FROM THE VAULTS

"Speckled Red (October 23, 1892 - January 2, 1973) was born Rufus Perryman in Monroe, Louisiana. He was an American blues and boogie-woogie piano player and singer, most noted for his recordings of "The Dirty Dozens", with exchanges of insults and vulgar remarks that have long been a part of African American folklore. Although the lyrics were sung rather than spoken, with its elaborate word play and earthy subject matter, "The Dirty Dozens" is considered in some respects an ancestor to rap music.

Speckled Red was the older brother of Piano Red, their nicknames derived from both men being albinos. The brothers were separated by almost a generation and never recorded together. Speckled Red and Piano Red both played in a raucous good time barrelhouse boogie-woogie style, although the elder Speckled Red played slow blues more often. Both recorded versions of "The Right String (But the Wrong Yo-Yo)", Speckled Red first in 1930, and the younger scored a big hit with the song 20-years later.

The family moved for brief periods during his early-to-mid teenage years to Detroit, Michigan, then Atlanta, Georgia after his father violated Jim Crow laws, before settling in Hampton, Georgia, where his birth was eventually registered some

time later. The family itself, consisting of Perryman and 7 brothers and sisters, had little musical background, though Speckled Red was a self-taught piano player (influenced primarily by his idol Fishtail, along with Charlie Spand, James Hemingway and William Ezell, and inspired at his earliest point by Paul Seminole in a movie theatre) and also learned the organ at his local church.

By his mid-teens he was already playing house parties and juke joints, and moved back to Detroit in his mid-20s to play anywhere he could, including nightclubs and brothels, and was noticed by a Brunswick Records talent scout just before he left for Memphis, Tennessee, where he was located by Jim Jackson. It was here where he cut his first recording sessions, resulting in two classics for Brunswick in "Wilkins Street Stomp" and the hit “The Dirty Dozens” which became a hit in late 1929.

The following year, 1930, he recorded again, this time in Chicago, Illinois, resulting in most notably “The Dirty Dozens No. 2,” which was not nearly as successful and the pianist was without a contract or label and again playing making the rounds at Memphis venues and St. Louis bars.

His 1938 session work in Aurora, Illinois with slide guitar player Robert Nighthawk and mandolinist Willie Hatcher for Bluebird Records was steady and long but also unsuccessful, and sometime after during the 1940s moved back to St. Louis and continued his career of playing taverns, as well working the public produce market doing manual labour until the servicemen returned home to heavy lifting jobs.

Charlie O'Brien, a St. Louis policeman and something of a blues aficionado who applied many of his professional investigative methods to track down old bluesmen during the 1950s, "rediscovered" Speckled Red on December 14, 1954, who subsequently was signed to Delmark Records as their first blues artist.

He experienced a small revival of interest in his music during the late 1950s and 1960s, his abilities still considerable, and worked around the St. Louis-area jazz scene, regularly as the intermission pianist for the Dixie Stompers, performing concerts with Dixie Mantinee and the St. Louis Jazz Club, played the University of Chicago Folk Festival in 1961, went to Dayton, Ohio, with Gene Mayl's Dixieland Rhythm Kings, and toured Europe in 1959 with Chris Barber. Several recordings were made in 1956 and 1957 for Tone, Delmark, Folkways, and Storyville record labels.

His age, however, had become a factor, and the remainder of the 1960s saw scattered performances. He died on January 2, 1973, of cancer in St. Louis, at the age of 80. He is buried in Oakdale Cemetery. (Info mainly from Wikipedia)

Curtis John Arceneaux (October 25, 1947 – November 25, 2011) better known by the name Coco Robicheaux, was an American blues musician and artist, from Ascension Parish, Louisiana, United States.

He was born in Merced, California, United States, the son of Herman Arceneaux from Ascension Parish, Louisiana and Virginia Grant of Waushara County, Wisconsin. His father was of Acadian (Cajun) descent, while on his mother's side his ancestry included English, Norwegian, Scottish, German, Dutch, Welsh, and Native American (Mohawk). Also on his mother's side he was a direct descendent of accused Salem witch Sarah Cloyce. He spent some of his preteen/early teens in France where his Air Force father was stationed for three years. He spent some of his childhood in the French countryside

Arcenaux was no stranger to the blues, either musically or otherwise. He played the blues most of his life, fronting his own band when he was 13 years old, playing Bourbon Street just two years later, and inking a record deal around the age of 18. Sounds like smooth sailing, but that often wasn't the case for the musician. He suffered a broken back when a vehicle struck him, and his lack of health insurance sent him to a charity hospital. In severe pain, he waited more than 24 hours beside a gunshot victim in an emergency room. The experience gave him a firsthand look at what a large segment of the population goes through due to lack of affordable health insurance, and it strengthened his resolve to do something to help.

He was one of the featured volunteer contributors on the CD Get You a Healin', a fundraising project for the New Orleans Musicians' Clinic housed in the Health Sciences Centre at LSU. Appearing with Robicheaux on the funk disc were Maria Muldaur, the Funky Meters, Luther Kent, and Dr. John, among others. The album's playful concept cantered each track on a part of the body or a health condition, and Robicheaux contributed "Louisiana Medicine Man." During the '60s in San Francisco, Robicheaux helped establish a free health clinic with another civic-minded crew that counted among its members singer Janis Joplin.

Arceneaux took his stage name from a Louisiana legend, in which a naughty child called Coco Robicheaux is abducted by a werewolf (Loup Garou or Rougarou). The name 'Coco Robicheaux' is repeated in the song "I Walk on Gilded Splinters" from Dr. John the Night Tripper's 1968 album, Gris-Gris.

Here’s “Revelator” from above album.

He made a record in 1965 for Mississippi label JB, but did not record further until the mid-'90s, when he put out Spiritland for Orleans Records. The album was well received, and in 1998 Robicheaux recorded Louisiana Medicine Man and followed up

with Hoodoo Party. In 1998, Offbeat magazine dubbed him the winner of its award for the year's Best Blues Album by a Louisiana Artist. He received three nominations, one in the category of Best Blues Artist, from the Big Easy Entertainment Awards the following year.

In addition to his New Orleans gigs, he performed in Colorado, New York, South Carolina, Australia, and Paris. He played festivals in Canada and France, and appeared for eight consecutive years at the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival beginning in 1994. He also played annually at the New Orleans French Quarter Festival
starting in 1995.

After the turn of the millennium, Robicheaux released three albums on the Spiritland label: Yeah, U Rite! (2005), Like I Said, Yeah, U Rite! (2008), and Revelator (2010).

Coco Robicheaux passed away in the early evening Friday, November 25 at Tulane Medical Centre in New Orleans age 64. He had been rushed to the hospital after having a heart attack and collapsing at his favourite hangout, the Apple Barrel on Frenchmen Street, where he could often be seen lounging on the outdoor bench in his trademark reptilian boots.

Shortly after Robicheaux's death, two second-line parades were held in his honour, both of which passed by the Apple Barrel bar. Later, more formal musical tributes were held at the French Quarter Festival in March 2012, at the Mid-City Bayou Boogaloo in May 2012, and at the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival in May 2013.

(Compiled and edited mainly from Wikipedia & Linda Seida @ AllMusic)

Page Morton (1915-2013) was a cabaret singer who married William Black, founder of the catering and coffee business Chock full o'Nuts. As Page Morton Black she was known for singing the "Heavenly Coffee" jingle on the company's televised advertisements and sponsored broadcasts. When Black died in 1983, she took over his charitable work with the Parkinson's Disease Foundation.

Morton was born Page L. Mergentheim on October 15, 1912 and raised in Winnetka, Illinois. Her father was Morton Adolf Mergentheim, a lawyer and professor of law working in the Chicago area. For a period he was a partner in the law firm of Sigmund Zeisler. Her mother, Rose Heymann, was a classically trained pianist who had studied with Fannie Bloomfield Zeisler, wife of Sigmund. Morton’s only sibling was Morton Alexander Mergentheim who was about 3 years older. They were both educated at New Trier High School in Winnetka, Illinois where her highest grade was 4th year.

Morton came from an affluent family but her father lost his money on the markets so she moved to New York with her mother to find work. In 1940 at the age of 18 she was living with her mother on East 43rd Street, having changed her name from Mergentheim to Morton. Her occupation in the 1940 census was given as model, and one newspaper of the period indicates that she was connected to the John Robert Powers modelling agency.When her father died in 1943, his obituary described her as an actress with the stage name of Page Morton.

During the 1940s and '50s she sang and played piano in various New York clubs, hotel bars and restaurants including the Warwick Hotel's Raleigh Room, Café Pierre, the Vanderbilt and the Sherry-Netherland. The band leader Guy Lombardo saw her perform in the Pierre and suggested to William Black that she could sing the advertising jingle for Chock full o’Nuts coffee.

In the 1960s Morton started to work on radio and television shows. She appeared on the Guy Lombardo New Year's Eve special, sponsored by the Chock full o’Nuts company. In 1961 she had her own radio programmes, and appeared on two further New Year's Eve specials, one hosted by Lombardo and the other by Xavier Cugat. She released her first album for MGM called May You Always and sang a duet with Jimmy Durante advertising the coffee brand

William Black had started his business by selling nuts from a stand on Broadway with a $250 start-up fund. As the company grew, he began selling his own vacuum-packed blend of coffee that eventually accounted for 60% of his multi-million dollar turnover.

