The Legends Of Specialty Series Part 1

Among recent reissues in Fantasy's The Legends of Specialty series are the second volumes devoted to Roy Milton, Joe Liggins, Jimmy Liggins and Percy Mayfield along with a volume of Art Neville's Specialty recordings. Another reissue, Shouting the Blues, includes Joe Turner's recordings for the Texas Freedom label, Big Maceo's Specialty sides, and recordings by Smilin' Smokey Lynn
and H-Bomb Ferguson. Musically, most of these recordings date from the heyday of jump blues, the late forties through the mid-fifties. All six releases contain Billy Vera's perceptive annotations and discographical information.

The two prime reissues have to be Memory Pain (Specialty) by Percy Mayfield, and Groovy Blues (Specialty), by Roy Milton. Blues Poet is a label bestowed on many, but no more deservingly than on Percy Mayfield, who was also an urbane vocalist whose recorded such classics as Please Send Me Someone To Love, Strange Things Happening (both heard here in alternate takes), I Need
Love So Bad and The Voice Within. While Specialty's earlier volume of Mayfield's recordings, The Poet of the Blues is the essential Mayfield collection, this contains a number of excellent performances (although a few rough spots may be heard), and has a 1960 demo of his Hit the Road Jack, that became a monster hit for Ray Charles.

Drummer-vocalist Roy Milton was Specialty's first and biggest star until Little Richard. The Oklahoma born Milton was nearly forty when his easy going shuffle R.M. Blues was a hit in 1945, and proceded to make numerous 'jump blues' recordings over the next decade as his band the Solid Senders produced a scaled down version of the territory big bands of the thirties (such as that of Count Basie or Jay MacShann). As Billy Vera notes, economic factors led to the demise of the big bands, while recording techniques improved to make it possible for a five to eight piece combo to have almost as much a punch as a full big band leading many swing era musicians like Milton to adopt the approach of the Count Basie riff-oriented blues-based territory band in a smaller configuration with bluesy novelty vocals, honking sax solos, solid riffs, bass-heavy boogie rhythm and a heavy accent on the second and fourth beats. Few succeeded with this formula as did Milton whose warmly delivered vocals and solid rhythm anchored a strong combo which featured the wonderful boogie woogie piano of Camille Howard (who also takes several of the vocals, but her singing is not as earthy as her playing). Milton was equally at home with a rocking shuffle, or a remake of a standard like On the Sunny Side of The Street (with his vocal indebted to Louis Armstrong), or My Blue Heaven. Big Band roots are revealed by the versions of One O'Clock Jump and I Want a Little Girl from the Count Basie canon, and Thomas Dorsey's Marie. While Camille Howard's vocal on the title track, Groovy Blues, is bland, the music here is anything but bland.

This review appeared in Jazz & Blues Report in 1993. I am splitting it up and will include this top paragraph with all three parts. I received my review copies from Fantasy Records. I am not sure about the availability of these albums, although one might check ebay. Here is Percy Mayfield singing Memory Pain.

Happy New Year

Happy New Year to all. here are a few videos for you to enjoy.

From Lightnin' Hopkins

and from Blind Lemon Jefferson

and from Charlie Jordan

and Lonnie Johnson

and a little Charles Brown

and from Roy Milton a New Years Resolution

And let us remember auld lang syne

First Bobby Timmons with the late Butch Warren on bass

Next Jim Cullen

and Dejan's Olympia Brass Band

and finally Guy Lombardo and His Royal Canadians

Big Joe Turner's Birthday Boogie Woogie Jubilee With Axel Zwingenberger

I have many fond memories of the late Big Joe Turner, one of the greatest blues shouters of all time. I had the honor to emcee Big Joe and Lloyd Glenn at Buffalo’s Tralfamadore Cafe in 1977 and saw him a number of times in New York whether at the Lone Star, Trammps or Fat Tuesday’s. In the 1970s he became acquainted with a young German pianist Axel Zwingenberger who played boogie woogie in the manner of the boogie woogie legends Pete Johnson (with whom Turner sang with in Kansas City, New York and Los Angeles), Albert Ammons and Meade Lux Lewis. Zwingenberger is still around and one of a number of individuals throughout the world still playing classic boogie woogie, showing his deep appreciation for the greats of the idiom while displaying his own touch.

