JOHN OAKLAND

In a year notable for the rise of The Beatles and similar 'beat' groups, I found great pleasure in a single issued at the very end of 1962, by Sheila Southern (HMV POP 1089), possessor of one of the sweetest voices in the business. White Wedding and Little Star are my choice for the single record of the year. In a different mood, Doris Day (CBS mono BPG62 101: stereo SBPG62I01) sings sacred songs with exquisite taste, true feeling and sublime expression. There has been a vogue for brass bands following the success of Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass, The Lonely Bull and Acapulco 1922; their LP, Stateside mono SLI0027, includes Struttin' With lvfaria, one of the finest examples of this exhilarating music. The bargain-priced Ace of Clubs label produced mono ACL1147, devoted to Lew Stone and the Monseigneur Band, with the late Al Bowily singing and the happily still present Nat Gonella playing trumpet, demonstrating that there were good arrangers in the business further back than last year, and there were two really good humorous records among a flood of unfunny offerings from America. One of these is British—or at least Commonwealth—Rolf Harris of Australia (Col. mono 33SX1507: stereo SCX3477), singing Sun Arise and a bunch of mixed numbers. The other is American, brilliantly funny parodies on all sorts of songs by Allan Sherman (Warner mono WM8131: stereo WS8I3I).