All language subtitles for Streetlight.Harmonies.2020.720p.WEB.H264-HYMN

[statics]

[jukebox operating]

Everything has to begin
somewhere, everything.

No matter where you went
in 1956, no matter
what neighborhood, what project,

there was a group doo-wopping,
they were singing,
making harmony.

You heard harmony
every place you went.

[music playing]

What is doo-wop? I wish I knew.

If you talk to ten people
in this music business,

they'll give
you ten different answers.

Doo-wop means great music.

Harmony, harmony, harmony.
No band, no nothing.

I don't know who came up
with that term.

I looked it up, doo-wop
in the Webster's dictionary...

Street corner.

Homegrown music.

Acapellas,
street corner harmony.

It's a feeling.

I would call it
really rhythm and blues.

Doo-wop. Do-bee-do-bee-do-wop.
Do-bee-do-bee-do-wop.

They would doo-wop,
we were R&B singers.

Four or five guys
standing on the corner
singing that wonderful music.

And we said,
"Well if they can do that,
we could do that."

One lady said
that she had conceived
four children on that song.

I don't know
if I should take credit
for it or apologize.

We paved the way for Rihanna,
Beyoncé, Destiny's Child.

When I first heard Boyz II Men,
New Edition, Backstreet Boys,
all that's doo-wop.

They should acknowledge us
because if it wasn't for us,
they wouldn't be here.

There would be nobody
out there doing anything
if they didn't reach back

into what we put down
as that foundation.

You know as long as there's
teenage girls out there,

I think vocal harmony groups
will be around.

It was good music then,
it's good now,

it's gonna be good in the future
when the next generation
recreates it.

That period of time,
some of the greatest music,

greatest singers,
greatest groups in history.

That was the beginning
of a revolution
that has never ended.

[music playing]

When I was in gospel,
we learned how to hum before
we learned to ever sing.

You know, my mother
used to go-- [hums]

I said, "Whoa!"

[music playing]

The do-wop as you call them,
I call them street corner
harmony groups,

came from gospel.

If you did have some talent,
it was-- usually it
came out in the church.

We imitated
a lot of the groups
that were by the church groups

that's where it basically
comes from. Soul Stirrers--

whatever they were,
the patterns they would use,

we would use that
into rock and roll
and rhythm and blues.

My mom was a gospel singer.

and through that
is where I met Sam Cooke

and he sang with a group
called the Soul Stirrers.

So, I got to meet a lot
of wonderful gospel singers

and my mom used to take me
around to all of the churches
and places she would sing

in the tri-state area.
So, I would sit there
and listen to her

and listen to them sing
and-- and I got very inspired.

I would listen to the High Lows
which weren't really
a doo-wop group necessarily,

but they were male vocal
group. the Swan Silvertones
and-- and groups like that

that were gospel in nature.
So, you had call
and response happening

or where you'd have
a lead vocalist and then
the other three vocalists

echoing what he was singing.
That was doo-wop.

It was kind of like standing
under the streetlight
on the street corner

and just starting parts
and just-- just singing.

So, it was always a part
of our heritage.

Pretty soon when I got--
so I'd say, "I'm tired
of going to church singing.

I gotta make some money."

The evolution of doo-wop
music or harmonizing of music

came from these guys
like the Mills Brothers,
the Ink Spots.

["If I didn't care"
by Ink Spots playing]

[Anthony]
Let's take the Ink Spots.

Now that's the early 40s,
during World War II.

The Ink Spots were singing
pop music. "If I Wouldn't Care."

[hums] And we would hear
that stuff and go,
"God, dad what was that?"

They used to rap, the Ink Spots.
♪ Oh, honey child, baby♪

In the middle-- eighth
of the song.

♪ Honey child
More than words can say♪

[Anthony] Spiritual music
gave birth to blues,

blues gave birth
to rhythm and blues,

rhythm and blues
gave birth to rock and roll,

rock and roll
gave birth to hip hop.

No doo-wop.
I don't know where that is.
It doesn't fit in the category.

It was the Ink Spots,
it was the Ravens,
but there was the Orioles.

["Does She Loves Me"
by The Orioles playing]

[Sammy] When they first heard
"Does She Loves Me"

that earthy sound
from the Orioles with Sonny Til

and by the time
"Crying in the Chapel"
came out,

you could see that
the music had changed

and it gave it
a more sophisticated sound.

Oh, that was beautiful.

They hung out
on Pennsylvania Avenue
which many of us believe

was the birthplace of rhythm
and blues vocal harmony

and it was rhythm and blues
vocal harmony, which would later
develop into doo-wop.

The Orioles were fantastic,
but they weren't doo-woppers.

The groups from then,
don't like that term

because that's not
what they were. They were
rhythm and blues singers.

Groups started springing up
all over the country trying
to imitate the Orioles

and I dare say, I don't know
of a group that formed
between 1948 and 1952

that was not influenced
strongly by the Orioles.

It was just soul.
It was the soul of Baltimore.

The Orioles hooked up
with a manager
named Deborah Chessler.

Deborah Chessler was
a twenty-five-year-old
songwriter from Baltimore.

She was Jewish
and she happened to stumble
on the Orioles

and decided she wanted
to manage them and use them

as an outlet for her songs,
which she did.

Deborah Chessler was
the first white woman
to manage a black group.

She went to a pool in Baltimore
and there was a sign,
"No blacks, no Jews."

She swam and she was coming out
and she saw the sign

and she went up to the girl
at the thing and said,

"I just want to tell you
something. Uh, I'm Jewish,

and I just swam in your pool."

She understood discrimination.

She identified, I think,
with African Americans.

She was happy that--
that her songs fit their styles.

My wife, she was in love
with Sonny Til in the Orioles,
you know.

I guess that's what made me
sing the way I sang.

They called him "The Voice."
They called him Sonny--
Sonny Voice.

His real name was--
was Earlington Tilghman.

His voice was so smooth.

Sonny would go get on stage,
when he started singing,
he had women falling out.

[music playing]

That song was recorded
by every major artist.

It was a new song
not written by a major composer,

but by an unknown girl
and it was recorded
by Ella Fitzgerald,

Dinah Washington, Irma Thomas
and Sonny Til which had the hit.

What does a thirteen-year-old
boy know about love?

Well, Mr. Laine,
I've been falling in love
since I was only five.

-Five?
-[audience laughing]

But I've been a fool
about it since I was eleven.

[audience laughing]

[Mr. Laine] I think we've had
enough of this little chitchat.

-Are you ready
to rock and roll?
-[Frankie] That's right.

I was watching television,
of course, black and white

and I hear this ruckus.
I'm watching
the Frankie Laine Show.

And I see these five guys
jump over this brick wall

and they had
on these white sweaters
with tees on them

and they start singing
"Why Do Fools Fall in Love?"

Well, when I tell you this
turned my whole life around.

["Why do fools fall in love"
by Frankie Lymon
and The Teenager playing]

I believe that Frankie Lymon
and The Teenagers
were put together

to become Jackie Robinson
of doo-wop.

[music playing]

There wasn't the internet then,
you didn't have home recorders.

So. in order to be
in the record industry,

if you have a group
and wanted to be a singer,

you had to go find an agent,
or start knocking on doors

and hopefully they would open
their door and listen you sing.

Richie Barrett moved
into the neighborhood.
We were so excited.

He's a recording artist,
he's a star, he has a group,

he's getting ready to perform
at the Apollo Theater.

Richard Barrett became
a big star as a singer
singing with the Valentine's,

but then he also became big
on the other end
of the microphone

just managing groups,
producing records,
writing songs.

Richard Barrett-- [puffs]
the king of all this stuff.

[Charlie H.] Richard Barrett
was living in an apartment
in Washington Heights

and he kept hearing
these kids singing
beneath his window.

And they were trying
to get attention.
They knew he was a big star.

He sees us singing
and he says, "You know what?