Boogie Woogie Jubilee is among the albums that Big Joe and Axel recorded together and currently available on Vagabond Records. It was recorded on May 1981 at Big Joe Turner’s Los Angeles home with the legendary jump blues band leader sitting in on drums. This is a wonderful informal house party recording and the occasion of this back yard party was Joe Turner’s 70th Birthday Party. And after Joe makes a comment to his friends, Axel launches into some Albert Ammons inspired boogie woogie before Joe shouts Hide and Seek Boogie, bringing together of some traditional blues verses and asking the audience “are you ready.” Audience claps reinforce Roy Milton’s steady drumming that helps propel Zwingenberger’s boogie woogie piano as well as Big Joe’s singing.

Big Joe generally was in terrific voice that afternoon. He sounds at times even stronger than as on of his contemporaneous recordings for Pablo and other labels. There are takes on some of the songs most associated with Turner such as Chains Of Love, Flip, Flop & Fly, Cherry Red, and Piney Brown Blues, wonderfully delivered with the strong, sympathetic accompaniment. And one can hear the audience enjoying these performances. The highpoint might be the title track, an extended vocal jam between Turner, Eddie ‘Cleanhead’ Vinson and Margie Evans and Cleanhead wishes Big Joe ‘Happy Birthday’ during his vocal here. There is one boogie woogie piano instrumental, California Crawl, that places Zwingenberger’s marvelous piano in the fore front as he conjures up Meade Lux Lewis and Albert Ammons.

Boogie Woogie Jubilee is a superb album with outstanding blues vocals and marvelous boogie woogie piano. I also recommend a studio recording by Big Joe and Axel, Let’s Boogie Woogie All Night Long, from a few years earlier, where Axel’s brother Torsten handles the drums which Johnny Otis engineered, and another disc has him with Lionel Hampton. Recent albums has him in a trio with Charlie Watts on drums and accompanying Albert Ammons granddaughter. I will be giving my thoughts on some of these other albums by Axel in future blogs.

I purchased this and several other albums by Axel directly from him at his website, http://www.boogiewoogie.net/2/en/0/a/0/aktuelles.html, and hear some clips from the recordings. Some may be available from third party sellers in the United States.


Here is Axel with Charlie Watts on Jools Holland's program Later, that includes a clip of boogie woogie classics. Then a video of Big Joe Turner from the American Folk Blues Festival in 1966.

Lil Greenwood, Former Ellington Vocalist Passed Away At 86.

Lil Greenwood at 2009 Ponderosa Stomp. House of Blues, New Orleans
Photo © Ron Weinstock

Lil Greenwood, who once sang with the Duke Ellington Orchestra, as well as recorded for the Modern and Federal labels, died on Tuesday, July 19, 2011 at the age of 86 in her native Alabama. She had suffered a stroke in Fall 2010 and had been in declining health since then.


A preacher's daughter from Pritchard, Alabama, who moved to the San Francisco Bay area where she found work as a nightclub singer and entertainer. In the early fifties, she spent three years with Roy Milton and His Solid Senders and her sessions for Modern Records were cut with this band with her first release being the June 1950 issued blues belter "Heart Full Of Pain," that was coupled with the up-tempo "Boogie All Night Long," that featured Jackie Kelso on alto sax and Camille Howard on piano. The Modern sides also included a live pair of songs recorded at Gene Norman's "Blues Jubilee."


She then recorded for Federal Records, a subsidiary of the Cincinnati based King Records. Her sessions were recorded in Los Angeles under the direction of legendary producer Ralph Bass (who produced among other things James Brown's first recordings. These sides were often with vocal backing by the likes of the Four Jacks or Thurston Harris and the Lamplighters along with "Monday Morning Blues," a vocal duet with Little Willie Littlefield.

All of the Modern and Federal recordings were issued on a wonderful English Ace reissue, "Walking and Singing the Blues." After these recordings she returned to the San Francisco area returning to nightclubs and where her manager got Duke Ellington to listen to her. Ellington was quoted, in the April 1960 Ebony Magazine, about her, “This girl has a voice that’s a mixture of Marian Anderson, Ella Fitzgerald, Dinah Washington and Mahalia Jackson; and I don’t know but what she’s better on spirituals than when she’s walking and singing the blues." It led her to singing with the Ellington Orchestra from 1956 to the early sixties.


