Al Hibbler born 16 August 1915

Albert George "Al" Hibbler (August 16, 1915 – April 24, 2001) was an American baritone vocalist, who sang with Duke Ellington's orchestra before having several pop hits as a solo artist. Some of Hibbler's singing is classified as rhythm and blues, but he is best seen as a bridge between R&B and traditional pop music.

According to one authority, "Hibbler cannot be regarded as a jazz singer but as an exceptionally good interpreter of twentieth-century popular songs who happened to work with some of the best jazz musicians of the time."

Hibbler was born in Tyro, Mississippi, United States, and was blind from birth. Some sources give his birth name as Andrew George Hibbler. At the age of 12 he moved to Little Rock, Arkansas, where he attended Arkansas School for the Blind, joining the school choir. After winning an amateur talent contest in Memphis, Tennessee, he began working as a blues singer in local bands.

Blessed with perfect pitch, he became the first black singer to have a radio program in Little Rock (1935–1936) on KGHI. In 1935, he landed a gig with a band called Yellow Jackets. In 1935 he failed his first audition for Duke Ellington.He left Little Rock with Dub Jenkins & His Playmates in 1936, staying with them almost two years. He then spent another two years with Boots and His Buddies out of San Antonio, Texas. In 1942, he joined Jay McShann and his Orchestra and stayed with them for eighteen months. In 1935 he joined Ellington's orchestra, replacing Herb Jeffries.

                              

He stayed with Ellington for almost eight years, and featured on a range of Ellington standards, including "Do Nothin' Til You Hear From Me", the words for which were written specifically for him and which reached # 6 on the Billboard pop chart (and # 1 for eight weeks on the "Harlem Hit Parade") in 1944, "I Ain't Got Nothin' But the Blues," and "I'm Just a Lucky So-and-So". 

Although Hibbler's style was described as "mannered", "over-stated", and "full of idiosyncrasies" and "bizarre vocal pyrotechnics", he was also considered "undoubtedly the best" of Ellington's male vocalists.While with Ellington, Hibbler won the Esquire New Star Award in 1947 and the Down Beat award for Best Band Vocalist in 1949.

Toward the end of time with Ellington, Mr. Hibbler's specialties became songs like ''Trees'' and ''Danny Boy'' -- oddments in an Ellington show but indicative of the singer's future career as a ballads-and-standards singer. All told, he made eighty-two recordings with the Duke Ellington Orchestra before he left to launch a solo career in 1951 after a dispute over his wages. He then recorded with various bands including those of Johnny Hodges and Count Basie, and for various labels including Mercury and Norgran, a subsidiary of Verve Records, for whom he released an LP, Al Hibbler Favorites, in 1953. In 1954 he released a more successful album, Al Hibbler Sings Duke Ellington, and in 1955, he started recording with Decca Records, with immediate success.

His rendition of 'Unchained Melody' was featured in the film 'Unchained' (1955) and was his biggest hit reaching # 3 on the US pop chart. It sold over one million copies, and was awarded a gold disc. Hibbler's version also reached # 2 in the United Kingdom, becoming his only British chart success. Its success led to network appearances, including a live jazz club remote on NBC's Monitor. Other hits were "He" (1955), "11th Hour Melody" and "Never Turn Back" (both in 1956). "After the Lights Go Down Low" (also in 1956) was his last top ten hit.

In the late 1950s and 1960s, Hibbler became a civil rights activist, marching with protestors and getting arrested in 1959 in New Jersey and in 1963 in Alabama. The notoriety of this activism discouraged major record labels from carrying his work, but Frank Sinatra supported him and signed him to a contract with his label, Reprise Records.

In 1971, Hibbler sang two songs at Louis Armstrong's funeral. In

1972 he made an album, A Meeting of the Times, with another fiercely independent blind musician, the multi-instrumentalist Rahsaan Roland Kirk. Hibbler made very few recordings after that, occasionally doing live appearances through the 1990s. His last public appearance was in January 1999, at a Jazz at Lincoln Centre evening of Ellington alumni, when he performed at a late-evening party. Seated, and using a vibrato as over-the-top as ever, he sang ''Time After Time.''

He died at Holy Cross Hospital in Chicago in 2001, at the age of 85. He is buried at Lincoln Cemetery in Blue Island, Illinois. He has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for Recording at 1650 Vine Street.

(Edited mainly from Wikipedia)