I'm gonna take you guys downtown
and get an audition."

And we were thrilled.
We had Richie Barrett
of the Valentines

who had a song out called
"Lily Maebelle"

who's going to take us downtown
and make us stars.

[music playing]

The first week in September,
Richard Barrett
of the Valentines

takes us down
to George Goldner
and there we do a live audition.

[Jerry] Let me tell you
about George Goldner.

He was one of the unsung heroes
of doo-wop street corner,
trust me.

So, we're auditioning
in front of George--
"You know, you guys sound great.

You guys sound-- Richie,
Richie, do they-- do they do
any original music?"

I said, "Well, there's a song
that we've been working on.

It's called Why Do Fools
Fall in Love."
And on December 3rd 1955,

we went into the studio
and we recorded "Why Do Fools
Fall in Love?"

And we were about sixteen,
and Frankie was thirteen.
Thirteen-years-old.

I don't know what I can say
about this next act.

What can you say?
But sensational.

All over the world,
Frankie Lymon,
a 13-year-old youngster

with a great way
with the song and The Teenagers.

That was the beginning
of a revolution
that has never ended.

That was a big bang
we were looking for.

There had never been
no teenage group before.

I'm 16 years old. Frankie Lymon
is younger than me.

[music playing]

And the people that related
to The Teenagers
were not just black,

they were white.

[Ron] The lyrics were something
that we got,

you know,
"Why Do Fools Fall in Love"

because when you're
14-years-old, 15-years-old

you're falling in love
constantly
and hoping for the best.

[Anthony] And they would get
to the Brooklyn Paramount

with Alan Freed,
and I lived down the street.

And me and a couple of other
kids, we knew that place
like the back of our hand.

We didn't let a little thing
about the theater
and not having any money--

we'd sneak in the theatre.
You know what I'm saying?

And I remember seeing him,
and he was singing
with The Teenagers

and Herman Santiago
and Sherman Garnes
and all the guys.

I said, "Oh, shoot!"
I just so-- was so overwhelmed

not knowing that I was gonna
meet him someday.

Frankie could--
he was a natural.

I always felt that way
and he could sing too.

You know, I'm talking
about a kid about that tall.

[music playing]

I tried to sing his song,
but I wasn't able to hit
the notes that he could hit.

He was fabulous.
He was fabulous.

He was a great singer
and he had
a great stage personality.

He was a genius.

Frankie Lymon, of course,
I mean that's--
he was the best.

I know Joey Fatone,
that's his favorite too.

Some star, he was a star,
he was a star.

It was written
all over him, man. "I'm good."

-He had his swag on early.
-He had swag.

[laughing]

[music playing]

The first time we met
he said, "Oh, yeah.
You're that cat, man.

We call you little Anthony,
man. You're that cat."
I said, "Yes, sir."

Then he tells me,
"Hey, man you want to go
to this here, restaurant?"

And-- and he took me
to Japanese restaurant
that specializes in soul food.

Figure that one out, man.
So, Frankie took me there
and it became--

we'd go there all the time.

We figured together, man,
we had the power.

I'm Little Anthony,
he's Frankie Lymon,

literally women they
would just come from everywhere.

For the next eighteen months,

Frankie Lymon
and The Teenagers
were on top of the world.

Can you imagine
in eighteen months,
they had six top 10 records

and they even made a tour
of England where they played
the London Palladium.

[Jimmy] And remember
we on the road with men.
They were like sailors.

You know, these guys
in the clothes
and The Coasters

and The Drifters,
they had women in every town.

And we started copying them,
you know.

And we got rebuked out
of the hotel
because Park West Hotel

wasn't gonna have it,
you know. [laughs]

Crazy!

During the tour,
Frankie Lymon was--

was no longer being managed
by Richard Barrett.

They picked up some new managers
and they said,

"Why are we dealing with
five kids when we only need
to deal with one?

We're gonna split Frankie
Lymon away from the group."

They split the group up
and Frankie Lymon after that
never had another hit record.

And The Teenagers on their own
with different leads

never had another hit record
after that.

I watched him in happy times
and I saw him when he
had become self-destructive

and there was nothing we can do.
And-- and I mean, I remember,

he was getting worse,
and worse, and worse.
He was taking heroin.

And-- and then we started.
So did the-- you know,

that's something I couldn't--
I didn't want to deal with.

I saw my brother get caught up
in that thing and I said,

"You know, I-- that's not--
that's not where I want to go."

But I just-- I just wanted--
I didn't know how to help him.

But he was still my friend.

Eventually,
I got to meet Frankie Lymon.

I was working at the Apollo
and it was sad

that he would hang around
backstage,

you know, and he was on drugs,
and he didn't look good at all.

And he would, you know,
try to borrow some money,
or ask for money

and stuff like that.
I mean, he was--
I looked up to him

and when I'm-- here
I am appearing at the Apollo,

and I see the guy
that I look up to

in this bad state,
you know, so--

[Anthony] I get a call
from my wife. She says,

"He's not with us anymore."

I said, "What?"

"He's not with us anymore,"
she said.

I was told by street people
that he took almost pure heroin

and he shot it up.

He was in the bathroom
and he slumped over and died.

It just-- it was ended.

It was over.

When Frankie Lymon
and The Teenagers
jumped over that wall,

I think the next day
teenage groups
popped up from coast to coast.

All of a sudden,
we realized that as a teenager,

we can actually,
you know, maybe make a record.

Frankie Lymon was
about the same age I was,

so I said, "Well,
if he can do it, I can do it."

They caused the epidemic.
There were the groups
in every schoolyard.

They were all over
and no matter where you went

in 1956, during the summer,

no matter what neighborhood,
what project,

you heard harmony
every place you went.

[music playing]

[Diz] We used to sing
on street corners.

If you were a singer,
then you know
what I'm talking about.

Most the time we was--
we'd get together and sing.

Come on, I'll meet you
at the corner, and I see you
walking up,

they gotta me, all good stop
and start singing
on the corner together.

[Charlie T.] You know,
a long time before I got

with the Drifters
I was with The Crowns--
The Five Crowns,

and we used to sing
on the street corner
of 8th Avenue.

It used to be the Cadillacs
on one corner,

it used to be The Five Crowns
on one corner,
The Harptones on another corner.

You know, you know
you light the fire
in the garbage can

and you take a little nip
of something and then you
hit a little doo-wop song.

[music playing]

And this is where this whole
thing called doo-wop developed
in the inner city

and that to me
is what doo-wop really is.
It's a homegrown music.

There was
a lot of poverty, you know,
there was no one who was rich,

everybody was struggling.

Everybody was trying to get out

and you'd rely
on whatever skill,

talent, ability
you had to do that.

That was a way
of releasing tension
and to form brotherhood.

Brooklyn was not
a high-end community.

There really wasn't any money
for-- for instruments.

Nobody could afford to buy
instruments, so you had to--

you wanted
to make some money, you had
to imitate the instruments.

Well not only could we
not afford them,
we couldn't play them.

We didn't know how to play them.

Started sundown,
as soon as the streetlights
came on,

uh, you would find
various groups taking positions.

It seems
like there was a group
under every streetlight.

["My true story"
by The Jive Five playing]

It was
just street-corner singing,

getting that harmony to ring,
usually standing
under the streetlight.

It would be like a concert
and it was just an amazing,

amazing evening until of course,
about nine o'clock, everything
shut down about 9:00.

We would have a lot of parents
saying, "Stop that noise
and get out of my back door."

And that was the good days.

[music playing]

[Barbara] Well, the schoolyards
they would assemble.

Various groups would show up,
and they'd find a spot.

Yeah everybody's going in
like a prizefighter.
You're going in,

one group is standing
in the corner and standing
in another corner,

in another corner, you know. And
it's-- when it's your turn--
when it's your turn to sing,

you go up
and you do the best song.

