His name was Ross Bagdasarian, but he called himself David Seville. When I was a kid I wished my voice could sound like his.
But at the time I didn’t realize that the other voices I heard on his records and his TV show — with the singing chipmunks Alvin, Simon and Theodore — were also his.
On the audio player is a fun and familiar Christmas song. Let it play through, then listen to it again when it starts playing automatically a second time. A simple, cheap and appealing effect.
[audio:http://www.dograt.com/Sounds/Wordpress/NOV06/Alvin.mp3,http://www.dograt.com/Sounds/Wordpress/NOV06/Chipmunks.mp3]
My mom bought Chipmunks albums and singles for us kids. One timely 45 is called “Alvin For President”. On 45 she also got “Alvin’s Harmonica” and my favorite “Ragtime Cowboy Joe”.
We just watched the new chipmunks movie this weekend, and it was fun to be able to play this for the kids afterward.
D’oh! I just thought of a good title for this post, after failing to come up with one last night. “Chipmunk Cheats.” Well, too late now!
Bismo. Wait. Since when were you “more grown up”? I apply that question to myself as well, of course!
Bagdasarian was Armenian. His cousin was the author William Saroyan, who wrote “The Human Comedy.” They co-wrote Rosemary (aunt of George) Clooney’s huge 1951 hit, “Come On a My House.” (Thanks to D.F. Rogers for reminding me of these fun facts.)
I captured “The Chipmunk Song” in WAV format and slowed it down to half speed by using Windows Recorder, of all things. Then I converted both copies of the song to 128 Kbps MP3.
WOW! I always knew that’s how it was done, but to actually hear it, 45 some-odd years later, is mind-blowing. The friendly Mr. Bagdasarian is obviously of Middle Eastern descent! Back then, we weren’t afraid of them (remember Danny Thomas, who was Lebanese, and Catholic, by the way).
Didja hafta play your vinyl on 16 2/3 speed to record the second version?
Awesome! I had several Chipmunk albums (still do!) and remember playing them back at 16rpm when I was a kid as well.
When more grown up, I recall “Jake” being a bit uncertain when at one of our earliest Blues Brothers shows, I talked him into including a lip synch of “Alvin’s Harmonica”… hey, it got the laughs!