Talk:Blue Velvet (song)

Ray Mason?
I've put a "citation needed" tag on the claim that Ray Mason premiered the song at a fashion show in Boston in 1950: I'm aware that there is a source provided but it simply gives an author and title (of a book?) which IMHO makes it a suspect source for what is a fairly significant claim. I have checked online for corroboration but am only finding quotes from this Wikipedia article: otherwise I can't even find references to any traditional pop singer named Ray Mason. And the time frame required to accommodate the "Ray Mason/ Boston fashion show" scenario seems off - if "Blue Velvet" was available for performance in 1950 why did no one record it until the summer of 1951? If the "Ray Mason etc" scenario is allowed to remain then I'd suggest it be moved to the Background section - even if verified it's out of place in the Other Recordings section. (As I feel it's suspect I'm leaving it where it is for now.) --Cherrylimerickey (talk) 22:35, 17 December 2016 (UTC)

I'm aware the Ray Mason info has been deleted from the article but in case the matter crops up again I will post here that I have found corroboration for Ray Mason performing at a Boston fashion show which featured music by Lee Morris including "Blue Velvet" - however this event dates not from 1950 but from 1951 specifically from November of that year when the Tony Bennett recording had already reached the Top 20: indeed the announcement of the second annual Million Dollar Fashion Show to be held at John Hopkins Hall on 29 November 1951 refers to "Blue Velvet" as a "current hit". The announcement appears on page 22 of The Boston Globe dated 23 November 1951, under the headline "Back Bay Merchants Stage Million Dollar Style Show Thursday".--Cherrylimerickey (talk) 00:00, 24 December 2018 (UTC)

Lana Del Rey version
Doesn't the Lana Del Rey version of "Blue Velvet" deserve its own article? I know it's not common for a cover version to have its own article but the "Lana Del Rey version" section takes up more than half of this article. teammathi (talk) 16:09, 13 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Considering "I Will Always Love You" falls under the same circumstances, I vote for it to stay. There are definitely reliable sources for the Bennet and Vinton versions of the song (although they're likely in print). --Thevampireashlee (talk) 17:58, 13 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Indeed, there are lots of songs which get covered and most only have one article. On another note I've mentioned the H&M ad campaign in the lead to the Del Rey section because it is somewhat confusing without it. The next section suddenly jumps into talking about Del Rey being chosen for "the" ad campaign after attending a dinner party, but at that stage we don't know for who the "the" refers to. Paul MacDermott (talk) 13:55, 14 October 2012 (UTC)

I didn't realize the film Blue Velvet was "based on this song"... oh, right, because I'm not an idiot. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.113.133.55 (talk) 15:44, 21 October 2012 (UTC)

Original recording
Conducting research to help improve this song article, I noticed a fatal flaw with what is included here: as it stands, the article purports that Bobby Vinton originally recorded the song and released as (what we would call today) a single, but this is untrue. The song was originally performed by The Clovers, a traditional R&B group. We're going to need to reshape the article so that it reflects this. Eventually, it seems this article is going to be very very large with numerous infoboxes (at least four) -- because the song has been released as a single, has received massive media attention, and has charted for multiple artists. I will attempt to fix what is currently in the article, so that it reflects this truth. --Thevampireashlee (talk) 03:58, 9 November 2012 (UTC)
 * The lead also states the song was "Originally recorded and performed by Tony Bennett." Can someone fix this with a reference? Ecphora (talk) 21:52, 26 January 2013 (UTC)

Release Year for The Clovers' Version
I will be changing the release year in the info box (which currently uses The Clovers' release) and body text for The Clovers' release from 1954 to 1955. There are no resources that I have found that are 100% correct for older music information but several have a very good track record (http://www.45cat.com, https://www.discogs.com and to a significantly lesser degree, https://rateyourmusic.com/). All of these have the release year for this single as 1955. Two specified the release month as February (perhaps one copying the other).

Links for this release on those sites are:

http://www.45cat.com/record/451052

https://www.discogs.com/Clovers-Blue-Velvet-If-You-Love-Me-Why-Dont-You-Tell-Me-So/master/537034

https://rateyourmusic.com/release/single/the_clovers/blue_velvet___if_you_love_me__why_dont_you_tell_me_/

Quite a few sites that have the air of being authoritative give the release year as 1954. An example is http://www.vocalgroupharmony.com/blue_vel.htm. It is interesting that that site has a poster for the Blue Velvet single release with the description "Ad for 'Blue Velvet' from February 1955". The site http://www.uncamarvy.com/Clovers/clovers2.html is specific to The Clovers and quite detailed. It says the article was copied from one by music historian Marv Goldberg that appeared in "Discoveries #113 - 10/97". It states:

December 6, 1954 found the Clovers opening at Boston's Hi-Hat. Then it was back to New York for their next Atlantic Studios session, on December 16. This time they recorded the 1951 Tony Bennett song, "Blue Velvet" (written by Bernie Wayne and Lee Morris) and re-recorded "Love Bug" (by Ahmet).

With this resource giving a recording date of December 16, 1954, all (of my) mostly-trusted resources giving a release date of 1955 with 2 specifying the month as February and the ad mentioned above also being February 1955, I feel it is safe to change the release date from 1954 to 1955 until compelling contrary evidence is supplied.

All that said, the actual original release was by Tony Bennett in 1951. If someone digs into the Bennett release and changes the info box accordingly, great!

--Wantnot (talk) 11:30, 20 February 2016 (UTC)

External links modified
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timey-wimey

 * "Blue Velvet" is a popular song written and composed in 1950 [...] Songwriter Bernie Wayne was inspired to begin writing "Blue Velvet" on a 1951 visit to Richmond, Virginia

Something bugs me here, but what? —Tamfang (talk) 01:47, 12 May 2023 (UTC)