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John Boudreaux
John Mortimer Boudreaux, Jr. (December 10, 1936, New Roads, Louisiana – January 14, 2017, Los Angeles) was an American drummer who was active in jazz, soul, and rhythm & blues idioms. Early Years Boudreaux moved to New Orleans at age ten or twelve with his mother to live with his grandmother on St. Philip Street, across the street from the Caledonia Inn, where Professor Longhair would land a gig in 1949 replacing Dave Bartholomew's swing band. His grandfather played bass drum and was Grand Marshal in the New Roads Mardi Gras parade. As a child, he studied with Harold Battiste, Ed Blackwell, and Ellis Marsalis on drums. "I wanted to play saxophone but the drum and the saxophone were two different prices. The drum—we’re talking snare drum—was a lot cheaper, so my mother bought the drum. That’s how I started playing drums. I must have been 14 then." Career Boudreaux joined The Hawketts as a student at Joseph S. Clark Sr. High School. He said band members would march ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Rhythm And Blues
Rhythm and blues, frequently abbreviated as R&B or R'n'B, is a genre of popular music that originated in African-American communities in the 1940s. The term was originally used by record companies to describe recordings marketed predominantly to urban African Americans, at a time when "urbane, rocking, jazz based music ... ith aheavy, insistent beat" was becoming more popular. In the commercial rhythm and blues music typical of the 1950s through the 1970s, the bands usually consisted of piano, one or two guitars, bass, drums, one or more saxophones, and sometimes background vocalists. R&B lyrical themes often encapsulate the African-American experience of pain and the quest for freedom and joy, as well as triumphs and failures in terms of relationships, economics, and aspirations. The term "rhythm and blues" has undergone a number of shifts in meaning. In the early 1950s, it was frequently applied to blues records. Starting in the mid-1950s, after this style of music contr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Smokey Johnson
Joseph "Smokey" Johnson Jr. (November 14, 1936 – October 6, 2015) was an American drummer. He was one of the musicians, session players, and songwriters who served as the backbone for New Orleans' output of jazz, funk, blues, soul, and R&B music. Life and career Born to Joseph Johnson Sr. and Rinda Williams, Johnson grew up in the Tremé neighborhood of New Orleans, a community rich in jazz history. He started on trombone at an early age and took lessons from Yvonne Busch, an influential music teacher who happened to be the Johnsons' neighbor. He switched to drums at age twelve. His first drum set was given to him by his grandfather. He attended Craig School and Clark High School where Yvonne Busch taught. He played in school bands. At age seventeen he started to perform professionally at local clubs including Club Tijuana, and toured with professional musicians during summers. After high school he joined James "Sugar Boy" Crawford’s band the Chapaka Shawee, also know ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Irma Thomas
Irma Thomas ( Lee; born February 18, 1941) is an American singer from New Orleans. She is known as the "Soul Queen of New Orleans". Thomas is a contemporary of Aretha Franklin and Etta James, but never experienced their level of commercial success. In 2007, she won the Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Blues Album for '' After the Rain'', her first Grammy in a career spanning over 50 years. Life and career Born Irma Lee, in Ponchatoula, Louisiana, United States, she was the daughter of Percy Lee, a steel chipper, and Vader Lee, who worked as a maid. As a teenager, she sang with a Baptist church choir. She auditioned for Specialty Records at the age of 13. By the time she was 19, she had been married twice and had four children. Keeping her second ex-husband's surname, she worked as a waitress in New Orleans, occasionally singing with bandleader Tommy Ridgley, who helped her land a record deal with the local Ron label. Her first single, "Don't Mess with My Man", was released in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mac Rebennack
