THIS WEEK IN 1977
1 Chanson D’Amour The Manhattan Transfer 2 Knowing Me, Knowing You Abba 3 Sound and Vision David Bowie 4 When Showaddywaddy 5 Going In With My Eyes Open David Soul 6 Torn Between Two Lovers Mary MacGregor 7 Boogie Nights Heatwave 8 Moody Blue Elvis Presley 9 Romeo Mr Big 10 Rockaria Electric Light Orchestra 1977 was the year punk exploded. In March the Clash released their debut single ‘White Riot’ and the Sex Pistols signed a recording deal with A&M...to be fired from the label after just six days.
None of this is reflected in our top ten from that month. ‘Chanson D’Amour’, the number one song in the UK in the third week of March, 1977, could hardly have been further from the sound of the punk revolution playing out in the background.
Almost 20 years before, in 1958, the original version of ‘Chanson D’Amour’ was also out of step with a developing music scene. The song, written by Missouri’s Wayne Shaklin, gave husband and wife Art and Dotty Todd a US hit on the back of heavy radio play by old school DJs reacting against rock ‘n’ roll which was in its infancy at the time.
Grammy award-winning jazz vocal group The Manhattan Transfer were formed by Tim Hauser in New York City in 1969, taking their name from the title of a 1925 novel by John Dos Passos. The original Manhattan Transfer line-up disbanded in 1973 after one album but Hauser quickly assembled a new band under the same name.
Down the years The Manhattan Transfer have explored a wide variety of music styles, including a cappella, vocalese, swing, standards, Brazilian jazz, R’n’B and pop. ‘Chanson D’Amour’, sung by Janis Siegel with an Edith Piaf sound, gave them their biggest international hit, but it did not chart in their native US.
It spent three weeks at the top of the UK charts and was also a number one in Ireland and Norway.
Tim Hauser died of cardiac arrest in 2014, at the age of 72. Janis Siegel is now 67 and continues to perform with The Manhattan Transfer.