HARRY SIMEONE CHORALE
Harry Simeone (May 9, 1911 – February 22, 2005) was an American music arranger, conductor and composer. After being introduced to an obscure song by friend and credited song co-author Henry Onorati, titled “Carol of the Drum”, Simeone changed the title to “The Little Drummer Boy” and recorded it under that title by a group he called “The Harry Simeone Chorale” for his Twentieth-Century Fox Records album Sing We Now of Christmas. He received joint authorship-and-composition credit for the album, although he did not actually write or compose the song. The single “The Little Drummer Boy” quickly became extremely popular and scored on the U.S. music charts from 1958 to 1962. The Harry Simeone Chorale had another Christmas success during 1962, with their rendition of the then-new song “Do You Hear What I Hear?” for Mercury Records. (More from Wikipedia)
In addition to Each One Heard in His Own Language, I can probably count the number of choral albums in my collection on one hand, though they include some of my all-time favorites. The album Little Drummer Boy by the Harry Simeone Chorale is one; this is where most people heard one of my favorite Christmas songs, “Little Drummer Boy” for the first time, though the song (originally called “Carol of the Drum” and written in 1941 by Katherine Kennicott Davis) had previously been recorded by the Trapp Family Singers. Then there is Christmas Hymns and Carols by the Robert Shaw Chorale, the Christmas album passed down from my parents that we always played while we decorated the Christmas tree. I finally got a second copy of the album for them – a reissue on Pickwick Records called Joy to the World – when I couldn’t bear the numerous skips any longer, though Mom and Dad still usually got out the old one.
(September 2014)