Malcolm John Rebennack Jr. (November 20, 1941 – June 6, 2019), better known by his stage name Dr. John, was an American singer and songwriter. His music encompassed New Orleans blues, jazz, funk, and R&B. Active as a session musician from the late 1950s until his death, he gained a following in the late 1960s after the release of his album ''Gris-Gris'' (1968) and his appearance at the Bath Festival of Blues and Progressive Music. He typically performed a lively, theatrical stage show inspired by medicine shows, Mardi Gras costumes, and voodoo ceremonies. Rebennack recorded thirty studio albums and nine live albums, as well as contributing to thousands of other musicians' recordings. In 1973, he achieved a top 10 hit single with " Right Place, Wrong Time". Early life and career Rebennack was born in New Orleans, Louisiana on November 20, 1941. He was the son of Dorothy (Cronin) and Malcolm John Rebennack, and had German, Irish, Spanish, English, and French heritage. His f ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Charles "Hungry" Williams
Charles "Hungry" Williams (February 12, 1935 – May 10, 1986) was an American rhythm & blues drummer, best known for the innovative and influential technique he used on numerous recordings that came out of New Orleans in the 1950s and 1960s. Early life Williams was born at Charity Hospital in New Orleans, Louisiana on February 12, 1935 to Henry, Sr. and Beatrice (née Henderson) Williams. The family lived in the 2nd Ward of New Orleans at 2522 Howard Avenue according to the 1940 U.S. Census. Henry, Sr. was listed as a construction laborer with the Works Progress Administration. Charles Williams was the second son in the family that included siblings Henry Jr., Clifford, Lloyd, and Mary Alice. He said his mother sang a lot because she was church-going, and his father liked to dance. Henry, Jr. played guitar and younger brother Lloyd played drums. Williams reported that "ever since I been big enough to know myself I used to be always beating on something, tin cans or something lik ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Earl Palmer
Earl Cyril Palmer (October 25, 1924 – September 19, 2008) was an American drummer. Considered one of the inventors of rock and roll, he is a member of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Palmer was one of the most prolific studio musicians of all time and played on thousands of recordings, including nearly all of Little Richard's hits, all of Fats Domino's hits, "You've Lost That Lovin' Feelin'" by the Righteous Brothers, and a long list of classic TV and film soundtracks. According to one obituary, "his list of credits read like a Who's Who of American popular music of the last 60 years". Biography Born into a show-business family in New Orleans and raised in the Tremé district, Palmer started his career at five as a tap dancer, joining his mother and aunt on the black vaudeville circuit in its twilight and touring the country extensively with Ida Cox's Darktown Scandals Review. His father is thought to have been the local pianist and bandleader Walter "Fats" Pichon. Palmer ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Dinah Washington
Dinah Washington (born Ruth Lee Jones; August 29, 1924 – December 14, 1963) was an American singer and pianist, who has been cited as "the most popular black female recording artist of the 1950s songs". Primarily a jazz vocalist, she performed and recorded in a wide variety of styles including blues, R&B, and traditional pop music, and gave herself the title of "Queen of the Blues". She was a 1986 inductee of the Alabama Jazz Hall of Fame, and was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1993. Early life Ruth Lee Jones was born in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, to Alice and Ollie Jones, and moved to Chicago as a child. She became deeply involved in gospel music and played piano for the choir in St. Luke's Baptist Church while still in elementary school. She sang gospel music in church and played piano, directing her church choir in her teens and was a member of the Sallie Martin Gospel Singers. When she joined the Sallie Martin group, she dropped out of Wendell Phillips High Sch ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Big Joe Turner
Joseph Vernon "Big Joe" Turner Jr. (May 18, 1911 – November 24, 1985) was an American singer from Kansas City, Missouri. According to songwriter Doc Pomus, "Rock and roll would have never happened without him." His greatest fame was due to his rock-and-roll recordings in the 1950s, particularly "Shake, Rattle and Roll", but his career as a performer endured from the 1920s into the 1980s. Turner was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1987, with the Hall lauding him as "the brawny voiced 'Boss of the Blues. Career Early days Turner was born May 18, 1911, in Kansas City, Missouri, United States. His father was killed in a train accident when Turner was four years old. He sang in his church, and on street corners for money. He left school at age fourteen to work in Kansas City's nightclubs, first as a cook and later as a singing bartender. He became known as "The Singing Barman", and worked in such venues as the Kingfish Club and the Sunset, where he and his par ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Al Hibbler