Eventually she returned to Alabama to take care of relatives and dropped from public view. Her career enjoyed a renaissance after 2000 as she received awards, had her early recordings reissued and recorded a new album, "Back to My Roots" with composer David Amram and others. She was much beloved and there was a concert in her honor this past Sunday which she was unable to attend.

I had the pleasure to see her as part of the Ponderosa Stomp in late April 2009 and she was terrific. Still a singer of great style and feeling, she brought perhaps a more uptown sheen to her performances than most of those that night. There is an you tube video of her singing "Summertime" from that performance. It was my only opportunity to see her perform but a memorable one. Her legacy is perhaps not as known as it should have been, but she touched many over the years.


In drafting this blog entry, I have drawn heavily on (and paraphrased) material from her website, http://www.lilgreenwood.net/, along with the Ace Records website entry on her reissue, http://www.acerecords.co.uk/content.php?page_id=59&release=813, and the Press-Register blog on her passing, http://blog.al.com/entertainment-press-register/2011/07/memorial_services_thursday_fri.html.

Specialty Profiles Evidence of Art Rupe's Hall of Fame Career

Art Rupe was just honored as one of the two Ahmet Ertegun honorees (to non-musicians for contributions to Rock and Roll) by the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and will be honored along with Dr. John, Neil Diamond, and Tom Waits. Rupe was an important independent record company pioneer whose Specialty Records label produced some of the classic jump blues, gospel and early rock and roll recordings. As Billy Vera says in the booklet accompanying the 5 CD box set, The Specialty Story, “If Art Rupe and his Specialty Records, had done nothing more than give us Little Richard, he would still deserve a place in the rock ’n’ roll triumvirate along with Sam Phillips (Sun Records) and Leonard and Phil Chess (Chess Records). … In little over ten years activity, Specialty Records growth paralleled, and perhaps defined, the evolution of black popular music—from the “race” music of the 1940s to the rock ’n’ roll of the 1950s.”


Specialty issued some amazing recordings. The core of the label’s output can be found on the afore-mentioned The Specialty Story which includes (among its 130 recordings) recordings that charted as well as recordings by artists or are of songs that would later become important. The box, specifically does exclude Specialty’s jazz recordings and only provides a token representation of the important Gospel catalog of the label. After Fantasy acquired the Specialty catalog (in 1990 I believe), they began issuing a great number of reissues from the Specialty catalog. Concord Music acquired the Fantasy catalog and have some new reissues of such material as well as many of the fantasy reissues remain still available. Concord did in 2006 issue some budget reissues that I reviewed initially for the December 2006 Jazz & Blues Report (Issue 289), which I am posting today in part to salute Mr. Rupe.

Those purchasing these budget reissues may well wish to check out the prior excellent reissues of these artists as well as releases by such important performers as Guitar Slim, Little Richard, Brother Joe May, The Pilgrim Travelers, Don & Dewey and Wyonna Carr.


Concord Music Group’s release of six initial Specialty Profile budget reissues hopefully will introduce some to the great music that has been issued by Fantasy Records prior to Concord’s acquisition of the label last year. Originally called Juke Box, Specialty was one of the independent labels that emerged after World War II that was central in the release of so much rhythm’n’blues, gospel and blues as well as some of the most important pioneering rock ’n’ roll recordings. These releases have 14 performances by the featured artist and a second bonus CD with ten performances by various Specialty artists.

Roy Milton, inspired by the big bands led his Solid Senders, the prototypical jump blues band, that in its tight, punchy sound captured some of the flavor of the bigger bands on a program of blues and jump numbers. Milton was a swinging drummer and an ingratiating vocalist with a terrific band that featured the wonderful pianist Camille Howard. Milton had many charting records, which became staples of the emerging rhythm and blues music. Two of his recordings Milton’s Boogie, his version of Count Basie’s Boogie Woogie and Milton’s Hop Skip & Jump were recorded by Elmore James pianist Little Johnnie Jones while such numbers as R.M. Blues and Information Blues still appeal with the strong driving swing and superb musicianship. This is terrific stuff.

John Lee Hooker recorded prolifically between the late forties and early fifties for a variety of labels including Specialty who acquired sides produced by Bernie Besman in Detroit. The 14 selections presented by Specialty capture Hooker on his driving one-chord boogies such as his revisiting of his first hit, Boogie Chillen, his slow brooding lament about a cheating woman which he would later visit for Vee-Jay, I’m Mad, and the hot duet with harmonica player Eddie Burns, Burnin’ Hell, where he proclaims “Ain’t no heaven, ain’t no burning hell” as he lays down a hot boogie guitar riff.“ There is a small combo version of Rosco Gordon’s No More Doggin’. This is this writer’s favorite period of John Lee Hooker’s recording with some of his most powerful recordings to which this disc is an excellent introduction.

