The Legends of the Rocking Dutchman - episode 12

Ladies' night

This transcript of the radio show is an approximation of what I said in the show. The real spoken parts may differ slightly.

And legends is what you're gonna get from me, female legends as today's is ladies night and the playlist features all women singing the lead vocals. And to start with the great music you came here fore, here is the great Betty Hall Jones with You Got To Have What It Takes. She recorded it in February, 1949 for Capitol records.

01 - Betty Hall Jones - You Got To Have What It Takes

Betty Hall Jones with You Got To Have What It Takes. This remarkable piano player and singer was born in Topeka, Kansas but she spent most of her musical life in California, where she worked as a session artist for Roy Milton, Alton Redd and Luke Jones, King Porter and Ray Charles. Like so many former R&B musicians, from the sixties and later she played in clubs and toured the world playing jazz. She performed on stage well into the nineties, when she was over 80 years old, and died in 2009 at the respectable age of 98 years.

On with Annisteen Allen. From 1957 on the Decca label is this Rough Lover.

02 - Annisteen Allen - Rough Lover
03 - Cleo Brown - Cleo's Boogie

Cleo Brown with Cleo's Boogie. She was a popular and productive piano player and singer in the thirties and forties. After she learned herself to play the piano boogie woogie style, she recorded Pinetops Boogie Woogie, and that became an influential record for other pianists. In 1953 she decided to quit the music business and she worked as a nurse until her retirement. She was rediscovered in the mid-80s after the English pianist Marian McPartland, for whom Brown had been a great inspration, tracked her down and she started recording again.

Next up Helen Humes with Stop Jivin' around, also known as the Pleasin' man blues. She recorded it in 1945 for Philo records, that later became the famous Alladin label. It was in the same year as her most well-know jump blues Be-Baba-Leba. Here is Stop Jivin' around.

04 - Helen Humes - Pleasin' Man Blues - Stop Jivin' Around
05 - Tina Dixon - Hello Baby

Magnificent. Tina Dixon with Hello baby, recorded in Houston in 1947 for Alladin records, and I'm afraid that's all I know about this wonderful blues song. We'll continue with Linda Hayes, whose real name was Bertha Williams. She was the sister of the lead singer of the Platters, Tony Williams. This was recorded for King records, among a few sessions with the platters, in 1955, but the vocal group remains remarkable silent on this one. It was never released back then. Here is the co-operating mama.

06 - Linda Hayes - Co-Operating Mama
07 - Rose Mitchell - Baby Please Don't Go

Wow. These are impressive down-to-earth new Orleans blues, here on the Legends of the Rocking Dutchman - Rose Mitchell with Baby Please don't go, from 1954, recorded in the Big Easy for Imperial. Now that's a song that I can keep on listening to and that puts anything that you play after in its shadow. So I guess it's best to do something completely different. Here is Mabel Scott with Disgusted and after that you will get Addie Williams with maybe Someday.

08 - Mabel Scott - Disgusted
09 - Addie Williams - Maybe Someday

(rocking dutchman jingle)

10 - Little Esther - Oo Poppa Do
11 - Dolly Cooper - Alley Cat

I thought it was about time to treat you with that authentic shellac sound. Sraight from an old 78, that was Dolly Cooper with Alley Cat from May, 1953 on the Savoy label. Before that you heard the great Little Esther with Oo Poppa Doo.

Next is Ella Johnson. She is the sister of Buddy Johnson and came from a big family from Darlington, SC. When her elder brother moved to New York to lead his own band, she followed and joined him in 1940 and from that year was their first hit Please mr. Johnson. They kept recording together until well into the sixties and they showed a versatility that kept them on the scene right through the rock 'n roll craze - but their heydays were definitely the golden years of the rhythm and blues. So here is Buddy Johnson with his sister Ella on lead in Ain't Cha Got Me Where You Want Me.

12 - Buddy Johnson Orch. feat. Ella Johnson - Ain't Cha Got Me (Where You Want Me)
13 - Faye Wilson & the Johnny Otis Orchestra - Playing Me For A Fool

Playing me for a fool - Faye Wilson was that backed up by the Johnny Otis orchestra and the background vocals were provided, as usual, by the Robins. I think the intro voice must have been Richard Berry.

Next up two vocal groups with female fronting. First the Larks with Barbara Gale with You're gonna lose your gal from 1954 on the Lloyds label - a subsidiary of Apollo records from Harlem, NY. The Larks had split up in 1952 but the lead tenor Gene Mumford had formed a new group with the same name in 1954 and it's this version of the Larks that backs up Barbara Gale in You're gonna lose your gal. After that Lillian Leach and the Mellows with Lovable Lilly.

14 - Barbara Gale & The Larks - You're Gonna Lose Your Gal
15 - Lillian Leach & The Mellows - Lovable Lilly

Now I think she has the sexiest voice in R&B music. Lillian Leach and the Mellows with Lovable Lilly on the Jay-Dee label. A pretty obscure group that never got any success. In the always reliable R&B notebooks of Marv Goldberg, he relates that Lillian, who was born and raised in the Bronx, was somewhat pushed into singing and she suffered from extreme stage freight. Despite, she recorded and did gigs from 1954 to 1958, as I said, with no success at all. In 58, after recording two songs with Apollo records, that were never released, she called it quit. She married and retired from singing. That is, in 1983, after a Bronx neighbourhood reunion, the group members re-found each other and started singing again. Lillian's last performance was as late as 2006, two years after the death of group member Arthur Crier, and in that gig she was backed up by the Cliftonaires.

So enough talking for now, let's get back to the music. Here is Betty Hall Jones with That's A Man For You

16 - Betty Hall Jones - That's A Man For You
17 - Ruth Brown & Her Rhythmakers - Somebody Touched Me

Atlantic sweetheart Ruth Brown was that, backed up by her own group the Rhytmmakers with Somebody Touched me. Ruth Brown was so succesful that the sales of her records were *the* important factor in establishing Atlantic records and the label was often called the house that Ruth built.
So let's go on with Little Sylvia. She's been on this program quite a few times and this time a song from her from the very beginning of her career. She recorded Little Boy in 1951 for Savoy and she is backed up here with the Heywood Henry orchestra.

18 - Little Sylvia - Little Boy

Little Sylvia w/ Little Boy from 1951.

Well, we're reaching the end of the show for today, and I hope you dig these ladies as much as I do. I left one especially to finish with. As James Brown once sung, this is a man's world and all the previous songs were with female frontage but most, if not all, of the other musicians on these records were men. So I want to end with the one and only all-women big band that ever existed, the International Sweethearts of Rhythm. Here is their unforgettable Jump Children.

19 - International Sweethearts Of Rhythm - Jump Children

And the legendary International Sweethearts Of Rhythm mark the end of another episode of the Legends of the Rocking Dutchman. That was the classic Jump Children. I suggest you do a youtube search on this exciting all-female band to see how they raised the roof of the places they were playing.
I hope you dug this show as much as I liked to make it, and if so, or if not, please let me know - just send an e-mail to rockingdutchman@rocketmail.com, or visit my web site, just do a google search on the legends of the rocking dutchman and it'll pop up first. As for now, byebye and have a great day. No, have a rocking day. See you next time on the Legends of the Rocking Dutchman!