In 1951 he divorced his first wife and married singer Jean Martin. She featured on sponsored radio and television programmes for Black and sang the "Heavenly Coffee" jingle. By 1960 Black and Martin were separated and divorced in 1962. Black married Morton in Connecticut on March 27, 1962. She curtailed her singing career after their marriage. But her voice lived on in the jingle, which was broadcast for more than 20 years. Upon frequent and nostalgic request, she continued singing it at public events long afterward.

Chock Full o’Nuts is that heavenly coffee, Heavenly coffee, heavenly coffee.

Chock Full o’Nuts is that heavenly coffee, Better coffee a millionaire’s money can’t buy.

In 1984, "That Heavenly Feeling" re-worded as "The Chock Full o'Nuts" jingle, underwent a final, bizarre lyric change. Henry Jerome turned it into "I Want to Know," and Page Morton Black went into the studio with backing singers and a creepy bass-

baritone…and released the single via Atlantic. The single went nowhere, and the "Chock Full o'Nuts" chain of 25 stores mostly in Manhattan and Brooklyn was eclipsed in the late 80's and early 90's by fast food joints.

After her marriage Morton became a director of Chock full o’Nuts and worked with her husband's philanthropic ventures. Following the death of a friend and colleague in 1957, Black had contributed $100,000 to establish the Parkinson's Disease Foundation. Later he donated several million dollars to medical research. Morton became the unpaid secretary of the Foundation and following the death of her husband in 1983, she took over his role as the chairperson and remained so until 2012.

Even after her career ended, music was still a big part of Black's life she played the piano faithfully every day, and sang, and her two dogs sat right beside her. Page's last dramatic moment came in 2008. Her home in Mamaroneck caught fire, and she was trapped on an upstairs balcony, the elderly lady saved by the timely arrival of the fire department.

She died on July 21, 2013 at her home in the Premium Point enclave of New Rochelle, N.Y. She was 97. Her interment was private but a celebration of her life was held at Frank E. Campbell Funeral Chapel on September 12, 2013.

(Compiled & edited mainly from Wikipedia & New York Times)

Johnny Western (born October 28, 1934) is an American country singer-songwriter, musician, actor, and radio show host. He is a member of the Western Music Association Hall of Fame and the Country Music Disc Jockey Hall of Fame.

Johnny Western was born Johnny Westerlund in Two Harbors in Lake County in northeastern Minnesota but was primarily reared in Northfield in south central Minnesota. His father was an instructor and officer in several Civilian Conservation Corps camps, where Western spent some his earlier years. He also lived on Indian reservations along the Canada–United States border.

When he was five years old, Western's parents took him to see the western film Guns and Guitars, which starred the actor/singer Gene Autry. The young boy decided he wanted to be a singing cowboy. At the age of twelve, he received a guitar. Within a year, he was performing professionally.

Johnny Western's professional career began as a young teenager, singing and playing rhythm guitar with a collegiate singing trio. He got a job on radio at the age of thirteen, a feat publicized in Billboard as the youngest disc jockey and singer on American radio. At age sixteen, Western began performing with the Sons of the Pioneers.

He made his first professional recordings in the summer of 1952 in the studio of WCAL Radio station of St. Olaf College of Northfield, Minnesota. The six songs which resulted from those sessions were released on three singles on the local J-O-C-O label. After having played a supporting role in an episode of "Have Gun, Will Travel", Western wrote "The Ballad of Paladin" as a musical

"thank-you-card" to Richard Boone. This landed him a deal with Columbia Records.

Between August 1958 and May 1963, Western recorded seven singles and one album (Have Gun, Will Travel, released in May 1962) for Columbia, until he was dropped from their roster. He then signed a contract with the Philips label, but only one single resulted ("Light The Fuse" b/w "Tender Years").

Have Gun Will Travel included the haunting Stan Jones song "Cowpoke", which members of the Western Writers of America chose as one of the Top 100 Western songs of all time. The album was a mature work, redolent of Western lore. It also included
Western's third version of "The Ballad of Paladin", a fine and introspective performance of "The Lonely Man", the gallows ballad "Hannah Lee", "The Streets of Laredo", "The Searchers" and "The Last Roundup".

Johnny Horton, Johnny Cash & Johnny Western

After this, Western was left without a recording contract. Over the years, he recorded various songs for small local labels such as Hep in Missouri or a promo-single for Dodge City. It was not until Johnny Cash invited him to record at his House Of Cash recording studio that Western was able to compile enough material for another LP, which was released under the simple title of Johnny Western in 1981. Apart from the House of Cash recordings, it contained some unreleased songs Western had recorded for the Hep label.

Western's third album was recorded September 17–20, 1984 at Jack Clement Studio in Nashville, with Art Sparer producing. It was released under the title Johnny Western Sings 20 Great Classics & Legends. Amongst others, it contained a new version of Western's own composition "The Gunfighter", featuring Harold Bradley on gut-string guitar, imitating the original "El Paso" sound, since Western had originally written that song with Marty Robbins in mind.

His scarce recording output notwithstanding, Johnny Western remained a consistent performer for over sixty years and so his name was never lost on the general public.

He performed with Gene Autry and was a part of the Johnny Cash road show from 1958 until 1997. He wrote and performed the theme song "The Ballad of Paladin" for the CBS television program Have Gun – Will Travel, with Richard Boone. In collaboration with Johnny Cash, he re-wrote the lyrics of NBC's Bonanza and the theme song, "The Rebel - Johnny Yuma", from the ABC series The Rebel, starring Nick Adams.

In October 2013, Johnny Western announced that he would stop touring and giving concerts.

(Info from Wikipedia)

Lee Roy Pettit (October 29, 1916 – July 31, 1994), known professionally as Ramblin' Jimmie Dolan, was a Western swing musician born in Gardena, California. He is best remembered for his hit single, "Hot Rod Race" on Capitol Records, which reached No. 7 on the Billboard country chart in February 1951.

He always claimed for legal purposes that he was born Jimmie Lee Dolan, and was born in 1924 in (at different times in his life) Texas, Oklahoma, or Wyoming, but The Encyclopedia of Country Music pegs his birth name as Lee Roy Petit, his year of birth as 1916 (which would make him one of the oldest contributors to 1950s rock & roll), and his place of birth as Gardenia, CA. The 1916 birth date might make more sense, in terms of his apparent desire, manifested at age 14 when he took up the guitar, to be a singing cowboy.

He later worked at radio station KWK in St. Louis, MO, until he enlisted with the US Navy. Dolan prefers to be remembered for his contributions in entertaining troops in the Pacific Theatre, especially the Philippines during World War II. He reached the rank of Chief Petty Officer filling the function of a radioman. He returned from the war with a ready built fan base and his charisma soon had him in demand at dance halls throughout the west.

By 1946 he was singing on KXLA in Los Angeles and was billing himself as "America's Cowboy Troubador". He had his first recording contract soon after, for Four Star Records, which, thanks to a delay, didn't start seeing the light of day until 1948 -- the latter included a cover of Ernest Tubb's then recent hit "I'm Walkin' the Floor Over You." Meanwhile, Dolan was building up a loyal following on the air with his warm, easygoing persona and voice, and his self-effacing manner. He was signed at various moments in the late '40s to the Bihari Brothers' Modern Records and also to Crystal Records for one single, before joining Capitol Records' roster in 1949.

When he was discharged from the armed forces after the war, he decided to make Los Angeles, CA his home. While on the west coast, he played the various nightclubs with is band in Southern California. He hosted and played on numerous radio stations. In the early 50's he was a pioneer of television in the Seattle area where he was the general manager of its first television station as well as one of its stars. He had a television show for children as well as an adult variety show, for which he won the award for Best Western TV show of 1951.

Dolan's Capitol sides featured such top session players as Merle Travis and Charlie Aldridge on guitar, and were beautifully spare productions, with no pop music pretensions or other embellishments. What's more, the Capitol sessions showcased the singer/guitarist's limited but occasionally significant talent as a songwriter. He had to wait until 1950 for his first hit, a version of the Moon Mullican song "I'll Sail My Ship Alone," which featured lead guitarist Porky Freeman along with his usual sidemen Wade Ray on fiddle and Freddie Tavares playing steel guitar. He also had hits with tunes such as "It Had To Come Someday", "I'll Sail My Ship Alone", "Who's Kiddin' Who", "Hot Rod Race", and "I'll Make Believe".

He then had a long running radio show in San Francisco. On an airline flight he met United Airlines Stewardess Charline Bales, a graduate of the University of Idaho. They were married for 13 years. He is survived by a daughter, Patricia and a granddaughter Aria.

Not much is known about Dolan's life during the 39 years that he lived after walking away from Capitol and the music business. Last time he was heard of was that he was employed as a second hand auto sales man in Los Angeles. During the late 1980s he was contacted by the former president of his fan club, recently widowed. They met again, both being free and lived happily together until his death in Riverside Co., California on July 31, 1994

(Compiled & edited from Wikipedia, hillbilly music.com & AllMusic)

Dale Evans Rogers (born Lucille Wood Smith; October 31, 1912 – February 7, 2001) was an American actress, singer, and songwriter. She was the third wife of singing cowboy Roy Rogers.

