Please Send Me Someone to Love
Encyclopedia
Blues ballad
The term blues ballad is used to refer to a specific form of popular music which fused Anglo-American and Afro-American styles from the late 19th century onwards...
, written
Songwriter
A songwriter is an individual who writes both the lyrics and music to a song. Someone who solely writes lyrics may be called a lyricist, and someone who only writes music may be called a composer...
and recorded
Sound recording and reproduction
Sound recording and reproduction is an electrical or mechanical inscription and re-creation of sound waves, such as spoken voice, singing, instrumental music, or sound effects. The two main classes of sound recording technology are analog recording and digital recording...
by Percy Mayfield
Percy Mayfield
Percy Mayfield was an American songwriter famous for the songs "Hit the Road Jack" and "Please Send Me Someone to Love", as well as a successful rhythm and blues artist known for his smooth vocal style.-Career:...
in 1950, on Art Rupe
Art Rupe
Arthur N. "Art" Rupe is an American music industry executive and record producer. He started Specialty Records, noted for its rhythm & blues, blues, gospel and early rock and roll music recordings, in Los Angeles in 1946.-Career:Born in the Pittsburgh suburb of Greensburg, Pennsylvania, Rupe...
's Specialty Records
Specialty Records
Specialty Records was an American record label based in Los Angeles. It was originally launched as Juke Box Records in 1946, but later renamed by its owner Art Rupe when he parted company with a couple of his original partners...
label
Record label
In the music industry, a record label is a brand and a trademark associated with the marketing of music recordings and music videos. Most commonly, a record label is the company that manages such brands and trademarks, coordinates the production, manufacture, distribution, marketing and promotion,...
. It was on the R&B
Rhythm and blues
Rhythm and blues, often abbreviated to R&B, is a genre of popular African American music that originated in the 1940s. The term was originally used by record companies to describe recordings marketed predominantly to urban African Americans, at a time when "urbane, rocking, jazz based music with a...
chart
Record chart
A record chart is a ranking of recorded music according to popularity during a given period of time. Examples of music charts are the Hit parade, Hot 100 or Top 40....
for 27 weeks and reached the number one position and was his most successful song
Blues ballad
The term blues ballad is used to refer to a specific form of popular music which fused Anglo-American and Afro-American styles from the late 19th century onwards...
, written
Songwriter
A songwriter is an individual who writes both the lyrics and music to a song. Someone who solely writes lyrics may be called a lyricist, and someone who only writes music may be called a composer...
and recorded
Sound recording and reproduction
Sound recording and reproduction is an electrical or mechanical inscription and re-creation of sound waves, such as spoken voice, singing, instrumental music, or sound effects. The two main classes of sound recording technology are analog recording and digital recording...
by Percy Mayfield
Percy Mayfield
Percy Mayfield was an American songwriter famous for the songs "Hit the Road Jack" and "Please Send Me Someone to Love", as well as a successful rhythm and blues artist known for his smooth vocal style.-Career:...
in 1950, on Art Rupe
Art Rupe
Arthur N. "Art" Rupe is an American music industry executive and record producer. He started Specialty Records, noted for its rhythm & blues, blues, gospel and early rock and roll music recordings, in Los Angeles in 1946.-Career:Born in the Pittsburgh suburb of Greensburg, Pennsylvania, Rupe...
's Specialty Records
Specialty Records
Specialty Records was an American record label based in Los Angeles. It was originally launched as Juke Box Records in 1946, but later renamed by its owner Art Rupe when he parted company with a couple of his original partners...
label
Record label
In the music industry, a record label is a brand and a trademark associated with the marketing of music recordings and music videos. Most commonly, a record label is the company that manages such brands and trademarks, coordinates the production, manufacture, distribution, marketing and promotion,...
