All is Gold That Glitters, Part 2

... continued from here.

Colpix LP # 407 (1959)

For all we know, Nina's first Colpix album (The Amazing Nina Simone) was released in August 1959 (see also the Nina Simone Database). Considering the fact that the songs were only recorded in mid-July '59 in NYC the LP was really rushed out; the first review of the LP appeared already in the July 20, 1959, issue of Billboard. It might be of interest to report here what it says:

Here is a splendid new artist on her disk debut [a typical Billboard blunder since Nina's first LP was actually Bethlehem BCP # 6028, rel. towards the end of 1958!]. Miss Simone already identified with the jazz field, can sell strongly in pop too with these offerings. Her style has touches of many artists - Sarah Vaughan, Carmen McRae, Della Reese, even Marian Anderson, who was an influence on Miss Simone in her earlier days. The gal has a fine spiritual-gospel quality and is strongly oriented to folk- blues traditions. Program consists of a few standards, jazz stylings and gospel type numbers. An impressive artist well worth hearing. (p. 23).

Several issues later, Billboard felt compelled to provide some basic information about Nina Simone, under the heading »Thrush Nina Simone Was Piano Teacher« (Aug. 17, 1959, p.20). In October, we find a little notice clarifying Nina's label affiliation (Oct. 5, '59, p. 23) because many, it seems, were in doubt whether she recorded for Bethlehem or Colpix (actually she was with Colpix since April '59), and in the next issue Nina's name was listed - among Frank Sinatra, The Shirelles and Ernest Tubb! - as Today's Top Talent (Oct. 12, '59, p. 9).

Nina Simone, promo photo believed to be taken in 1960.

ad from EBONY, May 1960

By December 1959, Nina had further gained in notoriety. First press items appeared which spoke about Nina's temper during her live per- formances, e.g. the piece in JET (December 3, 1959, p. 44):

The way those San Francisco fans don't love Nina Simone the way they "love" Porgy. During a performance before a huge audience, Nina was booed, heckled and hissed by fans who claimed she talked too much, was indifferent and temperamental. Half of them walked out not wanting "to stay" there any longer, much less "forever.

However, she really made it, publicity-wise, when EBONY published a large article about her (including numerous photos), »Nina Loves Porgy«, in December 1959. Here again reference is made, right in the first lines, to Nina's »moods« but the author also finds something to recommend about her temper:

No female singer since the electric emer- gence of Sarah Vaughan 13 years ago has provoked such a bewildering variety of reactions and opinions as has this wiry, moody girl from Tyron, North Carolina. By creating acute controversy over her merits as a musician, she has injected a stimulat- ing and refreshing new force into the troubled, strife-torn and often murky waters of American jazz. When she sings she either disturbs or delights her hearers. Seemingly indifferent to the furore she has created ...

And voices who found much to praise in Nina's art were not lacking either. In the January 7, 1960, JET issue, the Chicago jazz critic Sidney Lazard is quoted with the words:

Her every song is like the revelation of a beautiful, exciting secret. And those who listen fill up with an undisguised happiness, tempered only by the knowledge that it will all end too soon (p. 24).

(Sidney Lazard was then to write, for the March 1960 issue of the ROGUE magazine, a piece entitled »Nina Simone, Tempestuous Talent«, but I haven't read or seen it yet.)

To return to Nina's first Colpix album! Nadine Cohodas in her biography of Nina Simone, Princess Noire, stresses correctly that the Colpix sessions of July 1959 (resulting in the first LP) were completely different from what (and how) she recorded at Bethlehem: While the Bethlehem sessions were »intimate« (three musicians in a small studio), the Colpix sessions were managed by Hecky Krasnow of »Rudolph-the-Red-Nosed-Reindeer«-fame and Nina »was part of a larger mosaic assembled by others, from song selection to arrangement. ... Krasnow had picked an eclectic mix of songs, ... and [the arranger Bob] Mersey surrounded Nina with violins, muted trumpets, and flutes, a prescripion Colpix hoped would bring crossover sales in the pop market (p. 83).« This, in the case of many other artists, would have proved a recipe for musical disaster, but it did not in the case of Nina Simone. Her presence and musicality saved the day and notwithstanding the lush production Colpix put up around Nina, the results were great. And for once I really agree with what we read on the back cover of her first Colpix LP; in general, those notes are so plainly smooth-written and honey-drafted to lure even the most critical customer in buying the most inaudible crap, but this does not apply in this case:

