Excello Records was an American

blues Blues is a music genre and musical form which originated in the Deep South of the United States around the 1860s. Blues incorporated spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts, chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads from the Afr ...

independent record label An independent record label (or indie label) is a record label that operates without the funding or distribution of major record labels; they are a type of small- to medium-sized enterprise, or SME. The labels and artists are often represented ...

, started by Ernie Young in

Nashville Nashville is the capital city of the U.S. state of Tennessee and the seat of Davidson County. With a population of 689,447 at the 2020 U.S. census, Nashville is the most populous city in the state, 21st most-populous city in the U.S., and the ...

Tennessee Tennessee ( , ), officially the State of Tennessee, is a landlocked state in the Southeastern region of the United States. Tennessee is the 36th-largest by area and the 15th-most populous of the 50 states. It is bordered by Kentucky to th ...

, United States, in 1953 as a subsidiary of Nashboro, a

gospel Gospel originally meant the Christian message ("the gospel"), but in the 2nd century it came to be used also for the books in which the message was set out. In this sense a gospel can be defined as a loose-knit, episodic narrative of the words an ...

label.

History

It recorded such

artists An artist is a person engaged in an activity related to creating art, practicing the arts, or demonstrating an art. The common usage in both everyday speech and academic discourse refers to a practitioner in the visual arts only. However, the ...

Lonnie Brooks Lonnie Brooks (born Lee Baker Jr., December 18, 1933 – April 1, 2017) was an American blues singer and guitarist. The musicologist Robert Palmer, writing in ''Rolling Stone'', stated, "His music is witty, soulful and ferociously energetic, b ...

Lightnin' Slim Otis Verries Hicks, known as Lightnin' Slim (March 13, 1913 – July 27, 1974), was an American blues musician who played Louisiana blues and swamp blues for Excello Records. The blues critic ED Denson ranked him as one of the five great blu ...

Slim Harpo Slim Harpo (born James Isaac Moore; January 11, 1924 – January 31, 1970) was an American blues Blues is a music genre and musical form which originated in the Deep South of the United States around the 1860s. Blues incorporated spiri ...

Roscoe Shelton Roscoe Shelton (August 22, 1931 – July 27, 2002) was an American electric blues and R&B singer. He is best remembered for his 1965 hit single "Strain on My Heart" and for his working relationships with the Fairfield Four and with Bobby He ...

Lazy Lester Leslie Johnson (June 20, 1933 – August 22, 2018), better known as Lazy Lester, was an American blues musician who sang and played the harmonica and guitar. In a career spanning the 1950s to 2018, he pioneered swamp blues, and also played ha ...

, the Kelly Brothers,

Lonesome Sundown Cornelius Green III (December 12, 1928 – April 23, 1995), known professionally as Lonesome Sundown, was an American blues musician, best known for his swamp blues recordings for Excello Records in the 1950s and early 1960s. Early life Green ...

Silas Hogan Silas Hogan (September 15, 1911 – January 9, 1994) was an American blues musician who played swamp blues and Louisiana blues. His most notable recordings are "Airport Blues" and "Lonesome La La". He was the front man of the Rhythm Ramblers. ...

Arthur Gunter Arthur Neal Gunter (May 23, 1926 – March 16, 1976) was an American blues guitarist and musician. He was best known for his song "Baby Let's Play House", which was later a hit single for Elvis Presley. Biography Gunter was born in Ogletho ...

, Marion James,

Carol Fran Carol Fran (born Carol Augustus Anthony; October 23, 1933 – September 1, 2021) was an American soul blues singer, pianist, and songwriter, best known for her string of single releases in the 1950s and 1960s, and her later musical association w ...

Warren Storm Warren Storm (February 18, 1937 – September 7, 2021) was an American drummer and vocalist, known as a pioneer of the musical genre swamp pop; a combination of rhythm and blues, country and western, and Cajun music and black Creole music. Ba ...

Tabby Thomas Ernest Joseph "Tabby" Thomas, (January 5, 1929 – January 1, 2014), also known as Rockin' Tabby Thomas, was an American blues musician. He sang and played the piano and guitar and specialized in swamp blues, a style of blues indigenous to southe ...

, Guitar Gable, and a spoken word sermon by

Martin Luther King Jr. Martin Luther King Jr. (born Michael King Jr.; January 15, 1929 – April 4, 1968) was an American Baptist minister and activist, one of the most prominent leaders in the civil rights movement from 1955 until his assassination in 1968 ...

Arthur Gunter recorded an

answer song An answer song, response song or answer record, is a song (usually a recorded track) made in answer to a previous song, normally by another artist. The concept became widespread in blues and R&B recorded music in the 1930s to the 1950s. Answer son ...

Eddy Arnold Richard Edward Arnold (May 15, 1918 – May 8, 2008) was an American country music singer who performed for six decades. He was a Nashville sound (country/popular music) innovator of the late 1950s, and scored 147 songs on the ''Billboard'' cou ...

country and western A country is a distinct part of the world, such as a state, nation, or other political entity. It may be a sovereign state or make up one part of a larger state. For example, the country of Japan is an independent, sovereign state, while the ...

song, " I Wanna Play House With You". His song, "

Baby Let's Play House "Baby Let's Play House" is a song written by Arthur Gunter and recorded by him in 1954 on the Excello Records label and covered by Elvis Presley the following year on Sun Records. A line from the song ("I'd rather see you dead, little girl, than t ...

", was

covered Cover or covers may refer to: Packaging * Another name for a lid * Cover (philately), generic term for envelope or package * Album cover, the front of the packaging * Book cover or magazine cover ** Book design ** Back cover copy, part of co ...

Elvis Presley Elvis Aaron Presley (January 8, 1935 – August 16, 1977), or simply Elvis, was an American singer and actor. Dubbed the "Honorific nicknames in popular music, King of Rock and Roll", he is regarded as Cultural impact of Elvis Presley, one ...

References

External links

Excello singles discography
American record labels Record labels established in 1953 Blues record labels {{US-record-label-stub

History

See also

References

External links