Original album liner notes…
…he lives in the “top ten”
A few years ago, a new talent burst on the American musical
scene. His name…SAM COOKE. His talent…to take a
song and so interpret it as to make it peculiarly his
own. Vocal quality, plus the apparent ease with which
the young vocalist could bend notes and skirt around musical
corners to gain effect, created a new style which was
immediately accepted. His first record, You Send Me,
soared close to the two-million mark, and a new career was
launched.
But now the speculation began. Would the new style
hold? Could Sam Cooke repeat his initial success, or
would he be one of the many one-day wonders that the record
industry knows so well?
The answer is in this recording. Like the champ that
he is, Sam Cooke has come back again and again to score on
the nation’s best selling charts. He lives in the “top
ten.”
We brought him to the RCA Victor label in the middle of his
career, and he has scored so heavily for us, we’ve nicknamed
him “The Consistent One.” From his explosive Chain
Gang right through his two-sided smash Having a Party and
Bring It On Home to Me, Sam Cooke has held the title
firm.
We hope, through this collection of Sam Cooke hits, you will
enjoy following the career of this very successful young
man.
We enjoyed being part of it.
Hugo & Luigi
__________________________________________________
1. You Send Me
(2:45)
(Cooke)
Recorded 6/1/1957 at Radio Recorders, Los Angeles, CA
Produced by Bumps Blackwell
Musicians:
Clifton White & Rene Hall, Guitar;
Ted Brinson, Bass;
Earl Palmer, Drums
Keen Single #4013, Pop #1 R&B #1
2. Only Sixteen
(2:02)
(Cooke)
Recorded 1/4/1959 at Rex Productions, Los Angeles, CA
Produced by Bumps Blackwell
Musicians:
Clifton White & Rene Hall, Guitar;
Ray Johnson, Piano
Dolphus Ashbrook, Bass
Charlie Blackwell, Drums
Keen Single #2022, Pop #28 R&B #13
3. Everybody Loves To Cha Cha Cha
(2:42)
(Cooke)
Recorded 1/7/1959 at Radio Recorders, Los Angeles, CA
Produced by Bumps Blackwell
Orchestra Conducted By Rene Hall
Musicians:
Clifton White & Rene Hall, Guitar
Dolphus Ashbrook, Bass
Charlie Blackwell, Drums
Keen Single #2018, Pop #31 R&B #2
4. (I Love You) For Sentimental Reasons
(2:38)
(Best/Watson)
Recorded 8/23/1957 at Radio Recorders, Los Angeles, CA
Produced by Bumps Blackwell
Musicians:
Clifton White & George Collier, Guitar
Ted Brinson, Bass
Charlie Blackwell, Drums
Keen Single #4002, Pop #17 R&B #15
5. (What A) Wonderful World
(2:06)
(Cooke/Adler/Alpert)
Recorded 3/2/1959 at Rex Productions, Los Angeles, CA
Produced by Lou Adler and Sam Cooke
Musicians:
Clifton White, Guitar
Dolphus Ashbrook, Bass
Ron Selico, Drums
Single #2112, Pop #12 R&B #2
6. Summertime
(2:21)
(Gershwin/Gershwin/Heyward)
Recorded 6/1/1957 at Radio Recorders, Los Angeles, CA
Produced by Bumps Blackwell
Musicians:
Clifton White & Rene Hall, Guitar
Ted Brinson, Bass
Earl Palmer, Drums
Keen Single #4013, Pop #81
7. Chain Gang
(2:35)
(Cooke)
Recorded 1/25/1960 at RCA Studios, New York, NY
Produced by Sam Cooke with Hugo & Luigi
Orchestra Conductor: Glenn Osser
Musicians:
Clifton White, Guitar
other personnel unknown
RCA Single #47-7783, Pop #2 R&B #2
8. Cupid (2:37)
(Cooke)
Recorded 4/14/1961 at RCA Studios, Hollywood, CA
Produced by Sam Cooke with Hugo & Luigi
Orchestra Conducted By Rene Hall
Musicians:
Clifton White & Bobby Gibbons, Guitar
Cliff Hils, Bass
Earl Palmer, Drums
RCA Single #47-7883, Pop #17 R&B #20
9. Twistin’ The Night Away
(2:43)
(Cooke)
Recorded 12/18/1961 at RCA Studios, Hollywood, CA
Produced by Sam Cooke with Hugo & Luigi
Engineer: Al Schmitt
Orchestra Conducted By Rene Hall
Musicians:
Clifton White & Tommy Tedesco, Guitar
Ernie Hayes, Piano
Red Callender, Bass
Earl Palmer, Drums;
Jackie Kelso & Jewell Grant, Saxophone
RCA Single #47-7983, Pop #9 R&B #1
10. Sad Mood
(2:38)
(Cooke)
Recorded 10/1/1960 at RCA Studios, New York, NY
Produced by Sam Cooke with Hugo & Luigi
Orchestra Conducted By Sammy Lowe
Musicians:
Clifton White & Everett Barksdale, Guitar;
Ernie Hayes, Piano
Panama Francis, Drums
Milt Hinton, Bass
RCA Single #47-7816, Pop #29 R&B #23
11. Having A Party
(2:36)
(Cooke)
Recorded 4/26/1962 at RCA Studios, Hollywood, CA
Produced by Sam Cooke with Hugo & Luigi
Engineer: Al Schmitt
Orchestra Conducted By Rene Hall
Musicians:
Clifton White & Tommy Tedesco, Guitar