Nina is ... whatever the words and music she is singing really mean. Nina is a musical experience - an emotional trauma - an intellectual challenge ... Nina is a cauldron into which have been poured all the streams of musical expression and consciousness that shape American musical thought and emotion; classical, jazz, folk, ballad and Negro Church music ... When Nina plays and when Nina sings - the cauldron boils and the audience bubbles over ... Everything Nina does is new and different - how do you prove it - with standard material, all new material or stuff pulled down out of orbit? ... This album is just as good as your ear. Everything than can be said in the musical idiom within the boundaries of the twelve numbers ... is here said ...

This about sums it up nicely, I think.

From EBONY, Dec 1959, p 169.

For the record, and for the sake of complete- ness, Mrs Cohodas in Princess Noire got some different information as to the release dates. On p. 91 especially, she states that Nina's Colpix 45'' # 135 was put out in January 1960 and goes on to say that the »record was a teaser for the anticipated release of two full-scale albums, The Amazing Nina Simone ... and Nina Simone at Town Hall«. In fact, three singles were taken from Nina's first Colpix LP (one of those, Colpix # 135, actually also features »The Other Woman« not on the LP), but they were all released in 1959, # 135 in particular in November '59. The LP was already on the market by then for three months. Cohodas then claims that »before Colpix could get the LPs in circulation«, Bethlehem issued another album entitled Nina Simone and Her Friends. As is known, this Bethlehem LP irritated Nina mightily (to put it mildly) because her contract with Bethlehem/King had expired and she had signed for one album only (namely her 1958 Jazz as Played in an Exclusive Side Street Club aka Little Girl Blue). In her autobiography, Nina said that »[m]y first album for Colpix was The Amazing Nina Simone, but before it even came out Bethlehem had released a rival, Nina Simone and Her Friends, which contained the few remaining songs that we had decided not to use on Little Girl Blue« (I Put A Spell On You, p. 65). Now this is consonant with what Nadine Cohodas claims, but the Bethlehem LP referred to (BCP # 6041) was not out before January 1960 (or maybe even February), i.e. at a time when the first two Colpix LPs were already circulating for months. I can't resolve this, obviously, but I still believe that the Colpix LPs were released before Bethlehem came out with their second (abusive) LP in early 1960.

Enough of this, let's listen to Nina Simone instead! Her first tune on her first Colpix LP, recorded in mid-July 1959 ...

Nina Simone: »Blue Prelude« from the Colpix LP # 407 (1959):

All is Gold that Glitters

(From Ebony, December 1959 issue, p. 169)

Today I went into the music bookstore I visit fairly often (obviously) and left it with a copy of Nadine Cohodas's Princess Noire. The Tumultuous Reign of Nine Simone (New York: Pantheon 2010). For different reasons I couldn't resist buying it, not the least because it was the hardcover edition and they hawked it for around 12 bucks. First thing you notice when taking the book in hand is its dust cover in gold and black (which, however, feels to the touch as if plastic would pretend to be calfskin leather ... very strange, tactily speaking). Once you remove the dust cover you'll be then eyestruck by the aureate splendour of the book cover itself that shines forth from beneath. Now whether Cohodas's book does merit all this gilded extravagancy I cannot yet say but the subject of her book certainly does.

Colpix LP 407 (not the truly original label
which has Colpix in red letters above, but
actually the 2nd label Colpix was using ...
but at least still in gold, compared with the
light blue of the following label versions)

That gold is somehow Nina Simone's colour I have always felt since I got to know her early Colpix LPs which came with a golden label, starting with her first Colpix LP 407 (The Amazing Nine Simone), recorded in July 1959 in New York.
1959 was the year when Nina Simone became a big name in the music business; in retro- spective, it certainly was the year which determined (and made) her later career, even though she herself at the time was still plan- ning to become a classical pianist and merely recorded jazz, folk, gospel and pop items to finance her piano study. »New Year 1959 found me ... with a hit record, a rising reputation, and no idea how to make the money I needed to finish my classical training«  she was later to say in her autobiography I Put A Spell On You (p. 63 f.).

