Stringy-string-string

Continuing my trip back through the 1959 album charts.

27/09/59 : Gypsy Campfires - 101 Strings


I've no idea about any of this - I'm guessing it'll be a string section playing some gypsy songs, but let's see, shall we?

Yup - pretty much, although I think I'd go as far as calling them an orchestra because there are a lot of strings here (considerably more than 101, I suspect) along with a few other instruments as well. Bizarrely, one of the tracks is called "Two Guitars" when it seems to feature all the stringed instruments except guitars. It's not terrible and I did find my toes tapping along at times, but it's intriguing that people actually chose to listen to this sort of thing - it's what you hear when you're put on hold on the phone these days.

We're at #9 in the chart this week on their second week of a two week run, with this being as high as it got although it did manage another four random weeks in '60. The top five this week were South Pacific, Gigi, Russ Conway, Peter Sellers and My Fair Lady and there were no new entries or named women in the entire chart.

Wikipedia doesn't have an entry for the album, but has quite the lengthy entry for the group. Their name isn't entirely accurate because they consisted of 124 stringed instruments played by an often changing cast, were active from '57-'81 and they released - go on, guess how many albums? No, it was more than that - the entry lists TWO HUNDRED AND SIXTY NINE albums, including such unforgettable classics as East Of Suez, The Soul Of Poland, Trumpet-a-gogo Volume 2, Gay Nineties Waltzes and Appointment In London. But people really seemed to dig them because globally they've sold 50 million albums!

"Customers also listened to" Devotchka, The Hawaiian Surfers, The Village Stompers and The Red Army Choir - well, there's an interesting selection of names and no mistake. I didn't hate 101 Strings but it was really rather peculiar and I'll not be searching them out again - but it seems like I don't have a choice in the matter because they had a #1 album in '60 so we'll be visiting that at some point I guess!

20/09/59 - Surprisingly amusing
04/10/59 - Well done, but not one of my favourites

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