From: "Dik de Heer" Date: Mon Jul 8, 2002 1:16 am Subject: Born To Be With You : Louis Jordan LOUIS JORDAN (By Steve Walker) Born 8 July 1908, Brinkley, Arkansas Died 4 February 1975, Los Angeles, California Louis Jordan can lay claim to be one of the major pioneering figures in the development of mid-20th century rhythm and blues, treading the mid-path between popular jazz of the 1930's and r&b-tinged rock'n'roll of the early and mid-1950's. Louis was born in Brinkley, Arkansas, a country town situated between Little Rock and Memphis. His mother, Adell, died when Louis was merely an infant, and he was subsequently raised by his grandmother and by his Aunt Lizzie. Louis' father, James Aaron Jordan, was a major formative influence in his life. James, a talented multi-instrumentalist, worked part of the year as a musician with travelling minstrel shows, and the rest with the Brinkley town band. At eight years old, Louis was taught the rudiments of trombone-playing by his father, but could only produce a restricted number of notes on the instrument, as his arms were too short to enable him to fully extend the trombone slide. He switched to the clarinet and, by the time he reached his teens, he was sufficiently proficient to enable him to start touring with the Rabbit Foot Minstrels and playing in the local band in Brinkley. At the age of nineteen, after touring with the Silas Green Show, Louis landed a job in Little Rock with Brady Bryant's Salt and Pepper Shakers, having switched to playing his recently acquired alto saxophone. This all-purpose band played jazz, popular tunes and waltzes. One year later, he found himself in Hot Springs, Arkansas, at the time one of the most wide-open cities in the U.S.A., where Al Capone and Owney Madden were regular visitors. Every night, after work, Louis would sit up listening to all-night radio, assiduously learning every new tune broadcast. His dedication paid off when he landed a job as both instrumentalist and vocalist with Ruby Williams' band at the Green Gables and later at the prestigious Club Belvedere, where he began to work up the cabaret routines which would serve him well throughout his career. In 1932, Louis joined Dr. Sells' Traveling Medicine Show and finished up in Philadelphia where he settled in with Charlie Gaines' band, and from where he made a brief tour as part of a small group supporting Louis Armstrong. From here, after meeting Ralph Cooper, he moved on to New York where, by 1936, he was the featured billing in LeRoy Smith's band appearing at the Apollo Theatre. Louis then joined Chick Webb's band, one of the top-rated black bands in the nation. They played at the vast Savoy Ballroom on Lenox Avenue in Harlem ('The Home Of Happy Feet'). The featured girl singer was Ella Fitzgerald, with whom, it is said, Louis had 'a little love affair'. Although Louis' first appearances on record with Chick Webb were in support of Ella Fitzgerald, the first time that he can be discerned as an individual is as part of a vocal trio with Ella and Charlie Linton singing 'There's Frost On The Moon'. At a Chick Webb band rehearsal one day, Louis heard a record by British band-leader Bert Ambrose. Ambrose used timpanis (large tuneable drums) to change keys. Louis was sufficiently inspired to buy a set of timpanis and form his own band in 1938. Louis Jordan and The Tympany Four (sic) began work at the Elks Rendezvous (464 Lenox Avenue at 133rd Street) on 4 August, 1938. Journalist Dan Burley recommended the group to J. Mayo Williams, talent scout and recording manager for Decca records. Although originally set for October, it was a further two months before perfectionist Jordan felt his band was sufficiently well-rehearsed for their initial recording session. After backing Elks Rendezvous vocalist Rodney Sturgis, Louis' group cut 'Honey In The Bee Ball' (for a while, the group's signature tune) and the comedy number 'Barnacle Bill The Sailor' on which Louis plays some strong baritone sax phrases. Released in Decca's 'Race Records' series, the initial record sold well and Jack Kapp gave the go-ahead for further sessions to be recorded. 'Keep A-Knockin'' became a local hit and 'Flat Face', issued in the U.K., was voted top disc of November 1939 by the Number One Rhythm Club. As Louis' fame spread, a live radio link was installed at the Elks Rendezvous and the band broadcast live on WNEW, Mondays and Fridays at 11.30 pm. By the early 1940's, a sizeable number of big band fans had started to listen to small jazz-orientated groups as a preference. Louis, spurred on by the success of small combos led by Stuff Smith, Fats Waller, Mugsy Spanier and John Kirby, added a strong dose of extrovert showmanship to what was now the Tympany Five (although the actual numbers would vary throughout his career they would always be billed as 'Five') and pushed on to greater things. In a September 1940 recording session, the Tympany Five introduced, for the first time on record, their trademark 'shuffle' rhythm, on 'A Chicken Ain't Nothing But A Bird'. Selling a healthy 62,000 copies, this record is a definite landmark in Louis' career. The next upward move was to the Capitol Lounge, one of Chicago's top nightspots, in support of The Mills Brothers, and the band continued their successful recording career. Their recording of 'I'm Gonna Leave You On The Outskirts Of Town' (in response to their earlier hit 'I'm Gonna Move To The Outskirts Of Town') appears in the very first Harlem Hit Parade (24 October, 1942). When the U.S.A. entered World War II in December 1941, Louis Jordan was one of the first bandleaders to volunteer to play for the troups via the U.S.O. By this time, sales for hits like 'Knock Me A Kiss' were reaching 300,000. In July, 1942, Louis was recorded, for the first time, by Milt Gabler, who, more than a decade later, would also be responsible for the Decca recordings of Bill Haley, whose style owed more than a little to Louis Jordan's influence. This session produced one of Louis' best-known numbers, and the inspiration of the eponymous hit