About what we gonna do?
We gonna burn them
and all that kind of stuff

that's-- that was the term
back then. We gonna burn.
We gonna burn them tonight.

-That's right. That's right.
-[laughing]

And it was really trial
and error. We were imitating
all the other groups.

So basically, we were doing
their songs,

but then we were here,
"Well, wait a minute.

If we just singing it
in the streets,
it didn't sound the same

as it was-- as they sound
on the records."

Well, somehow,
we stumbled up in the hallways

of Brooklyn
and in Fort Greene projects

and other projects
where other groups came from
and it had echo.

There was natural echo. We said,
"Oh! That's what we're hearing

on the record. We could do this
in the hallway."

You must be in

a stairwell

or a bathroom for harmony.
I mean, it was like--

it was amazing to scramble
around the fire,

"Where are we gonna sing today?
Oh, shucks!
They're in the bathroom."

[Anthony] Then we found out

that when we're down
in the subway,
it was even better

and that's how we learned.
We learned by trial and error.

This is how we talked.
It wasn't you're the tenor,
you're the baritone,

you're the second tenor--
no, nobody--

it's like,
"You do the high part,

man and you--
you do the low part."

When you're singing those--
those sweet love songs like
that on--

on the street corners
where there were girls
always around.

-All right.
-And that was-- that was it.

-That's what you all gonna do?
-I would put my baseball glove
down, my bat down--

-this is what I wanted to do.
-And everything, right?

Yes, yes indeed.

["In the still of the night"
by The Five Satins playing]

But the main thing it was
all the girls used to come
to the best group

and we were the best group.
Over The Harptones
and The Moonglows and all.

We were the best group.
They used to come and crowd
and load up our corner,

you know, and that was them--
that's the most marvelous--

excuse me wife,
this is my younger days.

We wanted attention,
you know,

and that was the easiest way
to get attention.

Well, it was
because of the girls.

Hell, all the fellas
wanted the girls, so.

That was the coolest
thing in the world
that you didn't need a band.

You didn't need anything.
That you and your friends
could go on a street corner

and-- and sing-- and--
and girls would like that.

That's a big deal.
That's a really big deal.

[music playing]

So that was the beginning
that evolution. It went
from the street corner,

to the subways,
in the hallways of Brooklyn.

And you remember,
as we keep doing this,
we're getting better and better

and better at our craft.

It wasn't thought
that we would eventually

go on to be professional.

-It was just the fact
that we were enjoying ourselves.
-Yeah.

As long as they
had a streetlight,

or a bunch of guys together
staying on the corner,

on the stoop, it didn't matter.
For me, it was the inner-city
urban sound.

For me, it was camaraderie,
it was achievement,

it was a coming together
of a bunch of guys

singing their hearts out,
making harmony together.

[music playing]

["Maybe"
by The Chantels playing]

Before the 50s, no one
was writing songs for kids.

They didn't have money,

but in the 50s,
Eisenhower was President
and things were good,

and the kids literally
had a buck to spend on a record.

In the late 50s, young people
started writing songs for kids.

It was kids
writing songs for kids now.

[Ron] Growing up
in New York area was
luckiest thing in the world

because you could take
a ferryboat to Manhattan

from Staten Island
and go up to the Brill Building,

which was the mecca
of all music at the time.

The Brill Building.
Oh, man! How sweet!

The building wasn't a concept,
there was a building

and it was just--
it was no more than that.

That's where they
were making a star,
right in the Brill Building.

It really wasn't magical then,
it's magical now.

[Sammy] This is the building
where all the record companies,

Scepter Records
and Gone Records
and a host of others.

It was like fourteen,
fifteen floors
of music publishers,

managers, record companies,
and even a recording studio.

So, everything was linked
to this-- this one area.

[Jeff] It was just a cool place
with brass front doors,

and a long hall leading
to the elevators,

black and white marble floors,
and a restaurant on either side

you could access
from the street,
or from the interior hallway.

The whole building
was filled with music.

There were people
in the elevators singing.

You know, they were
actually elevator operators
who would tell you--

that's when they didn't have
automatic elevators,

they would tell you
which publishing companies
are looking for people.

We were rabid Heartbeat fans,

so we followed the address
on that label.

We started knocking
on the doors, on every door

in that building
until somebody said okay.

I once met Paul Simon
and he was just starting out
and he said to me,

"You don't have to start
on the first floor,
second floor."

He said, "Go to the top
and walk down each flight

and stop
at the publisher's offices
and the manager's office

because it's easier coming down
than going up."

One of the places we
stopped at was a record label
called Whole Records

and the woman and her husband
that owned the label said,

"You don't have to go
no further than this.
We're very interested."

They gave us a contract
to take home to our parents

because we were all minors
at the time

and that's what we did.

We signed,
we were in the studio,

and we recorded "Little Star."

["Little Star"
by The Elegants playing]

We were all seventeen-years-old
when we had our first hit
record "Son in Law."

When I was sixteen-years-old,
I recorded my first hit record,

a group called The Chips,
the record was called
"Rubber Biscuit."

I think we started
when I was about
fourteen-fifteen years old.

I was thirteen coming up,
thirteen, twelve, you know.

I was nineteen-years-old
when we recorded,
"I only have eyes for you."

When I wrote Little Star
and recorded it,
I was sixteen-years-old.

I was coming out
of summer school
for the last time I thought

and I saw Jimmy Moschello
who was still singing
with me today,

one of the original members,
and I'm coming down the walkway,
and he's beeping the horn

and he's yelling,
"It's number one.
It's reached number one."

And we knocked out Perry Como
and I didn't want to tell
my grandmother that.

She would kill me.
I took my books
and I saw a big garbage pail

and I threw my books
in the garbage pail
and I jumped into his car

and we took off
and I said, "That's it.
I'm-- I'm a singer now.

I don't--
I don't need a diploma."

[music playing]

It's all in the writing baby.
It's all in the writing. The
real stars are the songwriters.

It really was an occupation
that we would get up and--
and go in and write.

And we would get to work
every day. Some guys would get
there ten in the morning.

We had four or five, six,
maybe eight piano rooms
and you'd close the door

and then you'd start
to write your song.

["Yakety Yak"
by The Coasters playing]

See, we were
with a couple of guys
named Leiber and Stoller.

These are white Jewish guys
that went to church

and they loved the black sound
in the churches.

Leiber and Stoller
were the man.

They were the ones,
Jerry and Mike.
They was the man.

We were the first white act
they ever touched
other than Elvis

and they wrote for him
and produced
some of the stuff,

but they produced
all of The Drifters
and The Coasters

and all this great music
that had complicated
arrangements.

They were too me--
they were the best.

They could just out of clear
blue sky-- just give you
some words.

They were the hippest guys
out there on the streets.

Their lyrics
were always cool--

-[Marty] Right on.
-Right on.

Jerry said, "Billy,
you talk too much, man."

And Billy said,
"No, I don't talk too much."
"Yes, you do it."

Said, "Yeah you just yak, yak,
yak all the time."

And when we came back
the next day, Jerry had put
some words to "Yakety Yak.

They had a million hits
and they were
with the best people.

Oh, Yakety Yak, Charlie
Brown, Along came Jones,

Down in Mexico,
One kiss led to another,
Searchin',

on and on.

It was happening.
We were inventing.
I called it Kitty Hawk,

you know, that's
where the Wright Brothers
threw their--

pushed their first plane
off the hill and went,
"Hey, it flies," you know.

And that's what we were doing.

People have said,

"You made history.
Did you know it?"

We didn't know
we were making history.
We were making records.

[music playing]

See back then,
especially in Philadelphia
and New York City too,

most radio stations
were playing
the popular music of the day;

Rosemary Clooney,
The Four Lads, but all the--

at the other end
of the dial, you had
the little black stations.

[Jocko] You ready for the big
ride from outer space, huh?

