the song swinging safari

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A Swingin' Safari by Billy Vaughn

Songfacts®:

• This song was written by German band leader Bert Kaempfert, and was released as the title track of his 1962 album. The album went Gold in his native country. Whereas Kaempfert's recording failed to chart, Vaughn's cover reached #13 on the Billboard chart. Vaughn was Dot Records' staff producer.
• The song and the album reflect the influence that Kwela music had on Bert Kaempfert. Kwela is a genre of music originating in Southern Africa, which prominently features the use of a penny whistle. This sound was also adapted in other successful Western music, notably Paul Simon's 1986 album Graceland . In the liner notes to The Bert Kaempfert Collection , Ladi Geisler, the orchestra's bass guitarist, said: "Bert Kaempfert tried to swap the penny whistle for a piccolo. Now that was a real piece of innovation. Then, finally, it was all ready and Bert was really pleased, he had managed it, he had captured the sound of the penny whistle using the piccolo."
• This was the original theme of the TV game show The Match Game ('60s version). It was reused as a theme for several later game shows.
• More songs from Billy Vaughn
• More instrumental songs
• More TV show theme songs
• More songs from 1962

Comments: 7

• Night Heron from Etna Ca I can well remember this from the first version of The Match Game. Nice little song.
• Barry from Sauquoit, Ny On July 15th 1962, "Swingin' Safari" by Billy Vaughn & his Orchestra entered Billboard's Hot Top 100 chart at position #70; and on September 2nd, 1962 it peaked at #13 and spent 12 weeks on the Top 100... It reached #5 on Billboard's Adult Contemporary Tracks chart... Between 1954 and 1966 he had twenty-eight recordings make the Top 100; with four reaching the Top 10, "Melody of Love" at #2 (for 1 week) in 1955, "Shifting Whispering Sand" at #5 in 1955, and in 1958 he released a record were both sides made the Top 10; the A-side, "Sail Along Silvery Moon", peaked at #5 while the B-side, "Raunchy", reached #10... The week "Melody of Love" was at #2 on Billboard's Best Sellers chart, the #1 record was "Sincerely" by the McGuire Sisters... R.I.P. Mr. Vaughn (1919 - 1991).
• Barry from Sauquoit, Ny In 1957 Billy Vaughn pulled off a feat that no other instrumentalist has ever matched; he had a two-sided Top Ten hit record. "Sail Along Silvery Moon" peaked at #5 while the flip-side, "Raunchy", reached #10!!!
• Steve Dotstar from Los Angeles, Ca cool little instrumental....
• Kelley from Hickory, Ky This song is vaguely similar to "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" by the Tokins though there is no direct connection that I know of. Lion was released earlier and may have been an inspiration for Kaempfert
• Murph from Peoria, Il This song was not used as an advertising jingle for Clark Teaberry Gum. The song was called "The Mexican Shuffle" (renamed for the ad campaign as "The TeaBerry Shuffle," and was played by Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass. Incidentally, the exposure the song and band got through the TeaBerry gum ad is what propelled them to fame. Swingin Safari is similar enough to Mexican Shuffle that I think it would be easily confused. Murph
• Rato from Lisbon, Portugal The original version, by Bert Kaempfert (in the album of the same name) is much better than this cover. The single was released in March 2, 1962.

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A Swingin' Safari

Bert kaempfert & his orchestra / bert kaempfert.

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Discography timeline, allmusic review, user reviews, track listing, similar albums, moods and themes.

A Swingin' Safari

1 January 1962 12 Songs, 33 minutes ℗ 1962 Revolver Records

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You are here, vol. 8: a swingin' safari, error message.

• A Swingin´ Safari
• That Happy Feeling
• Afrikaan Beat
• Happy Trumpeter (Magic Trumpet)
• Tootie Flutie
• Wimoweh (The Lion Sleeps Tonight)
• Black Beauty
• Skokiaan (South African Song)

A Swingin' Safari was also released on CD with the original Lp cover photo and identical catalog number. I do not know if it was released before or after the BK Collection version.