Albert George Hibbler (August 16, 1915 – April 24, 2001) was an American baritone vocalist, who sang with Duke Ellington's orchestra before having several pop hits as a solo artist. Some of Hibbler's singing is classified as rhythm and blues, but he is best seen as a bridge between R&B and traditional pop music. According to one authority, "Hibbler cannot be regarded as a jazz singer but as an exceptionally good interpreter of twentieth-century popular songs who happened to work with some of the best jazz musicians of the time." Early life Hibbler was born in Tyro, Mississippi, United States, and was blind from birth. Some sources give his birth name as Andrew George Hibbler. At the age of 12 he moved to Little Rock, Arkansas, where he attended Arkansas School for the Blind, joining the school choir. Later he began working as a blues singer in local bands, failing his first audition for Duke Ellington in 1935. However, after winning an amateur talent contest in Memphis, Te ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Dew Drop Inn (New Orleans, Louisiana)
The Dew Drop Inn, at 2836 LaSalle Street, in the Faubourg Delassize section of Central City neighborhood of New Orleans, Louisiana, is a former hotel and nightclub that operated between 1939 and 1970, and is noted as "the most important and influential club" in the development of rhythm and blues music in the city in the post-war period. The venue primarily served the African-American population in the then heavily segregated Southern United States. History Frank G. Painia (1907–1972) established a barbershop on LaSalle Street in the late 1930s. He began selling refreshments to workers at the nearby Magnolia Housing Project, and then expanded his premises to include a bar and hotel, which opened as the Dew Drop Inn in April 1939. During World War II, Painia also started booking bands for concerts in the city, and frequently had the musicians staying at his hotel. He started putting on entertainment in the hotel lounge, before developing it further into a dancehall, w ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Clarence "Frogman" Henry
Clarence Henry II (born March 19, 1937), known as Clarence "Frogman" Henry, is an American rhythm and blues singer and pianist, best known for his hits " Ain't Got No Home" (1956) and " (I Don't Know Why) But I Do" (1961). Career Clarence Henry was born in New Orleans, Louisiana, United States, in 1937, moving to the Algiers neighborhood in 1948. He started learning piano as a child, with Fats Domino and Professor Longhair being his main influences. When Henry played in talent shows, he dressed like Longhair and wore a wig with braids on both sides. He joined Bobby Mitchell & the Toppers in 1952, playing piano and trombone, before leaving when he graduated in 1955 to join saxophonist Eddie Smith's band. "Clarence "Frogman" Henry: An R&B Legend!", ''Rockabilly Hall of Fame'' Retr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Barbara George
Barbara George (16 August 1942 – 10 August 2006) was an American R&B singer and songwriter. Biography Born Barbara Ann Smith at Charity Hospital in New Orleans, Louisiana, United States, she was raised in the 9th ward New Orleans, and began singing in a church choir. She was discovered by singer Jessie Hill, who recommended her to record producer Harold Battiste. Her first record on Battiste's AFO (All For One) record label, the certified gold single "I Know (You Don't Love Me No More)" (composed by her) was issued in late 1961 and topped the R&B chart and made number 3 on the ''Billboard'' Hot 100 chart. It was later recorded by many other artists, including Freddie King, Paul Revere & the Raiders (1966), the Merseybeats, Ike and Tina Turner, and Bonnie Raitt (1972). Her only album, 1961's ''I Know (You Don't Love Me No More)'' contains 12 tracks, 11 of which credit George as the writer. Two subsequent self-penned singles, "You Talk About Love" (on AFO) and "Send For Me (I ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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