This transcript of the radio show is an approximation of what I said in the show. The real spoken parts may differ slightly.
That's right, that's right, wake up y'all for the best music ever played, the Rhythm & Blues! And today again some great highlights of African American music from before the days of Rock 'n Roll, and today I start with the end of an era, that is, when most big bands had collapsed or were on the verge to do so. Just a few stood the storm of the war and the 1942 to '44 strike of the American Federation of Musicians, and one of them was Buddy Johnson and his band - he actually managed to survive rock 'n roll. In October of 1944, for Decca recording had resumed for about a year and it's this month that the next instrumental was waxed. Here is Buddy Johnson with One Of Them Good Ones.
01 - Buddy Johnson - One Of Them Good Ones
02 - Marion Abernathy - Hey Little Boy
And from the aftermath of the first strike of the American Federation of Musicians we jump straight to the days before the second one. Two days from Christmas of 1947 and the labels were doing every effort to get as much masters as they could, to survive that recording ban. The studios were booked 24/7 these days and in that frenzy, this Hey Little Boy of Marion Abernathy was born and she was backed up by Hot Lips Page on this release on the King label.
Now I've mentioned these two strikes very often in this show. The first one from '42 to '44 for its all-changing effect on the music industry - the collapse of the big bands, the rise of the independent labels and the vocalist that were brought to stardom. All favorable for the rise of Rhythm & Blues, and I count 1947 not only as the most productive year but also the quintessential year of Rhythm & Blues, just before the sound of Rock 'n Roll was to be invented - and just before the word Rhythm & Blues was coined.
'Cause yes - I loosely call all African American music from before, say, '55 Rhythm & blues, but it was in 1948, right during that second strike, that Jerry Wexler named it like that, as an alternative for what it was called before, that was 'race' music - the Jerry Wexler who would soon join Ahmet Ertegun in his new record label Atlantic.
Well you know that I play from all decades ever since the first blues was recorded back in 1920, this program brings you the story of African American music, here on the Legends of the Rocking Dutchman.
And for the next one we go to a 1937 recording on Decca - by then the leading label in Rhythm & Blues. The Harlem Hamfats were the house band of the label, put together by producer and executive J. Mayo Williams to back up the blues singers of Decca. But the band proved to be pretty succesful in their own right. It's probably been lost to history why this record, number 7398 of the Race series of Decca, was billed as the Palooka Washboard Band, as this were just the Harlem Hamfats. Well here they are, with Save Me Some.
03 - Palooka Washboard Band - Save Me Some
04 - Leroy Dallas - I'm Going Away
(jingle)
05 - Lil Armstrong & her Dixielanders - Riffin' The Blues
06 - T-Bone Walker - Trinity River Blues
And you got four in a row, after the Palooka Washboard band a.k.a. the Harlem Hamfats you got bluesman Leroy Dallas on the Sitting In Label from 1948. Then after the jingle that instrumental was pianist Lil Armstrong and her band the Dixielanders, and I played this as the background of my talking many times, so I thought to give it a bit more exposure. It's from 1940 on Decca.
Lil Hardin Armstrong was the second wife of Louis Armstrong and well, the couple separated in 1931, but she always kept a strong bond with him. In the late forties, she'd decided to quit the music business and become a tailor, and her graduation project was a tuxedo for her former husband. On that party, she found out she could never leave the music when the people asked her to play the piano. She died a month after him, after she collapsed while performing on a memorial concert for Louis on television.
And then that last blues I played - that was a very young T-Bone Walker and he sang the Trinity River Blues for Columbia records, backed by Douglas Fernell on the piano. That was back in 1929 when he was some 19 years old and he was billed on the label as Oak Cliff T-Bone - Oak Cliff is a neighborhood of Dallas TX and T-Bone a corruption of his middle name Thibeaux. His next recording opportunity came in the forties, and in the decade in between he played the clubs on Central Avenue of Los Angeles, as a bluesman on his own or as in the band of Les Hite. Well his fame came when he was some fifteen or twenty years in business, pretty long for a start I guess.
Next a man who tried to get a late ride on the waves of success of Louis Jordan. Calvin Boze pretty much succeeded in being a Jordan soundalike, but unlike the master he only scored one hit with it - that is Safronia B. This is from 1950 on the Aladdin label - here is Look Out For Tomorrow Today.
