The Chronological

You know it's about time somebody took all the little records that Big Joe Turner managed to make back in the day and brought them out in sequence the way they appear in the Classics Chronological Series. Nobody in the world ever sounded quite like Joe Turner and nobody ever will. There is a magical quality that makes his blues performances feel like rituals full of clarity and grace. Each and every Joe Turner record is as beautiful as a massive stand of tiger lilies growing up through the middle of a brickyard, silent, solid, and dignified under the dew in the first light of dawn. Incredibly, despite his enormous popularity during the Second World War, by 1949 this gifted vocalist was scuffling to get recording gigs. Ten tasty sides were cut in Los Angeles for the MGM label with a solid band fairly bursting with hot horns and driven by Pete Johnson's piano. Joe Turner closed out the year by waxing two sides for Rouge Records in Baton Rouge, LA, and four for the Freedom label in Houston, TX. In April of 1950, Joe Turner made a fistful of records in New Orleans backed by Dave Bartholomew & His Orchestra with Fats Domino at the piano.

Tiny Grimes was one of the earliest jazz electric guitarists to be influenced by Charlie Christian, and he developed his own swinging style. Early on, he was a drummer and worked as a pianist in Washington. In 1938, he started playing electric guitar, and two years later he was playing in a popular jive group, the Cats and the Fiddle. During 1943-1944, Grimes was part of a classic Art Tatum Trio which also included Slam Stewart. In September 1944, he led his first record date, using Charlie Parker; highlights include the instrumental "Red Cross" and Grimes' vocal on "Romance Without Finance (Is a Nuisance)." He also recorded for Blue Note in 1946, and then put together an R&B-oriented group, "the Rockin' Highlanders," that featured the tenor of Red Prysock during 1948-1952. Although maintaining a fairly low profile, Tiny Grimes was active up until his death, playing in an unchanged swing/bop transitional style and recording as a leader for such labels as Prestige/Swingville, Black & Blue, Muse, and Sonet.

Her mountainous stature matching the sheer soulful power of her massive vocal talent, Big Maybelle was one of the premier R&B chanteuses of the 1950s. Her deep, gravelly voice was as singular as her recorded output for Okeh and Savoy, which ranged from down-in-the-alley blues to pop-slanted ballads. In 1967, she even covered ? & the Mysterians' "96 Tears" (it was her final chart appearance). Alleged drug addiction leveled the mighty belter at the premature age of 47, but Maybelle packed a lot of living into her shortened lifespan.

Jimmy Witherspoon was either a blues singer who worked from a jazz perspective, or a jazz singer with blues tendencies, or most accurately, a blues singer who applied jazz rhythms to a gospel delivery, which makes him, in some ways, a less propulsive version of Ray Charles. This disc of his earliest recordings, most of them released on Modern Records, shows Witherspoon predominantly as a shouter, and he sounds like a man used to years of fronting a small jazz orchestra. In time his microphone technique would improve, and he learned how to let subtle nuances into his singing, working both ends of the hard/soft dynamic into his phrasing.

Here's a superb segment of the Art Tatum story, beginning with ten trio sides featuring guitarist Tiny Grimes and bowing, singing bassist Slam Stewart. Six marvelous selections recorded May 1, 1944, were subsequently issued on the Comet label. Each of these performances appeared on 12" 78-rpm records, allowing for well over four minutes of…

The Hawks/The Bees - The Chronological Hawks/Bees 1953-1954 (2005) {Classics Blues And Rhythm Series 5160}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 219 Mb | MP3 @320 -> 130 Mb
Full Artwork @ 300 dpi (jpg) -> 10 Mb | 5% repair rar
© 1953-54, 2005 Classics Records / Classics Blues And Rhythm Series | 5160
Rhythm & Blues / Doo Wop / New Orleans R&B

This wasn't the Canadian band who became the Band; the original members of this Hollygrove-New Orleans gospel quartet called the Hawks – Albert Veal, John Henry Morris, Paul Exhano, and Sam Tophia – began their career by calling themselves the Humming Four and were all part of one of the oldest New Orleans-area groups to form in the post-World War era. They later recorded for Imperial Records' local A&R man Dave Bartholomew, who invited the group to work with some of his R&B groups.