Dale Evans was born Lucille Wood Smith on October 31, 1912 in Uvalde, Texas, the daughter of T. Hillman Smith and Bettie Sue Wood. She had a tumultuous early life. Her name was changed to

Frances Octavia Smith while she was still an infant. She spent a lot of time living with her uncle, Dr. L.D. Massey, a general practice physician, in Osceola, Arkansas.

At age 14, she eloped with and married Thomas F. Fox, with whom she had one son, Thomas F. Fox, Jr., when she was 15. A year later, abandoned by her husband, she found herself in Memphis, Tennessee, a single parent, pursuing a career in music. She landed a job with local radio stations (WMC and WREC), singing and playing piano. Divorced in 1929, she took the name Dale Evans in the early 1930s to promote her singing career.

After beginning her career singing at the radio station where she was employed as a secretary, Evans had a productive career as a jazz, swing, and big band singer that led to a screen test and contract with 20th Century Fox studios. She gained exposure on radio as the featured singer for a time on the Edgar Bergen/Charlie McCarthy show.

Throughout this early period, Evans went through two additional failed marriages, the first of which was to August Wayne Johns from 1929 to 1935. In 1937, she married her third husband, accompanist and arranger Robert Dale Butts; they divorced nine years later. During her time at 20th Century Fox, the studio promoted her as the unmarried supporter of her teenage "brother" Tommy (actually her son Tom Fox, Jr.). This deception continued through her divorce from Butts in 1946 and her development as a cowgirl co-star to Roy Rogers at Republic Studios.

Evans married Roy Rogers on New Year's Eve 1947 at the Flying L Ranch in Davis, Oklahoma, where they had earlier filmed the movie Home in Oklahoma. Art and Mary Jo Rush were best man and matron of honour. The marriage was Rogers' third and Evans' fourth but was successful; the two were a team on- and off-screen from 1946 until Rogers' death in 1998. Shortly after the wedding, Evans ended the deception regarding her son, Tommy. Roy had an adopted child, Cheryl, and two biological children, Linda and Roy (Dusty) Jr., from his second marriage.

Together they had one child, Robin Elizabeth, who died of complications of Down syndrome shortly before her second birthday. Her life inspired Evans to write her bestseller Angel Unaware. Evans was very influential in changing public perceptions of children with developmental disabilities and served as a role model for many parents. After she wrote Angel Unaware, a group then known as the “Oklahoma County Council for Mentally Retarded Children” adopted its better-known name Dale Rogers Training Centre in her honour.

From 1951-57, Evans and Rogers starred in the highly successful television series The Roy Rogers Show, in which they continued their cowboy and cowgirl roles, with her riding her trusty buckskin horse, Buttermilk. Alice Van-Springsteen served as a double for both Evans and Gail Davis, the actress who starred in the syndicated series Annie Oakley, often performing such tasks as tipping over wagons and jumping railroad tracks.

In addition to her successful TV shows, more than 30 films and some 200 songs, Evans wrote the well-known song "Happy Trails". In late 1962, the couple co-hosted a comedy-western-variety program, The Roy Rogers and Dale Evans Show, which aired on ABC. It was cancelled after three months, losing in the ratings to the first season of The Jackie Gleason Show

Full retirement proved elusive for Dale. She continued as a bestselling author and had a weekly television show 'A Date With Dale' for the Trinity Broadcast Network. The couple's headquarters became the The Roy Rogers-Dale Evans Museum in Victorville, California near their Happy Valley home which chronicled their lives. She and her husband routinely greeted fans at their museum.

For her contribution to radio, Dale Evans has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6638 Hollywood Blvd. She received a second star at 1737 Vine St. for her contribution to the television industry. In 1976, she was inducted into the Western Performers Hall of Fame at the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. In 1995, she was inducted into the National Cowgirl Museum and Hall of Fame in Fort Worth, Texas. In 1997, she was inducted into the Texas Trail of Fame. She ranked No. 34 on CMT's 40 Greatest Women in Country Music in 2002.

Evans died of congestive heart failure on February 7, 2001, at the age of 88, in Apple Valley, California. She is interred at Sunset Hills Memorial Park in Apple Valley, next to Rogers. Following Dale's death, the Roy Rogers and Dale Evans Museum moved to Branson, Missouri.

(Edited mainly from Wikipedia)

Charlie Walker (November 2, 1926 – September 12, 2008] was an American country musician born in Copeville, Texas. He held membership in the Grand Ole Opry from 1967, and was inducted into the Country Radio DJ Hall of Fame in 1981.

Charles Levi Walker was born on a cotton farm at Copeville, Texas. Encouraged by his father, he began performing while in his teens. In 1943 he began working as a singer and guitarist with Bill Boyd's Cowboy Ramblers. In 1944 he enlisted in the US Army and was posted to Tokyo, where he served as a disc jockey for the American Forces Radio Network.

On demobilisation he headed for San Antonio, Texas where he found work on the radio station KMAC and, trading on his rural roots, became popular as "Ol' polk salad, cotton-picking, boll-pulling, corn-shucking, snuff-dipping Charlie Walker". He remained at KMAC

for a decade, developing a career that would, in 1981, see him inducted into the Country Music DJ Hall of Fame.

In 1956, he signed a contract with Decca. His first single for the label, "Only You, Only You" broke into the Top 10. It was followed by three minor hits before he switched labels, to Columbia, and took a chance on "Pick Me Up On Your Way Down", a song the then-barely known Howard had written after overhearing the line spoken during an argument in his local bar.

Elvis Presley and Charlie Walker at the Memorial at Rodgers Park - May 25, 1955 Jimmie Rodgers Memorial Festival "Meridian, Miss. in 1955. They were participating in the tribute to Jimmy Rogers. Charlie was a well-known disc jockey at the time - before he became a recording artist. This was one of the last events Elvis attended before he was so famous he needed an army to manage crowd control around him.

Further chart entries followed, including "I'll Catch You When You Fall" and "When My Conscience Hurts the Most" (both 1959), "Who Will Buy the Wine" (1960) and "Facing the Wall" (1961). Another change of label, to Epic, saw more success with singles such as "Close All the Honky Tonks" (1964), "Wild as a Wildcat" (1965) and "Don't

Squeeze My Sharmon" (1967), a title that, somewhat improbably, referenced a then-popular brand of toilet paper. From 1965 until 1967 he proved a popular fixture at the Golden Nugget casino in Las Vegas.

In 1967 he was invited to join the cast of Nashville's famous weekly radio show, The Grand Ole Opry. Although the hits began to dry up, he maintained a presence in the recording studio, hopping from Epic to RCA and then Capitol. His final appearance in the charts came in 1975 with "Odds and Ends (Bits and Pieces)".

An engaging performer, Walker's brand of no-frills country appealed to traditionalists on this side of the Atlantic and he made several appearances at the Wembley Festival in London. In 1985 he played the tragic singer Cowboy Copas in Sweet Dreams, the Oscar-nominated biopic of Patsy Cline, starring Jessica Lange. He continued to perform regularly on the Opry until sidelined by ill health.

He had been diagnosed with colon cancer just a few months before he died at the age of 81 in Hendersonville, Tennessee, 12 September 2008.

Walker's love for country music showed whenever he took the stage. He toured every state in the U.S., as well Norway, the U.K., Japan, Italy, and Sweden. No other performer will ever be able to fill the shoes of this talented entertainer. He is one country music artist whose legend lives on.

(Compiled and edited mainly from Wikipedia & Paul Wadey @ The Independent)

Joseph H. Turner (November 3, 1907 – July 21, 1990) was an American jazz pianist.

Though endlessly confused with the singer Big Joe Turner, pianist Joe Turner came from a completely different direction, following the James P. Johnson/Fats Waller stride tradition, armed with a
superb technique and a fine sense of swing.

Born in Baltimore, Maryland, he started to learn the piano from his mother at age five and began to make a name for himself in Harlem as a teenager shortly after his move to New York in 1925. Turner got his first big musical break in 1928 with his hiring by the Benny Carter Orchestra and Louis Armstrong in 1929-30

He was an accompanist to Adelaide Hall in a duo, first with Alex Hill and then Francis Carter, the latter with whom he and Hill toured Europe in 1931, after which he stayed as a solo act.

He resided first in Czechoslovakia, then Hungary, and France where he remained until 1939.He was chosen for Goudie’s second recording under his own name on the jazz-friendly Swing label, May 28, 1939. Four days earlier he’d been in a session for alto saxist Andre Ekyan that included Goudie, Django and drummer Tommy Benford. When war broke out he returned to the U.S. to work as a singer.

He was drafted in World War II, and played piano in Sy Oliver's army band in 1944-1945 and Rex Stewart in 1946, Turner returned to the continent, residing in Hungary in 1948 and then Switzerland from 1949 to 1962.

Here's "Smashing Thirds" recorded in Basel, April 18. 1958.

Taken from above album.

He settled in Paris in 1962 in a residency at La Calvados, continued to play engagements elsewhere in Europe.

In 1976 he returned to the United States and played at the Cookery in New York City, where his stride piano style was acclaimed anew. He eventually survived to become the last major active stride pianist of his era. He contined to play at La Calavados, a nightclub situated near the Champs Elysees until his death from a heart attack in 1990 in Montreuil, near Paris, at the age of 82.

