Pye 7N 15722
(United Kingdom)
Warner Bros. 5494
(United States)
Vogue EPL.8301 (France)
Vogue DV 14256 (Netherlands)
Vogue DV 14297 (West Germany)
Vogue STU 42207 (Denmark)
Vogue US-105 (Japan)

Writer(s)

Tony Hatch

Producer(s)

Tony Hatch

Petula Clark singles chronology

"True Love Never Runs Smooth"
(UK-1964)

"Downtown"
(1964)

"I Know a Place"
(1965)

UK EP release

Audio sample
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"Downtown '88"

Single by Petula Clark

from the album My Greatest

Released

June 6, 1988

Genre

Dance
house

Length

3:25

Petula Clark singles chronology

"Life's A Game"
(1988)

"Downtown '88"
(1988)

"I Couldn't Live Without Your Love '89"
(1989)

"Downtown"

Single by Dolly Parton

from the album The Great Pretender

B-side

"The Great Pretender"

Released

April 1984

Recorded

December 1983

Tony Hatch

Dolly Parton singles chronology

"Save the Last Dance for Me"
(1983)

"Downtown"
(1984)

"Tennessee Homesick Blues"
(1984)

"Downtown"

Single by Emma Bunton

from the album Life in Mono

B-side

"Something Tells Me
(Something's Going to Happen)"
"Perhaps Perhaps Perhaps"

Released

13 November 2006

Format

CD single
digital download

Recorded

2006

Simon Franglen

Emma Bunton singles chronology

"Crickets Sing for Anamaria"
(2004)

"Downtown"
(2006)

"All I Need to Know"
(2007)

Music video
"Downtown" on YouTube

"Downtown" is a song composed by Tony Hatch which, as recorded by Petula Clark in 1964, became an international hit, reaching No. 1 in Billboard Hot 100 and No. 2 in UK Singles Chart. Hatch received the 1981 Ivor Novello award for Best Song Musically and Lyrically.

The song has been covered by many singers, including Dolly Parton and Emma Bunton.

Tony Hatch had first worked with Petula Clark when he assisted her regular producer Alan A. Freeman on her 1961 #1 hit "Sailor". In 1963 Freeman had asked Hatch to take over as Clark's regular producer: Hatch had subsequently produced five English-language singles for Clark none of which had charted.

In the autumn of 1964 Hatch had made his first visit to New York City, the purpose being to seek material from music publishers for the artists he was producing. Hatch would recall: "I was staying at a hotel on Central Park and I wandered down to Broadway and to Times Square and, naively, I thought I was downtown. Forgetting that in New York especially, downtown is a lot further downtown getting on towards Battery Park. I loved the whole atmosphere there and the [music] came to me very, very quickly". According to Hatch he was standing on the corner of 48th St waiting for the traffic lights to change, looking towards Times Square when "the melody first came to me, just as the neon signs went on."

Hatch envisioned his embryonic composition "as a sort of doo wop R&B song" which he thought to eventually pitch to the Drifters: Hatch had scored his biggest success to date with the Searchers' "Sugar and Spice" modeled on the Drifters' hit "Sweets for My Sweet", and had also produced a cover of the Drifters' "Up on the Roof" for Julie Grant. It has been said that Hatch gave Julie Grant the opportunity to record "Downtown" which Grant turned down but this does not accord with Hatch's statement that he played "Downtown" for Petula Clark within a few days of conceiving the melody and only completed the song's lyrics after Clark had asked to record it: also Hatch has said that prior to Clark's expressed interest in "Downtown" "it never occurred to me that a white woman could even sing it."

...
Wikipedia