Show 33: City Songs - Eastern U.S.

Our next-to-last “city songs” show before we more onto other subjects for awhile. We’ll conclude our city songs series not on our next show but the one after that.

This week, we’re not traveling too far... consider it a road trip to various cities in the eastern half of the U.S.


Song 1 : : Manhattan
Artist : : The Girls from Bahia
Album : : !Revolucion con Brasilia!

The Girls... a.k.a. Quarteto em Cy in their native Brazil... are four sisters, Cyva, Cynara, Cybele, and Cylene (hence the Cy in the name). Throughout the 60s, they worked with many of the Brazilian greats including Vinicius de Moraes, Dorival Caymmi, Baden Powel and Oscar Castro Neves. They are still active and have a website (which will be of interest if you can read Portuguese).

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Song 2 : : Baltimore, You’re Home To Me
Artist : : Dave Hardin
Album : : Pecker (soundtrack)

Can’t tell you anything much about Dave Hardin... I’ve seen him listed here and there as a singer/songwriter/actor. This is a very heartfelt tribute to Baltimore from the soundtrack to the film Pecker. I love that this film was often billed as “John Water’s Pecker.”

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Song 3 : : Make Ours Miami
Artist : : The Hellers (Heller Corporation)
Album : : City Songs

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Song 4 : : We Like To Be In Washington, D.C.
Artist : : The Hellers (Heller Corporation)
Album : : City Songs

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Song 5 : : Kansas City Talk
Artist : : The Hellers (Heller Corporation)
Album : : City Songs

Three songs by The Hellers. Great ad-jingle style stuff courtesy of the good folks at Heller-Ferguson Inc. Go here and scroll down for a little info.

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Song 6 : : Allentown Jail
Artist : : Billy Strange
Album : : Strange Country

Since this show is supposed to be about eastern cities, please consider this instrumental piece to be about Allentown, Pennsylvania or Allentown, New Jersey. the great Billy Strange is also still around and occasionally active. His website can be found here.

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Song 7 : : St. Louis Blues
Artist : : Peter Appleyard
Album : : Per-cus’-sive JAZZ

Doctored for Super Sound! Loved the artwork for these “doctored” records from the 50s and 60s with a great big syringe on the cover. I think this is by British-born Canadian jazz man Peter Appleyard (who is also still active and has a website) but I’ve also sometimes seen it credited to Sid Cooper. My CD copy (Hecho en Mexico) does not list the artist.