Early life John Thomas "Jack" Halloran was born in
Rock Rapids, Iowa on January 10, 1916. Halloran earned degrees in music from
Morningside College in
Sioux City, Iowa, and
Northwestern University in
Evanston, Illinois.
Choral and pop culture involvement Halloran sang with a male quartet called the Cadets on several Chicago-based radio shows, including ''
Don McNeill's Breakfast Club. He later formed the Jack Halloran Quartet, which appeared on the television programs Garroway at Large and The
Pat Buttram Show
. Relocating to Hollywood, Halloran became a choral director for films, records, and television, working with such entertainers as Roy Rogers, Pat Boone, Ray Charles, Frank Sinatra, and Dean Martin. He landed the job of choral director and arranger on The Dean Martin Show'' while working with the singer on his recording of "
Volare." Halloran also organized the Jack Halloran Singers, which performed throughout Southern California. In 1957, Halloran arranged and recorded the current version of the now-popular Christmas song "
The Little Drummer Boy" (then titled "Carol of the Drum") for the
Dot Records album
Christmas Is A-Comin'. However, the recording was not released as a single that year. In response to this, Dot producer Henry Onorati, who left Dot to become the new head of
20th Century Fox Records in 1958, introduced the song to
Harry Simeone. When 20th Century Fox Records contracted with Simeone to make a Christmas album, Simeone hired many of the same singers that had sung in Halloran's version and made a near-identical recording with his newly-created
Harry Simeone Chorale. The song has since been covered by hundreds of artists, including multiple re-recordings by Simeone. Halloran directed the orchestra and chorus for
Bing Crosby's 1959 LP
Join Bing and Sing Along. He directed the chorus for Crosby's 1962 albums
On the Happy Side and
I Wish You a Merry Christmas, and his 1971 album
A Time to Be Jolly. He was also a member of the
Ray Conniff Singers, appearing on such albums as
Speak to Me of Love (
Columbia, 1963). Halloran was also a former local president of the
American Federation of Television and Radio Artists.
Later life and death In the mid-1980s, Halloran taught sight-singing and group harmony classes for vocalists at the
Dick Grove School of Music in Southern California. Halloran died of a stroke in
Lancaster, California, on January 24, 1997, at the age of 81. His wife Ella Rose Halloran (; born 1920) died in 1998. The couple were buried together at Mount Hope Greeley Township Cemetery in
Mount Hope, Kansas. ==Arrangements and compositions==