Passengers fasten
your seat belts.
Three, two, one, take it off.

[music playing]

I was listening to a disc
jockey from North New Jersey

where you could hardly hear it
on the radio,
there was such static,

but you could hear
the doo-wop sound
coming through.

["Stay" by Maurice William
And The Zodiacs playing]

I was fooling around
with the dial
and I hit black radio

down the right end
of the dial and I found it
much more interesting.

They played records
that I never heard,

that never got over
to the white stations.

It was much more interesting.

There was a disk jockey
called Jocko

who had a rap--
who had a persona.

He will come out
the Apollo Theater
in a rocket ship

and in a spaceman's suit
and he was the persona.

[Jocko] --through Jocko and the
engineer the big rocket ship
sure thing.

Greeting salutations.

Jocko knew the ghetto,
the street corner,

the music
in the black neighborhoods

and was playing music
because he had an ear.

[music playing]

So, all the black cats
Lord Fauntleroy,

Sir John Bandy,
all the black cats
had a persona.

So, what happened
when rock and roll happened,

the white cats,
all had to get a handle.

I became the Geator.

Jocko, if he
would have been white,

he would have been bigger
than Alan Freed.

-[radio presenter]
The Moondog Show.
-Hi, everybody. Hi y'all.

This is yours truly,
Alan Freed welcoming you

to the Big Beat
once again on radio.

Alan Freed, my main man.

Alan Freed
was the king of the DJs.

Anyone who was anyone
had to go
through my main man.

[Fred] Alan Freed was
a disc jockey from Cleveland,

who was one
of the first white deejays
to play black music.

["That's what you're doing
to me" by The Dominoes playing]

People didn't like that
too much really.

He was not initially into this.

He knew enough
to visit record stores
and see what kids were buying

and when he saw
white and black kids
buying black music

like this he said,
"Well, maybe I can start

playing some of this
on the radio."

He realized that this was
a new form of music.

[Charlie H.]
He moved to New York
basically on the fame

that he had developed
in-- in Cleveland

and of course now,
he had an even bigger audience

and he could push hard.

But what he really did
was mix R&B music with--
with the white pop

that was out there
and play it all.

So, you would hear Elvis Presley
and then you'd hear
The Platters,

then you would hear
The Moonglows, then you
would hear The Elegants.

You would hear
different groups on your radio
and that opened it up.

They just couldn't hardly
separate it.

It was very difficult
to separate it after Alan Freed
started playing it.

They had hit the major markets,
you know, like Jocko was
on a limited station.

Tommy Smalls, Dr. Jive
was on a limited station.

You couldn't get him, let's say,
in the five boroughs

just like you could get
Alan Freed.

[Diz] You ever heard of a Clyde
McPhatter? Alan Freed,
you know who Alan Freed was.

They had a song
that said "That's
what you're doing to me."

That they were playing
over the air

and here's
where this expression came from.

"I want to rock.
I want to roll.

I want to feel it deep down
in my soul.

Oh, can't you see.
That's what you're doing to me."

[music playing]

Alan Freed would play
that every day on the air

and when Alan would come back
on the air

and say, "Everybody,
it's time to rock n roll"

because he got it
from the record.

So, he was playing this music

and at-- at an alarming rate
and it was growing so fast

and so many people
were digging it, kids.

It just grew like wildfire.

All of a sudden black music
became the number one music
in the world.

Once Alan Freed pulled
the covers off of that music

and had the audacity
to make movies integrated
with this music

that was shown
from coast to coast,

I think that's
one of the reasons
why they got rid of him

and really tried to hurt him.

They tried to blackball him.

They tried to threaten him
that he couldn't do this.

He couldn't do that.
And he just went
against the odds.

To me, he was the king
of rock and roll.
I'm sorry he's gone.

[Jerry] This is the Geator,
the big boss with the big cat
sauce, the man with the planet.

Let's go back to the year 1959.
Dion and the Belmonts,
ladies and gentlemen,

out of the Bronx.
The name of the song is called
"I Wonder Why?" My man.

["I wonder why" by Dion
and the Belmonts playing]

The black groups really
were the R&B soul singers.

They were
really the earthy singers,
but there were other groups

and there were white groups.
They could not sing
the way we did.

They couldn't get that soul.
So, they created
their own style.

We often look at the late 50s

as a time when a lot
of white doo-wop groups
started singing

and, in the beginning,
of course,
they were singing black music.

We were all kids
and they-- they heard
the same thing that we heard.

Now, I would-- I wouldn't even
buy a record that was recorded

by a white artist at that time.

You know I was like, you know,
it was like going against

everything that I--
that I believed in musically.

My first exposure
to doo-wop music came
from my cellar

because there was a local group,
The Elegants and they
would rehearse in my cellar.

So, I would hear
these great harmonies
coming out of the cellar

and my dad would say,
"But they're
never gonna make it.

How are they gonna get
a record made?"
And about three months later,

they had the number one record
in the country and they sold
a million records.

It has been stated
that the first two groups
to create and open the door

for this whole Italian-American
doo-wop movement

was ourselves
The Elegants
and Dion and the Belmonts.

[music playing]

The Italian-American groups
were basing their singing
on their own culture.

They grew up listening
to Frankie Laine and Tony
Bennett and Frank Sinatra.

And there's a little bit
of that in their style
of singing.

Some of it is spiritual,
some guys sang bluesy, but it
was all in a city feeling.

It had no color
cause Dion and the Belmonts
was doo-wop group,

Frankie Valli the Four Seasons
was a doo-wop group.

White groups and black groups
do sound slightly different

even when doing the same song
in similar style.

This was pretty much brought
on by the fact
that in many cities

the Italian-American
neighborhoods

were right next
to the African-American
neighborhoods

and there was
some interaction between groups.

All the groups,
all the white groups
and the black groups

there was no difference
after a while.

["The angels listended in"
by The Crests playing]

This music is
for whoever wants to do it.

It's basically
a black form of music,

but the fact
that we had two Puerto Ricans
in our group

lets the world know
that Puerto Ricans
love the music as well.

You know, I like to think
that music is the great uniter.

It was especially noticeable
in doo-wop music,

I think, because here
were cases
where all of a sudden

you started having racially
integrated groups singing.

There were several of them
that were very big The Romancers
out on the west coast,

The Del Vikings were another.
Johnny Maestro in The Crests.

I came from a place
called South Beach
in Staten Island New York.

Johnny Maestro's family
lived not too far from us

and he also wanted to doo-wop,
to sing with his own group

at that time
when he had The Crests.

Johnny Maestro and The Crests.
The first integrated group.

Spanish, black, white.

Johnny Maestro greatest voice
of them all.

[music playing]

It was black and white kids
singing together,
emulating that harmony.

Music has no color.
This is about love.
It's for the love of the music.

[music playing]

Before I actually played
the Apollo,

I often wondered
what they did
when the show was over,

they went to another--
and-- and-- and I would hear
them talk about--

"Well, we're going
on a big tour. We're gonna go
to the Howard Theatre.

We're gonna play this
out there tomorrow." Oh, man,

that's like running away
and going to the circus.

["A thousand miles away"
by The Heartbeats playing]

Touring and so forth,
shows this was
all new to us, to all of us.

We went to almost every state
with Dick Clark.

We went from Canada to Texas,
New York to California.

We did ninety one-nighters
in ninety days and we did
three of them in one year.

Get on a bus, you get off
a bus. You do your show,
you get back on the bus.

You go to the hotel,
you-- you didn't have time
to even hang out.

It's time to go to sleep,
get up, get on the bus.

Well the buses were fine.
Actually, there was
always somebody,

a group of somebody's
playing cards in the back.

There was a great sense
of camaraderie on it.

We just had each other
and the jamming and the kidding
around and the joking.

It was a big-- big family.
I was working with some
of the biggest acts at the time.

