A Wonderful Time Up There

Album: Pat Boone's Greatest Hits (1958)
Charted: 7 4
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Songfacts®:

  • Also known as "Gospel Boogie," this fast-paced, jazz-infused tune about the day of reckoning - when "the lord is a comin' from his throne on high" - was written by celebrated gospel songwriter Lee Roy Abernathy. He knew he had a hit when he wrote the song in 1947 for his Homeland Harmony Quartet, but some conservative clergymen equated the jazz beat with the dance of the devil and refused to allow the quartet to perform the number in their churches. A decade later, Pat Boone covered the song and landed at #4 on the pop chart.
  • Boone associates "A Wonderful Time Up There" with the most embarrassing moment of his career: when he flubbed the lyrics on a Tonight Show performance. He recalled in a Splash Magazine interview: "Dave Letterman was filling in for Johnny Carson on the Tonight Show. I was going to sing my big hit, 'A Wonderful Time Up There'… Because it was a big hit, I didn't put the words on the teleprompter. The words go by really fast and the thought entered my mind that it would be awful if I forgot the lyrics. Well, every performer knows that if you let that thought enter your mind, you're going to get messed up, and I did. I was singing the wrong words and finally stopped. The band is still playing, the singers are still singing and the producer, Freddy de Cordova, is signaling me to keep singing. I knew they were taping the show and sending it to New York and that it wouldn't be seen for a few hours so I thought we could start over. But, he kept signaling me to continue so I tried to get back in, but got lost again. It was in total shambles."
  • This was covered by Johnny Cash and Johnny Mathis.

Comments: 1

  • Barry from Sauquoit, NyOn this day in 1958 {May 16th} "A Wonderful Time Up There"* by Pat Boone peaked at #2 {for 1 week} on the United Kingdom's National Music Express chart, for the week it was at #2, the #1 record for that week was "Who's Sorry Now" by Connie Francis...
    Between 1955 and 1962 the Jacksonville, Florida native had twenty seven records on the U.K. Singles chart, twelve made the Top 10 with one reaching #1, "I'll Be Home", for five weeks in June of 1956...
    Patrick Charles Eugene Boone will celebrate his 86th birthday in two weeks on June 1st, 2020...
    * Besides the above "A Wonderful Time Up There", he had three other records peak at #2 on the .K. Singles chart, "Don't Forbid Me" for five weeks in March of 1957, "Love Letter In The Sands" for seven non-consecutive weeks in August of 1957, and "Speedy Gonzales" for four weeks in August of 1962...
    And from the 'For What It's Worth' department, the remainder of the U.K.'s Top 10 on May 16th, 1958:
    At #3. "Whole Lotta Woman" by Marvin Rainwater
    #4. "Lollipop" by The Mudlarks
    #5. "Wear My Ring Around Your Neck" by Elvis Presley
    #6. "Tom Hark" by Elias and His Zigzag Flutes
    #7. "The Grand Coolie Dam" by Lonnie Donegan
    #8. "Swingin' Sheppard Blues" by Ted Heath and His Music
    #9. "Lollipop" by The Chordettes
    #10. "It's Too Soon To Know" by Pat Boone
    https://www.officialcharts.com/charts/singles-chart/19580516/7501/
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