Ernie Freeman, Piano
Ray Pohlman, Bass
Frank Capp, Drums
Julius Wechter, Percussion
William Green, Saxophone
RCA Single #47-8036, Pop #17 R&B #4
12. Bring It On Home To Me
(2:44)
(Cooke)
Recorded 4/26/1962 at RCA Studios, Hollywood, CA
Produced by Sam Cooke with Hugo & Luigi
Engineer: Al Schmitt
Orchestra Conducted By Rene Hall
Musicians:
Clifton White & Tommy Tedesco, Guitar
Ernie Freeman, Piano
Ray Pohlman, Bass
Frank Capp, Drums;
Julius Wechter, Percussion
William Green, Saxophone
RCA Single #47-8036, Pop #13 R&B #2
BONUS TRACKS
13. Win Your Love For Me (2:45)
(Cooke)
Recorded 6/22/1958 at Capitol Records, Hollywood, CA
Produced by Bumps Blackwell
Musicians:
Clifton White, Ulysses Livingston & Bob Bain, Guitar
Charlie Blackwell, Drums
Dolphus Ashbrook, Bass
Jack Costanzo, Percussion
Keen Single #2006, Pop #22 R&B #4
14. You Were Made For Me
(2:53)
(Cooke)
Recorded 11/26/1957 at Radio Recorders, Los Angeles, CA
Produced by Bumps Blackwell
Musicians:
Clifton White & Rene Hall, Guitar
Ted Brinson, Bass
Earl Palmer, Drums
Keen Single #4009, Pop #27 R&B #7
15. Nothing Can Change This Love
(2:36)
(Cooke)
Recorded 8/23/1962 at RCA Studios, Hollywood, CA
Produced by Sam Cooke with Hugo & Luigi
Orchestra Conducted By Rene Hall
Musicians: Nathan Griffin, Organ
Edward Beal, Piano
Clifton White & Bill Pitman, Guitar
Ray Pohlman, Bass
Earl Palmer, Drums
Ron Rich, Percussion
Julius Wechter, Percussion
William Green, Saxophone
RCA Single #47-8088, Pop #12 R&B #2
__________________________________________________
Sam Cooke was a great artist and major hit maker in the late
1950s and early 1960s. For awhile he was RCA Records’
second best-selling singles artist, after Elvis
Presley. But for all his talent, Sam Cooke was not a
superstar during his lifetime. His fame did not rival
that of Ray Charles or Frank Sinatra. Sam Cooke was a
successful rock and roll singer (when the term still
encompassed R&B) who was interested in crossing over
into the mainstream, to the sort of adult respect accorded
to Sinatra and Nat “King” Cole. Cooke had lots of big
hits, but he saw himself at the start of a long
journey. At the time he was killed, in December of
1964, he thought his major work, the work for which he would
be remembered, was still in front of him.
Cooke’s early death froze him in time, with all his
possibilities unplayed. It is possible had he lived
that he would have moved into the mainstream, had
middle-of-the-road hits like Johnny Mathis. Or he
might have gone to film and TV stardom. After all, he
was an exceptionally handsome and charming young man at the
moment when television and movies were about to become
racially integrated. Had Cooke lived to follow that
road, he might have been Sidney Poitier or Bill Cosby.
But there’s another way to look at it. The year before
Cooke’s death saw him and the country challenged by new ways
of thinking. Martin Luther King led the march on
Washington. JFK was assassinated. The Beatles
arrived in America. Cooke stood at ringside as his
friend Cassius Clay became heavyweight champion – the moment
Clay won he pulled Cooke into the ring and embraced him and
shouted to the TV cameras, “Sam Cooke – the greatest rock
and roll singer in the world!” Along with Clay, Cooke
became acquainted with the radical leader Malcolm X and
began studying the philosophy of Black Power. He had a
library of black history before black history had a name.
When his protégé Bobby Womack complained that some of the
new rock singers could not really sing, Sam told him that
from now on it was not going to be about who had the
prettiest voice, it was going to be about who was the most
believable. From now on, people who wrote the songs
would be singing them.
When Cooke heard Bob Dylan’s “Blowin’ In The Wind,” he said
it should not have been left to a white boy to write that
song, and composed his own great anthem of integration, “A
Change Is Gonna Come.” Cooke donated the song to an
album Martin Luther King assembled for the Southern
Christian Leadership Conference. Had Sam Cooke
followed this path, he might have become a powerful voice
for the struggle for equality. He might have gotten
there ahead of Curtis Mayfield, Marvin Gaye and Stevie
Wonder, who were all influenced by Cooke and all achieved
great success in the years after his death.