We didn't think of anyone
as being a legend,

but here I am, you know,
thirty days and sixty days,
you know, eating and drinking,

and laughing and joking
with Buddy Holly, and Dion,
and Frankie Avalon,

and Bobby Darin,
and The Coasters, The Drifters.

We were all
just having a good time.

I made lifelong friends
on those tours.

There was a lot of fun.
It was all brand new to us.

The South was different.

[chuckles] The South was
a lot different.
It was-- it wasn't as much fun.

[music playing]

I'll never forget Birmingham,
Alabama. It was scary.

It was a scary time
in my life.

During 1959, we did

a six-week tour
of one-nighters in the south

and that was a mind-boggling

and eye-opening situation
for all of us.

We would see people outside
with sticks, guns,

"better not get off
that bus boy," you know,
it was a heck of a time man.

[Lois] You know, we knew
what we were reading on--
in the papers.

We heard it on the news.
We saw things on TV

about what was happening
in the south, but we
really didn't have a clue.

To play the South was like,
it was hard for me as a
teenager, as a young teenager.

I don't know
about the other girls
because they were eighteen

and maybe they were
more mature than I was.

I wasn't as mature
to understand racism
and I was angry.

[sighs] Rough, man. Some of them
was rough, you know.

We had to go to the back room.
When we would go
into the south,

we had to go to the back room
to eat. We couldn't sit
down and rest around.

Mmm-hm, they wouldn't--
they wouldn't serve you.

They wouldn't serve you
back then.

[music playing]

We're kids. We go,
we sit at the counter

and we go to order
and somebody said,
"You can't order sitting here."

"What do you mean
we can't order?"

You know and then, you know,
we went and did
the, "We're from New York."

And a guy, a black guy
came and tapped us,
and he said, "Come here."

And he said,
"You're gonna get us killed.
You cannot order at a counter.

You can only order over there
and you can't eat here."

White artists,
they were allowed to sleep
in the Sheraton Hotels

when we were not allowed
to sleep at Sheraton Hotels.

We had to sleep
on some floors of hotels.

We had to stay in these,
you know, backstreet motels

that no kid should have been in
because of the things
that we heard.

We couldn't see because we were
pretty much locked in our rooms
for our own protection.

Cops would have to escort us in.
They'd be looking at us,
"Don't look,

don't you look
at no white girl.
Don't look at a white girl."

I mean, yep--

you have to keep your eyes
like this, guns all around you,

I mean, you know,
it's frightening.

[music playing]

[Charlie T.] We did a show
in Georgia with James Brown
and they say--

the producers say,
"You're not allowed
to sing to black or white"

and they put our microphones
to the wall. We had to sing
to the wall.

First time I went
to venue where the orchestra's
to my back,

I'm singing to the wall,

there's white on this side,

black on that side
and they all screaming
for the music.

We're not looking
to either side,
we're looking to the wall.

I mean, it was hard to--

hard to believe
that I'm being hated
on one side

and getting
so these kids are loving us.
It was strange.

By me being thirteen and, you
know, a thirteen-year-old got
a little fire in her.

When the white kids would come
and they would say to us,

you know,
with the southern accent,
"Could I have your autograph?"

And I would say no.

Why do I have to give
my autograph?
You know that was my way

of rebelling and that was
my way of being heard.

We went down to Charleston,
South Carolina

and the bus driver
was a white guy. His name
was Little Willie, you know.

So, him and I went down
to [mumbles].

A water faucet for the black
and water faucet for the white.

You know, so Willie said,
"I'm gonna get me
a drink of water," you know.

I said-- he said, "Come on,
go with me Charlie."

So, I went with him.
He was up to this, you know,

and so he went
to the white faucet.
He said, "Come here, Charlie."

Said, "You drink out
that one, I'm gonna drink
out of this one."

Like then we took a quick sip

and went back. He said,
"How do you feel?"

"I feel like I drunk water."
He said, "I do too."

He said, "I do too."

He said, "Now you can see
how the water tastes on the
white side.

And I can see how the water
tastes on the black side."
I said, "Okay."

In my mind as a kid,
I'm performing for you.

I'm doing everything I can
and I hear all this applause
and you like me.

And I'm happy that you like me,
you know.

I'm good enough to perform
when I'm on stage
and I'm good enough

for them too like me
as a performer,

but I'm not good enough
for them to like me
as a person.

But then as I got older,
I realized that, uh,

color doesn't matter, you know.

And I know that I had to
develop from inside

and not outside. I had
to learn that it didn't matter.

[music playing]

Obscenity and vulgarity
of the rock and roll music

is obviously a means
by which the white man

and his children can be driven
to the level with a nigger.

Rock and roll has got to go.
And go it does at KWK.

This was a time
when there were movements

within the country
to ban rock and roll
from radio and everywhere else

because first of all they
considered it the devil's music

and the people that did not
consider it the devil's music,

considered this Negro music.

Most of the great songs
were coming
from the R&B singers

and all those songs were copied
by at least four or five
or six white artists.

As soon as the black artists
had a great hit,
they jumped right on it.

And so you can see when The
Chords came out with "Sh-boom"

which is very black sounding
rhythm and blues song,

then The Crew Cuts out of Canada
started doing it

as a white group
and they toned it way down
and made it more commercial.

["Sh-boom"
by The Crew Cuts playing]

["Sh-boom"
by The Chords playing]

When I heard their version,
I was livid. I was so angry

because first of all it
wasn't-- it didn't have
the same rhythm

that you really wanted
to dance-- at least we didn't.

And I just thought it was--
it was so awful

that they gave this
such airplay and the guys--

The Chords never got a chance.

["Sh-boom"
by The Chords playing]

Pat Boone was doing
Little Richard, which to me was,
you know, it was unheard of.

Pat Boone covered Little
Richard's "Tutti Frutti,"

you know, and tamed it down
some and then that was played

on the white stations
that would not play black music.

[Terry] Pat was covering
everybody's songs

and he was really making this
and it was a disheartening thing

to hear something
that was recorded by these guys

and watch a white guy take over
and reap the rewards,

and the financial
and the success. It was a drag.

[Wally] They didn't put
black people on th cover
of their records.

Fats Domino just sold
twenty-five million records

and you don't put his picture
on the cover?

At that particular time,
they didn't.

"I Only Have Eyes for You"
was on our album
"Flamingo Serenade."

["I only have eyes for you"
by The Flamingos playing]

We wanted our picture on it.

I'm sitting on a stool
with my guitar
Tommy Hunt's there.

Nate's at the table
with the champagne,
and what a great picture,

but George had to stop
doing that. He said,

"We can't use-- we can't use
the photographs anymore."

We said, "Why?" He said,
"Because down South they--

down South is
not gonna play it."

They're not gonna play it
because they see us black guys,
we can't do that.

So Flamingo Favorites,

they had a whole field
of green grass

and then they had
all these pink flamingo birds.

They could accept our music
and, you know, our singing,
but not--

wrong color, man. Wrong color.

[music playing]

When rock and roll
and doo-wop started,

there was no script.
There was no rhyme or reason.
There was no how-to book.

In 1955-56, uhm, you know,
black artists,

and especially, young;
their parents didn't know
anything about copyright.

They didn't know
about music law.

They didn't know
about royalties.

Our parents believed everything
that our manager told them.

We didn't know any better.
We were all young and dumb

and because the record companies
knew that so they
took advantage of it.

Our manager was George Goldner.
He said, "Hey, this is
for the board. Sign this."

Okay, they signed,
but they didn't know that they
were signing away our rights.

My lyrics have been taken.

I've gotten--
not one royalty in my life

and I wrote practically
everything
that we-- we recorded.

This is one of the--
the parts of the music industry

that people need to know about.
Frankie Lymon and The Teenagers

also represents the great
American Royalty Rip-off.

"Why Do Fools Fall in Love"
is played in elevators.

