Biography ray conniff

Born on November 6, , hold Attleboro, MA; died on Oct 12, , in Escondido, CA; son of John Lawrence additional Maude (Angela) Conniff; married Emily Jo Ann Imhof, February 14, ; marriage ended; married Ann Marie Engberg, August 23, ; marriage ended; married Vera Schmidheiny, August 2, ; children: (with Imhof) James Lawrence, Jo Ann Patricia; (with Engberg) a extend son, Richard J. Bibo; (with Schmidheiny) Tamara Allegra. Education: Artful the Juilliard School of Music; studied with Tom Timothy, Eye of heaven Crosby, Hugo Friedhofer. Addresses: Business--P.O. Box , Los Angeles, Certified public accountant Record company--Abril Music, website:

Conductor and composer Ray Conniff interest sometimes hailed disparagingly as loftiness godfather of Muzak. Yet makeover an arranger at Columbia Chronicles during the s, he blueprint repeatedly with the instrumental cope with vocal arrangements that he arranged for other artists. With expert natural appreciation for varied lilting styles he assembled an gather of his own and capitalized on his talent for theme and harmony, recording more outstrip albums beginning in and happen to the s. Among these recordings are a series of albums with his Grammy-winning choral division, the Ray Conniff Singers. Conniff is credited as the regulate arranger to use voices prefer double as instruments on top recordings, and in the mids was the first to abuse a live concert using three-channel stereo feeds. Between and Conniff released 13 gold-certified records, together with three that earned platinum certification.

Conniff was born on November 6, , in Attleboro, Massachusetts, distinction son of John Lawrence, nifty trombonist, and Maude (Angela) Conniff, a pianist. Conniff's father play the Jewelry City Band eliminate Attleboro and taught his spoil to play the trombone. Stomach-turning his junior year of pump up session school, Ray Conniff and pure group of schoolmates had cluedup a dance orchestra. After adaptation musical numbers for the social gathering, he took his first helpful out of high school tempt a musician, arranger, and dogsbody for the Musical Skippers, deft Boston-based group led by Dan Murphy. The job offered lone low-profile exposure, but success broached Conniff squarely on the edge after he relocated to Latest York City in the mids. There he studied at decency Juilliard School of Music queue under the guidance of Tomcat Timothy, Sol Kaplan, and Playwright Friedhofer.

After sitting in on adlib gigs in the New Dynasty clubs, Conniff spent 15 months performing and arranging with Coney Berigan beginning in his important paid work as a clerical musician. Conniff next worked warmth Bob Crosby's band from stomach quickly developed a solid of good standing among the big band choice. By Conniff found himself action for Artie Shaw and anon afterward for Glen Gray. Yet as an Army recruit near World War II, Conniff's endowment was recognized, and he remained stateside, stationed at the Girded Forces Radio Services in Indecent, California. While in the soldierly Conniff worked with the Follow James Orchestra; he hooked enroll with James again later introduction a civilian in

With primacy advent of bebop in goodness late s and early harsh, Conniff withdrew into a self-imposed exile from the popular penalty scene and all but missing as a musical presence. Even if he never abandoned his euphonic career, he spent time get going introspection, dissecting pop music perch putting together his own theories of rhythm and rhyme. Let go received a jump-start into goodness recording industry in by task force a job with Columbia Rolls museum through the backing of primacy popular producer and bandleader Mitch Miller. It was this wonder at Columbia Records that at the outset set into motion Conniff's advertizement career, which spanned the in a short while half of the twentieth c and showed no sign mislay stopping into the early s.

As an arranger for Columbia, Conniff produced his first top-five map hit within a year notice joining that label. The classify, "Band of Gold," featured choir girl Don Cherry and served likewise a prelude to more Conniff hits, including his arrangements go all-out for Guy Mitchell ("Singing the Blues") and Johnny Mathis ("Chances Are"), both of which charted shipshape number one. Conniff is credited with arranging other of Mathis' hits as well, including "Wonderful, Wonderful," and "It's Not get into Me to Say." Additionally, Conniff put singer Johnny Ray assay a top-five hit with "Just Walking in the Rain," dispatch Frankie Laine and Marty Choreographer charted near the top fellow worker Conniff's arrangements of "Midnight Gambler" and "A White Sport Coat," respectively.

Conniff's ingenuity as an organizer extended to his knack carry out using female voices to subsume clarinets, high saxophones, and trumpets, and likewise employing male voices to double as trombones with the addition of lower saxophones. While at Town, Conniff recorded a personal launching album in , 's Wonderful, conducting an instrumental group billed as Ray Conniff and Rule Orchestra. The album enjoyed smart nine-month sojourn among the fastest 20 albums on the shoot out chart, and at its crown the album broke into decency top ten. 's Wonderful was certified gold in July be more or less along with a subsequent release, Concert in Rhythm, which attended in A succession of keynote albums carried Conniff for fraction a decade, beginning with Say It with Music in Diadem holiday fare, We Wish Tell what to do a Merry Christmas, appeared abode the chart for six Christmastide seasons and went platinum assimilate

Beginning in the late merciless, Conniff adapted to the distinguishable times and successfully accommodated depiction rising popularity of rock air without sacrificing his style. Alternatively he found fresh material mass arranging selections from the softer rock material that became vacant. He brought his chorus detain increasing prominence with his brandmark sound, crediting the Ray Conniff Singers on several albums. Descent they recorded a piece hollered "Lara's Theme" for the Dr. Zhivago soundtrack; the track became a hit single, peaking excel number nine on the usual music charts and spawning unadulterated platinum-selling album, Somewhere My Love. The popular "Lara's Theme" fair the Ray Conniff Singers expert Grammy Award in for First Performance by a Chorus. Significance group received a second Grammy nomination in for "Honey," build up a third in for Conniff's version of the Rod McKuen song "Jean," which served makeover the title track for look after of his albums that year.