Billboard ad, Sept. 28, 1959

But things went better than she thought (and she often thought only the worst to come anyhow), and the unexpected success of her Bethlehem recordings, in particular of her version of »I Loves You Porgy«, opened her many doors. The New York-based Columbia-Colpix took her under contract in April 1959 because King-Bethlehem had signed her only for one album (which had appeared in mid-1958 as Little Girl Blue). What is more, Nina Simone was dissatisfied with how she was treated and promoted by Bethlehem-King's Sid Nathan, and famously she even sold away her rights of the entire album for the sum of $3.000 (something she much regretted later since her first Bethlehem LP also features such popular tunes like »My Baby Just Cares For Me« ...). She was then not unhappy to be signed by Joyce Selznick of Colpix, especially because she was given a longterm deal. And Colpix had, obviously, greater material resources to promote her nationwide and maybe also more enthusiasm since the Colpix label had been founded only recently, in October 1958.
     Only little more than two months passed after signing the contract with Colpix, and Nina Simone found herself in a New York studio to lay down the 14 tracks in July '59, twelve of which were then released on her first Colpix LP The Amazing Nina Simone. Half of them were also released, in the course of '59, on three Colpix singles. One of those 45's, Colpix # 124, had the very felicitous combination of the uptempo gospel song »Children Go Where I Send You« with the old 1932 jazz standard »Willow Weep For Me« (the latter also recorded before by Billie Holiday and Dinah Washington). The first song, with its wonderful climax towards the end, highlights Nina's piano playing (and few songs on the first Colpix LP actually do), while the second strongly puts her vocal art in evidence. There is much else to say about her first Colpix album, but I cannot do it tonight and it has to wait for another occasion sometime soon. So let's leave it, for today, at the two songs mentioned. And I guess there will be few persons around who do not share the view that with Nina Simone, all is gold that glitters:

Nina Simone: »Children Go Where I Send You« / »Willow Weep For Me« from the Colpix LP # CP 407 (1959):

Continue here ...

Bessie Smith Tribute Contest (1st part)

»After You've Gone«

Being one of the queen mothers of modern jazz, blues and ultimately soul as well, Bessie Smith and the songs she recorded have inspired many. On March 2, 1927, Bessie recorded four popular songs, Turner Layton's & Henry Creamer's »After You've Gone« among them. (The song was first recorded in July 1918 by Marion Harris: listen to it here; find out more about it here and here.) At the time and later on as well, Bessie's choice of popular tunes was often criticized. Chris Albertson writes:

Blues purists - who, oddly enough, don't complain about Bessie's 1923 record- ings of lesser-known pop fare - have bemoaned her "commercial" repertoire for this session, and critics have rationalized it as an attempt to regain lost ground. But Bessie's popularity was not threatened at the time, and her recordings reflected only a part of her actual repertoire. Her treatment of these songs offers delightful evidence of her talent for turning banal material into something special. (...)
Just as the sudden popularity of theatrical blues (as opposed to the street corner variety) had turned "sweet" singers into blues divas overnight, so it was easy for blues singers to venture beyond their regular domain. Bessie did this routinely on stage, but even a song like "After You've Gone" almost be- came a blues when she handled it ... (Bessie, rev. and expanded ed., New Haven 2003, p. 148 f.)

The least one can say is that Bessie made the song her own, so that until today nobody (I guess) associates it with Marion Harris but rather with Bessie Smith. Thus we find it on two »Bessie Smith Tribute« LPs from the late '50s, the one, famous enough, by Dinah Washington, the other, truly obscure, by Becky Hall.

AAMCO LP # 324 (1959?)

