Essays on the history of Doo-wop and Doo-wop songography, with over 25,000 songs listed by artist, title, label and album number.

With abundant background and enticing images, this work covers more than just the gorgeous harmonies of the unforgettable doo wop groups. The landmark volume traces the development of the music, politics, art, architecture, and popular culture of the 1950s.

Fun, colorful survey of Doo Wop architectural style unique to resorts in The Wildwoods, New Jersey.

Contains alphabetically arranged entries that provide information on the cities of origin, members, and music of some of the most popular rhythm and blues and doo wop groups.

In Doo-Wop Acappella: A Story of Street Corners, Echoes, and Three-Part Harmonies, scholar and musician Lawrence Pitilli details this too-little-explored area of 1950’s - early 60’s American culture. As Kenny Vance and the Planotones suggested in their classic song “Looking for an Echo,” every doo-wop acapella group’s mission—the search “for a sound, a place to be in harmony, a place we almost found”—was more than the story of street kids seeking recording glory. It is the tale of urban change, mass migrations, ethnic acculturation, a changing radio and recording industry, and the dynamics of cultural change in the “sounds”—sonic and linguistic—that every generation seeks to make and re-make for itself. In his study of this neglected period, Pitilli uncovers a rich musical tradition practiced largely by amateurs in an almost mythologized urban America. Although most of these practitioners were musically untrained, their lack of formal music education and financial support neither diluted their passion for singing or their quest for possible fame and fortune. In this engagingly written and celebratory work, Pitilli further demonstrates that doo-wop acappella was closely tied to broader issues, including the self-invented individual, gender roles, ethnicity, race, and class.

Prologue -- La Veinte: a Santa Monica barrio -- Rubén Ladrón de Guevara Sr., 1914-2006 -- 1742 22nd Street, Barrio La Veinte, Santa Monica -- Palm Springs / Cathedral City / Las Vegas -- Binnie -- La Gatita -- Las Vegas : breakup of the family -- Sue Dean -- Beverly -- Shindig! with Tina Turner and Bo Diddley, 1965 -- The Sunset Strip riots -- The southern belle -- LACC / The New Revelations Gospel Choir -- Miss Santa Barbara -- Frank Zappa / Ruben And The Jets / Rock 'n' Roll Angels / 1972-1974 -- Miss Pamela & the G.T.O.'s (Girls Together Outrageously) -- Miss Claremont -- Miss Chino -- The mutiny -- The movie star and Miss Blue Eyes -- We open for Zappa at Winterland, San Francisco, April, 1973 -- Con Safos the album -- Mexico / Hollywood / The Whisky / Eastside Revue / Zyanya Records -- La gypsy -- The Star Spangled Banner / America the Beautiful -- The Whisky / Con Safos the band, 1980 -- Miss Aztlán -- Gotcha -- Zyanya Records -- Cristina / Día de Los Muertos / Chicano Heaven -- Born in East L.A.--the movie -- HBO/Cinemax special -- Performance art : Mexico and France -- La quemada -- La rebel -- Jammin' with Johnny -- Arts 4 City Youth -- UCLA -- Journey to New Aztlán -- Miss San Francisco : the enchantress -- Miss Mongolia -- Metropolitan State Hospital -- Trinity Elementary School -- Teaching at UCLA -- Miss Tokyo -- Mexamérica the CD -- The Eastside Revue : a musical homage to Boyle Heights, 1922-2002 -- Boyle Heights, LA Times -- Collaborations with Josh Kun -- The Iraq war -- Collaborations with Nobuko Miyamoto / Great Leap / NCRR / MPAC -- Manzanar pilgrimage -- Yellow Pearl remix -- Minutemen protest in Baldwin Park -- Rock 'n' rights : rockin' for the mentally disabled -- Resistance & respect : Los Angeles muralism & graff art -- Miss Bogotá -- Word up! a performance and theater summit at the Ford, 2006 -- Meeting my Okanagan brothers from Westbank First Nation, B.C. Canada -- Epiphany at Joshua Tree -- Miss Altar in the sky -- Rubén Guevara & the Eastside Luvers -- The Tao of Funkahuatl -- The Tao of Funkahuatl the CD -- Mex/LA -- Opening for Los Lobos at the House of Dues -- Fifty years in show biz / The Madeleine Brand Show, NPR, 2011 -- Miss Beijing -- Miss Monterey Park -- End of ten year sex drought -- My 70th birthday party -- Platonic homegirls -- Joseph Trotter -- A Boyle Heights cultural treasure -- The new face of Boyle Heights -- ¡Angelin@s presente! -- Sara Guevara -- Confessions of a radical Chicano Doo Wop singer : the solo, multi-media theater piece -- The fall -- Reflections on L.A

A school janitor teaches children to sing and have confidence in themselves.