Stranger on the Shore
| "Stranger on the Shore" | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Single by Mr. Acker Bilk and the Leon Young String Chorale | ||||
| B-side | "Take My Lips" (UK) "Cielito Lindo" (US) | |||
| Released | October 1961 | |||
| Genre | ||||
| Length | 2:52 | |||
| Label | Columbia DB4750 (UK) Atco 45-6217 (US) | |||
| Songwriter(s) | Acker Bilk | |||
| Producer(s) | Denis Preston | |||
| Mr. Acker Bilk and the Leon Young String Chorale singles chronology | ||||
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"Stranger on the Shore" is a piece for clarinet written by Acker Bilk for his young daughter and originally named "Jenny" after her. The tune was written on a single scrap of paper by Bilk and handed over to arranger Leon Young who crafted the string arrangement, including the characteristic harmonic shifts at the very end.
The recording was subsequently used as the theme tune of a BBC TV drama serial for young people, Stranger on the Shore. It was first released in 1961 in the UK, and then in the US, and reached number 1 on both the US Billboard Hot 100 and the UK Singles Chart.
In May 1969, the crew of Apollo 10 took "Stranger on the Shore" on their mission to the moon. Gene Cernan, a member of the crew, included the tune on a cassette tape used in the command module of the Apollo spacecraft.