Calypso Craze 1956-57 and Beyond

Forty-year-old Bear Family Records is a German label renowned for digging deeply into the country, blues and rock’n’roll archives, and for unearthing German movie soundtracks. The sumptuous box set is Bear Family's speciality: Bear doesn’t just put out whatever archive material it can get its paws on – the music selection is deeply researched with every track considered to be of cultural or stylistic importance. Calypso Craze includes not just six CDs, but a vivid DVD of calypso performances from the 30s onwards and a 175-page hardback book – arguably the best researched and cogent explanation for the development of the music in the US and beyond. Its beguiling narrative argues that for a brief period calypso swamped the US, threatening to sideline even Elvis and co.

This diasporic story begins with the 20s and 30s, the start of calypso's international interest. The CDs show how core classics such as Caresser's ‘Edward the VIII’ and King Radio's ‘Matilda’ were key influences, and how US-based calypsonians like The Duke of Iron adapted historic calypsos like ‘Guests of Rudy Vallee’ and ‘Calypsonian Invasion’ using top jazz session-men on elegant productions. The story then examines US popular singers’ contributions to calypso and how it was stylistically altered. On 1945's ‘Stone Cold Dead in the Market’ we hear Ella Fitzgerald's rather forced Caribbean accent, and on 1946's ‘His Feet Too Big for De Bed’, big-band leader Stan Kenton brings a calypso touch to commercial swing.

The famous crooner Harry Belafonte gets a full CD and a whole chapter in the book devoted to him. Derided by some as a commercial populist of calypso, the book points out that Belafonte was actually a reluctant Calypsonian, and did not capitalise on the success of 1956's Calypso – the first million-selling album by a single artist – as much as he could have. The album features Belafonte's reworkings of classics such as ‘Man Smart (Woman Smarter)’, ‘Hold ’Em Joe’ and the delicately delivered ‘Kalenda Song’, with lyrics steeped in 19th-century African memory. They have a majesty and confidence, while the arrangements remain wonderfully rich.

Calypso is then followed to various corners of the US, with calypso-tinged soundtracks spicing up movies, and the set shows how the US craze was mirrored to some degree in Britain. The story ends with calypso's crash – in the US, that is – as fast-spreading rock’n’roll stole hearts and record sales. In short, Calypso Craze is a seminal release, an important piece of archive research and a listener's delight: a valuable contribution to the record of 20th-century popular music.