I heard it on American Idol.
Numerous people
have recorded it;

Diana Ross, The Beach Boys.

Frankie's wife is getting
royalties,

but he didn't get no money
while he was alive and we don't.

[Eddie] I'm working on it now,
I'm trying to get--
to get my royalties.

They're selling my records,
they're still playing

them and they're still out
there doing it.

They ain't changed, you know.

They're still doing it.

Look at the body of work.
We sold seventy--

seventy-some million records

over the years.
We didn't even know it.

Somebody got the money
and it sure wasn't me.

[music playing]

Every time I saw a girl group
on television
I always wondered,

"Oh, I bet they're having
so much fun and look
at their clothes,

and their singing,
and their vocals
and their harmonies."

When I moved to New York City
from Philadelphia

and I saw and heard
various groups,

I mean, even more
so than in Philadelphia,
on the street corners

and that tight harmony
just gave me chills.

I knew that I wanted
to be a part of that.

The guys on the block
used to stand
on the corners and sing.

Then we said,
"Well, if they can do that,
we can do that."

We used to get on, like I said,
on the porch and just sing

with one another
in schools after school,

that's what you did for fun
in the summertime.
That was what we did.

-We loved to sing.
-A-ha.

I don't know how we became
professional.

It just happened

as my becoming
a Clickette just happened.

["Lover's Prayer"
by The Clickettes playing]

You know and we were classy.
We came from good families,
good parents,

you know, we may have
not had money,

but we had morals.
That's what The Crystals
were about.

We knew how to dress,
we knew how not to be sleazy,

we knew that when we'd go
on the road, we'd have
to protect ourselves.

We just went out and did what
we had to do and then went back
to the dressing room

and weren't allowed
to socialize.

For a woman in the industry,

especially once she decides
to get married and have kids,

she's juggling now.
You know, she-- she--
her attention is divided,

she can't be very
as focused on her music,

or you know, on the music side
of her life because she's torn.

And I experienced this--
as a mom, you know, and a wife.

[Fanita] You know, when they
called us and told us they
wanted us to go on tour,

and to be gone
for maybe two months, oh.

I was devastated.
I mean, I had one small boy.

It was just the hardest thing
I've ever had to do.

As young girls, it wasn't easy.
The pay was horrible.

We still struggled,
no matter if the people
were dancing to it,

enjoying our music,
we as artists,
we were struggling.

Let's forget about the intro
for now, let's just come
right in. One, two, three.

[music playing]

[La La] When we did work
with Phil, we knew
that we were gonna have a hit.

With all the music
that was around us
in the studio,

you knew, that there was
something special

that's gonna come out
of this studio.

[Fanita] He was a genius.

He was different.
He was a different producer.

He knew exactly what he wanted

and we did exactly,
you know, what he told us to do.

He would go into the studio
and create a wall of sound.

["Then he kissed me"
by The Crystals playing]

And then when he heard
"Then He Kissed Me,"
it was like--

they thought it was like
as if it was an opera. I know--

all they're saying
about "Then He Kissed Me"
is like, "Huh?"

I'm just putting down the track.

I didn't even have a boyfriend
at the time

to even know
what the lyrics meant.

That's what Phil
picked up on, innocence.

And when you're innocent
and pure, and you're
putting down the track

that's what came in.
I think, if I had been dating,

even though I was fifteen,
maybe I was like dating
a little bit,

I may have had
a little attitude.

[Fanita] Well, the experience
that we got from working
with Phil Spector

was endurance
because we had to have
patience with him.

And he'd work you to death.
I mean, I remember going
to the studio

and working with Phil,
Sonny Bono picking me up
at the Knickerbocker Hotel,

would share,
and he would pick me up
at 12 o'clock.

And I wouldn't leave
the studio until five o'clock
in the morning.

He would call us sometimes
at four o'clock in the morning,

to come and do the background.

And my husband wasn't
very happy about that
at the time,

but we got up
and, you know, we-- we went
and did what we had to do.

His sound was so big that
they call it the Wall of Sound.

He taught me
how to produce records.
How to produce guitars,

and pianos,
combine them together,

drums and bass.
I learned a lot from him.

[Jerry] Phil was a genius,

but as all geniuses sometimes,
you get a little nuts.

[Fanita] You know, when we were
at Fremont High School

walking down the halls,
singing a cappella,

I had no idea

that I would have a career
like this,

being able to see the world,

just had no idea this--
you know,

that it would happen
to a little girl like me.

[Lois] What I'm most proud
of for The Chantels is
that through all of--

what we went through,
we maintained our integrity,

our sense of who we were,
and we never lost that.

[music playing]

The white folk did not listen
any longer and silenced.

They were bold about the fact
that they liked doo-wop,
they liked black music.

["Tears on my pillow"
by Little Anthony
& The Imperials playing]

With the kids,
there was no problem.

It was a grown-ups--
they were the ones
that didn't like it,

but the kids,
they were getting into it.

-That music was restricted
in your white families.
-Yeah.

-It was called jungle music--
-Yeah.

Or jigaboo music, whatever,
but see, the white kids
loved the music.

So, I mean, it was coming.

All of a sudden, these black
artists are breaking out
everywhere and crossing over,

but we crossed over
in such a remarkable way,

we bridged it.

[music playing]

I went to Dallas
and right down the center they--
they had a rope

right down the center
of the place and they had
the black on this side,

and the white on this side.

And as we were singing,

these on this side
was shaking hand with this hand
they were dancing like--

like, you know, like you have
to dance with a girl
and you grab my hand.

The white and the black
were doing this across the rope.

And then after that we stopped.

We stopped the band
and stopped everything
and asked the promoter there--

asked can we take
the rope aloof.

We said, "Look how those kids
are dancing. Look how they're
doing together."

And when he took the rope aloof
from the front--
at the front of it,

they went together, man,
they started dancing
with each other

and it just flipped.

So, from then on,
we had mixed crowds
and we loved it.

Things were turning around.
Things were changing.

That was the very beginning
of this integration thing.

As things progressed,

it was not uncommon
for audiences in some
of the big concerts

to be mixed, black and white.

And it was in a sense of,
people who then would grow up
into the 60s

that realized
that this was just one aspect
of black culture.

This was creating
a sea change in America.

Our music kind of like melted
the races together.

If there's one legacy
that doo-wop music has is

that it did help usher
in an era of civil rights.

Music has always had
a way of being
the great common denominator

that brought people together.

This music moved
the country to a place

where in the 60s
the civil rights movement
was ready to happen.

Doo-wop music really peaked
in the late 1950s,

uh, and of course,
you could see even then it
was starting to change.

When you got into the 1960s
there were different styles
of music coming through.

[music playing]

As you moved into the 1960s,
things got a little bit
slicker in the music.

Doo-wop music had at this point
branched off
into a number of styles.

The white groups
that are out there singing

with sort of an Italian-American
influence to them

were the groups
that would evolve
into the white groups

of the 1960s
like the Beach Boys.

["Surfin'"
by The Beach Boys playing]

Doo-wop kind
of became rock and roll.

Those kinds
of harmonies were to lay
the foundation for us

to create, you know,
music about more contemporary
things, like surfing.

Like, "Surfing is the only life,
the only way for me.
Surf with me.

Bop, bop doop-de-doop-de-doo.
Bop, bop."

So, you had a little more
of an evolved doo-wop sound

as the origins of the Beach Boys
incarnation.

Well, the four freshmen taught
me a harmony,

and-- and falsetto.
Well, it was four-part harmony.

It spoke to me
in a very spiritual way.

Brian's voice I thought was
beautiful, I mean,

he honestly captured
that Frankie Lymon quality
to me.

Real, real pure
even and Brian had that.

Boy did we get lucky
with the voices
and composition and roots

to work from, you know,
the basic roots. Very fortunate.

[Brian]
When I heard "Surfin'"--

my family and I were listening
to the radio
and they played "Surfin'."

