Ray Conniff

This bandleader is famous for introducing the "hum-sing-hum" chorus to pop music. Conniff noticed how the public usually latches onto only fragments of a song's lyrics, so he crafted arrangements of standards and hit tunes that emphasized their most memorable refrains. He had his faceless, ever-perky choir (picture a New England dinner theatre production of Night of the Living Dead) hum most of the songs, only chiming in with the key lyrics. Not only did Conniff's concoctions move millions of units, but the style was widely copied by just about every easy listening and jazz act throughout the 1950s and '60s. While Conniff was a lounge music revolutionary, his earlier roots in hot jazz helped ensure that his own music was often much better and more fun than that of his many imitators. His thematically linked album covers (featuring lone blonde goddesses being courted -- or surrounded -- by a phalanx of WASP lotharios) are a joy to record collectors and smarmy indie rock ironists everywhere. The latter group has also embraced Conniff's hip-after-the-fact recordings of soft rock, disco and funk hits.