. It was on the R&B
Rhythm and blues
Rhythm and blues, often abbreviated to R&B, is a genre of popular African American music that originated in the 1940s. The term was originally used by record companies to describe recordings marketed predominantly to urban African Americans, at a time when "urbane, rocking, jazz based music with a...
chart
Record chart
A record chart is a ranking of recorded music according to popularity during a given period of time. Examples of music charts are the Hit parade, Hot 100 or Top 40....
for 27 weeks and reached the number one position and was his most successful song
Blues ballad
The term blues ballad is used to refer to a specific form of popular music which fused Anglo-American and Afro-American styles from the late 19th century onwards...
, written
Songwriter
A songwriter is an individual who writes both the lyrics and music to a song. Someone who solely writes lyrics may be called a lyricist, and someone who only writes music may be called a composer...
and recorded
Sound recording and reproduction
Sound recording and reproduction is an electrical or mechanical inscription and re-creation of sound waves, such as spoken voice, singing, instrumental music, or sound effects. The two main classes of sound recording technology are analog recording and digital recording...
by Percy Mayfield
Percy Mayfield
Percy Mayfield was an American songwriter famous for the songs "Hit the Road Jack" and "Please Send Me Someone to Love", as well as a successful rhythm and blues artist known for his smooth vocal style.-Career:...
in 1950, on Art Rupe
Art Rupe
Arthur N. "Art" Rupe is an American music industry executive and record producer. He started Specialty Records, noted for its rhythm & blues, blues, gospel and early rock and roll music recordings, in Los Angeles in 1946.-Career:Born in the Pittsburgh suburb of Greensburg, Pennsylvania, Rupe...
's Specialty Records
Specialty Records
Specialty Records was an American record label based in Los Angeles. It was originally launched as Juke Box Records in 1946, but later renamed by its owner Art Rupe when he parted company with a couple of his original partners...
label
Record label
In the music industry, a record label is a brand and a trademark associated with the marketing of music recordings and music videos. Most commonly, a record label is the company that manages such brands and trademarks, coordinates the production, manufacture, distribution, marketing and promotion,...
. It was on the R&B
Rhythm and blues
Rhythm and blues, often abbreviated to R&B, is a genre of popular African American music that originated in the 1940s. The term was originally used by record companies to describe recordings marketed predominantly to urban African Americans, at a time when "urbane, rocking, jazz based music with a...
chart
Record chart
A record chart is a ranking of recorded music according to popularity during a given period of time. Examples of music charts are the Hit parade, Hot 100 or Top 40....
for 27 weeks and reached the number one position and was his most successful song .
Song
It has been called a "multilayered universal lament" The lyrics are stated as a prayerPrayer
Prayer is a form of religious practice that seeks to activate a volitional rapport to a deity through deliberate practice. Prayer may be either individual or communal and take place in public or in private. It may involve the use of words or song. When language is used, prayer may take the form of...
:
-
- Heaven please send to all mankind,
- Understanding and peace of mind,
- And if it's not asking too much,
- Please send me someone to love.
This song was one of the most influential of its time, and was widely recorded by other artists
Musician
A musician is an artist who plays a musical instrument. It may or may not be the person's profession. Musicians can be classified by their roles in performing music and writing music.Also....* A person who makes music a profession....
. Mayfield sang it in a soft ballad
Ballad
A ballad is a form of verse, often a narrative set to music. Ballads were particularly characteristic of British and Irish popular poetry and song from the later medieval period until the 19th century and used extensively across Europe and later the Americas, Australia and North Africa. Many...
style. Its appeal lay in the sensitivity of its lyrics
Lyrics
Lyrics are a set of words that make up a song. The writer of lyrics is a lyricist or lyrist. The meaning of lyrics can either be explicit or implicit. Some lyrics are abstract, almost unintelligible, and, in such cases, their explication emphasizes form, articulation, meter, and symmetry of...
in juxaposing an awareness of a world in conflict, with a personal expression of the need for love.
Sung in Mayfield's gentle, suave vocal
Human voice
The human voice consists of sound made by a human being using the vocal folds for talking, singing, laughing, crying, screaming, etc. Its frequency ranges from about 60 to 7000 Hz. The human voice is specifically that part of human sound production in which the vocal folds are the primary...
style, the lyrics were a combination of a romantic love ballad and a social message against discrimination.
