Scott McKenzie was born 82 years ago.
McKenzie was best known for his 1967 hit single and generational anthem, "San Francisco (Be Sure to Wear Flowers in Your Hair)."
Born in Jacksonville, Florida, his family moved to Asheville, North Carolina, when he was six months old. He grew up in North Carolina and Virginia, where he became friends with the son of one of his mother's friends, John Phillips.
In the mid-1950s, he sang briefly with Tim Rose in a high school group called The Singing Strings, and later with Phillips, Mike Boran and Bill Cleary formed a doo wop band, The Abstracts.
In New York, The Abstracts became The Smoothies and recorded two singles with Decca Records, produced by Milt Gabler.
In 1961, Phillips and McKenzie met Dick Weissman and formed the folk group, The Journeymen, at the height of the folk music craze. They recorded three albums and seven singles for Capitol Records. After The Beatles became popular in 1964, The Journeymen disbanded.
McKenzie and Weissman became solo performers, while Phillips moved to California and formed the group, The Mamas & the Papas, with Denny Doherty, Cass Elliot and Michelle Phillips.
McKenzie originally declined an opportunity to join the group, saying in a 1977 interview, "I was trying to see if I could do something by myself. And I didn't think I could take that much pressure.” Two years later, he left New York and signed with Lou Adler's Ode Records.
Phillips wrote and co-produced "San Francisco (Be Sure to Wear Flowers in Your Hair)" for McKenzie. John Phillips played guitar on the recording and session musician, Gary Coleman, played orchestra bells and chimes. The bass line of the song was supplied by session musician Joe Osborn. Hal Blaine played drums.
It was released on May 13, 1967 in the U.S. and was an instant hit, reaching #4 in the United States and #2 in Canada. It was also #1 in the UK and several other countries, selling over seven million copies globally.
McKenzie followed the song with "Like An Old Time Movie," also written and produced by Phillips, which was a minor hit (#27 in Canada). His first album, The Voice of Scott McKenzie, was followed with an album called Stained Glass Morning. He stopped recording in the early 1970s and lived in Joshua Tree, California, and Virginia Beach, Virginia.
McKenzie died on August 18, 2012 in Los Angeles. He had suffered from Guillain–Barré syndrome since 2010.