Let's start with the second, entitled A Tribute to Bessie Smith (AAMCO # ALP-324). Strangely, the singer is nowhere mentioned on the cover; instead you'll have to read the sleeve notes on the back in order to finally stumble across the artist's name in about one of the last lines. On another blog, the writer is as clueless as I am about who Becky Hall really was. In fact, it is not even clear whether one of the two women posing in the cover photo is Becky Hall or not (my guess is that she isn't, because on many other AAMCO 33⅓ covers there is no picture of the artist but rather a more or less kitschy, if not outright trashy or freaky, tableau composed of otherwise unrelated models) ...!
     The low-priced AAMCO label (a subsidiary of some sort of Alison Enterprises) was established in summer 1958 and barely a year later, in June '59, Alison-AAMCO already filed for bankruptcy (see Billboard, June 29, 1959, p. 7). However, if running across the net you'll find release dates for AAMCO LPs ranging from 1956 to the mid-'60s ... Conventionally, Becky's LP is assigned to 1959, and this makes sense because Georges Rhodes (who was Sammy Davis's accompanist) is mentioned as the arranger in the notes on the back cover. Rhodes joined Alison-AAMCO only at the beginning of '59 (see JET, Jan. 29, 1959, p. 64), thus 1959 seems to be about right as the release date of the album.
     For the curious among you I can add that it is worthwhile to look for other AAMCO LP releases ... you'll find everything from serious jazz by famous soloists and bandleaders to mildly bizarre releases of more or less exotic stuff: Torero (Music of the Bull Ring) (»a 66 piece band captures the pageantry of bull ring«), Favorite Polkas, Mazeltov, Flamenco, The Scots Guards Bag Pipes (»Stirring songs of Scot- land«) and, my favorite album, Tarik Bulut's In An Egyptian Garden (»Sensuous songs of the exotic Middle East«). Also noteworthy is the respective cover art of many of these LPs, and not without good reason at least one AAMCO album made it on the Bizarre Records website ...

EmArcy LP # MG-36130 (1958)

Second, Dinah Washington. Her album Dinah Sings Bessie Smith (EmArcy LP # MG 36130) was out in February 1958. It doesn't need much of an introduction, I think. It features 10 songs made famous by Bessie Smith and recorded by Queen Dinah in December '57 and January '58, accompanied by her then-husband, the saxophonist Eddie Chamblee, and his band. »After You've Gone« in particular was taped at Universal Recorders, Chicago, on January 7, 1959. On the back cover of the EmArcy LP, the tune is explicitly mentioned as »one of a handful of non-blues songs among the 160 (which Bessie put on wax during her eleven years as a recording artist).«

Below, you can listen to Becky Hall's version of »After You've Gone«, followed by Dinah's. I personally feel that putting Becky's version first is doing her a favor, really. Maybe this is because I am, by personal inclination, unshakably partial to the art of Ruth Lee Jones. Anyhow, Becky's every so often strident voice is less forceful and less modulated than Dinah's, especially in the upper registers, and vocally she tackles the song as if it were kind of a French chanson. Finally, and quite indepen- dent from both the artists' respective talents, Dinah's voice was recorded way clearer and more up front than was Becky's. But well, there is always something to listen to with interest, if not delight:

Becky Hall ('59)/ Dinah Washington ('58): »After You've Gone«:

The Queen Re-Issued ... Again

It seems that things, when they come, they come in a bunch. A few weeks ago I stumbled across the newly released 12-CD box of Leontyne Price's albums of songs and spirituals. Now, more recently, I came across a new 4-CD box of some of Dinah Washington's most famous LPs, released by the Real Gone Jazz label. The box fea- tures eight remastered albums on 4 CDs and is part of the huge re-issue programme by Real Gone Jazz.

From Ebony, march 1964 issue

Of course, this is not spectacular news; we have the Complete D.W. On Mercury Collection, and several of Dinah's Mercury albums have been re-issued separately on CD more than once. But still, I paid about $14 for the box and this is, after all, a bargain (each one of the former separate re-issues of Dinah's LPs is priced almost as high!). However, there is no booklet (just scarce info about the personnel on the back), and the CDs do not come in repros of the original sleeves (as do, for example, the CDs in the Leontyne Price box). And the selection of the albums seems somewhat erratic, probably they went after some criterion of popularity.

