Ralph Marterie (24 December 1914 – 10 October 1978) was an Italian

big-band A big band or jazz orchestra is a type of musical ensemble of jazz music that usually consists of ten or more musicians with four sections: saxophones, trumpets, trombones, and a rhythm section. Big bands originated during the early 1910s and ...

leader born in

Acerra Acerra () is a town and ''comune'' of Campania, southern Italy, in the Metropolitan City of Naples, about northeast of the capital in Naples. It is part of the Agro Acerrano plain. History Acerra is one of the most ancient cities of the regio ...

(near

Naples Naples (; it, Napoli ; nap, Napule ), from grc, Νεάπολις, Neápolis, lit=new city. is the regional capital of Campania and the third-largest city of Italy, after Rome and Milan, with a population of 909,048 within the city's adminis ...

), Italy.

Life and career

Marterie first played professionally at age 14 in Chicago. In the 1940s, he played

trumpet The trumpet is a brass instrument commonly used in classical and jazz ensembles. The trumpet group ranges from the piccolo trumpet—with the highest register in the brass family—to the bass trumpet, pitched one octave below the standard ...

for various bands. His first job as a bandleader was courtesy of the US Navy during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

. He was then hired by the ABC Radio network, and the reputation built from these broadcasts led to a recording contract in 1949 with

Mercury Records Mercury Records is an American record label owned by Universal Music Group. It had significant success as an independent operation in the 1940s and 1950s. Smash Records and Fontana Records were sub labels of Mercury. In the United States, it is ...

. His highest success in the

U.S. The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

charts A chart (sometimes known as a graph) is a graphical representation for data visualization, in which "the data is represented by symbols, such as bars in a bar chart, lines in a line chart, or slices in a pie chart". A chart can represent tab ...

was a

cover Cover or covers may refer to: Packaging * Another name for a lid * Cover (philately), generic term for envelope or package * Album cover, the front of the packaging * Book cover or magazine cover ** Book design ** Back cover copy, part of co ...

of "

Skokiaan "Skokiaan" is a popular music, popular Melody, tune originally written by Zimbabwean musician August Msarurgwa, August Musarurwa (d. 1968, usually identified as August Msarurgwa on record labels) in the Tsaba-tsaba big band-style that succeeded M ...

" in 1954. In 1953 he recorded a version of Bill Haley's "Crazy, Man, Crazy", which is generally regarded as one of the first rock and roll songs. His version of "Crazy, Man, Crazy" reached No. 13 on the Billboard jockey chart and No. 11 on Cashbox in June, 1953. His recordings of " Pretend" and " Caravan" also made the Top 10. "Caravan" sold over one million copies, and was awarded a

gold disc Music recording certification is a system of certifying that a music recording has shipped, sold, or streamed a certain number of units. The threshold quantity varies by type (such as album, single, music video) and by nation or territory (see ...

. In 1957, he hit No. 25 on the ''Billboard'' Hot 100 with "Tricky", and in 1957 he reached No. 10 with "Shish-Kebab". His compositions included "Dancing Trumpet", "Dry Marterie", and "Carla".

Joel Whitburn Joel Carver Whitburn (November 29, 1939 – June 14, 2022) was an American author and music historian, responsible for setting up the Record Research, Inc. series of books on record chart placings. Early life Joel Carver Whitburn was born in Wau ...

's pop chart research books say that Marterie's version of "The Song Of Love" peaked at No. 84 for the week ending December 26, 1955. However, ''

Billboard A billboard (also called a hoarding in the UK and many other parts of the world) is a large outdoor advertising structure (a billing board), typically found in high-traffic areas such as alongside busy roads. Billboards present large advertise ...

'' did not put out an issue that week and Marterie never recorded this tune; the listing is in fact a

copyright trap Fictitious or fake entries are deliberately incorrect entries in reference works such as dictionaries, encyclopedias (including Wikipedia), maps, and directories. There are more specific terms for particular kinds of fictitious entry, such as Mo ...

, to prevent others from stealing Whitburn's work. He died on October 10, 1978, in

Dayton, Ohio Dayton () is the sixth-largest city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Montgomery County. A small part of the city extends into Greene County. The 2020 U.S. census estimate put the city population at 137,644, while Greater Day ...

Partial discography

Albums

*''Ralph Marterie'' (1955) *''Music for a Private Eye'' (1959) *'' Marvelous Marterie'' (1959) *''Dance Band In Town'' - Esquire Mercury MG20066 Australia ''N.B''.: A separately published discography of Ralph Marterie's recordings and of his recording sessions is ''Ralph Marterie and His Orchestra'', by Ross Brethour, Charles Garrod, and Edward Novitsky (Zephyrhills, Fla.: Joyce Record Club Publications, 1992; 65 + 5 leaves).

References

External links

Ralph Marterie on the Big Band database

1914 births 1978 deaths People from Acerra Italian trumpeters Male trumpeters Mercury Records artists 20th-century Italian musicians 20th-century trumpeters 20th-century conductors (music) 20th-century Italian male musicians Italian emigrants to the United States {{italy-conductor-stub