Trini Lopez (1937 - 2020)

Trini Lopez, was the man still alive?, I mused when I heard on the radio this morning that he had passed away. Somehow I had him filed under music of my parents' age and time. Somewhere with Frankie Laine, Louis Armstrong, Doris Day and Pat Boone. Singers of the few albums we had in the home, that my mother had brought from Canada when she emigrated to The Netherlands.

The reason I had filed Lopez incorrectly had a simple reason I found: his big hit song 'If I Had A Hammer' is around for as long as I can remember, so that includes the albums of my mother and the singles of my uncle and aunt that were played when I was very small when visiting my grandparents, but had nothing to do with their choice of music. I must have heard it somewhere else on a radio or whatever. The song was just always there.

'If I Had A Hammer' turns out not to be a pre-rock and roll single but post rock and roll from 1963. By the time that I started to find out what hits were and develop my own taste in music Trini Lopez was an almost forgotten memory. Probably touring the golden oldies circuit quite successfully.

My guess is that Lopez appealed to the part of youth and perhaps their parents that had barely lived through rock the craze or scare depending on a person's response to the devil's music. It is a nice, innocent song of warning, etc. When I hear it my nostalgic streak is immediately pleased but that is about it.

Diving in deeper, only two other songs pop up: 'America', the 'West Side Story' song and 'Lemon Tree'. Another song that I sort of know for ages but for a long time did not know who the singer was. That turned out to be Trini Lopez as well. He does get one thing very wrong in 'Lemon Tree'. Obviously he had never heard of Limoncello or limone granita. Granted, I do not eat lemons.

I do not own a single song by Lopez. For that I'm not interested enough. He remains a pre-The Beatles artist of a not rock and roll and blues kind. So in spirit does belong to my parents', who did not care for music really, day and age.

I do have 'If I Had A Hammer'. My mother brought the single for me from a fancy fair or something like it. Not by Trini Lopez but by Rob Denis. Look at the picture listen to the, English singing, voice and it is clear. A very young Rob de Nijs, one of The Netherlands most famous singers of the past 50 years gave a go at an English language career that never got off the ground. But that is a different story.

Trini Lopez died at the age of 83 of Covid.

Wo.


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