musical, 'Five Guys Named Moe'. Now Louis' music was cutting across racial barriers and his good-humoured approach was deemed 'acceptable' to the mass white audience. His live appearances created sell-outs wherever he appeared, and he was one of the first small groups to successfully play the vast ballrooms, which had previously been the domain of the big bands. By 1943, Louis' band was voted into sixth place in Downbeat Magazine's poll of popular jazz bands, behind such luminaries as Duke Ellington and Tommy Dorsey. Also in 1943, Louis added further to his growing fame by featuring his new recording, 'Is You Is Or Is You Ain't My Baby' in the Hollywood movie 'Follow The Boys'. By the time 1944 rolled around, he was billed as 'The King Of The Blues' or 'The King Of The Jukeboxes' and was duetting on record with Bing Crosby on 'Your Sox Don't Match'. The hits kept on coming through the mid-1940's - 'Ration Blues', 'G.I. Jive', 'Mop! Mop!', 'Buzz Me' (estimated to have appeared in 400,000 jukeboxes) and, perhaps his best known number 'Caldonia' (also known as 'Caldonia Boogie'). In order to circumnavigate the fact that he was contracted to another publishing house, Louis assigned the rights to 'Caldonia' to his third wife, Fleecie Moore. The fact that Fleecie held the rights to 'Caldonia' and other Jordan compositions is sited as the reason for their reconciliation following Fleecie's knife attack on him. 'Caldonia' was also a major hit for Woody Herman, thus further increasing its copyright value. Some of Louis' sidemen during his most successful years would become influential in their own right. Wild Bill Davis joined the Tympany Five in 1945 as pianist and arranger and was later replaced by Bill Doggett. Carl Hogan, electric guitarist extraordinaire, was a direct influence on Chuck Berry, who said, 'I identify myself with Louis Jordan more than any other artist.' (Listen to Hogan's guitar licks on 'Ain't That Just Like A Woman' and then realise where else you've heard them). More hits followed. 'Beware' featured in his first full-length movie of the same title, 'Stone Cold Dead In The Market' re-united Louis with Ella Fitzgerald and introduced the intriguing 'calypso' beat, and 'Choo Choo Ch'Boogie' topped the r&b charts for so long in 1946, that it ties with Joe Liggins' 'The Honeydripper' for the most weeks at #1 in the history of the charts (eighteen). Louis continued to command top dollar for appearances all over the country, as 'That Chick's Too Young To Fry', 'Ain't Nobody Here But Us Chickens' and 'Let The Good Times Roll' stormed the charts through into 1947. Be-bop was a trend that Louis chose not to follow, and it may be that this was the start of an imperceptible decline in popularity, although that could hardly be discerned from his record sales through the late 40's and early 50's - 'Jack, You're Dead', 'Boogie Woogie Blue Plate', 'Run Joe', 'Beans And Cornbread' and the wonderful two-sided romp 'Saturday Night Fish Fry' all hit number one in the r&b charts. In 1950, Louis Jordan and Louis Armstrong were united on record on the exhilarating 'You Rascal You' and the jaunty 'Life Is So Peculiar'. By the early 1950's, Louis' exhausting schedule was having a detrimental effect on his health; his arthritis was continually plaguing him and tests showed that the sugar level in his blood was alarmingly high. After a short recuperation at his home in Phoenix, Louis resumed work, but the hits were becoming more infrequent. In late 1953, after examining Louis' recent sales figures, Decca decided not to renew his recording contract. Louis' place at Decca was soon to be filled by a small combo featuring a faster version of the 'Jordan' shuffle - Bill Haley & His Comets. Upon his departure, Louis noted, 'Decca asked me to get on that rock thing, you know, with a big beat. They wanted me to honk on a tenor. I was a little too old for that.' After a short stay with Eddie Mesner's Aladdin label, producing, amongst others, the exciting 'Louis Blues', our man, still continually working, switched, via a short stay at R.C.A./Vik, to Mercury in late 1956, at the height of early rock'n'roll fever. The attendance of such stellar sidemen as Sam 'The Man' Taylor and Mickey Baker, with Quincy Jones as arranger, indicate Mercury's serious intent in rocking up some of Louis' classic songbook, but the resulting sides, whilst superbly crafted, hardly caused a ripple in a world now dominated by a white, snake-hipped sexpot from Memphis. Louis' hit-parade days were firmly a thing of the past. Despite this, Louis kept working hard. In 1962, he visited the U.K. for the first time, where he toured and recorded with traditional jazz revivalist Chris Barber. His new (fifth) wife, Martha Weaver, persuaded Louis to adopt a less bruising schedule, and they settled into a more relaxed way of life at their Los Angeles home, with Louis recording occasionally for Ray Charles' Tangerine label (1962-65) and Pzazz (1968-69). In late 1974, he had a heart attack and was advised by his doctors not to play the saxophone. Admirers continued to offer him work, even if all he did was to sing. But, on 5 February 1975, he died from another heart attack. Louis Jordan was inducted into the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame in 1987 as 'a rock'n'roll forefather' 'Jordan did more to define hep and to prepare white folks for the coming of rock'n'roll than any other man of that era' - Nick Tosches, 'Unsung Heroes Of Rock'n'Roll'' ..yeah, that's Reet, Petite and Gone. Further reading: John Chilton, Let The Good Times Roll : The Story Of Louis Jordan And His Music. London : Quartet Books, 1992. ISBN 0 7043 7025 5. (US edition : Ann Arbor, MI : University of Michigan Press, 1994.) Further listening: too many to mention, but the definitive collection is probably Bear Family's 9-CD boxset 'Let The Good Times Roll' , which will give you all of his Decca recordings. BCD 15557. For his Mercury recordings, 'Rock'n'Roll'; Mercury 838 219-2 Website: http://www.louisjordan.com/ (check out the photo gallery)