-
- Show the world how to get along,
- Peace will enter when hate is gone,
- But if it's not asking too much,
- Please send me someone to love.
Covers
The song's durability is demonstrated in its many cover versionCover version
In popular music, a cover version or cover song, or simply cover, is a new performance or recording of a contemporary or previously recorded, commercially released song or popular song...
including those by Luther Allison
Luther Allison
Luther Allison was an American blues guitarist. He was born in Widener, Arkansas and moved with his family, at age twelve, to Chicago in 1951. He taught himself guitar and began listening to blues extensively. Three years later he began hanging outside blues nightclubs with the hopes of being...
, Gene Ammons
Gene Ammons
Eugene "Jug" Ammons also known as "The Boss," was an American jazz tenor saxophonist, and the son of boogie-woogie pianist Albert Ammons.-Biography:...
, Champion Jack Dupree
Champion Jack Dupree
William Thomas Dupree, best known as Champion Jack Dupree, was an American blues pianist. His birth date is disputed, given as July 4, July 10, and July 23, in the years 1908, 1909, or 1910. He died on January 21, 1992.-Biography:...
, Billy Eckstine, Nancy Wilson, Bill Henderson, The Moonglows
The Moonglows
The Moonglows were an American R&B and doo-wop group based in Cleveland, Ohio.-Early years:Originally formed in their native Louisville, Kentucky as the Crazy Sounds, the group moved to Cleveland, where disc jockey Alan Freed renamed them 'the Moonglows'...
, Esther Phillips
Esther Phillips
Esther Phillips was an American singer. Phillips was known for her R&B vocals, but she was a versatile singer, also performing pop, country, jazz, blues and soul music.-Early life:...
, Memphis Slim
Memphis Slim
Memphis Slim was an American blues pianist, singer, and composer. He led a series of bands that, reflecting the popular appeal of jump blues, included saxophones, bass, drums, and piano. A song he first cut in 1947, "Every Day I Have the Blues", has become a blues standard, recorded by many other...
, Brook Benton
Brook Benton
Brook Benton was an American singer and songwriter who was popular with rock and roll, rhythm and blues, and pop music audiences during the late 1950s and early 1960s, when he scored hits such as "It's Just A Matter Of Time" and "Endlessly", many of which he co-wrote.He made a comeback in 1970...
, James Booker
James Booker
James Carroll Booker III was a jazz, New Orleans rhythm and blues and soul musician born in New Orleans, Louisiana, United States.-Biography:...
, Count Basie
Count Basie
William "Count" Basie was an American jazz pianist, organist, bandleader, and composer. Basie led his jazz orchestra almost continuously for nearly 50 years...
, Pat Boone
Pat Boone
Charles Eugene "Pat" Boone is an American singer, actor and writer who has been a successful pop singer in the United States during the 1950s and early 1960s. He covered black artists' songs and sold more copies than his black counterparts...
, Elkie Brooks
Elkie Brooks
Elkie Brooks is an English singer, formerly a vocalist with Vinegar Joe, and later a solo artist. Elkie has been nominated twice for Brit Awards' top female singer. She is known for her powerful husky voice...
, Solomon Burke
Solomon Burke
Solomon Burke was an American singer-songwriter, entrepreneur, mortician, and an archbishop of the United House of Prayer For All People. Burke was known as "King Solomon", the "King of Rock 'n' Soul", and as the "Bishop of Soul", and described as "the Muhammad Ali of soul", and as "the most...
, Red Garland
Red Garland
William "Red" Garland was an American hard bop jazz pianist whose block chord style, in part originated by Milt Buckner, influenced many forthcoming pianists in the jazz idiom.-Beginnings:...
, Etta James
Etta James
Etta James is an American blues, soul, rhythm and blues , rock and roll, gospel and jazz singer. In the 1950s and 1960s, she had her biggest success as a blues and R&B singer...
