This group brought him his biggest hit: Somewhere My Love (1966). In 1959, Conniff started The Ray Conniff Singers (12 women and 13 men) and released the album It's the Talk of the Town. When it sold poorly, he had it withdrawn. It was an experiment by one of the senior managers at Columbia to cash in on a new dance step, but from the outset, Conniff disliked it. His second album was Dance the Bop! (1957). II (1960), Say It With Music (1960), Memories Are Made of This (1960, gold album), and ’s Continental (1962). He released many more albums in the same vein, including ’s Marvelous (1957, gold album), ’s Awful Nice (1958), Concert in Rhythm (1958, gold album), Broadway in Rhythm (1958), Hollywood in Rhythm (1959), Concert in Rhythm, Vol. In the booth Mitch was totally surprised and excited at how well it worked." Because of the success of his backing arrangements, and the new sound Conniff created, Miller allowed him to make his own record, and this became the successful ’s Wonderful!, a collection of standards that were recorded with an orchestra and a wordless singing chorus (four men, four women). The women were doubled with the trumpets and the men were doubled with the trombones. I decided to have the choir sing along with the big band using wordless lyrics. He played live with his orchestra and eight-person chorus in large football stadiums as well as in Viña del Mar.Ĭonniff commented, "One time I was recording an album with Mitch Miller – we had a big band and a small choir. In Brazil and Chile in the 1980s and 1990s, he was treated like a young pop superstar despite being in his seventies and eighties. His later albums like Exclusivamente Latino, Amor Amor, and Latinisimo made him very popular in Latin-American countries, even more so after performing in the Viña del Mar International Song Festival. He also was the first American popular artist to record in Russia-in 1974 he recorded Ray Conniff in Moscow with the help of a local choir. He topped the album list in Britain in 1969 with His Orchestra, His Chorus, His Singers, His Sound, an album which was originally published to promote his European tour (Germany, Austria, Switzerland) in 1969. In these early years Conniff produced similar-sounding records for Columbia's Epic label under the name of Jay Raye (which stood for "Joseph Raymond"), among them a backing album and singles with the American male vocal group Somethin' Smith and the Redheads.īetween 19, Conniff had 28 albums in the American Top 40, the most famous one being Somewhere My Love (1966). He also backed up the albums Tony by Tony Bennett, Blue Swing by Eileen Rodgers, Swingin' for Two by Don Cherry, and half the tracks of The Big Beat by Johnnie Ray. Among the hit singles Conniff backed with his orchestra (and eventually with a male chorus) were " Yes Tonight Josephine" and " Just Walkin' in the Rain" by Johnnie Ray " Chances Are" and " It's Not for Me to Say" by Johnny Mathis " A White Sport Coat" and " The Hanging Tree" by Marty Robbins " Moonlight Gambler" by Frankie Laine " Up Above My Head", a duet by Frankie Laine and Johnnie Ray and "Pet Me, Poppa" by Rosemary Clooney. He wrote a top-10 arrangement for Don Cherry's "Band of Gold" in 1955, a single that sold more than a million copies. After his stint with Shaw, he was hired in 1954 by Mitch Miller, head of A&R at Columbia Records, as the label's home arranger, working with several artists including Rosemary Clooney, Marty Robbins, Frankie Laine, Johnny Mathis, Guy Mitchell and Johnnie Ray. Army in World War II (where he worked under Walter Schumann), he joined the Artie Shaw big band and wrote many arrangements for him. He studied music arranging from a course book. Joseph Raymond Conniff (Novem– October 12, 2002) was an American bandleader and arranger best known for his Ray Conniff Singers during the 1960s.Ĭonniff was born November 6, 1916, in Attleboro, Massachusetts, United States, and learned to play the trombone from his father.
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