(Compiled and edited from Wikipedia, AllMusic, jazzhotbigstep & LA Times)

Ralph Earl Sutton (November 4, 1922 – December 30, 2001) was an American jazz pianist born in Hamburg, Missouri.

Ralph Sutton was one of the greatest stride pianist to emerge since World War II, with his only close competitors being the late Dick Wellstood and the very versatile Dick Hyman. Nearly alone in his

generation, Sutton kept alive the piano styles of Fats Waller and
James P. Johnson, not as mere museum pieces but as devices for exciting improvisations. Although sticking within the boundaries of his predecessors, Sutton infused the music with his own personality; few could match his powerful left hand.

Raised in the tiny village of Howell, Missouri (later destroyed when the government took the land for a TNT plant), Sutton trained in classical piano and played the organ in the Presbyterian church as a young boy. By the age of 11 was playing in his builder father's country dance band. As a teenage he would

listen to the Harlem Rhythm radio show which first introduced him to "stride" piano; the style he would play for the rest of his life.

Jack Teagarden heard Sutton play around 1940 at a college and recruited him for his band. Sutton played with Teagarden until he was drafted into the Army in 1943. After the conclusion of World War II, in 1945, Sutton returned to St. Louis and worked with the Joe Schirmer Trio. Sutton then journeyed to New York rejoining Jack Teagarden's band. When he opened at the Famous Door on New York's 52nd street with Teagarden it helped put Sutton on the map, leading to a regular slot on Rudi Blesh's famed This Is Jazz radio

show, and to the formation of Sutton's own trio, featuring the fine New Orleans clarinettist Albert Nicholas.

In 1948, Sutton took on the select gig of intermission pianist at Eddie Condon's Greenwich Village club, where he stayed for eight years, also taking part in Condon's radio and TV shows, recording regularly and attracting international interest. In 1952 Sutton was asked to London to play the Royal Festival Hall. This was the start of his many European tours which would continue until his death.

By 1956 Sutton had moved his family to San Francisco, where he continued his work as an intermission pianist and combo performer, also subbing for Earl Hines when the latter was on tour in Britain. He joined trumpeter Bob Scobey's bright Dixieland band, recorded
yet more albums and seemed destined for a steady if locally

confined career until the impresario Dick Gibson invited him to Colorado to play at a jazz party.

Here he met his second wife Sunnie, who operated the Rendevous club in the ski resort of Aspen. With the help of bassist Milt Hinton and drummer Gus Johnson, Sutton turned it into a jazz centre, attracting star players like Ruby Braff, and appeared himself as part of the World's Greatest Jazz Band. While the WGJB's working title may have seemed over-blown to some, the all-star line-up produced a marvellous sound, bolstered by bassist Bob Haggart's superior arrangements, many of pop songs rather than of the usual Dixieland staples.

Sutton visited Britain several times with the group, stunning audiences with numbers like a hard-swinging version of Honky Tonk Train Blues, but in 1974 he left the WGJB to freelance, touring America and Europe, recording for labels like Sackville and appearing regularly at festivals. In 1979, in an inspired move, he teamed up with keyboard veteran Jay McShann as The Last of the Whorehouse Piano Players, the two men producing some of the most rumbustious and lively music on the planet. His biography, Loose Shoes By Shacter, appeared in 1994.

Despite suffering a stroke in the early '90s, Sutton kept a busy schedule through the mid-'90s, playing at jazz parties and festivals.

He died suddenly on December 29, 2001, in his car outside a restaurant in Evergreen, CO. Although he would have received much greater fame if he had been born 20 years earlier and come to maturity during the 1930s rather than the 1950s, at the time of his death it was obvious that Ralph Sutton had earned his place among the top classic jazz pianists of all time.

(Compiled and edited from Wikipedia, George Borgman blog, AllMusic & The Guardian)

Ralph plays two of his favourite tunes: Love Lies & Viper's Drag. Jerry Cherry from St Louis is on the bass at the 1994 Mid-America Jazz Festival in St. Louis.

Jan Garber (born Jacob Charles Garber, November 5, 1894 – October 5, 1977) was an American jazz bandleader. Billed as "the Idol of the Airlanes," Jan Garber led a big band in the 1930s that was the epitome of "sweet" music. His reed section's quavering saxophones were the band's trademark.

Garber was born in Indianapolis, Indiana. Garber moved with his family to Louisville, Kentucky, when he was three months old, and lived there until he was 13. The family then moved to a small town near Philadelphia. He was the tenth of 12 children.

Garber went to the University of North Carolina, and shortly after World War I he played violin in the Philadelphia Symphony Orchestra. In 1921 with pianist Milton Davis, he co-founded the Garber-Davis Orchestra. Chelsea Quealey and Harry Goldfield (who would eventually join Paul Whiteman) were the orchestra's trumpeters.

In 1924 Garber and Davis split up and during the 1924-1930 period the Jan Garber Orchestra played dance music and some hot jazz. Prominent in this emergence were the imaginative musical arrangements of pianist Doug Roe; the singing of Nebraska native Lee Bennett; and a series of comic skits, special shows and mini-concerts during each dance. Garber married Dorothy Comegys on December 18, 1926. They had one daughter Janis who would later became a singer with the band.

With the rise of the Depression, Garber's ensemble was struggling but his greatest popularity surfaced in early 1933, shortly after he took over leadership of the 'Little Freddie Large Orchestra' from Canada. With Freddie's unique lead alto saxophone captivating radio listeners from Cincinnati to Catalina Island, the Garber Band - with a sound like Lombardo but lots peppier - became an overnight sensation at Chicago's famed Trianon Ballroom. A year later, it was solidly entrenched among the most popular dance groups in the entire country. The band's theme song was "My Dear", composed by Garber in conjunction with Freddie Large.

His orchestra recorded popular recordings for Victor up to 1935 and then for Decca during the next seven years. The most popular recordings were “You’re Breaking My Heart” and “Jealous Heart.”

During these years, Jan Garber was to become increasingly well known as 'The Idol of The Air Lanes.' This was an informal title bestowed by announcer Pierre Andre during one of the band's countless broadcasts on Chicago's WGN Radio.

In 1942 Jan Garber surprised his fans by switching gears and reorganizing his orchestra into a swing band; he was apparently persuaded by his 12-year old daughter! Gray Rains' arrangements transformed the orchestra's sound and Liz Tilton took pleasing vocals, but the recording ban of 1942-1944 kept the big band from recording much, and by 1945 Garber had returned to his former sweet sound. Over his 55 years in the business Garber recorded over 1000 records.

In addition to superior musicians, Jan was blessed with a series of excellent vocalists from the mid-1940s onward. Tommy Traynor and Tim Reardon were early names in the post-war Garber Band, together with Alan Copeland and his 'TwinTones' singing group. Also emerging from the late 1940s were Bob Grabeau; Roy Cordell (called "the best of them all" by Jan's widow, Dorothy); Larry Dean; Julio Maro; and Marv Nielsen. Prominent among Jan's post-war female vocalists were Thelma Gracen, Julie Vernon and Janis Garber (who was billed for a time as 'Kitty Thomas').

During the 1950s, Garber’s group appeared regularly in Las Vegas and played the Southern horse show circuit. They continued to record actively through the 1960s. Garber continued working on at least a part-time basis into the mid-'70s, performing music that pleased dancers. His last show was in Houston after which his daughter Janis led the band until 1973 when it disbanded. It was later reformed and currently is led by Howard Schneider.

After having been ill for a length of time Garber died in Shreveport, Louisiana on October 5, 1977, a month before his 83rd birthday

(Compiled and edited from Wikipedia, AllMusic, discogs.com & jangarber.com)

Stonewall Jackson (born November 6, 1932) is an American country singer, guitarist and musician who achieved his greatest fame during country's "golden" honky tonk era in the 1950s and early 1960s.

Jackson, born in Tabor City, North Carolina, is the youngest of three children. Stonewall is not a nickname; he was named after the Confederate Gen. Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson. Some publicity for the singer claimed he was a descendant of the general..

Stonewall's father died when he was two and his mother moved the family to South Georgia. Jackson grew up there working on his uncle's farm. When he was ten he traded his bike for a guitar and began making up songs. Some of his later hits, such as "Don't Be Angry," were written very early in his creative life.

Jackson enlisted in the Navy in 1950 and was discharged in 1954. He moved to Nashville, Tennessee in 1956. Within a few days of his arrival he delivered an unsolicited demonstration recording to the offices of the Acuff-Rose publishing house, and executive Wesley Rose heard his recorded singing and set up an audition for Jackson at the Grand Ole Opry. He became the first entertainer to join the Opry without a recording contract, performing first on the Opry's Friday Night Frolics before his official debut. Backed by Ernest Tubb's Texas Troubadours, he

proved so popular that the audience demanded four encores.

Eventually Jackson hit the road with Tubb, who became a mentor to the young singer and songwriter. By early 1957, Jackson had signed a recording contract with Columbia Records and cut his first record, "Don't Be Angry." Jackson followed up with a cover of George Jones'"Life to Go," which peaked at number two in early 1959.

The upbeat "Waterloo," with its mixture of novelty and melancholy, did even better, spending five weeks at the top of the country charts, hitting number four on the pop charts, and garnering Jackson some national television exposure. Through the early '60s

Jackson was a consistent hitmaker with such country standards as "Why I'm Walkin'" (number six, 1960), "A Wound Time Can't Erase" (number three, 1962), and "I Washed My Hands in Muddy Water" (number eight, 1965).

