This transcript of the radio show is an approximation of what I said in the show. The real spoken parts may differ slightly.
And today's stepout to the history of African American music brings us to the Great Depression and the blues and jazz of these days. The term Rhythm & Blues had to be invented for more than a decade - up to the late forties 'race music' was the word. The recording hotspots were New York and Chicago, where labels such as Bluebird, Decca anc Vocalion were active. And from Decca's Chicago branch is the first one for today, Papa Charlie McCoy who recorded his Candy Man Blues under the name of Mississippi Mudder in August of 1934.
01 - Papa Charlie McCoy - Candy Man Blues
02 - Harlem Hamfats - I Feel Like A Millionaire
Charlie McCoy also was a member of the Chicago based group the Harlem Hamfats that you just heard. They were the very first studio band put together with the sole purpose to record and they were pretty succesful with that. The group only lasted two years but they're thought to be of great influence to Louis Jordan. Still, their style is quite typical for the thirties and this I Feel Like A Millionaire is pretty much representative for what they played.
You heard the lead singer Herb Morand, who also did the trumpet on this one and in many of their recordings. Morand definitely was the man helped defining the Hamfat sound with his rasping vocals and gritty trumpet playing. Well, not on his own 'cause I think there are other important ingredients. The mandolin of 'Papa' Charlie McCoy, and the whining clarinet style of Odell Rand and, not part of the band, the guy at Decca on the mixing panel. He was responsible for the consistent, but pretty odd way the whole band was deminished in volume when the lead singer comes in.
The Hamfats, they also backed up Frankie Halfpint Jaxon, Rosetta Howard and Johnny Temple, in fact, that was the first reason Decca producer J. Mayo Williams put them together. But when they had a hit with their first record Oh Red, they got a contract for themselves for fifty sides.
Next a classic of Lil Hardin Armstrong. Her Brown gal got numerous covers, most notably the fifties remake of Clarence Palmer and his Jive Bombers, titled Bad Boy. But here's the original that she recorded in Chicago in 1936 for Decca.
03 - Lil Hardin Armstrong - Brown Gal
04 - Don Redman - Down Home Rag
(jingle)
05 - Lovin' Sam Theard - State Street Blues
06 - Bessie Smith - I Need a Little Sugar in My Bowl
You got four in a row with after Lil Hardin Armstrong, Don Redman with the Down Home Rag from 1938 on the Bluebird label - great swing music. Then after the jingle you got Lovin' Sam Theard with the State Street Blues, and with that recording we're even harking back to 1929, when the economic crash just began. Sam Theard was a great song writer resposible for classics such as Louis Armstrong's big hit I'll Be Glad When You're Dead You Rascal You, then Rubbing On That Darned Old Thing, Let the Good Times Roll that he wrote with Louis Jordan, and Rock around the clock that was recorded by Hal Singer. Not the song that was made famous by Bill Haley and his Comets, though. I promise to play that Hal Singer song in a next show.
Then last was the famous Bessie Smith from 1931 with I Need a Little Sugar in My Bowl and she recorded that for the Columbia label.
Next one of the great bands of the thirties, Andy Kirk & His Twelve Clouds Of Joy and from this band a song advertising a dance called the Toadie Toddle. Now we know the late fifties and sixties as the era of the dance craze with numerous songs about the weirdest dances - but the kinda song was much older. This is from 1938 on Decca - the Toadie Toddle.
07 - Andy Kirk & His Twelve Clouds Of Joy - Toadie Toddle
08 - Blanche Calloway and her Joy Boys - I Got What It Takes
Blance Calloway and her Joy Boys with I Got What It Takes from 1931 on the Victor label. With her Joy Boys she was the first female leader of an all-male band that included great names like Cozy Cole, Chick Webb, Bennie Moten and Zack Whythe. Blance was the elder sister of Cab Calloway and a gorgeous and flamboyant lady, but she had troubles to survive in the male-dominated music business, together with the segregation and economic hardships of the thrirties. In many aspects, she had a lot in common with her younger brother, and that included her flair and the fact that they both were very innovative musicians.
After Cab Calloway had borrowed his sister's Hi-De-Ho scat from her Just A Crazy Song, he made himself master of scat and the next is one of the many examples. From 1933 on Victor is Zah Zuh Zaz - and the story he sings features the same characters as in Minnie The Moocher - Minnie herself and Smokey Joe. Here is Cab Calloway.