Not included in this 4-CD box is Dinah's 1959 LP The Queen! (Mercury LP # SR 60111, released in autumn '59). This LP does contain a number of jazzy ballads and big band-blues tunes. It wasn't produced with much care, if we are allowed to deduce this from the fact that the song title of »Show Time« is given as »Show Place« in Martin Williams's notes on the back cover - and that's what the lyrics of the song actually say! (However, on the label of side 1 and on both sides of the sleeve we find it listed as »Show Time«). And Williams's comment that Dinah »sounds like she just walked out of a Baptist church, stopped by the Brill building just long enough to pick up a copy of a tune, and started to wail« is way over the top. Throughout his entire notes Williams really is keen to put Dinah in the gospel mould, noting that she »did beat the funky players to a kind of direct gospel-jazz« and referring to her being »almost raised on religious music« ... hmmm, don't start wondering what it could possibly mean for someone to be raised »almost« on religious music!

More sensible and closer to the truth is Billboard's short review in the Oct. 5, 1959, issue (p. 28): The Queen has a package here of much vocal craftsmanship. There are four blues ... and a number of ballads and sophisticated songs ... The backing is tastefully smart jazz. For those who are fond of wonderful phrasing and sensitive vocal nuance, here it is. Well yes, this about sums it up. You can listen to two songs from this album, »Show Time« (!) and »Trouble In Mind«. The latter song is famous enough but easily bears being played one more time. Both tunes were recorded with the Eddie Chamblee Orchestra at Universal Recorders, Chicago, on January 20, 1958.

Dinah Washington: »Show Time« / »Trouble In Mind« from the Mercury LP # SR 60111 (1959):

* * *

Press Item of the Week

... not strictly a press item, today, but still curious. »The Ole Mummers Strut« explained in 12 instructive photos ... that's the idea at least. Ehm, proved not very instructive to me, though. Maybe it takes a professional dance teacher to make sense of it. Looks a bit they're stepping upon thumbtacks strewn all over the floor ... or else on some floor heater that wasn't switched off in time. Pity I don't know the said Strut by the Nu Tornados, could've helped.

The Second Sweet Inspiration

Before the Inspirations, Part I

You all know the Jackson family, LaToya, the late Michael, Jermaine and all the others, including the earringed patriarch Joseph »Joe« Jackson and arguably the last one of the family to walk around with the face God has given him. One of the most influential families in the music business ever, no doubt about it. But how many of you remember the Drinkard family? Doesn't ring a bell? Maybe the bell starts ringing if I add that part of that family goes by the name of »Houston«, another by that of »Warrick«. The latter was, in 1962, mis-printed on a Scepter label as »Warwick«. »I wanted to pull the record to have the spelling corrected but was promised that the correction would be made on the second pressing. Apparently, that never happened. I remained a wick instead of a rick« says Dionne Warwick in her recently published autobiography My Life, As I See It (New York 2010, p. 22).
     With »Houston« and »Warwick« I'm sure several bells started ringin'. And well they should. The Drinkard-Houston-Warwick family cluster, with all appandages to it and further ramifications, may justly be considered more important than the Jack- son clan; they certainly are longer around in the business. (Don't forget also that opera singer Leontyne Price is a cousin of Dionne Warwick and that Sarah Vaughan grew up with her mother!) But, you ask, what has this to do with the Sweet Inspirat- ions? A whole lot, starting with the simple fact that Emily »Cissy« Drinkard Houston (the mother of Whitney Houston) was part of the group until the late autumn of '69. This is the obvious bit. Less obvious and generally less known is the fact that the Sweet Inspirations evolved out of two or three gospel outfits that had common roots and shared many of their members.

* * *

First and foremost, the Drinkard Singers. On the left photo (publ. in JET-Magazine in the June 15, 1998, issue p. 58) you can see all the members of the group as of ca. 1957 (left to right): Emily »Cissy« Drinkard, Lee Drinkard Warrick, Marie »Rebie« Drinkard Epps, Larry Drinkard, Anne »Annie« Drinkard Moss and Judy Guions (aka Judy Clay), on the piano Nicholas »Nick« Drinkard. They all were brothers and sisters with the exception of Judy Guions who had been adopted (not officially, though) by Lee Warrick.
     In the beginning, the group was formed in the late 1930s when the family was still living in Savannah, Georgia. They later moved to East Orange, N.J., and it was there that their fame spread. Several family members remember East Orange as a very cosmopolitan, multi-ethnic place devoid of racial tensions. Today, the town has almost 90% Black or Afro-American population (making this one of the highest per- centages in the entire U.S.), and in 2008 Obama's Democrats reaped 98% (!!) of all votes cast. In 1951, the Drinkard Singers performed in the legendary Carnegie Hall and backed gospel greats of the day, Mahalia Jackson and Sister Rosetta Tharpe, but also Clara Ward. Then, in 1954, they recorded some tunes to appear on a Savoy LP, and in 1956 they had a single out, again on Savoy.

