page_title: Neil Sedaka
section_title: Amarillo – Guinness World Record
hierarchical_section_title: Neil Sedaka / Into the 21st century / Amarillo – Guinness World Record
caption_attribution_description: Amarillo National Bank Plaza One building in Amarillo, Texas, USA.
context_page_description: Neil Sedaka is an American pop singer, pianist, composer and record producer. Since his music career began in 1957 as a short-lived founding member of the Tokens, he has sold millions of records as an artist and has written or co-written over 500 songs for himself and others, collaborating mostly with lyricists Howard Greenfield and Phil Cody.
context_section_description: On a business trip to New York in mid-1971, Harvey Lisberg, who was a longtime fan of Sedaka, asked Don Kirshner if he'd written anything new. Kirshner took Lisberg to a small room with a piano where Sedaka was already seated, and he tapped out a few songs. One of these was the Sedaka/Greenfield composition "(Is This the Way to) Amarillo?" which Lisberg loved and placed with his artist Tony Christie who recorded and released it in 1971. The song did relatively well on the UK singles chart, reaching the Top 20.
  Sedaka released the song in the U.S. in 1977 as the shortened "Amarillo," but it was only a mid-chart entry, peaking just shy of the Top 40.
  It lay dormant for more than three decades, when UK comic Peter Kay lip-synched it for a 2002 video in his TV series Peter Kay's Phoenix Nights. For the 2005 annual Comic Relief charity drive, he solicited a number of celebrity friends of his and updated the video, and it became an enormous hit. The original 1971 Tony Christie single was re-released to radio and CD/download sales, and hit No. 1 for seven weeks and was the biggest hit in Britain for all of 2005.
  When interviewed for an "extras" feature for a DVD set of a concert filmed in London on April 7, 2006 (see below), Sedaka jokingly said that he had heard that Christie had retired and was "golfing in Spain." The sudden revival of "Amarillo" summoned Christie back to the UK for an unexpected return to fame.  In early 2006, the song received new life yet again when a dance beat was added and the lyrics were revised to become a novelty hit, released as "Is This the Way to the (England) World Cup?", to mark the appearance of the England football team at that summer's FIFA World Cup finals. It was used yet again later that summer by the Central Band of the Royal British Legion prior to the Men's Finals of the 2006 Wimbledon tennis tournament.
  On April 7, 2006, Sedaka was appearing at the Royal Albert Hall and filming for the afore-mentioned CD/DVD package, when he was interrupted mid-concert by a gentleman who walked onstage from the wings. The planned scenario was that Sedaka was to begin performing "Amarillo", and after one verse, the audience was to be surprised by the appearance of Christie for an eventual duet. At the interruption, a confused Sedaka asked, "What is this?" The interloper was a representative from Guinness Records, and he was there to present Sedaka with an award from Guinness World Records: British Hit Singles and Albums for composing "(Is This the Way to) Amarillo?", the most successful UK single of the 21st century (up to that date, of course). After the presentation, Sedaka proceeded into "Amarillo," Christie entered onstage to an eruption of cheers from the audience, and after the successful duet performance, the two men walked offstage together, triumphantly arm in arm, as the first half of Sedaka's concert came to a close.
caption: Amarillo National Bank Plaza One building
exif: {"Image BitsPerSample": "[8, 8, 8]", "Image ImageDescription": "", "Image Make": "Canon", "Image Model": "Canon PowerShot A85", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image SamplesPerPixel": "3", "Image XResolution": "72", "Image YResolution": "72", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "ImageReady", "Image DateTime": "2006-06-20T20:58:51+19:00", "Image JPEGInterchangeFormat": "2548", "Image JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "4849", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Centered", "Image Copyright": "", "Image ExifOffset": "292", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/1000", "EXIF FNumber": "16/5", "EXIF ExifVersion": "022", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2006:04:16 04:01:49", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2006:04:16 04:01:49", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "", "EXIF CompressedBitsPerPixel": "3", "EXIF ShutterSpeedValue": "319/32", "EXIF ApertureValue": "107/32", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MaxApertureValue": "107/32", "EXIF MeteringMode": "Pattern", "EXIF Flash": "Strobe return light not detectedFlash did not fire333", "EXIF FocalLength": "211/32", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "010", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "600", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "800", "EXIF FocalPlaneXResolution": "852000/79", "EXIF FocalPlaneYResolution": "227200/21", "EXIF FocalPlaneResolutionUnit": "2", "EXIF SensingMethod": "One-chip color area", "EXIF FileSource": "Digital Camera", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Normal", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Auto Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Auto", "EXIF DigitalZoomRatio": "1", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard"}