San Damiano (Heart and Soul) [7-inch single]

Description

San Damiano (Heart & Soul) is a single by the British singer and songwriter Sal Solo (feat. St Philip’s Choir), fomerly of Classic Nouveaux, released on MCA Records in December 1984 (catalogue number 930 MCA). The single was produced by Sal Solo featuring choral arrangement by Robert Prizeman.

“I had made friends with a new young band named Kajagoogoo and bass player Nick Beggs (later of Iona) was a Christian. We hung out together quite a bit, and decided in October ’83 to go to Italy on a pilgrimage. The place was called San Damiano”

One pilgrim asked Sal what he did – “I thought everyone knew; when Nick and I arrived, people started saying the carnival had come to town!” – and, on being told of the pair’s rock’n’roll connections, the man smiled and said, ‘I can understand why God has brought you here. Music is the international language of the young today. They are looking for what you have found. You can tell them about it.’ Sal felt that these were his ‘marching orders’ from God.

After visiting San Damiano, Solo converted to the Catholic faith, and soon after writing a song about San Damiano. The following May Sal got a call from his manager offering him a spot on BBC’s The Rock Gospel Show. All he knew about the TV show, which he’d never seen, was that it has choirs; and Sal fancied a choir on his «San Damiano (Heart & Soul)» song.

“When the choir came in the studio and began to sing my song, this heavenly sound came out, and I thought, ‘That’s exactly it!” I was in awe because, until that stage, all my music had been driven by my own ambition. Now here was something which it seemed God was driving. The sound conveyed perfectly the peace, serenity and majesty I had felt in San Damiano.”

Though «San Damiano (Heart & Soul)» was never intended to be a single – simply as a television session. At the mixing stage, the engineer said ‘Shall I mix it in mono or stereo? There’s not much point putting it in stereo just for TV, is there?’ It was almost as an afterthought that Sal asked for a stereo mix.

“When I performed it on TV, the BBC got letters about the song. When I’d performed it, one woman in the studio had said in a plumy voice, ‘Excuse me Mr Solo, I thought that was lovely. I can just imagine it in Top Of The Pops.’ I thought, Well I can’t imagine it! Afterwards my manager asked what I would like to do with it.”

Sal wanted to release it as a single and, because of its apparent uncommercial sound; his manager suggested releasing it near Christmas, so that people would think it was a Christmas record. Classix Nouveaux’s last chart hits «Because You’re Young» and the aptly titled «The End…Or The Beginning» had peaked at 43 and 60 respectively, and the band hadn’t had a whiff at the UK charts since the end of 1982. It was to everyone’s surprise, therefore, when «San Damiano (Heart & Soul)» entered the charts in December 1984 and stayed there for ten weeks, peaking at No 15.

“Even when the track was first offered to record companies, the reaction had been so much better than for anything I’d ever done in my life before. God really seemed to have his hand on it. People in the record company kept coming to me and sharing personal things. No one really knew what the record was about, but it seemed to touch a chord in them that made them think of God, or of all the hymns they’d ever known as a kid.

“To this day, I look back in wonder about the way the record went. At every interview, people wanted to talk to me about God. If I’d been a total unknown and sang a religious song, no one would have batted an eyelid; but because I was known for something at the other end of the scale, in image terms, it was a novelty for them.” [Excerpt from an interview with Sal Solo featured in Cross Rhythms Magazine, August 1991]

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7-inch Vinyl Single tracklist:

Side A. San Damiano (Heart & Soul)
Side B. San Damiano (Hymn)

Note: The original UK single release comes in a glossy picture sleeve. Also released as a 12-inch 45 RPM Maxi-Single, featuring “San Damiano (Heart & Soul) (Long Version)” on side A and two tracks on side B: “San Damiano (Voices)” and “San Damiano (Music)”.

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A full-page advertisement for various new releases on MCA Records, including Sal Solo’s single San Damiano (Heart & Soul), was featured on the back cover of the December 15, 1984 issue of Britain’s Music Week Magazine.

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[youtube_sc url=”-Pxup4o2Wm8″ title=”Sal Solo – San Damiano 1984″ autohide=”1″ rel=”0″]

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[youtube_sc url=”UeKqQG0q11Q” title=”Sal Solo – San Damiano 1984″ autohide=”1″ rel=”0″]

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[youtube_sc url=”JXnxu40Kdp4″ title=”Sal Solo – San Damiano (Heart & Soul) (Studio, TOTP)” autohide=”1″ rel=”0″]Sal Solo performing “San Damiano” at BBC’s Top of the Pops

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[youtube_sc url=”vKtC8T5OEEg” title=”Sal Solo – San Damiano 1984″ autohide=”1″ rel=”0″]”San Damiano (Extended Version)”

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[youtube_sc url=”Hopd-PiddVA” title=”Sal Solo – Music And You (the Rock Gospel Show, 1985)” autohide=”1″ rel=”0″]Sal Solo (feat. The London Community Gospel Choir) performing “Music And You” at BBC’s Rock Gospel Show, 1985