From:   "Dik de Heer" 
Date:  Mon Jan 14, 2002  1:16 am
Subject:  Born To Be With You : Allen Toussaint

ALLEN TOUSSAINT

Born 14 January, 1938, New Orleans, Louisiana

Allen Toussaint was the most important producer and songwriter of
New Orleans R&B and rock 'n' roll of the 1960s. He produced and
wrote classic, gently funky rhythm numbers and timeless ballads for
Lee Dorsey, Barbara George, Clarence "Frogman" Henry, Jesse Hill,
Ernie K-Doe, Chris Kenner, The Meters, Aaron Neville, The Showmen,
Benny Spellman and Irma Thomas.
It was the piano that prompted him to take up music. Already as a
child, he played every day, learning to play by ear listening to records
and the radio. When he was 13, Toussaint joined a neighbourhood
band called The Flamingoes and began to play at dances and socials.
Dave Bartholomew discovered him in 1957 and asked him to play on
some sessions (Fats Domino's "I Want You To Know" is an example).
Early in 1958 he recorded the LP "The Wild Sounds of New Orleans"
in just two days, for RCA. Although the album didn't sell, one song
from it, "Java" became an enormous hit for trumpeter Al Hirt in 1963.
Toussaint was in the U.S. Army at that time. "I was walking through
the barracks one day and I heard 'Java' by Al Hirt, and I didn't know
he had recorded it. I told one of the guys in the barracks that there
was a song that I wrote on the radio and would he turn it up a little.
He said "Aww, of course, you wrote it". He didn't believe it."

In December 1959, he recorded more piano instrumentals, for the
Seville label. Like the RCA album, these were released under the
name of Al Tousan. When Joe Banashak started his Minit label in
early 1960, Toussaint became the creative force behind the label.
His first hit at Minit was Jesse Hill's "Ooh Poo Pah Doo", but the
real breakthrough came in 1961 with big hits like "Mother-in-Law"
(by Ernie K-Doe), Chris Kenner's "I Like It Like That" and Lee
Dorsey's "Ya Ya". "Mother-in-Law" was the first No. 1 ever to be
recorded in New Orleans (neither Fats Domino nor Little Richard
ever had a No. 1).
Almost single-handedly, Toussaint had changed the sound of New
Orleans R&B. After his demob in 1965, he began another roll,
still producing Lee Dorsey and soon also Aaron Neville and The
Meters, who would later become The Neville Brothers.
With his partner Marshall Sehorn, he built the SeaSaint recording
studios in the 70's and also produced several albums under his own
name (as a singer) and the # 1 hit "Lady Marmalade" for Labelle.
He formed NYNO Records in the mid-'90s to give New Orleans
music a national outlet.

Recommended listening: "The Complete Tousan Sessions" (RCA
and Seville recordings), Bear Family BCD 15641.
Website: http://www.nynorecords.com/allen.shtml