"Hands Off" is a 1955 song written and recorded by

Jay McShann James Columbus "Jay" McShann (January 12, 1916 – December 7, 2006) was an American jazz pianist, vocalist, composer, and bandleader. He led bands in Kansas City, Missouri, that included Charlie Parker, Bernard Anderson (trumpeter), Bernard A ...

. The single, on the

Vee-Jay Vee-Jay Records is an American record label founded in the 1950s, located in Chicago and specializing in blues, jazz, rhythm and blues and rock and roll. The label was founded in Gary, Indiana in 1953 by Vivian Carter and James C. Bracken, a ...

label, was the most successful Jay McShann release on the ''Billboard''

R&B chart The Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs chart ranks the most popular R&B and hip hop songs in the United States and is published weekly by ''Billboard''. Rankings are based on a measure of radio airplay, sales data, and streaming activity. The chart had 100 p ...

. "Hands Off", with vocals performed by

Priscilla Bowman Priscilla Bowman (born Priscilla I. Mills, May 30, 1928 – July 24, 1988) was an American jazz and rhythm and blues singer, who had a No. 1 hit single on the ''Billboard'' magazine R&B chart in 1955 with the song " Hands Off". She was the lea ...

, was number one on the R&B best seller chart for three weeks. The single is notable because this was the last single to hit number one on the R&B chart without making the Billboard pop charts until 1976. For the next twenty-one years, all singles which made the top spot on the ''Billboard'' R&B chart would make the pop charts. Preston Foster reworked "Hands Off" to create the 1956 song "

Got My Mojo Working "Got My Mojo Working" is a blues song written by Preston "Red" Foster and first recorded by R&B singer Ann Cole in 1956. Foster's lyrics describe several amulets or talismans, called ''mojo'', which are associated with hoodoo, an early African ...

" popularised by

Muddy Waters McKinley Morganfield (April 4, 1913 April 30, 1983), known professionally as Muddy Waters, was an American blues singer and musician who was an important figure in the post-war blues scene, and is often cited as the "father of modern Chicago b ...

References

1955 singles {{1950s-R&B-song-stub