07 - Calvin Boze - Look Out For Tomorrow Today
08 - Gene Phillips - Hey Now
And another one that sounds pretty much inspired on the good mood jump blues of Louis Jordan - that was Gene Phillips with Hey now and he recorded that in Los Angeles for the Modern label in 1947. And with so many soundalikes - it's time for the master himself so here he is, as always on the Decca label. From '46 here is Louis Jordan with All for the Love of Lil.
09 - Louis Jordan - All for the Love of Lil
10 - Bull Moose Jackson - Houston Texas Gal
The Houston Texas Girl of Bull Moose Jackson - saxophonist and singer and he cut that for the King label. In 1943 he'd taken a job as a sax player in the band of Lucky Millinder and it was Millinder who encouraged him to go out for himself as an Rhythm & Blues singer. Jackson could do crooning pop songs as easily as bawdy blues with his band the Buffalo Bearcats, and his dirty blues Big Ten Inch Record and Nosey Joe did well on the gigs he played but sold poorly because they were considered too explicit in lyrics and banned from radio.
The Big Ten Inch Record though got a classic - being covered by the rock group Aerosmith in 1975. A blues band named the Flashcats played it live at their performances in the early eigties and with help of a local DJ they found Jackson back - he'd retired from music and worked in Howard University's catering. They convinced Bull Moose Jackson to play with them on their tour and that brought him back into the spotlights complete with a comeback album named Moosemania.
Next a pretty much forgotten vocalist and saxophonist named Gay Crosse, and his band is most notable, playing a sideline in the career of the important jazz saxophonist John Coltrane. In 1952, he was not as recognized as he got later, and while in Cleveland, someway his saxophone got lost - stolen or broken, the story don't tell - and Coltrane was just stone broke. His stint with the far more serious band of Earl Bostic had ended and so he joined Gay Crosse's Good Humour Six to earn some money - the band succesfully played the local Club Ebony with Louis Jordan covers and own material.
Now by 1954 Coltrane had left the band again and it's from this year that the next one is. Recorded in Nashville for the tiny Republic label, here is No Better For You of Gay Crosse.
11 - Gay Crosse - No Better For You
12 - Luther Stoneham - Sittin Here Wonderin'
That was bluesman Luther Stoneham, mostly a session guitarist but here he sings Sittin' Here Wondering, a recording from 1952 for the Mercury label.
And for the next one we'll get Peppermint Harris on a recording he did for the Sitting In With label but it didn't get a release by then. I found it on a CD set titled Houston Might Be Heaven. It was Bob Shad, the boss of the Sitting In With label, who is responsible for his stage name. Peppermint was his nickname and Shad didn't remember his last name, and so the name Harris came on the label. His Houston recordings were done in all kinds of places - legend has that one was in a Houston whorehouse. Well here he is with Gonna End My Worries.
13 - Peppermint Harris - Gonna End My Worries
14 - Memphis Slim - Darling I Miss You
Memphis Slim was that with Darling I Miss You, one of his over 500 recordings. This is on the Miracle label, and actually the second release of that label, number 102, and the flip of Kilroy Has Been Here.
And for the next one I dive back into the early depression years, that is 1930 with Memphis Minnie. She made several recordings of her blues Bumble Bee, two for Vocalion and one for the dime store labels of the ARC group. This one was released on Vocalion number 1476. Here she is with Bumble Bee.
15 - Memphis Minnie - Bumble Bee
16 - Manzie Harris - Cool Lovin' Mama
17 - Art Shackelford Sextette - Play Fiddle Play
And this little instrumental from 1947 ends today's Legends of the Rocking Dutchman, and it was a recording for the Modern label of Art Shackelford sextet titled Play Fiddle Play and I've been trying hard to find that fiddle in it, now, there is none. Before that you got the Cool Lovin' Mama of Manzie Harris.
As always you can let me know what you thought of today's show and send an e-mail to rockingdutchman@rocketmail.com, and to read back today's story and see what's on for next week, go to my website, just search the web for the Legends of the Rocking Dutchman and it will show up first. In that long list of shows, this was number 155.
You'll have to wait another week for your next shot of Rhythm & Blues and until then, don't get the blues. See you next time, here on the Legends of the Rocking Dutchman!