After Fats Domino, probably no New Orleans artist had the impact of one Lloyd Price whose recording Lawdy Miss Clawdy, was one of the first rhythm and blues hit recordings to cross over to a white audience in a massive fashion. Price went on to a celebrated recording and performing career. The 14 selections here come from two CDs of his music and is a reasonable sample of his earliest recordings, dating from 1952 or 1953 with the exception of 1956’s Rock ‘n’ Roll Dance. Price’s earliest recordings for Specialty had him backed by Dave Bartholomew’s legendary studio band with Fats Domino on piano for the Lawdy Miss Clawdy session while later sessions included pianists Edward Frank and Huey ‘Piano’ Smith and such horn players as Wallace Davenport and Herb Hardesty. These tracks are classic New Orleans R&B with tracks like Mailman Blues, or Where You At? being hot rockers. Price’s youth perhaps leads to some vocals sounding as a bit overwrought (If Crying Was Murder).


Larry Williams was Lloyd Price’s second cousin, and born in New Orleans although his family moved to the West Coast in his youth, returning to the New Orleans a couple of times, including stints with his cousin as driver and valet and then briefly with Fats Domino. He joined Specialty around the time Little Richard had quit music and with hits like Bony Moronie, Short Fat Fanny and Dizzy Miss Lizzy, which also influenced an imaginative John in Liverpool. He was a solid pianist, pounding out his boogie rocking licks backed by some of the best studio bands in Hollywood with transplanted New Orleans drummer Earl Palmer anchoring things. These were splendid rock and roll recordings. There is a nice rendition of his cousin’s Just Because along with Sonny Bono’s High School Dance and She Said Yeah, the coupling Bad Boy and Slow Down, covered by the Beatles, and Little School Girl, a reworking of the blues classic Good Morning Little Schoolgirl. Williams could not handle success leading to drug problems and an early death, but his legacy is these terrific recordings.

Percy Mayfield was labeled The Poet Laureate of the Blues, for his wonderfully crafted sophisticated blues. As a performer, he sang with an intimacy that matched the sophistication of his lyrics. Until disfigured in an auto accident he had the looks to make him a major star and still remained an major songwriter (hired by Rat Charles) as well as a performer who continued to make thoughtful and sophisticated recordings until his death. His songs, including Please Send Me Someone to Love, Strange Things Happening, The River’s Invitation, Lost Love (aka Baby Please) and Lost Mind, have become blues standards and his original recordings are terrific. Given that only 14 selections were chosen, Mayfield’s early demo of Hit the Road, Jack, might have been omitted along with the duet with Joy Hamilton, Sugar Mama-Peachy Papa, as they are below the level of these other included recordings.


The last of the reissues is devoted to the legendary Sam Cooke with the Soul Stirrers and includes of a nice sampling of his early gospel recordings along with several of his earliest pop recordings. Nine of the selections are Cooke as a member of the Soul Stirrers in which he shares the lead with Paul Foster whose vocals are as remarkable as Cooke’s. Listen to the closing I’m Gonna Build Right on That Shore, where Foster takes the first lead with Cooke taking the lead mid- song and then the two trade lead verses. Its a remarkable performance but just one of several classic gospel recordings here including renditions of Thomas Dorsey’s Peace in the Valley, Cooke’s Touch the Hem of His Garment and Jesus Gave Me Water. The five pop performances by Cooke include I’ll Come Running Back to You, Lovable and I Don’t Want to Cry, but Cooke’s mostly are overshadowed by his later pop recordings. Still, this is a fine overview of early Sam Cooke and the Soul Stirrers recordings that sound fresh even today.

