘King’ Cole, Teresa Brewer, Mahalia Jackson and Pat Boone.

July 11, 1956:  Studio Session

 When Bobby Darin went back into the studio in July 1956, he didn’t try to improve on the styles of singing, or build upon what he had attempted, at his previous session but, instead, tried something completely different.

The first release from this session coupled The Greatest Builder with Hear Them Bells.  Both songs are semi-religious efforts, and neither are particularly good or particularly original compositions.  The Greatest Builder is a ballad sung with such fake sincerity that it is almost nauseating.  The arrangement is sedate and uses full orchestra and chorus, and has little in common with what most teenagers would have been buying or listening to at the time.  Oddly, the arrangement and the material are more in line with what some of the British stars were scoring hits with in the UK charts at the time.  For example, Malcolm Vaughan had a number 3 hit in the UK with St Theresa of the Roses a couple of months after the release of The Greatest Builder, and there is not a vast chasm between the styles of the two songs.  The difference, though, is that Vaughan seemed comfortable singing these types of rather square ballads and managed to do so with integrity and sincerity, but Bobby manages neither.

Hear Them Bells is better, and finds Bobby singing in a style and arrangement which, as with Blue Eyed Mermaid, is most associated with Guy Mitchell.  This song is again accompanied by an orchestra and chorus, and has a sound that is close to that used in Mitchell’s hits My Truly Truly Fair and Cloud Lucky Seven, despite the semi-gospel nature of the lyrics.  The lyrics are trite, but Bobby manages to give a better performance here, giving a bouncy, lively vocal over a fun, if dated, arrangement.

The main problem with these songs is that the listener doesn’t believe that Darin believes what he’s singing about, or that this is the style of music that he wants to be singing.  Perhaps this is partly to do with the issue of hindsight – after all, in 1968 Bobby released a song, Sunday, which attacks organised religion and what he views as its hypocrisy, and here we have songs telling us about the wonders of The Greatest Builder and going to church on a Sunday.  Billboard were hardly ecstatic about the single either (and they were usually very easily pleased), stating that The Greatest Builder was “not great material of its type” and that Hear Them Bells wasn’t “hefty on message, but can help carry the better side.”[11]  Variety were more impressed, saying that Bobby gave an “all-out reading” of the ballad and that Hear Them Bells is “an uptempo religioso in a get-happy tempo and Darin also belts this one neatly.”[12]  Oddly, at the height of Bobby Darin’s fame at the end of 1959, Decca decided to re-release this single.  As Billboard pointed out at the time, the single “bears little resemblance to the present Darin vocal sound.  It’s a happy sound but fans will find little that’s familiar.”[13]  Cash Box referred to Bobby as a “talented songster,” and said of The Greatest Builder that “Bobby Darin hands in a potent deck as he introduces a dramatic inspirational ballad…Could catch on.”  It didn’t.[14]

Dealer In Dreams, the A-side of the fourth and final Decca single, is a Darin-Kirshner song which would have worked quite well for Elvis Presley, being quite similar in style and structure to Don’t Leave Me Now, which Presley would record twice during 1957 and include in Jailhouse Rock (Richard Thorpe, 1957).  Bobby’s recording misses the mark, however, because it is over-arranged; Darin is singing a rock ‘n’ roll ballad with a full orchestral arrangement.  With a less square arrangement and a more nuanced vocal, this could have worked well.  Still, the song itself is solid and could have been a hit in the right hands.

Help Me was written by Cy Coben, co-writer of The Greatest Builder, and again finds Bobby in a strange, alien environment more in line with the British charts than the American ones.  This type of big ballad never became Bobby’s forte, as he didn’t have the right voice for it, and here he is once again bogged down with a by-the-book orchestral arrangement.

In their review of the single, Billboard picked up again on the idea that Bobby Darin hadn’t yet worked out who he was within the recording studio.  Whereas Variety had compared him to Harry Belafonte on his first single, Billboard suggested that Dealer in Dreams was “reminiscent of Johnnie Ray” before stating that it “deserves exposure.”  Of Help Me, they wrote that the recording was “a big, fancy piping of a pleading ballad of genuine appeal.”[15]  The record-buying public didn’t agree, and neither did most of the critics, with this pairing get the least attention of the four Decca singles.

*

In the end, Darin’s short tenure at Decca must have been as frustrating for Darin as it was for listeners.  He had recorded eight sides, none of which had attracted much attention from record buyers, and was seemingly no closer to finding his own voice than when he first stepped into the Decca recording studios a few months earlier.  It would be nearly a year before he returned to the recording studio, although he continued performing live in supper clubs and as part of revues aimed at teenagers, such as Bill O’Brien’s Teen Time.  When he did return to the studio, it would be with a much more confident sound and with Bobby positioning himself firmly as a rock ‘n’ roll singer.  For now.

[1] “Decca Debut,” Cashbox, April 7, 1956, 26

[2] “Reviews of New Pop Records,” Billboard, March 31, 1956, 56.

[3] Herm Schoenfeld, “Jocks, Jukes and Disks,” Variety, March 14, 1956, 50.

[4] “Record Reviews,” Cash Box, March 31, 1956, 8.

[5] Ibid.

[6] George Laine, “Wax Museum,” Pasadena Independent, April 20, 1960, 12.

[7] “Reviews of New Pop Records,” Billboard, May 26, 1956, 50.

[8] Ibid.

[9] Elvis would appear twice more on the show on the two programmes immediately following Bobby’s appearance.

[10] Stage Show was part of The Jackie Gleason Show.

[11] “Reviews of New Pop Records,” Billboard, September 29, 1956, 64.

[12] Herm Schoenfeld, “Jocks, Jukes and Disks,” Variety, October 8, 1956, 62.

[13] “Reviews of New Pop Records,” Billboard, December 28, 1959, 27.

[14] “Record Reviews,” Cash Box, September, 29, 1956, 10.

[15] “Reviews of New Pop Records,” Billboard, February 23, 1957, 63.