"Over the Rainbow"
Artist - Judy Garland with Victor Young and his Orchestra
If James Brown is the "hardest working man in show business" Judy Garland—born Francis "Baby" Gumm—has no competition as the hardest working woman. Between 1924 and her death in 1969 she appeared in thirty-two movies (and did voice-overs for two more), thirty television specials, thousands of concerts and performances on Broadway, and she recorded almost one hundred singles and a dozen albums.
There was really never a time when she wasn't working. Her parents were former vaudeville performers who owned a theater in Grand Rapids, Minnesota. Judy made her stage debut at the age of two, as part of a song and dance act with her sisters Susie and Jimmie. The Gumm Sisters were popular local attractions, and after getting as far as they could in Grand Rapids their parents decided to take them to California, where the family moved. The girls made regular appearances on radio programs and in night clubs while they took dance and acting classes and tried to break into the movies. The girls were featured in several short films, but Baby was the one who seemed destined for stardom, pending a name change. She was signed by MGM in 1935; the next year, just shy of her fourteenth birthday, she made her first record.
While she made a string of hit musicals, several dramatic films, and a series of perky pictures with fellow child star Mickey Rooney, she is best remembered for The Wizard of Oz and her heartfelt performance of "Somewhere over the Rainbow." "Rainbow" was composed by songwriter Harold Arlen, who had already penned a number of jazz and popular standards, including "Stormy Weather," and "I've Got a Right to Sing the Blues." He and lyricist Yip Harburg sketched the song quickly but felt it wasn't quite right, so they turned to Ira Gershwin for advice. He suggested a more subdued setting (reminding them that the song wasn't really for Judy Garland, but rather, for Dorothy Gale) and the final lines, "If happy little bluebirds fly above the rainbow why can't I?" MGM executives thought the song ruined the pacing of the film and tried to cut it three times before finally deciding to leave it in. The song won the 1940 Oscar for Best Song and became Judy Garland's theme song for life. Her interpretation was so definitive that others who record the song have to take care to come up with a new approach; many sing the verse, which did not appear in the film and which Garland rarely performed.
Must Haves:
- "The Trolley Song"
- "You Made Me Love You"
- "Together Wherever We Go" (with daughter Liza Minelli)
- "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas"
Performers Influenced By This Artist:
"I'm sittin' On Top of the World"
Artist - Les Paul and Mary Ford
In the early 1950s Les Paul and Mary Ford, his wife and singing partner, were pop music superstars. Paul started his career as a country musician, but he also played with jazz giants like Coleman Hawkins and Art Tatum, and was praised for his fluid technique, hard-swinging style, and lighthearted manner.
Les Paul is most celebrated today as a technological innovator. He is perhaps most famous for the Gibson Les Paul, the end result of his early tinkering with electronic amplification. He electrified his first guitar (a standard acoustic model) by attaching the pickup from a telephone receiver and a phonograph needle to the bridge of the instrument, and then wiring the pickup to two radios, which he used for speakers. Early electric guitars often created ugly overtones and feedback; Paul figured out that if the instrument's volume came from a pickup, the hollow body was unnecessary. He created an instrument he called the "Log"—a piece of pine with strings and a pickup attached. Audiences found it so disturbing that he had to attach carved pieces to the outside to make it resemble a conventional guitar; if anyone doubted the benefits of the solid-body instrument, he removed its disguise.
Paul also conducted the earliest known attempts at overdubbing; before the advent of tape recording this involved precisely synching two turntables and recording the result on a disc-cutting lathe—an almost impossible task. He built a recording studio in his garage using simple equipment, and there produced hits for Andrews Sisters and Bing Crosby, experimenting with new techniques like close miking and echo delay. After World War II Paul gained access to a reel-to-reel tape recorder that had been taken from the Nazis; this new technology made overdubbing much simpler. Paul started producing records with layer upon layer of instruments and vocals, something he called the "New Sound." His first hit with Mary Ford, "Lover," involved eight overdubbed layers, and it was like nothing that had been heard before. The novelty of their sound, as well as Paul's excellent guitar work and Ford's graceful voice, propelled them to stardom; they not only had a number of hit records, but also a radio and TV show, Les Paul and Mary Ford at Home, that ran for seven years.