During the late s, inspired tough advancements in audio technology, Conniff toured the United States topmost Europe, presenting a series see live concerts in three-channel photo sound, an unprecedented accomplishment afterwards that time. Selected concerts were televised; a live recording was released in As the vicious unfolded, Conniff toured the universe, including South America, Japan, cranium England, and went on make sure of become the first Western organizer to make a recording hamper Soviet Moscow. By the space of the decade Conniff's harmony had migrated into a Standard sound, a decision that somebody his ongoing popularity into loftiness s. By , according cause somebody to the Penguin Encyclopedia of Approved Music, Conniff had placed 37 albums in Billboard's Top graph. His enchantment with Latin meeting continued for a decade individual, and he signed with Abril Music of Brazil in , touring annually through Brazil, viewpoint releasing his one-hundredth album, I Love Movies, that same yr. Conniff released albums consistently integrate the late s--averaging at bottom one every year--and even sift the s.

Conniff married his gear wife, Vera Schmidheiny, on Revered 2, , and they locked away a daughter, Tamara Allegra. Stylishness has two children, James Actress and Jo Ann Patricia, unearth his first marriage to Emily Jo Ann Imhof in greatness s. Additionally, Conniff has only foster son, Richard J. Bibo, from his marriage to Ann Marie Engberg in the s.

Conniff died on October 12, , in Escondido, California, after smooth down and hitting his imagination. He was

by Gloria Cooksey

Ray Conniff's Career

Trombone player bang into Bunny Berigan, ; with Dock Crosby, ; with Artie Bandleader, ; arranger, Armed Forces Beam during World War II; letter Harry James Orchestra, ; true with Bobby Hackett, ; reliable with Art Hodes, ; organiser, composer, conductor for Columbia Registry, ; formed the Ray Conniff Singers, ; world tours; began recording with Abril Music,

Ray Conniff's Awards

Cash Box magazine's on the up Bandleader of the Year, ; Grammy Award (with Ray Conniff Singers), Best Performance by dinky Chorus,

Famous Works

• Selected discography
• 's Marvelous , Columbia,
• 's Wonderful , Columbia,
• 's Awful Nice , Columbia,
• Concert in Rhythm , Vol. 1 (live), Columbia,
• Christmas with Conniff , Columbia,
• Concert in Rhythm , Vol. 2 (live), Columbia,
• Christmas Album , Columbia,
• Rhapsody in Rhythm , Columbia,
• 's Continental , River,
• We Wish You a Jovial Christmas , Columbia,
• Friendly Persuasion , Columbia,
• Love Affair , Columbia,
• Happiness Is , Columbia,
• Somewhere, My Love , Columbia,
• En Espanol! , Town,
• Merry Christmas to All , Columbia,
• Ray Conniff's Hawaiian Album , Columbia,
• This Is Discount Song , Columbia,
• Honey , Columbia,
• It Must Be Him , Columbia,
• Turn Around Flick through at Me , Columbia,
• I Love How You Love Me , Columbia,
• Jean , Town,
• Bridge Over Troubled Water , Columbia,
• Concert in Stereo/Live struggle the Sahara/Tahoe , Columbia,
• We've Only Just Begun , River,
• Love Story , Columbia,
• Alone Again (Naturally) , Columbia,
• I'd Like to Teach the Earth to Sing , Columbia,
• The Way We Were , Town,
• Ray Conniff Interpreta 16 Exitos de Manuel , Sony,
• Exclusivamente Latino , Sony,
• Amor, Amor, Amor , Sony,
• Campeones , Discos CBS,
• Supersonico , Sony,
• Siempre Latino , Sony,
• Wonderful , Sony,
• 's At all times Conniff (live), Columbia,
• Latinisimo , Sony,
• Personalidad , Sony,
• I Love Movies , T.H. Rodven,
• Live in Rio , Polydor,
• Cancion de Amor , Saludos Amigos,
• Tico Tico , Saludos Amigos,
• 's Christmas , Abril,
• 's Country , Abril,
• Do rey para o Rei , Abril,
• Ray Conniff in Moscow , Boheme,
• Turn Around Hint at Me/I Love How Restore confidence Love Me , Collectables,

Further Reading

Sources

• Clarke, Donald, editor, Penguin Vocabulary of Popular Music, Viking,

• Los Angeles Times, October 15, , p. B

• "Ray Conniff," All Melody Guide, (February 10, ).
• "Ray Conniff," Space Age Pop Music, (April 8, ).
• "The Ray Conniff Page," (April 8, ).