In 1963, Jackson was the first artist to record a live album from the Grand Ole Opry with Old Showboat.

His next No. 1 hits came in 1964 with "Don't Be Angry" and "B.J. the D.J." (Jackson's foray into the teenage tragedy song trope, about an over-worked country music radio station disc jockey, who crashes his car in a rainstorm). During the second half of the '60s, he reached Top 40 less often, scoring only one Top Ten hit: 1967's "Stamp Out Loneliness". His Columbia albums of this period

contained ornate wordplay from the pens of well-established Nashville writers like Vic McAlpin; songs such as "Ship in a Bottle" and "Nevermore Quote the Raven" applied literary virtuosity to traditional country themes

From 1958 to 1971, Jackson had 35 Top 40 country hits. Along with Ray Price, Webb Pierce, Carl Smith, Faron Young, Carl Butler, George Jones and Charlie Walker, Jackson is considered a cornerstone, after Hank Williams and Lefty Frizzell, of the hard-driving honky tonk sound in the late 1950s and early 1960s.

By 1970, however, Jackson wasn't even hitting the Top 40. He bounced back briefly in 1971 with a cover of Lobo's "Me and You and a Dog Named Boo." In 1973, he had his last hit with "Herman Schwartz," which reached number 41. After that, Jackson continued to appear regularly on the Opry and to record occasionally, releasing albums like the inspirational Make Me Like a Child Again. He also re-recorded versions of his old hits, and he privately published his autobiography, From the Bottom Up, in 1991.

In 2006, Jackson sued the Grand Ole Opry for $10 million in compensatory damages and $10 million in punitive damage, claiming age discrimination. As a member of the Opry for over fifty years, Jackson believed that management was sidelining him in favor of younger artists. In his court filing, Jackson claimed that Opry general manager Pete Fisher stated that he did not "want any gray hairs on that stage or in the audience, and before I'm done there won't be any." Fisher is also alleged to have told Jackson that he was "too old and too country." The lawsuit was settled on October 3, 2008 for an undisclosed amount and Jackson returned to performing on the show. He has been a member of the Opry since 1956.

Jackson lives on a farm in Brentwood, Tennessee with his wife Juanita, who is also his personal manager and operates his song publishing company, Turp Tunes. He has a son, Stonewall Jackson, Jr.

Jackson was inducted into the North Carolina Music Hall of Fame on October 11, 2012

(Compiled and edited from Wikipedia & AllMusic)

Johnny Rivers (born John Henry Ramistella; November 7, 1942) is an American rock 'n' roll singer, songwriter, guitarist, and record producer. His repertoire includes pop, folk, blues, and old-time rock 'n' roll. Rivers charted during the 1960s and 1970s but remains best known for a string of hit singles between 1964 and 1968.

He has lent his smooth, reedy and soulful voice to a diverse array of songs in such music genres as blues, folk, rhythm and blues and inspired covers of rock-and-roll oldies. Moreover, Rivers has recorded a slew of singles and albums that have sold over 30 million copies, and he has had nine Top 10 hits as well as 17 other songs in the Top 40 charts throughout his career.

Rivers was born as John Henry Ramistella in New York City, of Italian ancestry. His family moved from New York to Baton

Rouge, Louisiana. Influenced by the distinctive Louisiana musical style, Rivers began playing guitar at age eight, taught by his father and uncle. While still in junior high school, he started sitting in with a band called the Rockets, led by Dick Holler, who later wrote a number of hit songs. He Ramistella formed his own band, the Spades, and made his first record at 14, while he was a student at Baton Rouge High School. Some of their music was recorded on the Suede label as early as 1956.

Following brief abortive stints in both New York -- where legendary rock'n'roll disc jockey Alan Freed suggested that Johnny change his last name to Rivers -- and Nashville, Johnny settled in Los Angeles. He returned to Baton Rouge in 1959, and began playing throughout the American South alongside comedian

Brother Dave Gardner. One evening in Birmingham, Rivers met Audrey Williams, Hank Williams' first wife. She encouraged Rivers to move to Nashville, where he found work as a songwriter and demo singer. Rivers also worked alongside Roger Miller. By this time, Rivers had decided he would never make it as a singer, and song writing became his priority.

In 1958, Rivers met fellow Louisianan, James Burton, a guitarist in a band led by Ricky Nelson. Burton later recommended one of Rivers' songs, "I'll Make Believe", to Nelson who recorded it. They met in Los Angeles in 1961, where Rivers subsequently found work as a songwriter and studio musician. His

big break came in 1963, when he filled in for a jazz combo at Gazzarri's, a nightclub in Hollywood, where his instant popularity drew large crowds.

He soon became a popular headliner at the famous nightclub The Whisky-a-Go-Go. His 1964 album "Johnny Rivers Live at the Whisky-a-Go-Go" peaked at #12 on the album charts and beget a #2 hit single with Rivers' cover of Chuck Berry's "Memphis."

Johnny followed with a steady succession of hit covers of "Maybelline,""Midnight Special," and "Seventh Son." Rivers scored his only #1 hit with the elegiac "Poor Side of Town" (he also co-wrote this particular song), which was followed by the exciting "Secret Agent Man." Johnny's covers of "Baby I Need Your Lovin'" and "The Tracks of My Tears" were likewise very successful. In addition, he started his own record company, Soul City Records; this label was instrumental in launching the career of the vocal group The 5th Dimension. He also gave then burgeoning songwriter Jimmy Webb a big break by recording the Webb composition "By the Time I Get to Phoenix" on his album "Changes."

Johnny continued to churn out hit singles in the '70s; his covers of "Rockin' Pneumonia and the Boogie Woogie Flu,""Blue Suede Shoes" and "Help Me Rhonda" all did well. Rivers' last top 10 hit was the soothing and sensuous "Swayin' to the Music (Slow Dancin')."

Rivers continued releasing material into the 1980s (e.g., 1980s Borrowed Time LP), although his recording career was winding down. He is still touring, however, performing 50 to 60 shows a year. Increasingly he has returned to the blues that inspired him initially.

In 1998 Rivers reactivated his Soul City Records label and released Last Train to Memphis. In early 2000, Rivers recorded with Eric
Clapton, Tom Petty and Paul McCartney on a tribute album dedicated to Buddy Holly's backup band, the Crickets

Johnny Rivers career total is 9 Top 10 hits on the Billboard Hot 100 and 17 in the Top 40 from 1964 to 1977; he has sold well over 30 million records.On June 12, 2009, Johnny Rivers was inducted into the Louisiana Music Hall of Fame.

His name has been suggested many times for induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, but he has never been selected. Rivers, however, was a nominee for 2015 induction into America's Pop Music Hall of Fame.

He continues to both tour and record the occasional new album to this day. (Compiled and edited from Wikipedia & IMDb)

Here's Johnny performing "Memphis" on American Bandstand
July 11, 1964.

Kay Thompson (born Catherine Louise Fink; November 9, 1909 – July 2, 1998) was an American author, singer, vocal arranger, vocal coach, composer, musician, dancer and actress. She is best known as the creator of the Eloise children's books and for her role in the movie Funny Face.

Thompson was born Catherine Louise Fink in St. Louis, Missouri, in 1909, the second of the four children of Leo George Fink, a Jewish, Austrian-born pawnbroker and jeweller, and his American born, gentile wife Harriet Adelaide "Hattie" Tetrick..

Thompson began her career in the 1930s as a singer and choral director for radio. Her first big break was as a regular singer on the Bing Crosby-Woodbury Show Bing Crosby Entertains (CBS, 1933–34). This led to a regular spot on The Fred Waring-Ford Dealers Show (NBC, 1934–35) and then, with conductor Lennie

Hayton, she co-founded The Lucky Strike Hit Parade (CBS, 1935) where she met (and later married) trombonist Jack Jenney. Thompson and Her Rhythm Singers joined André Kostelanetz and His Orchestra for the hit series The Chesterfield Radio Program (CBS, 1936), followed by It's Chesterfield Time (CBS, 1937) for which Thompson and her large choir were teamed with Hal Kemp and His Orchestra.

As a singer, Thompson made very few records, starting with one side, "Take a Number from One to Ten", on a 1934 session by the Tom Coakley band. In 1935, she recorded four sides for Brunswick ("You Hit The Spot", "You Let Me Down,""Don't Mention Love To Me," and "Out of Sight, Out of Mind"), and another four sides for Victor. The 4 Brunswick sides are excellent examples of mid-1930's sophisticated New York cabaret singing.

For her motion picture debut, Thompson and her choir performed two songs in the Republic Pictures musical Manhattan Merry-Go-Round (1937). In 1939, she reunited with André Kostelanetz for Tune-Up Time (CBS), a show that was produced by radio legend William Spier (who later married Thompson in 1942). On an instalment of Tune-Up Time in April 1939, 16-year-old Judy Garland was a guest. It was at this time

that Thompson first met and worked with Garland, developing a close personal friendship and professional association that lasted the rest of Garland's life.

In 1943 Thompson signed an exclusive contract with MGM to become the studio's top vocal arranger, vocal coach, and choral director. She served as main vocal arranger for many of producer Arthur Freed's MGM musicals and as vocal coach to such stars as Judy Garland, Lena Horne, Frank Sinatra, and June Allyson. Some of the many MGM musicals Thompson was the vocal arranger for include Ziegfeld Follies (1946), The Harvey Girls (1946), Till the Clouds Roll By (1946), Good News (1947), and The Pirate (1948).

