588 Paul and Paula “Hey Paula” 1962

“The story is that Ray Hidebrand (1940- ) and Jill Jackson (1942- ), two young students at Howard Payne College, drove to Fort Worth from Brownsville and showed up at the studio on a day when the scheduled singer didn’t show. They played Major Bill Smith their song ‘Hey Paula’; Smith decided to record it on the spot, and issued it on Le Cam credited to ‘Jill and Ray.’ Mercury Records picked it up for national distribution on their Philips subsidiary but decided to change their names to ‘Paul and Paula’” (Martin Kohout, The Handbook of Texas Music, 2012). 

Paul and Paula “Hey Paula”