The Viscounts

The Viscounts were one of those odd pop/rock & roll hybrid groups that were common to both America and England at the end of the 1950s and the start of the '60s, but which always seemed to do better in England. The trio coalesced out of an eight-piece outfit called Morton Fraser's Harmonica Gang, based in London -- they were a variety act that were popular on television, and did a few world tours during the second half of the '50s. Manchester-born Don Paul, who had won a few important talent competitions, including Opportunity Knocks on British television, joined the octet in 1956, and he soon met another newcomer, Ronnie Wells, winner of a recent harmonica competition, from Farnborough, Hampshire. And in 1958, Indian-born Gordon Mills, son of a Welsh army non-com, and another champion harmonica virtuoso, came aboard in 1958. The three soon discovered that, in contrast to Morton Fraser, who considered rock & roll to be little more than a passing fad (and an intermittently annoying one) at best, they liked the new music. They quit the group after a show in Dublin, and took the name The Viscounts after the model of plane that they took back to England.

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