09 - Cab Calloway - Zah Zuh Zaz
10 - Lucille Bogan - Pay Roll Blues
Quite a difference from the flamboyant showmanship of Cab Calloway to the earthy blues of Lucille Bogan. Her Pay Roll Blues on the Brunswick label is a typical blues for her time, and actually this was just before the 1929 crash. Now there's not much difference between the blues of the roaring twenties and the depression years of the thirties, both telling of poverty and hardships. I think African-Americans didn't really share in the prosperity of the twenties where they did get the full hit of the Depression.
Now just recently I played a song of her titled Groceries on the Shelf. It protested against the disputable reputation the Piggly Wiggly chain of grocery stores had, back in the thirties, and the song was encouraging people to what she called help themselves, to steal back what the store stole from them in terms of way too expensive and way too easily given credit.
It was based on a song of Charlie 'Specs' McFadden with the same title and also featuring the Piggly Wiggly store, but this song is about unfaithful and unfair women. McFadden recorded this twice for the Paramount label and once for Decca. Here is that Decca version.
11 - Charlie 'Specs' McFadden - Groceries On The Shelf
12 - Leroy Carr & Scrapper Blackwell - How Long Has That Evening Train Been Gone
The legendary duo Leroy Carr and Scrapper Blackwell and that was How Long Has That Evening Train Been Gone that they recorded for the Vocalion label in 1932. Carr is often seen as the thirties Nat King Cole with his laid-back style. On this and many other recordings he teamed up with Scrapper Blackwell with his typical, single note, picking guitar style.
Leroy Carr died young, at the age of 30 in 1935, of complications of his alcohol addiction and one of his close friends, Bill Gaither, has performed several years as Leroy's Buddy in honor of him. Gaither was, like his friend, a productive bluesman and from him you'll get a Decca recording from 1939 titled Stony Lonesome Graveyard.
13 - Leroy's Buddy (Bill Gaither) - Stony Lonesome Graveyard
14 - Sippie Wallace - I'm A Mighty Tight Woman
Sippie Wallace with I'm A Mighty Tight Woman, a recording from 1929 that she did for Victor. That was the year that she moved to Detroit and got off the radar for the Chicago-based recording companies. From 1923 until her removal to the Motor City she'd done quite some succesful recordings but it wasn't until 1966, at the age of 68 that she re-entered the blues scene after Victoria Spivey persuaded her to do so, and she performed on stage for another twenty years until she got a stroke after a concert in Germany and she died on her 88th birthday.
Next Georgia White with a 1937 recording for Decca, one of the over 100 she did for the label in the thirties. The song was used as the theme song of the romantic British comedy Love soup that aired in 2005 to 2008. Here is her Alley Boogie.
15 - Georgia White - Alley Boogie
16 - 'King' Oliver - Stingaree Blues
17 - Bo Carter - Please Warm My Weiner
And the last one for this show was Please Warm My Weiner of Bo Carter and of course with a title like that, the double entendre is obvious. He did that in 1935 for the Bluebird label and before that you got from the same record label King Oliver with the Stingaree Blues from 1930. You got pretty old stuff today, and maybe you have noticed that a few weeks ago I altered the intro of this program. That's for a reason, as the old one still announced post-war Rhythm & Blues, where I increasingly play older music on here. Well today's set was all made of blues from the Great Depression and even older and through the time that I do this show for you, they have become a regular feature of the Legends of the Rocking Dutchman.
Don't worry, I'll remain playing forties and fifties Rhythm & Blues as the main ingredient of this radio program. Still I hope you appreciate also this older African American music and well of course you can let me know and send me e-mail. Send it to rockingdutchman@rocketmail.com. Your suggestions, questions and feedback are greatly appreciated and I'll always reply your mail.
You will find that mail address also on my web site together with transcripts of the shows, playlists and more. Ask Google for the Legends of the Rocking Dutchman and you'll be led straigt to my site. For information regarding this particular show, look for number 134 in the Episodes section.
Time's up for now so have a rocking day and just don't get them blues. See you next time here on the Legends of the Rocking Dutchman!