Valentino....in LP form!

[Tastypotpie]

A while back I picked up an odd LP called Rudolph Valentino Tangos. (pictured here)



Did a search on it and...this was a THING, apparently?









Didn't know Valentino was still a selling point 40-odd years after his death. Cool!
Which bring up the question...who was this marketed too? His nostalgic fans who were now in their 60's? Was there a flap of Valentino popularity 50-odd years ago? (I'm guessing a lot of these come from the 60's. Also, that orange one looks like a tie-in to that 1951 bio-pic)

[Jack Theakston]

The Castilians Decca album (from 1951) is certainly a tie-in with the '51 biopic. Latin music, at that point, had become a bit in vogue in the US market, and naturally, there was a movie tie-in. The Castilians also recorded "Valentino Tangos" on Decca DL 8279 in 1956. My guess is that these releases did well enough that budget labels picked up on this by recording their own tango albums (of which there were many), and since Rudy had been dead for some time and there was no real copyright case with the original Castilians album, it was a sure cash-in. Tangos on their own were a pretty heavy market at that time, and the added incentive of Valentino made them more cover-attractive.

The Jardin KAPP album is from 1959, the Cazador on Reprise from '61. I'm sure you could date most of these from around that period (Decca also re-issued the Castilians album in '61.)

[Donald Binks]

I have LP's No 3 and 5 from the above covers. Yes the Castillion's was the orchestra that played in the 1951 Valentino picture. The Orchestra de Granados record is one of my favourites. It is vibrant stereophonic sound of the type in vogue when it first came out. I think the record is just about clapped out as I have played it so many times over the years. (I would have bought both these records in the 1960's).

Valentino's name was still well known in the 1960's and I can remember at the barber's one would say "try and make me look like Rudolf Valentino" before having a haircut.