Thompson left MGM in 1947 after working on The Pirate to create the night club act "Kay Thompson and the Williams Brothers", with the four Williams men as her backup singers and dancers. They made their debut in Las Vegas in 1947 and became an overnight sensation. Within a year, they were the highest paid nightclub act in the world, breaking records wherever they appeared. She wrote the songs and Robert Alton did the original choreography for the act.

Thompson, who lived at the Plaza Hotel in New York City, became most notable as the author of the Eloise series of children's books. The books have been speculated to be partly inspired by the antics of her goddaughter Liza Minnelli, daughter of Judy Garland and film director Vincente Minnelli, though when asked if this was true, Thompson responded, "I am Eloise."

She later recorded for Capitol, Columbia, Decca, and, most importantly, for MGM Records, which issued her only complete album of songs, in 1954. In February 1956, Thompson wrote and recorded the song "Eloise" at Cadence Records with an orchestra

conducted by Archie Bleyer. The song debuted on March 10, 1956, and became a Top 40 hit, selling over 100,000 copies.

As a film actress, Thompson played one major role only: that of fashion editor Maggie Prescott in the musical Funny Face (1957). Reunited with her colleagues from MGM, producer and songwriter Roger Edens and director Stanley Donen, Thompson garnered critical praise for her stylish turn as an editor based on real-life Harper's Bazaar editor Diana Vreeland, opening the film with her splashy "Think Pink!" and performing duets with Astaire and Hepburn.

In 1962 Kay served as creative consultant and vocal arranger for Judy Garland's legendary TV special with Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin, and kept busy with various nightclub/TV performances of her own until she decided to leave the limelight. It was fashion icon Halston who lured Kay out of her self-imposed retirement for a time in the 1970s in order to stage his runway shows.

Thompson only acted in one additional feature film, 1970's Tell Me That You Love Me, Junie Moon, because, according to its star Liza Minnelli, Thompson disliked the slow speed of movie production.

She eventually moved into Minnelli's Upper East Side penthouse and, contrary to her larger-than-life persona, grew quiet and reclusive with the last decade pretty much confined to a wheelchair. She died at the penthouse on July 2, 1998 at age 88. (Edited mainly from Wikipedia)

Natalie Paine (née Natalie Elston, born November 10, 1932 in New York - October 7, 2016 ) was an American blues and jazz singer who performed as Natalie Lamb. During the late '60s and '70s, Lamb was one of the top singers in trad jazz and classic blues, styles of music that were very much out of vogue.

Natalie Elston was born in New York City, USA, on November 10th 1932. She attended Hunter College, eventually graduating with a doctorate from Columbia University. For the next thirty years, she worked in the city's public school system, also appearing from time to time as a 'folk' singer in halls and clubs, before settling down to sing classic 'blues' after hearing an album of 'Odetta' songs.

In 1965, going on-stage under the pseudonym 'Natalie Lamb', she joined with pianist Sammy Price in forming a duo. A recording that she made that year with Price for Columbia may have given her some fame, but it was never released. In the following years, she also worked with various 'blues' and old-time 'jazz' ensembles, such as with the 'Red Onion Jazz Band' (even appearing on a 'live' recording with them from the New York Town Hall in 1969) and with the 'Peruna Jazzmen'.

Here's "Some Of These days" from above album.

In 1973, she recorded her own 'live' album, "Natalie Lamb Wails the Blues", accompanied on this by Kenny Davern and Art Hodes. She then collaborated with Bill Davison, Slide Harris, Tommy Gwaltney and Dick Wellstood on the long-player "Jazz Hayloft Style, Volumes 1 & 2" (1974), and with Claude Hopkins on

"Sophisticated Swing" (also 1974). In 1979, she was featured on the album "Natalie Lamb/Sammy Price and the Blues" (it also included performance by Doc Cheatham), followed by her input on the records "Jazz of The Connecticut Traditional Jazz Club" in 1982 and 1998's "Blues 'Round the Clock".

In addition to all this, she performed at many European 'trad jazz' festivals, and took part in a total of 20 recording sessions throughout her active career in 'jazz' from 1969 to 1999. Natalie Lamb died after a long illness in Annapolis on October 7th 2016, aged 83. Wedded twice (latterly to Bruce Paine), she is survived by him, as well as by her two daughters and one son from her first marriage to William M. Ludlam.

(Compiled and edited from Wikipedia, AllMusic, Capital Gazette & Legacy).

Mose John Allison Jr. (November 11, 1927 – November 15, 2016) was an American jazz and blues pianist, singer, and songwriter. He became notable for playing a unique mix of blues and modern jazz, both singing and playing piano.

He was born outside Tippo, Mississippi on his grandfather's farm, which was known as The Island "because Tippo Bayou encircles it." He took piano lessons from age five. His father, a piano stride player himself, encouraged the young Mose in his playing but also taught him the meaning of “work on the farm.” Mose picked cotton, played piano in grammar school and trumpet in high school, and wrote his first song at age thirteen.

In his youth, he had easy access, via the radio, to the music of Pete Johnson, Albert Ammons, and
Meade "Lux" Lewis. Allison also credited the songwriter Percy Mayfield, "the Poet Laureate of the Blues," as being a major inspiration on his songwriting. In high school he listened to the music of Louis Armstrong, Fats Waller, Duke Ellington, Louis Jordan, and another of his prime inspirations, Nat Cole of the King Cole Trio. He went to college at the University of Mississippi for a while and then enlisted in the U.S. Army for two years. Shortly after mustering out, he enrolled at Louisiana State University, from which he was graduated in 1952 with a BA in English with a minor in Philosophy.

He worked in nightclubs throughout the Southeast and West, blending the raw blues of his childhood with the modern pianistic influences of John Lewis, Thelonius Monk and Al Haig. In 1956 he moved to New York City and launched his jazz career as a piano accompanist with artists such as Stan Getz, Gerry Mulligan, Al Cohn, Zoot Sims, and Phil Woods. His debut album, "Back Country Suite", was issued on the Prestige label in 1957. His keyboard playing retained a delightful eccentricity throughout his career, an uncategorisable style of whirling runs and marching left-hand countermelodies that was his alone. He formed his own trio in 1958.

It was not until 1963 that his record label allowed him to release an album entirely of vocals. Entitled "Mose Allison Sings", it was a collection of songs that paid tribute to artists of the Mojo Triangle: Sonny Boy Williamson (2) ("Eyesight to the Blind"), Jimmy Rogers ("That's All Right") and Willie Dixon ("The Seventh Son"). However, it was an original composition in the album that brought him the most attention – "Parchman Farm". This was his most requested song for more than two decades, but he dropped it from his playlist in the 1980's because some critics felt it was politically incorrect.

Allison’s best songs surfaced ever more prolifically in the period between 1960 and 1964, with I Don’t Worry About a Thing, Your Mind Is on Vacation and Don’t Forget to Smile appearing on an impeccable series of albums for Atlantic. He began to tour

internationally through the 60s and 70s, and his bluesy vocals and the enthusiasm of such influential fans as Morrison helped him avoid the effects of the rock-driven downturn in jazz’s fortunes in that period.

Allison wrote some 150 songs. His own performances have been described as "delivered in a casual conversational way with a melodic southern accented tone that has a pitch and range ideally suited to his idiosyncratic phrasing, laconic approach and ironic sense of humour."

His 1987 recorded album "Ever Since The World Ended" - Blue Note 48015 received the highest rating (5 starts) in Down Beat February 1988. Prestige Records tried to market Allison as a pop star, but Columbia and later Atlantic tried to market him as a blues artist. Because he sang blues, Jet magazine thought that he was black and wanted to interview him.

Allison was inducted into the Long Island Music Hall of Fame in 2006. Allison's March 2010 album, "The Way of the World", "marked his return to the recording studio after a 12-year absence."

In 2012, Allison was honoured with a blues marker on the Mississippi Blues Trail in his hometown of Tippo. On January 14, 2013, Allison was honoured as a Jazz Master by the National Endowment for the Arts at a ceremony at Lincoln Centre in New York. The NEA Jazz Masters Fellowship is the nation's highest honour in jazz.

Allison died of natural causes on November 15, 2016, four days after his 89th birthday, at his home in Hilton Head, South Carolina. (Compiled and edited from Wikipedia, discogs.com & The Guardian)

Buck Clayton (born Wilbur Dorsey Clayton in Parsons, Kansas on November 12, 1911-died in New York City on December 8, 1991) was an American jazz trumpet player, fondly remembered for being a leading member of Count Basie’s 'Old Testament' orchestra and leader of mainstream orientated jam session recordings in the 1950s. His principal influence was Louis Armstrong.

Buck Clayton first rose to national fame as the lead soloist with the first great Count Basie band that roared out of Kansas City in late fall, 1936. Ironically, while Clayton’s understated, bell-like sound is associated with the hard swinging Kansas City style, he actually spent little time in Kansas City. By the time he arrived at the famed Reno Club, a small dive on 12th Street, Clayton had already led a colourful career as a band leader, ranging from Los Angeles to Shanghai.

