After the release on April 17, 1961, "Heart and Soul" reached number 18 on the Billboard Hot 100 in July of that year, making this song The Cleftones' most popular work.
In 1959, the Cleftones' manager, George Goldner, convinced the group that their future resided in re-recording existing songs with an established popularity.
[3] By this time, Charles James had grown more proficient on the guitar, and the group and Goldner used that to develop a new arrangement of the piece.
[4][5] At that time, a local prominent disc jockey set up a recording session in Rochester, New York, to record "Heart and Soul" and, arranged for singer Pat Spann's boyfriend Panama Francis to play drums and 15-year-old/future Grammy Award winner Duane Hitchings to play keyboards.
[10] Under its "Spotlight Winners of the Week" column, Billboard identified the song as having the strongest sales potential of all records reviewed for the week, commenting on The Cleftones and "Heart and Soul", This was a hit group a few seasons back and this rendition could bring them back into action.
Music critic Terry Atkinson of the Palm Beach Post noted in 1990 that "Heart and Soul" is the song for which the Cleftones are best remembered.
[17] In 2012, American author and essayist Ray Schuck noted that the lyrics, "Well, I know that you're in love with him, 'cause I saw you dancing in the gym/You both kicked off your shoes – man, I dig those rhythm and blues."
"[18] In his essay, Schuck argued that such a reference would "segue nicely into the verses comprising the remainder of this stanza, albeit with a disappointing outcome.
In the 1988 fantasy comedy film Big, this is the tune played on the giant piano at FAO Schwarz in the scene where the characters portrayed by Robert Loggia and Tom Hanks perform a duet in front of other customers.
[21] In the TV sitcom Frasier, during the 1998 Season 5, Episode 20 titled "First Date", the tune and song is sung by Niles and Daphne during a memorable and important scene as they slice vegetables.
In 2011, the song was featured in Family Guy S09E16 ("The Big Bang Theory") at 5:50, when Stewie shows Brian that they can do everything outside space and time.
It was used again in 2018 for S16E13 ("V is for Mystery"), where Sherlock (Stewie) and Watson (Brian) play it on the bagpipes inside Veronica's (Meg's) corpse.
"Play That Song", a single by the band Train that incorporates portions of the melody, reached number 41 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart in February 2017.