Also see:Django Reinhardt, Gene Autry, Dinah Shore, Andrews Sisters
Must Haves:
- "Mockin' Bird Hill"
- "How High the Moon"
- "Vaya Con Dios"
- "The World Is Waiting for the Sunrise"
Performers Influenced By This Artist:
"Hey Good Looking'"
Artist - Hank Williams
Hank Williams was the father of modern country music, whose stories of heartache and sorrow, told in plain, simple language, captured for many the essence of despair. Robbie Robertson of the band has said, "If you're talking about hurting, Hank Williams tells the story better than anybody." The tone of his lyrics—direct, simple, and heartfelt—are what set Hank Williams apart, and the words come from his lifelong association with the blues. Williams's mentor and first music teacher was a local blues singer, Rufus Payne, who was called Tee Tot; Williams was captivated by the older man's playing and asked if Payne would show him some chords. The relationship seems to have gone beyond a simple lesson or two; Tee Tot was more like a mentor and substitute for Williams's own father, who was frequently absent, and they played together on the streets and at house parties in and around Montgomery. Unfortunately Rufus Payne never recorded, so it is difficult to gauge how much of the older man's style was reflected in the music of his protégé, although Jerry Wexler, the head of Atlantic records quite clearly heard the heavy strain of the blues that ran through Williams's music. Hank Williams definitely learned two of the key elements of the blues: you should sing about what you know; and that even in the greatest misery there is hope so long as it is shared.
There was room for such music in the years immediately after World War II. Ernest Tubbs and Lefty Frizzell were introducing a new kind of country music, one that focused on the travails of modern life and was rooted in urban, rather than rural, environments.
In Montgomery, Williams formed a band, the Drifting Cowboys, and soon secured a radio job playing favorite country and western hits, and he became a local celebrity. Eager to expand his career, he traveled to Nashville in the hopes of meeting Fred Rose, co-owner of the Acuff-Rose publishing firm. He did, and Rose was so impressed by his music that he had Williams record a couple of songs on his Sterling label. Both songs were successful, and Williams was offered a contract by MGM. Williams recorded a string of hit records and soon became a favorite of the new, young audience that flocked to the studio when he was on the Grand Old Opry or the Louisiana Hayride. However, his personal life was disintegrating; he and his wife divorced, he became addicted to painkillers, and began drinking heavily. He died of a heart attack in the back seat of his Cadillac on the way to a concert on New Year's Day 1953; "Hey Good Lookin'," perhaps his biggest hit, was released posthumously.
Also seeRufus Payne, Ernest Tubb, Roy Acuff
Must Haves:
- Every country musician since the 1950s
- Bob Dylan
- the Flying Burrito Brothers
- the Band
- the Everly Brothers
- Bruce Springsteen
"Moaning at Midnight"
Artist - Howlin' Wolf
Howlin' Wolf (Chester A. Burnett, 1910–76) was one of the biggest stars of the Chicago blues, second only to the great Muddy Waters. A consummate performer with a commanding physical presence (6'6", 300 pounds), he was known for being able to rock a house down to its very foundations; he would lunge about the stage, climb curtains, do back flips and anything else he could think of to get an audience on its feet. He was also a powerful vocalist; though his rough, growling voice has been compared to "the sound of heavy machinery operating on a gravel road," he used it to deliver emotionally charged blues that contained hints of both malice and playfulness.
Howlin' Wolf was born in a small town in the Mississippi hill country. At the age of thirteen, he moved in with his father, who lived in the Delta region, where a powerful blues tradition was taking shape. Wolf found himself captivated by the music. When he turned eighteen, his father bought him a guitar, and Wolf convinced the legendary Charley Patton to give him lessons. He learned to play the harmonica from a boyfriend of his sister's, who went by the name Sonny Boy Williamson (Alec Rice Miller). When he wasn't working on his father's farm he traveled the region playing the blues with artists like Patton, Son House, and Robert Johnson.
In 1941 Howlin' Wolf was drafted and served in the Army Signal Corps. After a nervous breakdown and several bad years he moved to West Helena, Arkansas, and put together a band. Several years later he came to the attention of producer Sam Philips, who offered him a chance to make records. The two singles, "Moanin' at Midnight" and "How Many More Years," soared to the top of the Billboard R&B charts.