Polydor 825 494-2 (deleted)

The “BERT KAEMPFERT COLLECTION”

During 25 years of cooperation with POLYDOR, Bert Kaempfert arranged, composed and produced a countless number of songs. From 1961 until shortly before his death in 1980, close to 40 LP productions with and by Bert Kaempfert and his Orchestra were released in Germany alone under the Polydor label.

These albums contain more than 460 productions of his own beautiful compositions together with evergreens and world standards.

Polydor considers it a duty to re-release the more popular albums with the original track listing – and in the approximate sequence – on the 10 th anniversary of the death of this exceptional composer and bandleader. At the same time, the facilities of the modern CD-technique are of benefit to reproduce the original recordings.

The album “A SWINGIN’ SAFARI” was released in 1962. The original cover text reads as follows:

Composer-conductor-arranger Bert Kaempfert created a sensation with the million-selling hit recording of the hauntingly beautiful WONDERLAND BY NIGHT. With it, he almost single-handedly reestablished the popularity of the big band, and in so doing became one of its most popular and vital forces.

WONDERLAND has been followed by a bright succession of Kaempfert hits – the most recent of which, and perhaps the most significant being AFRIKAAN BEAT together with the title song of this album, and THAT HAPPY FEELING. The first two titles are original Kaempfert compositions and they represent – with their brilliant trumpet passages and beautiful intrusions of massed strings – one of the most rhythmically exciting and melodically imaginative sounds ever conceived by Mr. Kaempfert or anyone else on the scene today.

Mr. Kaempfert, like many other modern young men at this time, has long been fascinated by the music of Africa; and in particular by the unique rhythms and “penny whistle” sound that is the result of the mergings of European and African negro elements in South Africa. Thus, this album is the outcome of much research and study. Its moods range from softly sentimental to almost boisterously swinging. The sound is characteristically rich.

A SWINGIN’ SAFARI

Bert Kaempfert always had a special love for ‘black music.’ When he first heard a South African recording of the so called ‘penny whistlers’ he was so impressed that he wanted to procuce an LP in the same vein. And Bert Kaempfert went on to do just this, but at the same time remaining faithful to his own inimitable style; he was never an imitator of other musicians. Combining strings, choir, and his famous trumpet solos, he still managed to reproduce the penny whistle sound which runs through his arrangements like a clear stream. Ladi Geisler, long standing bass guitarist with the Kaempfert Orchestra, remembers: “Bert Kaempfert tried to swap the penny whistle for a piccolo. Now that was a real piece of innovation. Then, finally, it was all ready and Bert was really pleased, he had managed it, he had captured the sound of the penny whistle using the piccolo.”

The huge success of this album, which in the meantime had made its debut in Europe, was soon to be rewarded with a golden LP. Over and over again “A SWINGIN’ SAFARI” made new friends. In addition to other prizes, Bert Kaempfert was to receive in 1968 a second golden LP for this production and with it equaled the world record of 9 golden LPs, which until then had been held only by The Beatles. But Bert Kaempfert was to be even happier to learn of the popularity of this production in South Africa.

Knowledge of this recording is still immense. Nearly everyone who hears the opening bars of “A SWINGIN’ SAFARI” realizes that they have heard them before. And the intro to “AFRIKAAN BEAT” is today one of the most unmistakable symbols of Bert Kaempfert and his Orchestra, with its typical ‘cracking bass’; again Ladi Geisler recalls: “We musicians were, as always, spread out in front of one microphone. My amp stood about 9 feet away, the same distance as the trombones. Bert Kaempfert advised me to go easy on the lower notes (these were to come from the double-bass) and the high notes were to be accentuated so that it would ‘really crack.’ This was how the term ‘cracking bass’ was born.”

(Text translated from German by Ewen Campbell)

• Bert Kaempfert

Good Life Music

Discography

In Deutschland veröffentlicht und erhältlich:

A Swingin’ Safari

(P) 1962 Universal Music Domestic Pop, a division of Universal Music GmbH

Publishers:

• Tonika Musikverlag Kaempfert Schacht oHG
• Screen Gems-EMI Music Inc.