The musicians' union strike was only a year away, but for 1941 the dance halls ruled, ballroom tickets were affordable, the great Depression was quickly becoming a memory, and the war was something the Europeans would have to figure out.
Sinatra was Tommy Dorsey's lead vocalist, backed by the Pied Pipers on at least ten of his chart hits. The Pied Pipers were a quartet of three men and one woman, who happened to be Jo Stafford. Stafford's first hit came in 1941, a song called Yes Indeed that she sang solo. Tommy Dorsey allegedly fired one of the Pied Pipers in 1942, which led to the departure of the whole group in a show of team unity.
With the eventual departure of Sinatra in 1942, Tommy turned to Dick Haymes for vocal leadership. A bit of trivia: a certain trumpet player joined Dorsey after his discharge following World War II. The kid was young, and talent was still raw, but Dorsey saw something he liked. That trumpeter was Carl "Doc" Severinson.
Jimmy Dorsey ran something of a smoother ship in the early 1940s. He owned the #1 spot for 19 weeks out of 52 in 1941, a record that wouldn't stand long.
Glenn Miller eclipsed it just a year later. But don't let that minimize Jimmy's achievement in '41; each of the 5 songs listed above spent at least a week on top of the charts. Amapola spent 10 weeks at #1 and is therefore one of the all-time "monster" chart toppers. It would've topped Artie Shaw's Frenesi on this list, but for the fact that Shaw's number already had a few weeks at #1 in December of 1940.
Dorsey's hits featured a unique 3-part format. This "A-B-C" arrangement saw Bob Eberly lead the first third, the band - led by Jimmy's sax - took the second part, and Helen O'Connell would finish it out with a flourish.
As the average playing time of a commercial 78 RPM record was 3 minutes, each "section" lasted about a minute. It was an unstoppable formula in 1941.
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