See You Later Alligator

Infobox Single |
Name = See You Later Alligator


Artist = Bill Haley & His Comets
Nofrom Album = yes
Released = February 1, 1956
Format = 45, 78
Recorded = December 12, 1955
Genre = Rock and Roll
Length = 2:45
Label = Decca Records
Producer = Milt Gabler
Writer = Robert Guidry
Chart position =
NoReviews = yes
Last single =
This single = See You Later Alligator
Next single =

"See You Later, Alligator" (though more commonly spelled without the comma in the title) is the title of an iconic rock and roll song of the 1950s.

Originally entitled "Later Alligator," the song, based on a 12-bar blues chord structure (141541) [http://www.icce.rug.nl/~soundscapes/VOLUME06/Music_matters_Appendix.shtml] , was written by Louisiana songwriter Robert Charles Guidry and first recorded by him under his professional name "Bobby Charles" in 1955. Guidry, a white Cajun musician, adopted a New Orleans-influenced blues style for the recording. As a result, some reference books incorrectly list him as a black musicianFact|date=November 2007. (He also wrote "Walking to New Orleans," which was recorded by Fats Domino.)

The most famous recording of the song, however, was that created on December 12,1955 by Bill Haley & His Comets at a recording session for Decca Records. [http://thegardnerfamily.org/haley/discography/recordings.html#640] Unlike most of Haley's recordings for Decca, which were created at the Pythian Temple studio in New York City [According to John Swenson's book "Bill Haley" and the biography "Sound and Glory" by John W. Haley and John von Hoelle, Haley's December 1955 recording session of "See You Later Alligator" coincided with a major change in his recording practises. Up until this point, it had been policy for Haley to use a session musician to play drums on recording sessions (usually Billy Gussak but also Cliff Leeman and David "Panama" Francis although this last musician is disputed); this despite his hiring of talented and popular drummers to perform on stage with the Comets. In the fall of 1955, Haley hired Ralph Jones as his stage drummer but continued to use session musicians on record; according to Swenson and Haley/von Hoelle, Jones successfully lobbied to be also allowed to record with the group on "See You Later Alligator" and the practise of using session drummers was dropped thereafter (though Haley would return to it in the 1970s).] , "Alligator" and its flip-side, "The Paper Boy (On Main Street U.S.A.)," was recorded at the Decca Building itself in New York. The song was featured in "Rock Around the Clock," a musical film Haley and the Comets began shooting in January 1956. Decca records released this disk on February 1, 1956 in both 45 and 78 formats. [http://thegardnerfamily.org/haley/discography/releases.html#640]

Haley's arrangement of the song is faster-paced than Guidry's original, and in particular the addition of a two-four beat changed the song from a rhythm and blues "shuffle" to rock and roll. The song also has a more light-hearted bent than the original, starting out with a high-pitched, child-like voice (belonging to Haley's lead guitarist, Franny Beecher) reciting the title of the song. The ending of the song was virtually identical to the conclusion of Haley's earlier hit, "Shake, Rattle and Roll."

Bill Haley's recording of "See You Later, Alligator" popularized a catchphrase already in use at the time [cite news | first=Beulah | last=Racklin | pages=J28 | title=Do Kids Speak English? | date=February 28, 1954 | publisher=Los Angeles Times ] , and no less than Princess Margaret of the United Kingdom was quoted as saying it (this is related in a biography of the princess published in the early 1960s). It would become Haley's third and final million-selling single, although it did not hit the top of the American record sales charts.

Haley and the Comets would re-record the song several more times in his career: in 1962 for Guest Star Records, a drastically rearranged version for Mexico's Orfeon Records in 1966, and once more in 1968 for Sweden's Sonet Records. It was also a staple of the band's live act. Several post-Haley incarnations of The Comets have also recorded versions of the song. Guidry, under his Bobby Charles pseudonym, re-recorded the song himself in the 1990s.

References