Born in Parsons, Kansas, Clayton grew up in a musical family. Clayton’s father, a minister, taught him the basics of music. Picking up the trumpet as a teenager, Clayton performed with the church band, featuring his mother on organ. He first heard the clarion call of jazz during a stopover by the George E. Lee band in Parsons. After high school, Clayton followed his muse to California, where he began his professional career.

In Los Angeles, Clayton joined Charlie Echols' 14-piece band, playing taxi dances and ballrooms. Clayton and other band members soon left Echols to join forces with Broadway producer Earl Dancer and work in movies. When Dancer, a chronic gambler, disappeared with the payroll, Clayton took over leadership of the group. Just 23 years old, Clayton led his new band to China.

In 1934, the Clayton band opened at the palatial Canidrome Ballroom in Shanghai, China, becoming one of the first bands to play the Orient. Madame Chiang Kai- Shek and other celebrities flocked to the Canidrome nightly to sway to a potent mixture of hot jazz and classical music performed by the band, decked out in tails.

The Clayton band spent the next two years at the Canidrome, with ashort jaunt to Japan. A melee with a former Marine that turned the dance floor into a roiling free-for-all cost Clayton the job at the Canidrome. Unable to find steady work in Shanghai, Clayton and what remained of the band returned to the United States.

Back in the Los Angeles, Clayton reformed the big band and played several seasons at Sebastian’s Cotton Club and Club Araby. In the summer of 1936, Clayton left for New York to join Willie Bryant’s band at the original Cotton Club. On his way east, Clayton stopped off in Kansas City and joined the Basie Band at the Reno Club, replacing Hot Lips Page as star soloist. Clayton’s solo excellence, arrangements and compositions bolstered the national rise of the Basie band. Clayton remained with the Basie band until he was drafted in 1943.

Here's "Love Me Or Leave me" from above album.

After his honourable discharge in 1946 he prepared arrangements for Count Basie, Benny Goodman and Harry James and became a member of Norman Granz’s 'Jazz at the Philharmonic' package, appearing in April in a concert with Young, Coleman Hawkins and

Charlie Parker, and in October participated in JATPs first national tour of the United States. He also recorded at this time for the H.R.S. label. In 1947 he was back in New York, and had a residency at the Café Society, Downtown, and the following year had a reunion with Jimmy Rushing, his fellow Basie alumnus, at the Savoy Ballroom. Clayton and Rushing worked together occasionally into the 1960s.

From September 1949 Clayton was in Europe for nine months, leading his own band in France. Clayton recorded intermittently over the next few years for the French Vogue label, under his own name, that of clarinetist Mezz Mezzrow and for one session, with pianist Earl Hines. In 1953, he was again

in Europe, touring with Mezzrow; in Italy, the group was joined by Frank Sinatra.

Sidelined by lip surgery in 1967, Clayton focused on composing and arranging for other groups. He returned to playing in the early 1970s and toured internationally with his own group. When his lip gave out for good in the late 1970s, Clayton returned to directing, composing and arranging, while teaching at Hunter College in New York.

In 1987, Clayton formed a big band to perform his compositions. Clayton continued creating and leading his “Swinging Dream Band” until his death in 1991.

(Info from All about jazz.com & Wikipedia)

William Dale Fries, Jr. (born November 15, 1928) is an American singer, activist and politician best known by his stage name C. W. McCall and for his truck-themed outlaw country songs.

Fries was born November 15, 1928, in Audubon, IA, and while he displayed musical promise as a child, he was more interested in graphic design. While attending the University of Iowa, Fries studied music and played in the school's concert band, but his major was in fine arts, and after graduation he began handling the art chores at an Omaha, NE, television station. After five years there, he was hosting his own program, on which he drew caricatures of celebrities.

In 1972, while working for the Omaha advertising firm of Bozell & Jacobs, Bill Fries created a television campaign for the Old Home Bread brand of the Metz Baking Company. The advertisements told of the adventures of truck driver C.W. McCall, his dog Sloan, and of the truck stop that McCall frequented, The Old Home Café. Bill based the character and his environment on his own upbringing in western Iowa. The commercials were very successful. So successful, that the Des Moines Register

published the air times of the commercials in the daily television listings.

From those commercials came the first of the C.W. McCall songs, named after the restaurant: “Old Home Fill-er Up An’ Keep On A-Truckin’ Café”. While Bill provided the lyrics to the song and the voice of C.W. McCall, his collaborator Chip Davis wrote the music. Soon C.W.’s first album, Wolf Creek Pass, was released; its title song was a misadventure of a truck with brake failure.

C.W. McCall’s popularity reached its peak in January 1976, when “Convoy” — from his second album, Black Bear Road — reached the number one position on both the pop and country charts of Billboard. It sold over two million copies, and was awarded a gold disc by the R.I.A.A. in December 1975. Though McCall is not a one-hit wonder, "Convoy" has since become his signature song.

Like most musical acts, C.W. McCall toured the country, with Bill singing the words of C.W. and the "Fort Calhoun Nuclear Power Plant Boys" playing the music. In reality, the “Boys” were Chip Davis and an eclectic mix of musicians, who spent their non-C.W. McCall time recording albums of Chip’s music. Chip was a pioneer of “New Age” music, and his albums, recorded under the group name of “Mannheim Steamroller”, were also successful. But the fact that Chip Davis was the music behind C.W. McCall was not a well-known fact.

At least three other songs reached Billboard's pop Hot 100, including "Old Home Filler-Up an' Keep on a-Truckin' Cafe", "'Round the World with the Rubber Duck" (a pirate-flavoured sequel to "Convoy"), as well as the environmentally-oriented "There Won't Be No Country Music (There Won't Be No Rock 'n' Roll)". A dozen McCall songs appeared in Billboard's Hot Country Singles chart, including the sentimental "Roses for Mama" (1977).

In 1978, the movie Convoy was released based on the C.W. McCall song. The film starred Kris Kristofferson, Ali MacGraw, Burt Young and Ernest Borgnine and was directed by Sam Peckinpah. It featured a new version of the song, written specially for the film.

The albums that followed were not as successful as the first two and by 1980 Bill Fries had retired from the music business. In 1986, McCall (William Fries) was elected mayor of the town of Ouray, Colorado, ultimately serving for six years.

The last album to be released was 1990’s The Real McCall: An American Storyteller. This album, the first C.W. McCall recording to be released on audio CD, contained one new song and fifteen re-recordings of songs from the previous albums.

In 2009, McCall was inducted into the Iowa Rock 'n' Roll Hall of Fame. In 2014, Rolling Stone magazine ranked "Convoy" #98 on their list of 100 Greatest Country Songs.

Bill Fries lives in Ouray, Colorado with his wife Rena.

(Compiled and edited from Wikipedia & AllMusic)

Camillo Jean Nicolas Felgen (17 November 1920 in Tétange – 16 July 2005 in Esch-sur-Alzette) was a Luxembourgish singer, lyricist, disc jockey, and television presenter.

Camillo Felgen was born on 17 November 1920 in Tetingen in the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg. He attended elementary school, then high school and teacher training institute. From 1941 to 1945 he was elementary school teacher. Afterwards,he was an interpreter for the occupation forces, a reporter for a French-language newspaper in Luxembourg, and studied acting, singing and opera in Brussels and Liège. Was eventually hired by Radio Luxembourg as a choral singer and received a contract as a French newsreader. When he made his first recordings in Paris in 1951, he created (with the orchestra Marcel Coestier) the signature tune of his home station: "Bonjour mes amis".

In 1951, he had his first international hit record, "Bonjour les amies" ("Hello Friends"). The song went on to become the theme song for this national broadcaster. In 1953, he recorded his first German-language record, "Onkel Toms altes Boot" ("Uncle Tom's Old Boat"), in Berlin. He appeared in small roles in the German films “When Conny and Peter Do It Together” (1958) and “Five Sinners” (1960).

In 1958, Camillo Felgen was appointed by Radio Luxembourg as Program Director of the new program in German. On April 6, 1958, Camillo's first hit parade, the first ever German-language, was heard. Immediately afterwards he invented the "Merry Waves of Radio Luxembourg". Camillo became known as the father of the

hit parade presenting in one of his many programs “The Big Eight” top hits from all over the world. It was the success barometer for the record industry. Camillo's dark sexy voice enchanted women's souls at dusk and gave him corporeal letters (about 350 a week).

He represented his home country in the Eurovision Song Contest 1960 with "So laang we's du do bast", becoming the first Luxembourger and the first male contestant to represent Luxembourg and the first participant to sing in Luxembourgish. He finished last with only one point. Two years later he entered the contest again, this time doing much better by finishing in 3rd place with the song "Petit bonhomme". He did at times do the commentary in German too.

One of the greatest hits of Felgen was "Ich hab Ehrfurcht vor schneeweißen Haaren" ("I Respect Your Grey Hair"), a cover of singer-guitarist and entrepreneur Bobbejaan Schoepen. Another

was "Sag warum", in 1959, based on a melody by Phil Spector. In 1962 he recorded the original instrumental Tornados world hit Telstar, with vocals: Sometime a new day awakes.

Camillo Felgen also wrote German lyrics for cover versions of international songs, using the pseudonyms of Lee Montague (writing for Petula Clark, The Searchers, The Honeycombs, among others) and Jean Nicolas (writing for Connie Francis, Caterina Valente, Greetje Kauffeld and Lill-Babs, among others).