In the 1950s Howlin' Wolf joined the stable of Chess Records in Chicago, the label that had distributed many of the records he made with Philips. Wolf formed a longstanding partnership with guitarist Hubert Sumlin, whose lead guitar lines perfectly complemented Wolf's vocals; the singer even once threatened Muddy Waters when he hired Sumlin for a short tour! The Wolf/Waters rivalry drove both to greater heights of excellence, and the pair dominated the Chicago club scene that also included Elmore James, Big Joe Williams, B. B. King, Junior Walker, and Buddy Guy. Another member of the Chicago crowd was Willie Dixon, who wrote numerous hits for both Waters and Wolf.
In the 1960s Wolf gained a new audience; British blues and jazz fans regarded the bluesman—along with his contemporaries Muddy Waters and John Lee Hooker—as a living legend. The Rolling Stones refused to appear on the American pop program Shindig! unless Howlin' Wolf was invited as well, and the image of Britain's second most popular export sitting at the feet of the older musician, who was unknown to most Americans, launched a new phase of his career. His song "Smoke Stack Lightning" was in the Top 40 in England in 1964, outselling a cover version by the Yardbirds that was released earlier in the year.
Howlin' Wolf has been inducted into Blues Hall of Fame, Grammy Hall of Fame, and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame (as a founding influence). In 2004 Rolling Stone ranked him number 51 in their list of the 100 Greatest Artists of All Time.
Also see:Charley Patton, Tommy Johnson, Sonny Boy Williamson (Rice Miller), Jimmie Rodgers
Must Haves:
- "Smoke Stack Lightning"
- "Spoonful"
- "Moanin' at Midnight"
- "Little Red Rooster"
Performers Influenced By This Artist:
- The Yardbirds
- the Rolling Stones
- Led Zeppelin
- the Animals
- Joe Cocker
- Cream
- Spencer Davis Group
"Shake, Rattle, and Roll"
Artist - Big Joe Turner
Big Joe Turner, aka "the boss of the blues," was a blues shouter, a singer who developed his powerful vocal style while working as a bartender in one of the many saloons in Kansas City's notorious Tenderloin district. Under 1930s mayor Teddy Pendergast, Kansas City was wide open territory where every vice imaginable was available for a price and the bars literally never closed. Turner sang while mixing drinks when the mood took him; the house piano player, Pete Johnson, soon noticed that he and Turner could perform songs together, even though they were at opposite ends of the club! Their partnership lasted for two decades, and in 1938 the two were chosen to represent Kansas City's version of the swinging blues piano style called boogie-woogie at the famous "From Spirituals to Swing" concert at Carnegie Hall. The event was staged by jazz fan and record producer John Hammond and was intended to demonstrate the history of African American music from slavery to the present day. The two performed several numbers including "Roll 'Em Pete," still a jazz and boogie-woogie classic. The concert launched a nationwide craze for boogie-woogie piano. Johnson went on to boogie-woogie fame as the partner of Albert Ammons. Turner sang with the famous Count Basie Orchestra and other Kansas City bands that made powerful, riff-based music based on a hard-driving, four-to-the-bar feel. In the early 1950s Turner was discovered by Neshui Ertegun of Atlantic Records, who made him a solo recording artist. Turner had a string of hit records during the '50s and early '60s, and he was often chosen by critics in the United States and England as the best jazz vocalist in the world.
The song "Shake, Rattle, and Roll" was written by African American bandleader and songwriter Jesse Stone and was first recorded by Turner in 1954. Cover versions were subsequently recorded by Bill Haley and the Comets (with a set of "cleaner" lyrics, as the originals were deemed too suggestive for white radio) and Elvis Presley. While the Presley version never found an audience, Bill Haley's was wildly successful. It hit only number seven on the U.S. charts, but in England it topped the charts twice and launched rock and roll in that country.
Also see:Ethel Waters, Bessie Smith, Jimmy Rushing
Must Haves:
- "Roll 'Em Pete" (with Pete Johnson)
- "Corrine Corrina"
- "Chains of Love"
- "Honey, Hush"
Performers Influenced By This Artist:
- Wynonie Harris
- Joe Williams
- Ruth Brown
- Big Maybelle