And we couldn't believe it.
We said, "Oh, my God!
Surfin's on the radio."

I was proud as hell, you know.
Proud as hell.

[music playing]

Now, Motown started out
in the late 1950s

and Berry Gordy was writing
songs for Jackie Wilson.

Jackie Wilson, of course,
had a strong doo-wop background.

He started with The Dominoes
and then went out on his own.

Berry Gordy, in my opinion, did

probably
as much as Martin Luther King

did to bring
the races together.
He did it through music.

["It's the same old song"
by The Four Tops playing]

[Charlie H.] Berry Gordy was
looking for talent
and he stumbled upon

none other than Smokey Robinson
and The Miracles.

Smokey Robinson
and The Miracles,

you listen
to his early recordings
then you can hear the influence

of the other Detroit
doo-wop group that was so big,

Nolan Strong and the Diablos.

Berry Gordy came along.

He said, "I'm gonna make music
for young America.

I'm gonna have song writers
to write hits
for just this particular act."

Berry had a stable of young
writers,

you know, kids out of Detroit.

Holland-Dozier-Holland,
everybody's writing,

Smokey's writing,
they're all in house,

and they're coming out
with this whole new sound.

The sound of doo-wop and Motown

were distant cousins
in a sense.

The doo-wop era in the 50s
were basically just a way
to get started.

Get your opinion, your feeling,
into that genre of R&B music.

Motown is
a little more sophisticated.

They have more lyrics,
more melodies,
more chord progressions.

[music playing]

The stuff is still around
and the people are still--

when they throw parties,
the first thing
they want to hear

is a bunch of Motown
songs when they're having
a party, you know.

You're not partying,
unless you got Motown
on Jukebox.

Oh, my gosh! You can listen
to that stuff now
and it stills sounds fresh.

I think doo-wop had its time.
I mean, it was sort--

it was here
and then it was gone, but--

in one way
but in another way,

it was always there
in like an undercurrent.

The instrumentation
sort of changed it

and it gave it
a more sophisticated sound,

but the root of all of it
is still doo-wop.

[TV presenter]
There are rumors around
that this is Britain's revenge

for the Boston Tea Party.
Three thousand
screaming teenagers

are at New York's
Kennedy Airport to greet,

you guessed it,
The Beatles.

Beatles!

The musical Shack
that was heard around the world.

[Tony] Well, this jet pulls in,
707 and one by one,

a mop top came down
on the steps.

The Beatles, the phenomena,
it's just nothing ever happened
like it before.

They just took over.

They had the song.
They had the writers, you know.

They had the writers
singing the song.

They taught the world.
I respect them highly,
always have.

[TV presenter]
Their first meeting
with the American press

brings forth an interview
laced with quips and humor.

You'd laugh too with a gross
of 17 million dollars last year.

The only thing is
when they came here, they

killed our music.
Yeah, our music stopped
dead in its tracks.

We had that-- that feeling
against the Beatles
and English music

and what--
how could you do this to us?

Just as music was
at it's highlight,

-the black music, you know,
they came in with a rush.
-Yeah.

And that really knocked us
to our knees.

[Jon] The British Invasion
had put an effective end

to the record sales of the 50s,
early 60s style.

And they came, even doing
some of our music.

The world had changed
so rapidly, uhm, in the 60s.

The most turbulent decade
of any of our lives,

who have lived that long, uhm.
Turbulent in every possible way,

you know. Turbulent politically,
turbulent geopolitically,

you know, war in Vietnam
was going on.

The innocence by the end
of the 60s was kaput,
if-- there was no innocence.

End of an era.

Doo-wop groups
have never gone away.
They just-- they evolved.

It comes back, you know.
It's always you know
reinventing itself

and that's what we're seeing
always, you know.

That-- those groups
will never go away.

They just reinvent themselves.

Billy Joel had a great line,
"Everything old is new again."

Nothing that's good really dies.

[music playing]

Remember Sha Na Na.
Watching Sha Na Na
on Saturday night,

♪ Do-do-do-do-do
Do-do-do-do-do♪

♪ Tonight sweetheart--♪
It was like--

if-- if I could do that.

When Sha Na Na
started doing this

in the very late 60s, early 70s,

it's very hard to describe
if you weren't there,
but it seemed

like it was
a thousand years ago

that this music had happened.
It was a reclamation

of what seemed
like our youthful innocence.

- Let's give a big Sha Na Na
welcome to The Coasters.
-[cheering and aplause]

Miss Ronnie Spector
and The Ronettes.

-Martha Reeves
and the Vandellas. Hey!
-[cheering and aplause]

Prepare to meet Little Anthony.

-Hey, it is Ben E. King.
-[cheering and aplause]

Because we really had grown up
awfully fast.

Goodnight
and "Grease for Peace."

Then "Grease" opens,
the musical.

American Graffiti came along.

[TV presenter]
Grab that special one and jump
into your candy colored custom,

or your screaming machine,
cruise down town and catch
American Graffiti.

Finally, ultimately
in the mid-70s

this nostalgia
craze peaked with "Happy Days"
and "Laverne and Shirley."

We really did raise
a whole generation
of little kids

on doo-wop
and early rock and and roll.

My dad being from New York
and being in, you know,

that was able to be
in that scene as a teenager--

to be able to-- and he comes
home and finds me listening
to these records, he's like,

"Why are you listening
to those records?" I was like,
"Because they're awesome."

He's like, "But you're seven."
I was like, "I don't care."

They're so awesome.
They're still awesome
to this day.

Vocal harmony groups have been
around for a very long time now

and they're not gonna go away.
You see genres and music come
and go, and come and go,

but that vocal harmony group,
it's-- it's always been around
with guys and girls.

[music playing]

The core of NSYNC
is the harmonies.
It's the singing.

It always has been
and it always will be.

We were always aware of--
of what came before us,

you know, from the 30s
to, you know, now.

We always respected
those vocal harmony groups

because we really loved
mixing that R&B
with that doo-wop.

There's not that big
a difference
between the Ink Spots

and The Platters
and Earth, Wind, and Fire

and the Doobie Brothers,
or any of these groups.

It's all the same stuff.

[Anthony] Hip hop ain't
no different. It's still urban,

it's still music in the streets,

still kids
writings songs for kids.

You know, many young girls grew
up, uhm, and were so influenced

that they, uhm, became
recording artists like us.

We had a dream
and that music gave us faith

to know that we could grow up
and do the same thing.

And then to in turn,
to pass that hope on to--

-the next generation.
-Right.

That is the root.
When you get a bunch of guys

standing
around together, harmonizing.

So, I think that it's going
to continue to live.

This music
will be with us forever.

[music playing]

We still carry on the flavor,

trust me.
You'll still find out tonight.

[presenter] And I bring to you
Mr. Diz Russell.

♪ Baby please don't go
Baby please don't go♪

♪ Baby please don't go
Baby please don't go♪

♪ Now, baby please
Don't go back to New Orleans♪

♪ Because I love you so
Don't go, don't go♪

♪ You got me way down here
You got me way down here♪

Music is something
that if you love it--

I haven't been here over
fifty or sixty years.

--once you get attached to it,
you don't give it up.

You just don't give it up.

People don't forget good music.
So, we're keeping it alive.

We love this music.
It will never die.

It's just a great thing
that The Orioles continue
to keep the doo-wop alive.

[people cheering]

[Diz] Yeah! Thank you!

Still singing
after all these years.

-You got it, man.
-You reckon?

Oh, yeah.

So, this music
was never supposed
to mean anything

all these years later,
but it has.

I had a saying,
even at this time
when we were young kids

singing on-- on the Avenue,

I saw ourselves being stars
without a stage,

-right at that time.
-Mmm-hm.

-Wherever you sang.
-That's right.

-That was the stage.
-All right.

We had touched on something
that had never been done before

and all of a sudden, we were
on the ground floor of this.

