jump blues
Jump blues is an up-tempo style of blues, usually played by small groups and featuring horn instruments. It was popular in the 1940s and was a precursor of rhythm and blues and rock and roll. Appreciation of jump blues was renewed in the 1990s as ...
song written by Stick McGhee and J. Mayo Williams in 1949 and originally recorded by "Sticks” McGhee & His Buddies. It became an early hit for
Atlantic Records
Atlantic Recording Corporation (simply known as Atlantic Records) is an American record label founded in October 1947 by Ahmet Ertegun and Herb Abramson. Over its first 20 years of operation, Atlantic earned a reputation as one of the most i ...
, reaching #2 on the US R&B charts.
Background
Picardie and Wade in their book ''Atlantic and the Godfathers of Rock and Roll'' explain how the Atlantic version came to be. Stick McGhee had recorded the song in January 1947 in New Orleans for Harlem Records, a label which went out of business in 1948. A distributor from New Orleans called
Ahmet Ertegun
Ahmet Ertegun (, Turkish spelling: Ahmet Ertegün; ; – December 14, 2006) was a Turkish-American businessman, songwriter, record executive and philanthropist.
Ertegun was the co-founder and president of Atlantic Records. He discovered and ch ...
at
Atlantic Records
Atlantic Recording Corporation (simply known as Atlantic Records) is an American record label founded in October 1947 by Ahmet Ertegun and Herb Abramson. Over its first 20 years of operation, Atlantic earned a reputation as one of the most i ...
to find out if the firm could supply 5,000 copies of the song. Ertegun could not but offered to make an exact copy of the record. He first had to find someone to sing it and remembered Brownie McGhee whom Ertegun had met in his "endless trips to Harlem. I called him up and he said he could do it, but as it happened, his brother Stick was staying with him, so he might as well remake his own record." The song was recorded that same night and went on to sell 400,000 copies.
1949 recordings
*The song charted on the US R&B charts by three different artists in 1949, Stick McGhee’s version (“Stick” McGhee & His Buddies reached #2, Wynonie Harris’s hit #4 and
Lionel Hampton
Lionel Leo Hampton (April 20, 1908 – August 31, 2002) was an American jazz vibraphonist, pianist, percussionist, and bandleader. Hampton worked with jazz musicians from Teddy Wilson, Benny Goodman, and Buddy Rich, to Charlie Parker, Charles M ...
went up to #13.Whitburn, Joel, The Billboard Book of TOP 40 R&B and Hip Hop Hits, Billboard Books, New York 2006, p. 385, p. 234, p. 231
1000 Years of Popular Music
''1000 Years of Popular Music'' is a 2003 live album by Richard Thompson.
The album was originally conceived after Richard Thompson, along with many other artists, was asked by ''Playboy'' magazine to nominate his choice of the best songs of th ...