A legendary meeting took place in Paris in 1964. There, Felgen met the Beatles, who recorded their two German titles She Loves You and I Want To Hold Your Hand. The lyrics came from a'Jean Nicolas'– which was a pseudonym of Felgens. He has also worked as a copywriter for colleagues such as Peter Alexander (I count my worries every day), Connie Francis (beautiful stranger), the Everly Brothers (When you kiss me), Ralf Paulsen (Bonanza) and many others.

He was best known as the host of the television series 'Spiel ohne Grenzen' (Play Without Borders) .125 episodes from 1965 to 1973. Camillo was also instrumental in the idea of the "Golden Lion of Radio Luxembourg." Amongst others, Petula Clark ("Downtown") and Roy Black ("All in White") received the coveted trophy. In 1968, Chief Speaker Camillo Felgen said goodbye to his listeners to work freely. Thirteen episodes of the television series Spiel ohne Grenzen were waiting for him, as well as contracts in the show business.His successor, Frank Elstner (then 26), handed Camillo a farewell gilded microphone to which he spoke his first words 20 years ago at Radio Luxembourg.

Although he had long since retired from the front row, he guested now and then on radio and television specials. In 1986 he married his third wife Marianna, with whom he also ran a boutique for ball gowns in Luxembourg. He died in Esch-sur-Alzette on 16 July 2005, at the age of 84.One of the most popular voices in the fields of radio, television and record is silent forever.

At the anniversary celebration of 50 years of RTL RADIO Luxembourg on 15 July 2007, Camillo was awarded the "Honorary Lion". His widow accepted the award. Camillo had the spontaneous idea for the Lion Award, but never got one himself. RTL RADIO program director Holger Richter: "We would not be here without him today!"

(Compiled and edited from Wikipedia & radiojournal.de)

Georgia Carroll (November 18, 1919 – January 14, 2011) was an American singer, fashion model, and actress, best known for her work with Kay Kyser's big band orchestra in the mid-1940s.

The daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Roger Carroll, she was born in Blooming Grove, Texas, where her father raised sheep. Her family moved to Dallas, Texas, where she graduated from Woodrow Wilson High School.

One of Carroll's early jobs was modelling for a department store in Dallas, Texas. She eventually went to New York City and worked for the John Powers modelling agency. While she worked as a model in New York, she took vocal lessons. Aged 17, she made the cover of 'Redbook' and her face continued to be featured
throughout the 1930's and 40's in fashion magazines (Cosmopolitan, Vogue, Ladies Home Journal), on calendars and in advertising

She had her first brush with celebrity when she was the model for "The Spirit of the Centennial" statue at the 1936 Texas Centennial Exposition at Fair Park in Dallas, Texas. The statue still stands in front of what is now The Women's Museum. She was a 1937 graduate of Woodrow Wilson High School in Dallas and has been inducted into the school's Hall of Fame along with many other well-known graduates.

Carroll came to Hollywood when producers wanted her to play Daisy Mae in a film version of the Li'l Abner. Her height cost her that opportunity, however, when she turned out to be taller than the actor selected to play the title character. Her acting career began in 1941 when she appeared in several uncredited small roles in films such as Maisie Was a

Lady with Lew Ayres and Ann Sothern, Ziegfeld Girl with Judy Garland, as well as You're in the Army Now and Navy Blues, in both of which she appeared with the Navy Blues Sextette.

She appeared as Betsy Ross in the James Cagney musical Yankee Doodle Dandy in 1942. She also did modelling during this time, appearing in advertisements for Jewelite hairbrushes, among other products. Anne Taintor used some of these advertisements featuring Carroll to express the voice of the modern woman.

In 1943, Carroll joined Kay Kyser's band, (Kay Kyser's Kollege of Musical Knowledge), as a featured vocalist. Capitalizing on her good looks, she was given the nickname "Gorgeous Georgia Carroll", probably as a joking reference to the professional wrestler George Wagner, who used the name "Gorgeous George".

As a member of Kyser's band, Carroll appeared in three films: Around the World, Carolina Blues, and most notably the Second World War-era "morale booster" Thousands Cheer which gave fans a chance to see Kyser and his band in Technicolor.

Kyser's band has a featured performance near the end of the film, with Carroll delivering a key solo interlude of the Arthur Freed/Nacio Herb Brown standard, "Should I?"

Carroll and Kyser fell in love soon after she joined the band. A popular story often goes that one night in 1944 the two were pulled over for speeding in Nevada. After introducing themselves, Kyser, who wanted to avoid a ticket, quickly made up a story that they were in a hurry to get married. Knowing that publicity over the traffic stop would soon catch up to them, they decided it was best to find a Justice of the Peace and marry that night, in order to avoid negative press. But according to

Carroll, “We were playing a show in the desert for the service men. Kay was supposed to be headed for Los Angeles but headed for Nevada because that was the only place to get married in a hurry. I knew where he was going but just hoped I was doing the right thing. The story about worrying over the press catching wind of the speeding ticket is not true. Kay and Carroll went on to become one of the most successful couples in show business.

Georgia continued as vocalist with the Kay Kyser band, as well making appearances on television, retiring from performing in 1946. She concentrated on raising her family, collecting antiques and being active in the Chapel Hill historical preservation movement. Kyser himself retired from performing in 1951. The couple, who had three children, remained married until his death in 1985.

The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill is custodian of a large archive of documents and material about Kay Kyser which was donated by Carroll.

Georgia Carroll died in Chapel Hill, North Carolina on January 14, 2011, age 91. (Compiled and edited from Wikipedia & IMDB)

Blue Barron (November 19, 1913 – July 16, 2005), born Herschel Freidman, was an American orchestra leader in the 1930’s and early 1950s during the "Big Band" era. His band's more subdued tone was referred to as "Sweet" music to distinguish it from the "Swing" bands of the era. Barron's orchestra began in the New

York City area but later toured the U.S. and performed at popular venues in Los Angeles where they also appeared in several motion pictures and recorded a number of LPs.

Born in Cleveland, Ohio, United States, Freidman studied at Ohio University in Athens, Ohio before going into show business. (Musical references give differing spellings for his name, including Freedlin, but a niece of the bandleader believes the spelling Freidman is correct.)

Originally an impresario in his home town, he formed his own band in the mid-30s and took the name Blue Barron after briefly managing the band of the young Sammy Kaye. With a clear eye on the cash register, he adopted a musical policy that catered for the sweetest levels of popular taste. Heralded by his sugary signature

tune, ‘Sometimes I’m Happy’, he became very successful, securing important hotel and dance hall circuit bookings in the late 30s and throughout the 40s

His first group played on the Floating Palace showboat at Troy, New York, in October 1936. A newspaper report said the group "made an overnight hit at the Floating Palace and remained there for 22 weeks. In 1937, the orchestra made its network radio debut from the Southern Tavern in Cleveland, and that exposure helped to publicize Barron's name. The band opened in the Green Room of the Edison on January 5, 1938. Barron was heard not only on NBC's Red and Blue radio networks, but also on the CBS and

Mutual systems where his own makeshift orchestra was sometimes augmented by jazz guest stars of distinction.

Singer Tommy Ryan fronted the band while Barron served in the US Forces during World War II, and when he returned, Barron had popular record successes with ‘Chi-Baba, Chi-Baba’, ‘You Were Only Fooling (While I Was Falling In Love)’, ‘Powder Your Face With Sunshine’, ‘Whose Girl Are You’, ‘Are You Lonesome Tonight?’ and ‘Let Me In.’ Barron hit number 1 for two weeks in 1949 with "Cruising Down The River". The record sold over one million copies, gaining gold disc status.

The Blue Barron orchestra stayed at the Edison Hotel throughout the 1940's and also played on the road and appeared in the movie shorts "Melody Master: Blue Barron and His Orchestra (1939),""Paramount Headliner: Blue Barron and His Orchestra" (1940) and "Blue Barron and His Orchestra (1952)."

He was able to work in the industry until the Big Band era gave way to new musical forms. For his contribution to the recording industry, he has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 1724 Vine Street.

The band continued until 1956 before changing musical trends made it no longer financially viable. Barron still led bands at sporadic engagements into the 1960s and also performed with his wife, singer Patty Zych (aka Patty Clayton), on the hotel circuit. He then exited the music business and pursued a career in real estate management.

He died in his sleep on 16 July, 2005 in Baltimore, Maryland, age 91 and is interred in Arlington Cemetery of Chizuk Amuno in Baltimore.

(Compiled and edited from Wikipedia, Big Band Library, New York Times & All Music)

Speckled Red born 23 October 1891

Coco Robicheaux born 25 October 1947

Page Morton born 27 October 1915

Johnny Western born 28 October 1934

Jimmie Dolan born 29 October 1916

Dale Evans born 31 October 1912

Charlie Walker born 2 November 1926

Joe Turner born 3 November 1903

Ralph Sutton born 4 November 1922

Jan Garber born 5 November 1894

Stonewall Jackson born 6 November 1932

Johnny Rivers born 7 November 1942

Kay Thompson born 9 November 1908

Natalie Lamb born 10 November 1932

Mose Allison born 11 November 1927

Buck Clayton born 12 November 1911

C.W. McCall born 15 November 1928

Camillo Felgen born 17 November 1920

Georgia Carroll born 18 November 1919

Blue Barron born 19 November 1913