Trini Lopez at PJ's

by Trini Lopez

Overview

This was the album that made Lopez explode nationally, reaching number two, staying in the Top 40 LP charts for about a year, and yielding the hit "If I Had a Hammer." All of this seems to have been largely forgotten today, but at the time Lopez was ubiquitous indeed. What he did, at the head of a trio with Mickey Jones (later to play briefly with Bob Dylan) on drums and Dick Brant on bass, was to make folk-pop swing. There is certainly some folk music on here, including "If I Had a Hammer," "This Land Is Your Land," and "Gotta Travel On." It could be surmised that by treating such material in this fashion, Lopez had a tiny influence upon the subsequent folk-rock movement; Marty Balin of the Jefferson Airplane has said as much. In truth, however, Lopez was more the all-around entertainer with a Latin lilt than he was a folk singer, so you also get "America" (from West Side Story), "La Bamba," Ray Charles' "What'd I Say," "Volare," and "When the Saints Go Marching In." The live party-a-go-go atmosphere did much to put Lopez's likable energy over, and likely influenced the similar live-in-a-small-club ambience on Johnny Rivers' early hits, especially as Jones played with Rivers as well. ~ Richie Unterberger

Product Details

Release Date:	09/30/2014
Label:	Exhibit
UPC:	0780014406912
Rank:	93698

Tracks

1. A-me-ri-ca
2. If I Had a Hammer (The Hammer Song)
3. Bye Bye Blackbird
4. Cielito Lindo
5. This Land is Your Land
6. What'd I Say
7. La Bamba
8. Granada
9. Gotta Travel on/Down By the Riverside/Marianne/When the Saints Go Marching in/Volare
10. Unchain My Heart

Album Credits

Performance Credits

Trini Lopez   Primary Artist

Technical Credits

Terry Gilkyson   Composer
Ray Charles   Composer
Bobby Sharp   Composer
Isham Jones   Composer
D. Modungo   Composer
Larry Ehrlich   Composer
Francesco Migliacci   Composer
Mort Dixon   Composer
Frank Miller   Composer,Composer
Leonard Bernstein   Composer
Luis Martinez Serrano   Composer
Pete Seeger   Composer
Ritchie Valens   Composer
Ray Henderson   Composer
Tom Six   Composer
Mitchell Parish   Composer
Woody Guthrie   Composer
Dave Lazer   Composer
Stephen Sondheim   Composer
Agustin Lara   Composer
Trini Lopez   Composer
Dave Lazar   Composer
M. Dixon   Composer
Lee Hays   Composer
Richard Dehr   Composer
R. Gilbert   Composer
Dorothy Dodd   Composer
Freddy James   Composer
Hays Li   Composer
Jody Miller   Composer
Domenico Modugno   Composer
Paul Barnes   Composer
Teddy Powell   Composer
Paul Clayton   Composer
Traditional   Composer