Johnny Otis' Loving Celebration of Blues & Rhythm Music

Johnny Otis The Johnny Otis Show Live At Monterey (Epic / Legacy) This compact disc reissue of Johnny Otis rhythm and blues spectacular from 1970’s Monterey Jazz Festival is long overdue (part of which was in Clint Eastwood’s film,Play Misty For Me). Bringing together some of the giants of the music, (none of these still with us twenty three years later) Big Joe Turner, Eddie Vinson, Roy Brown, Pee Wee Crayton, Ivory Joe Hunter, Roy Milton and Little Esther Phillips, this was not merely some exercise in nostalgia, but rather a first rate afternoon of jump blues. They are all in great form with Turner’s I Got a Girl going back to his KC days, while Cleanhead and Roy Milton keep a nice groove going and Ivory Joe Hunter sings a ballad. Highpoint of the proceedings has to be Esther Phillips’ two songs, showing very much her Dinah Washington roots, but tearing into Cry Me a River Blues (with a great Clifford Solomon tenor solo) and Little Esther’s Blues, a medley of Blowtop Blues, T Bone Blues and Jelly Jelly. Johnny (who is still with us) reprises Willie and the Hand Jive. Also present were son Shuggie, and singers Margie Evans and Delmar Evans, part of Otis’ then current review. Shuggie has a country slide guitar feature, and a rocking electric guitar blues instrumental, Delmar Evans does a credible You Better Look Out, modeled on some Howlin’ Wolf songs, and teams with Johnny for Goin’ Back to L.A., a great take-off on Sweet Home Chicago. Otis put together a killer band, who really jump the blues. There has been hardly anything recorded in this vein since this that has come close to equalling this good rocking time. This review originally appeared in the December 1993 Jazz & Blues Report, contemporaneous with the reissue of this classic album which I purchased when it first came out. Unfortunately the CD apparently is not currently in print although it is likely available from some vendors that sell to collectors. It is available for download on amazon and itunes and likely other sources. It remains a celebration of classic post-war blues and R&B that will never be equaled. And Johnny Otis is still with us 17 years later after this was reissued. In case you missed it, there is a terrific biography of Otis, Midnight at the Barrelhouse: The Johnny Otis Story by George Lipsitz published by University of Minnesota Press and available from amazon and other sources.

Roy Milton's Miltone label delighted both musically and visually

The British Acrobat label has been issuing a number of very intriguing public domain reissues of classic rhythm & blues, often focusing on a specific label. While these releases may duplicate reissues of various recordings, such reissues often have a lot of unfamiliar material. Also, the releases gather together a variety of material that ranges from blues to gospel quartet, vocal group, pop, swing jazz and more. I point to reissues from vintage labels as Trilon, Big Town, Olivet or Irma as examples.

One reissue of special note is of the Miltone label that the great Roy Milton was a co-owner of. The attractive labels often sported illustrations from cartoonist William "Alex" Alexander that made them a treasure trove for collectors. The label was centered on Roy Milton and His Solid Senders, one of the premier jump blues bands, but included a number of other terrific recordings. Like other Acrobat label reissues, this disc contains a detailed label history and artist notes from Opal Louis Nations as well as some terrific sounds. The liner booklet also contains plenty of label illustrations.

The set opens with four solo sides by The Blues Troubadour, Jesse Thomas, who had recorded for Victor in 1929. Thomas, from Shreveport Louisiana, superficially comes off as a country blues artist as a solo performer, but his dazzling single note guitar and bop-tinged vocals (the delightful D. Double Due Love You being one example), sound modern six decades later. Then there is Jimmy Grissom, the Mississippi born singer who fronted the Blenders and Miltone vocal groups as well as share solo spots with Camille Howard, Milton's featured pianist. One interesting single was Miltone 4001 which coupled You Look So Good To Me b/w The Signifying Monkey, two early Willie Dixon classics with the Big Three Trio. Some of the sides with The Blenders featured comedienne and singer Effie Smith who sang Answer to R.M.Blues, an answer song to one of Milton's biggest hits.

Of course there are a number of Milton's big hits like Milton's Boogie, Red Light, Sunny Side of the Street, and Rainy Day Confession Blues, although some of the transfers here are noisier than those reissued on Specialty. Other delights are five stunning vocals from Little Miss Cornshucks and a number of sides from New Orleans legends like Roy Brown, Paul Gayten and Annie Laurie. So included here is Chubby Newsome's Hip Shakin' Mama; Roy Brown's Long About Midnight; Paul Gayten's Hey Little Girl; and Paul Gayton with Annie Laurie doing the classic Since I Fell For You. Through in some down home blues by Wright Holmes, and blues shouting from The Great Gates, and one has a real fine sampling of late forties R&B with many terrific recordings.

This is available from various Internet retailers like bluebeatmusic.com or amazon.