Calypso (album)

Calypso is an album by Harry Belafonte, released by RCA Victor (LPM-1248) in 1956. The CD was released on April 28, 1992 . It is the first full-length gramophone LP to sell over one million copies (the singles Bing Crosby's "White Christmas" and Tennessee Ernie Ford's "Sixteen Tons" had surpassed 1 million copies previously). The album is number four on Billboard's "Top 100 Album" list for having spent 31 weeks at number 1, 58 weeks in the top ten, and 99 weeks on the U.S. charts.

[edit] The tracks

The first track, "Day-O (Banana Boat Song)" largely contributed to the success of the album and it is still the song for which Harry Belafonte is best known.

It is a traditional Trinidadian Calypso folk song, sung from the point of view of dock workers working the night shift loading bananas onto ships. Daylight has come, the shift is over, and they want their work to be counted up so that they can go home (this is the meaning of the lyric "Come, Mr. Tally Man, tally me banana/ Daylight come and me wan' go home.")

The song was also used in a famous dinner scene in Tim Burton's Beetlejuice.

The third track, Jamaica Farewell, is another calypso folk song about the beauties of the West Indian islands and a love left behind. This was the first album on which it was published.

[edit] Track listing

Track	Song Title
1.	"Day-O" (Banana Boat Song)
2.	"I Do Adore Her"
3.	"Jamaica Farewell"
4.	"Will His Love Be Like His Rum?"
5.	"Dolly Dawn"
6.	"Star-O"
7.	"The Jack-Ass Song"
8.	"Hosanna"
9.	"Come Back Liza"
10.	"Brown Skin Girl"
11.	"Man Smart (Woman Smarter)"