1959
ONLY SIXTEEN * SAM COOKE * HIS MASTERS VOICE 642 * UK
This was Sam Cooke's eighth single on the Keen label USA released on January 6th 1959; it's a sentimental ballad about the innocence and passion of girls and boys who are on the very brink of leaving the Arcadian world childhood behind forever. Lou Rawls, an old school friend of Sam Cooke, claims that Only Sixteen was written by Cooke about his, Lou Rawls', (step) sister who was fifteen at the time, while visiting the Rawls family home. The credits for the song go to 'Campbell' (Barbara) but this was to avoid Sam Cooke paying royalties to Art Rupe at Speciality as he must have still been under some kind of song writing contract.
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