That was a--
that was a tremendous feeling.

I can't--
they can't take it away from us
no matter what happens.

But the legacy, I'm there.

If you google, you see Barbra
Jean English did a lot of stuff.

I stand
on the shoulder of giants

who came before me.

And it's heck of a life.

I owe a debt of gratitude to--

Frankie Lymon and The Teenagers

and every time
I see Jimmy Merchant,

I put my arms around him
and kiss him on the cheek

because they saved my life.
Excuse me for getting choked up.

I just hope that whatever
contribution we've made, uh,

leaves a lasting impression.

And I'm just suddenly
very cognizant of--

time.

I paid the dues and I paid
the cause to be a Drifter.

And I'm so proud
that we left a legacy behind.

I would like people
to remember me as being

a member of one
of the greatest girl groups

and that we influenced
other girl singers.

What I'm really proud of is

I came a long ways
and I met that lady over there.

I'm proud.

I never thought of quitting.

I never thought of quitting.
I figured I was gonna be
here till a hundred,

so I might as well to keep
on moving.

And that's what I've been doing
ever since.

I've been so blessed to be able
to sing this wonderful music.

It's hard to believe that I got
to really spend my whole life
making up songs

and going into studio
and having that great fun
producing records

and working with great talent.
I really got away with it.

Oh, we was in love with what we
was doing and we had a lot
of love for each other.

I see in that short period
of time accomplishment.

[Billy] If I had to do it
all over again, I would.

I wouldn't change a thing.
I just would like to go back

and-- and do what we did.

If you're lucky enough to last
this long-- can you believe it?

To last this long and live this
long and still be able to sing

and have a band that can play
the music which it's--

it's all pretty extraordinary
when I think about it.

It was an opportunity
of a lifetime that a lot
of people will never know.

I felt really blessed
to have been a part
of that.

-[interviewer] You were there.
-I was there, man.

You talk about camaraderie,
we-- we had
the time of our lives.

We were brothers
and sisters of the same large.

When I say I had the time
of my life, I truly had
the time of my life.

[La La] When we were growing up
in Brooklyn,
you sang on the stoops.

That's where we started
from singing on the stoops.

The first song I recorded
with The Crystals
was "Uptown." I was a kid.

-Is that a working mic there?
-It does work.

I started working with Charlie
when I was like thirteen
or fourteen years old on tours.

We did the amateur show.
That's how I first
came in touch,

really-- really up
with the stage at Apollo.

Me, Ben E. King, Al Berof, Doc
Green, and lover palace

and we tore
the audience up.

That's why I started
from singing
on the street corner.

Yeah, we started singing
on the stoop and we battle
each other, right?

You give me a pint of wine
I will sing anything with you.

-You know I love you, right?
-Yeah, we're good.

Thank you, baby. This guy has
known me since I was fourteen.

I used to take his money.
I used to hold his-- I used
to hold his money for him.

He used to gamble on the bus.
He used to always win,

but sometimes
after a while he started losing.

Losing a lot of money.

So, he said to me, "What I want
you to do is take this money

and whatever I ask you for it,
do not give it to me.

In a few hours of gambling,

he came back, "Could you give me
some money?" I said, "No."

I didn't give it to him
for about a day or so.

He was mad at me.
He was pissed with me.

My money.

You know, when you get backstage
and there were six or seven
groups out there working,

you get time to spend
amongst each other

and there's nothing
better than that.
This is a family.

-Oh, my God, it's VD.
-Ow, VD!

-Oh, my God!
-We gotta say goodbye

He nicknamed me VD, you know.
And when Hurricane Sandy hit,

first phone call I got was
from Charlie.

He said, "VD, you all right?
I see Staten Island,
they got hit hard, you know."

I don't know how many friends
I've got. Hundreds, thousands.
I don't know,

but that was the first call
I got. I'll never forget it.

-Hello everybody.
-[all] Hello.

-Hi.
-How are you doing?

-We're Straight No Chaser, man.
-All right, beautiful.

-How you doing guys?
-Pleasure.

They're beautiful,
they're beautiful, man.

We're were just a bunch of guys
that went
to Indiana University together.

Well that's sort of the beauty
of our story.

We didn't anticipate
that this was going to go
any further than college.

-[man] Nice to meet you.
-[La La] Same here.

So many guys. You guys
could all be models. My God!

Of course, I listened
to doo-wop growing up,
but I never thought

that I would come
into college, join a group

that I would be still doing
twenty years later.

[La La] These guys here got
the real deal
and which is good they're young.

They got good harmony,
you-- you know.

-Very good harmony. Very good.
-They got beautiful harmony
and they've been there

into the rhythm
and blues feel too

just like we are.
And they love just a song.
So, I'm happy about that.

One, two, three, and--

Doing Ben E. King's song today
and his music,

it's like, I wish
that I would have said
more things to him, you know.

-I feel Ben E. King
in every word.
-Oh, my god!

In every word that was
my friend. I feel Ben E. King
in every-- every word.

-Wishing he was here.
-Mmm-hm.

Just wishing he was here.

This is a once-in-a-lifetime
opportunity to be able to sing
with some of the Greats.

This is your moment.
This is your moment.

And to hear their stories
and to be able
to sing along with them.

This is so fun.
I'm just like a kid-- a kid
in the candy store right now.

I'm in FAO Schwarz.

And I hope they'll, you know,
enjoy singing with us as well.

So it's gonna be fun.
We're excited, fingers crossed.

-[Charlie] I love you Laila.
-I love you too.

♪ So, darling, darling
Stand by me♪

It's perfect. Let's record it.

"Stand by me", Ben E. King.

♪ When the night has come♪

♪ And the land is dark♪

♪ And the moon
Is the only light we'll see♪

♪ No, I won't be afraid♪

♪ No, I won't be afraid♪

♪ Just as long as you stand
Stand by me♪

♪ So, darling, darling
Stand by me♪

♪ Oh, stand by me♪

♪ Oh, stand by me♪

♪ If the sky
That we look upon♪

♪ Oh, should tumble and fall♪

♪ Or the mountain
Should crumble to the sea♪

♪ Lord, have mercy♪

♪ I won't cry, I won't cry♪

♪ No, I won't shed a tear♪

♪ Just as long as you stand
You stand by me♪

♪ And darling, darling
Stand by me♪

♪ Oh, stand by me♪

♪ Stand by me
Stand by me, baby♪

♪ Stand by me♪

♪ So, darling, darling
Stand by me♪

♪ Oh, stand by me♪

♪ Oh, I want you to stand
Come on and stand♪

♪ Stand by me♪

♪ Whenever you're in trouble
Won't you stand by me♪

♪ I want you to stand
Stant by me♪

♪ Come on and stand
Stand by me, baby♪

♪ Stand by me♪

♪ Oh, oh, stand by me♪

♪ Oh, I want you to stand
Stand by me♪

♪ Come on, come on
Come on and stand♪

♪ Stand by me baby♪

♪ Stand by me♪

♪ One more time
Let's sing it♪

♪ Stand by me
Come on, come on♪

♪ Come on and stand♪

♪ Come on and stand♪

♪ Stand by--♪

♪ Ah, girl♪

♪ Won't you stand by me♪

♪ Me♪

-[singer] Yeah. Yes,
that's the take right there.
-[Charlie] Beautiful.

-[La La] You guys sound so good.
-[Charlie] Thanks gentlemen.
Thanks so much.

-[man] I hear that.
-[Charlie] Thank you.
God bless you

and I hope it turn out
to be something.

[Jerry] So, there you have it,
ladies and gentlemen,

Streetlight Harmonies,

the story of the music,

the love, the devotion,
and the memories

from all of these wonderful
artists

who made our lives
a little more enjoyable.

As all good things must come
to an end so must this show,

but remember as the Geator says
"You got to keep on rocking

cause you really only do,
rock once."