And none of that considers what Cooke had begun as a
businessman. He had started his own label, SAR
Records, and was signing, producing and recording other
artists – while giving them a fairer deal than other labels
did. Sam Cooke the entrepreneur might have given Berry
Gordy a run for his money. He might have pulled off
the dream of an artist-controlled label that the Beatles
later attempted with Apple.
Cooke retains a great hold on the popular imagination in
part because of what we dream he would have become if he had
lived. But Cooke died young and tragically, shot to
death by a motel clerk after he was robbed by a prostitute
with whom the clerk may (or may not) have been in
cahoots. It was a sad way to go, and the circumstances
of his death, for a while, diminished Cooke’s reputation.
In the months after he died, the world Cooke knew was turned
upside down. Malcolm X was assassinated, Lyndon
Johnson sent combat troops into Vietnam, Motown became “The
Sound Of Young America,” Dylan released “Like A Rolling
Stone,” and the Stones put out “Satisfaction.” Sam
Cooke’s influence was alive in the Temptations and Smokey
Robinson, but for a few years he was pushed into the oldies
section. Times were changing too fast to look back.
Here is where Sam Cooke began to defy convention.
While most popular music becomes less vital as it gets
older, the sheer quality of the songs Cooke wrote, produced
and sang made them endure and grow in stature. By the
early seventies, Cooke’s acolytes were singing his songs and
his praises. Rod Stewart appropriated much of Cooke’s
swaggering, cackling vocal style and often covered Cooke’s
songs, including “Having A Party” and “Twistin’ The Night
Away.” The Band covered “A Change Is Gonna Come,” Tony
Orlando had a huge hit with “Cupid” (which Tom Waits
reclaimed in concert), Cat Stevens topped the charts with
“Another Saturday Night,” Van Morrison covered “Bring It On
Home To Me,” Simon and Garfunkel and James Taylor recorded
“Wonderful World” and on and on.
It’s been that way ever since. Van Morrison wrote a
song about listening to Sam Cooke, and used Cooke’s “Send Me
Some Lovin’” as a template for his own “Vanlose
Stairway.” Bruce Springsteen named a song about the
solace found in old records “Meet Me At Mary’s Place,” after
a Sam Cooke song. The Pretenders’ “Back On The Chain
Gang” evoked Cooke’s old hit for a new song about music
allowing departed heroes to live on after death. Sam
Cooke had achieved an almost impossible feat: after he died,
his music earned him the superstardom he had worked toward
his whole life.
This Best Of Sam Cooke album was the beacon that kept
Cooke’s most popular songs in the public eye during the long
years when most of his catalog was out of print. For a
couple of generations this was the first – and often only –
Sam Cooke album they owned. Although there are more
ambitious collections that show Cooke’s remarkable range and
diversity, this is still the best starting place.
These are Sam Cooke’s biggest commercial hits. This is
the message in a bottle that brought his gifts to millions
of people.
You can’t help thinking, if it’s lasted this long, it will
probably last forever.
– Bill Flanagan, New York, 2005
__________________________________________________
Original recordings Produced by Sam Cooke, Bumps Blackwell,
Lou Adler, Hugo Peretti & Luigi Creatore
Reissue Produced by Rob Santos
Mastered by Bob Ludwig at Gateway Mastering Studios
Portland, ME
Analog to Digital Transfers: Jody Klein, Teri Landi &
Steve Rosenthal at Magic Shop, NYC
Legacy A&R: Steve Berkowitz
Project Director: Nathan Sedlander
Package Design: David Gorman & Arthur Nakata,
Hackmart
Tape Research: Teri Landi
Session Research: Russ Wapensky
Photos: Front cover & booklet back cover: from Original
LP; page 11: inner tray card & back cover: BMG Archives;
page 4: MichaelOchsArchives.com; SONY/BMG / ABKCO; page 9:
Courtesy of Clark Kauffman Collection.
Special Thanks: Adam Block, Bill Flanagan, Peter Guralnick,
Gregg Geller, Jeff Jones, Clark Kauffman, Iris Keitel, Allen
Klein, Jody Klein, Teri Landi, Tom Tierney, and Russ
Wapensky
__________________________________________________
Also Available From Sam Cooke
The Man Who Invented Soul
(07863-67911-2)
One Night Stand – Live At The Harlem Square Club,
1963
(82876-69552-2)
Night Beat
(82876-69551-2)
The Rhythm And The Blues
(07863-66760-2)
__________________________________________________
What are you going to listen to next? For a
complete listing of titles from Legacy Recordings, please
visit us at: legacyrecordings.com
© 2005 SONY BMG MUSIC ENTERTAINMENT / Originally Recorded
1957, 1958, 1959, 1960, 1961, 1962. All Rights
Reserved by BMG Music / Manufactured and Distributed in
the U.S.A. by SONY BMG MUSIC ENTERTAINMENT / 550 Madison
Avenue, New York, NY 10022-3211 / RCA ® Marca(s)
Registrada(s) RCA Trademark Management, S.A.
“Legacy” and “L” Reg. U.S. Pat. & Tm. Off. Marca
Registrada. / WARNING: All Rights Reserved.
Unauthorized duplication is a violation of applicable
laws. / Printed in the U.S.A.
82876695502
