Santo & Johnny
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Santo & Johnny were an American rock and roll duo from Brooklyn.
Santo Farina was Johnny's older brother. He played the lap steel guitar as a youth, and then taught Johnny to play the electric guitar. They began recording in 1959 with Trinity Records' "Sleep Walk", written with the help of their mother.
"Sleep Walk" became a regional hit, and was then released nationally, becoming a #1 pop hit. The follow-up. "Tear Drop", was another hit, though their LP, Santo & Johnny, was less successful. They continued recording and releasing albums until 1976 with little pop success, after which Santo began a solo career.
"Sleep Walk" was originally covered by Betsy Brye in 1958 (it had lyrics as well), but has been also covered by The Shadows, The Ventures, Jake Shimabukuro, Larry Carlton, The Brian Setzer Orchestra, Deftones, Chet Atkins and Joe Satriani. Indie group Modest Mouse also covered the music, this time using the lyrics and entitling the song "Sleepwalking".
Santo & Johnny were an instrumental guitar duo best known for their hauntingly atmospheric instrumental 'Sleepwalk' which entered Billboard's Top 40 on August 17th, 1959. It rose to the No. 1 position for two weeks in September (the 21st and the 28th) and remained in the 'Top 40' list until November 9th.
Santo Farina (born October 24th 1937, Brooklyn, New York) was one half of the guitar duo. The other half was Johnny Farina (born April 30th, 1941 in Brooklyn). When they were very young, their dad was drafted into the Army and stationed in Oklahoma. There (on the radio) he heard this beautiful music. It was the sound of the steel guitar and he wrote home to his wife and said "I’d like the boys to learn to play this instrument."
Upon returning from the war, he searched out a man who could get the boys started with the steel guitar. Santo would listen frequently to the "Hometown Frolics," a country radio show and he learned to love the sound of the steel guitar as much as his father. When Santo was a teenager, he was able to get a local music store to modify an acoustic guitar which would allow him to play it like a steel guitar.
Santo became mesmerized with the sounds he could produce on his new guitar and he practiced day and night. In a matter of two years, he was performing for amateur shows on a new Gibson six-string steel guitar. Not long afterward, he started receiving lessons from a steel guitar teacher who had studied in Hawaii.
In 1952, at the age of fourteen, Santo formed an instrumental trio with a guitarist and drummer. By this time he was composing songs as well as the hits of the day. He also included a few Hawaiian standards when the group played at local dances and parties. With money he made from performing he bought another steel guitar. This one had three necks, each with eight strings. He experimented with the additional two strings until he came up with tunings that appealed to him.
When Johnny reached the age of tweleve, he began to play accompaniment to Santo on a standard electric guitar. The brothers soon formed a duo and became rather popular in school. They would play at church dances, wedding and clubs. 'The Farina Brothers' began to gather fans from Brooklyn to Long Island. As their popularity grew, they recorded a couple of demo tapes.
Santo took the demos and made the rounds of the New York record companies. The brothers eventually came to the attention of a music publishing company and signed a song writer's contract. This led to a contract with Canadian-American Records. Their first release "Sleep Walk" was composed by the brothers with help from their mother and their sister, Ann Farina.
After years of hard work, Santo & Johnny seemed prepared for success. They recorded the instrumental piece at Trinity Music in Manhattan. The disc was leased to Canadian-American Records (a label started in February 1959 by Gene Orndorf of Minot, North Dakota) and it became a huge hit.
They earned a gold record for 'Sleepwalk' and appeared on many of the top music shows including “The Alan Freed Show”, “Dick Clark’s American Bandstand”, and “The Perry Como Show”.
The duo followed their No. 1 hit with five entries on the charts from 1959 to 1964. The most successful was the immediate follow-up, "Tear Drop" which debuted in Billboard's Top 40 on December 14th, 1959 and eventually reached No. 23 on the charts. They released a self-titled debut LP, but the duo's popularity quickly slid and their U.S. record sales began to wane by the end of 1960. They did issue five more albums for Canadian-American before the company dissolved in 1965.
In 1965, they released an LP of Beatles songs. In particular, “And I Love Her” hit #1 for 21 weeks in Mexico for which they received "The Golden Kangaroo Award". Their fame spread to other countries and they were booked on tours of Australia, Mexico and Europe. They were signed to an Italian record label and had a string of Instrumental hits in Europe with standards like 'Love Story', 'Maria Elena', 'Ebb Tide', 'Love is Blue', and 'Enchanted Sea'.
In 1966, Santo and Johnny were briefly associated with United Artist Records, before switching to Imperial in 1967 on the strength of their international sales. They released 'The Brilliant Guitar Sounds of Santo and Johnny'. That was followed by three other Imperial issues before that company closed in 1968.
Santo and Johnny had quite a reputation worldwide. The duo was more popular internationally than they were in the United States. They continued to record, mostly for Italian labels, issuing albums filled with James Bond movie themes, Hawaiian songs, old standards, country music, light classics, and rock and roll hits.
In 1973, they recorded "The Godfather" movie theme. It held the #1 position for 26 weeks in Italy. They received an Italian Gold Record for it and were inducted into the Hall of Fame in Italy. By this time, they had recorded and released over forty albums worldwide. They had worked fourteen years (1959-74) appearing on their own TV show in Italy as well as playing clubs and casinos all over Europe.
In 1976, the duo disbanded.
In 1999, "Sleepwalk" earned BMI’s Millionaires Award, which symbolizes two million airplays on the radio. A version of 'Sleepwalk' by the Brian Setzer Orchestra earned the song a Grammy for best instrumental in 1999. In 2002, Santo & Johnny were honored by being inducted into the Steel Guitar Hall Of Fame.
Because of constant radio airplay, along with numerous TV show, movie & commercial inclusions, "Sleepwalk" continues to be one of the most popular & quickly recognized instrumentals of the 20th century.
Johnny Farina continues to perform this hit and many other recognizable standards in his shows and continues to make appearances all over the country. His appearances have included venues such as the Paramount Theater in New York City, the Meadowlands in New Jersey, Madison Square Garden in New York City and Harrah's in Las Vegas.
Santo Farina continued as a solo act for a period (after 1976) but has sinceretired from active performing.
"Sleepwalk" was sampled in 2006 by Blankito for Xzit's song "PGC & Fee Wee"