, Gladys Knight
Gladys Knight
Gladys Maria Knight , known as the "Empress of Soul", is an American singer-songwriter, actress, businesswoman, humanitarian, and author...
, B. B. King
B. B. King
Riley B. King , known by the stage name B.B. King, is an American blues guitarist and singer-songwriter.Rolling Stone magazine ranked him at No.3 on its list of the 100 greatest guitarists of all time. According to Edward M...
, Freddie King
Freddie King
Freddie King , thought to have been born as Frederick Christian, originally recording as Freddy King, and nicknamed "the Texas Cannonball", was an influential African-American blues guitarist and singer. He is often mentioned as one of "the Three Kings" of electric blues guitar, along with Albert...
, Peggy Lee
Peggy Lee
Peggy Lee was an American jazz and popular music singer, songwriter, composer, and actress in a career spanning six decades. From her beginning as a vocalist on local radio to singing with Benny Goodman's big band, she forged a sophisticated persona, evolving into a multi-faceted artist and...
, Jimmy Witherspoon
Jimmy Witherspoon
Jimmy Witherspoon was an American jump blues singer.-Early life and career:James Witherspoon was born in Gurdon, Arkansas. He first attracted attention singing with Teddy Weatherford's band in Calcutta, India, which made regular radio broadcasts over the U. S. Armed Forces Radio Service during...
, The Animals
The Animals
The Animals were an English music group of the 1960s formed in Newcastle upon Tyne during the early part of the decade, and later relocated to London...
, Sade
Sade (band)
Sade is a British smooth jazz band that formed in 1983, named for Nigerian lead singer Sade Adu. Their music features elements of R&B, soul, jazz, and soft rock....
, Grover Washington, Jr.
Grover Washington, Jr.
Grover Washington, Jr. was an American jazz-funk / soul-jazz saxophonist. Along with George Benson, John Klemmer, David Sanborn, Bob James, Chuck Mangione, Herb Alpert, and Spyro Gyra, he is considered by many to be one of the founders of the smooth jazz genre.He wrote some of his material and...
, Fiona Apple
Fiona Apple
Fiona Apple McAfee Maggart is an American singer-songwriter and pianist. Apple met international acclaim for her 1996 debut album, Tidal, which was a critical and commercial success...
, Jeff Buckley
Jeff Buckley
Jeffrey Scott "Jeff" Buckley , raised as Scotty Moorhead, was an American singer-songwriter and guitarist. He was the son of Tim Buckley, also a musician...
, Dinah Washington
Dinah Washington
Dinah Washington, born Ruth Lee Jones , was an American blues, R&B and jazz singer. She has been cited as "the most popular black female recording artist of the '50s", and called "The Queen of the Blues"...
, Jimmy Scott
Jimmy Scott
Jimmy Scott , aka "Little" Jimmy Scott, is an American jazz vocalist famous for his unusually high contralto voice which is due to Kallmann's syndrome, a very rare genetic condition. The condition stunted his growth at four feet eleven inches until, at age 37, he grew another 8 inches to the...
, Johnny Diesel and The Injectors, The Grateful Dead, Fred Neil
Fred Neil
Fred Neil was an American folk singer-songwriter in the 1960s and early 1970s. He did not achieve commercial success as a performer, and is mainly known through other people's recordings of his material – particularly "Everybody's Talkin'", which became a hit for Harry Nilsson after being...
, Joe Williams
Joe Williams (jazz singer)
Joe Williams was a well-known jazz vocalist, a baritone singing a mixture of blues, ballads, popular songs, and jazz standards.-Early life:...
, Big Shoulders
Big Shoulders
Big Shoulders was a Chicago based blues influenced rock and roll band, known for their bawdy renditions of popular folk tunes. They were active in the 1980s and 1990s.Their two albums were produced by Ken Saydak, the band's singer and keyboardist....
and E.G. Daily, Buddy Miller
Buddy Miller
Buddy Miller is a country singer, songwriter, musician, recording artist and producer, currently living in Nashville, Tennessee...
.
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