If not for TikTok, Connie Francis‘ 1962 tinkly organ bop “Pretty Little Baby” may have been forever obscure. It was never a hit, and Francis, reached by phone at her Parkland, Fla., home, barely remembers recording it. “I had to listen to it to identify it,” admits the 87-year-old pop legend, who became the first woman to top the Billboard Hot 100 as a solo act in July 1960 with “Everybody’s Somebody’s Fool,” one of her three Hot 100 No. 1s.
“Then, of course, I recognized the fact that I had done it in seven languages.”
A friend recently informed Francis that “Pretty Little Baby” had turned up on TikTok as a “viral hit,” an upbeat soundtrack for people (including Kylie Jenner and Kim Kardashian) showing off babies, puppies, kittens and — befitting the lyric “you can ask the flowers” — flowers. Francis responded: “What’s that?” In a sense, TikTok is just a technological update of American Bandstand in the ’60s, when Dick Clark’s TV countdown regularly drew 8 million viewers and automatically turned songs into hits. “Without Dick Clark, there would have been no Connie Francis,” Francis says.
“Pretty Little Baby” was one of 40 songs Francis recorded during several recording sessions over four days in August 1961, according to her 2017 autobiography Among My Souvenirs: The Real Story Vol. 1. The track landed on her Connie Francis Sings Second Hand Love & Other Hits album.
On April 10, “Pretty Little Baby” was streaming 17,000 times per week in the U.S.; a month later, it was streaming 2.4 million times, an increase of more than 7,000%. The track has 10 billion TikTok views, hitting No. 1 on the app’s Viral 50 and Top 50 charts, and recently crossed over to streaming success, with 14 million global streams, landing at No. 67 on Spotify’s Global Top 100. Francis’ label, Universal Music, recently reissued the versions Francis had sung in Swedish, Japanese and other languages in 1962, when her label, MGM, hoped to score hits in regions outside the U.S.
Francis, who told Facebook followers in March she is awaiting stem cell therapy to treat a “troublesome painful hip,” discussed “Pretty Little Baby,” “Who’s Sorry Now,” Just In Time (the hit Broadway musical about her late onetime boyfriend Bobby Darin) and the domineering nature of her late Svengali father, George Franconero Sr. Of her newfound virality, she tells Billboard: “I’m getting calls from everywhere: ‘You’re a TikTok phenomenon.’”
Did the memory of recording “Pretty Little Baby” come back to you when you recently listened to the song?
Yes. I remembered after I heard it. It’s just a blessing to know that kindergarten kids know me and my music now. It’s really thrilling.
That song was on Connie Francis Sings Second Hand Love & Other Hits. Phil Spector co-wrote the title track.
Yes, it was Phil Spector’s first top 10 record.
What do you remember about working with him?
I didn’t work with him on it. He wasn’t even at the session.
Since you posted “What’s that?” on Facebook, have you learned about viral hits and TikTok?
Yes. [Laughs.] Now I know.
Have you seen Just In Time, in which Gracie Lawrence plays you on stage?
I’m planning on going to see it.
Lawrence told an interviewer at Nylon that the most difficult song of yours to sing is “Who’s Sorry Now,” from 1958. She said: “The balance of singing emotionally, going through the heartbreak she experiences every night, while also wanting to deliver a pitch-perfect performance is a really challenging task. It’s one I assume Connie herself was navigating while performing the song as well at the pinnacle of her career, and she’s just been put through the ringer emotionally behind the scenes. I think about that a lot.” Does that resonate with you?
Yes. It does resonate with me.
How did you get through that emotion when recording it?
I didn’t want to record the song. My father insisted that I record “Who’s Sorry Now.” I did three other songs at the session first, in the hopes of not being able to get to “Who’s Sorry Now” in the four-hour time allotted to me. I had 16 minutes left in the session and I said, “That’s a wrap, fellas, there’s no time for ‘Who’s Sorry Now.’” My father said, “If I have to nail you to that microphone, you’re going to do at least one take of ‘Who’s Sorry Now.’” So that’s what I did — one take of “Who’s Sorry Now.” And I didn’t try to imitate anybody else, as I always had on my recordings. By the time I was 14, I did demonstration records, and a publisher would say, “Connie, give us some of that great Patti Page sound, give me some of that great Kay Starr sound, give me some of that great Teresa Brewer sound.” I didn’t have a style of my own yet. But on “Who’s Sorry Now,” I was so turned off on the song that I didn’t try to imitate anybody else. I just sounded like myself for the first time. And it was a hit.
So not only was that a breakthrough on the charts, it was a breakthrough for you creatively.
Yes, it was.
You described in your book the “arduous work” to drive between radio stations and record hops in different cities, “from one dreary, depressing $3 or $4 a day hotel room to the next.” When did that dreary, depressing part of your career come to an end?
It came to an end with “Who’s Sorry Now.” I didn’t have to worry about staying in $4-a-night hotels.
You wrote in your book: “Bobby wasn’t merely a person, he was an experience.” If an actor and actress were to reach out for suggestions on how to play both you and Mr. Darin, what advice would you give them?
Well, Bobby was very cool. And I was very naive. When he said, “I dig,” I said, “You do? For what sort of company? Oil?”
What plans do you have to promote “Pretty Little Baby”? Interviews? Appearances?
I don’t feel like going on the road.
TV shows?
Yes, I’ll do TV.
What do you miss about the music business?
I miss the stage.
Is there ever an opportunity for you to perform again?
Those days are over. That ship has sailed.
For health reasons? Or too difficult logistically?
For a variety of reasons. It’s too much work.
Anything else you want to say to your new “Pretty Little Baby” fans?
I want to thank everybody. It gives me a new lease on life.