Verve LP # V-8245 (1959)

Yet they hit it big in July 1957 when they were invited to appear at the Newport Jazz Festival, sharing the stage with the likes of Oscar Peterson, Carmen McRae, Ella Fitzgerald, Billie Holiday and countless other renowned musicians. Verve Records, aptly headed as well as managed by Norman Granz, taped the entire festival, and the stage show of the Drinkard Singers, on the afternoon of July 7, 1957, was released, in December 1957 as the A-side of Verve LP # MG V-8245 (Gospel Singing At Newport). Meanwhile, and aided by appear- ances on local TV stations in nearby Newark, the Drinkard Singers came to the attention of RCA. Thus another LP was recorded, in April 1958, entitled A Joyful Noise (RCA Victor LPM-1852) and actually their first fully-fledged studio album.

During their performance at Newport several members of the group had solo spots or leading parts, Marie Epps, Ann(e) Moss and Judy Guions. The only member of the later Sweet Inspirations to have participated in Newport was Cissy Houston, 23 years old at the time, but unfortunately the Verve LP as released contains no song where she does the lead singing (according to Hayes / Laughton's Gospel Discography, the song »My Rock« with lead vocals by Emily »Cissy« Drinkard was recorded but remained unissued). So, the obvious choice for this blog is to make you listen to the song which features Judy Guions as lead singer. She was later not a member of the Sweet Inspirations but still had close ties to them because Judy's sister, Sylvia Shemwell, was. As for Judy, she became a moderately successful soul singer in her own right, billed from 1961 onwards as »Judy Clay«. She recorded for Ember, Scepter, Stax and Atlantic, and many dozens of her unissued recordings have been made accessible on CD. Her greatest success came when she teamed up with white soul singer Billy Vera, together being the first racially integrated duo ever to appear nationwide in the U.S. (or rather, not always to appear as they would have liked to because several TV stations below the Mason-Dixon line wouldn't present a black & white duo on their screens ... as late as 1967!).
     In the beautiful 6-minute-plus rendering of »That's Enough« you can hear Judy Guions Clay (clearly) and Emily »Cissy« Drinkard (Houston) (less clearly because part of the choir, but she probably did the high soprano parts you can hear in the song). Apart from being a performance worth listening to, it is an important document for anybody interested in the »gospel roots« of singers who in the '60s left their mark on the secular soul scene. The introduction at the beginning is spoken by Joe Bostic, a famous gospel DJ of the day (read about him here and here). He had brought the Drinkard Singers to Carnegie Hall back in 1951 and for some years managed them; he then announced them at the Newport Festival on July 7, 1957:

The Drinkard Singers (feat. Judy Guions): »That's Enough« from the Verve LP # V-8245 (1957):


Note: For a while I thought (and had written so in the text above) that the Verve LP # 8245 was only released in 1959; several discographies (printed and on the web) do state this. However, a look into the contemporary music press (especially the issues of Billboard) clearly confirm that the album was released already in December 1957.

To be continued ...

The Fragile Dream

The events that unfolded during the last weeks in the Middle East have changed history: Two Arabic countries abolished their repressive political systems by a people's revolution and now are on their difficult path to democracy. We must hope that they succeed. The recent development of Tunisia seems promising, the newly acquired liberty of Egypt stands on knife's edge. The peoples of both countries are living a fragile dream.

In other Arabic countries, Yemen and Bahrain in particular, turmoil has set in as well, with no predictable outcome as yet. And the situation in Libya is meanwhile completely out of control. What started as an unrest on the streets of major Libyan cities has changed into civil war.

We are witnessing stormy times. Bad times for a blog, though.

Charles Ganimian & His Oriental Music: »Come With Me to the Casbah«, from the Atco LP 33-107 (Come With Me to the Casbah), recorded November 28, 1958, and released in 1959: