Jimmy Yancey born 20 January 1894

James Edwards "Jimmy" Yancey (February 20, 1894 - September 17, 1951) was an African American pianist, composer, and lyricist, most noted for his piano work in the boogie-woogie style that eventually became a recognizable element of uptempo blues and early rock and roll.

Jimmy Yancey, the Father of boogie, was born in Chicago February 20th, (depending on the source) 1894, or 1898. His older brother Alonzo Yancey (born in 1894, in Chicago died in 1944, in Chicago) was a pianist as well; their father was a guitarist.

Yancey worked originally as a singing, dancing vaudevillian, while still a small child. He had just turned 20 after touring the USA and Europe, and then began teaching himself to play the piano.He played at rent parties and clubs in Chicago from 1915 and gradually built up a reputation. In fact, he is said to have given ideas to Albert Ammons and Meade Lux Lewis—those two famous boogie pianists. Nevertheless, Jimmy Yancey felt that music was an uncertain way to make a living, so he became a groundsman with the Chicago White Sox baseball team in 1925.He did continue to play piano, though, and was one of the prime-movers in establishing boogie-woogie.

Yancey was a musician's musician, remaining mostly unknown and unheard outside of Chicago until 1936, when Meade Lux Lewis recorded one of his tunes, "Yancey Special." Three years later, producer Dan Qualey became the first to record Yancey for his new Solo Art label. After the Victor recordings, Yancey went on to record for OKeh and Bluebird.

While he played in a boogie-woogie style, with a strong-repeated figure in the left hand and melodic decoration in the right hand, his playing was delicate and subtle, rather than hard driving. He popularized a left hand figure which became known as the 'Yancey bass', and was later used in Pee Wee Crayton's "Blues After Hours", Guitar Slim's "The Things That I Used to Know" and many other songs. Part of Yancey's distinctive style was that he played in a variety of keys but always ended every song in E flat. He was also an undistinguished blues singer, accompanying himself on piano.

Yancey made many records, most were of solo piano, but late in his career he also recorded with vocals by his wife, Estelle Yancey, under the billing 'Jimmy and Mama Yancey'. They recorded the first album ever made by Atlantic Records. He played clubs and concerts and notably at the Carnegie hall in 1948. Yancey died of a stroke secondary to diabetes in Chicago on September 17, 1951. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1986. (Info edited mainly from larryjazz.com & Wikipedia)

Smokey Robinson born 19 February 1940

William "Smokey" Robinson, Jr. (born February 19, 1940) is an American R&B and soul singer-songwriter, record producer, and former record executive. Robinson is noted for being one of the primary figures associated with Motown Records, second only to the company's founder, Berry Gordy. Robinson's countless hits, and consistent contributions to the Motown label earned him the title of the "King of Motown". As both a member of Motown group The Miracles and a solo artist, Robinson recorded thirty-seven Top 40 hits for Motown between 1960 and 1987, and also served as the company's vice president from 1961 to 1988.

Robinson was born and raised in Detroit, Michigan's North End neighborhood, and when still a child was nicknamed "Smokey Joe" by an uncle because of his love of cowboy movies. In his teens, this was shortened to "Smokey". In 1955, Robinson founded a group he called the Five Chimes with his best friend Ronald White, and Northern High School classmates Pete Moore , Clarence Dawson, and James Grice. By 1957, the group was called the Matadors and included cousins Emerson and Bobby Rogers in place of Dawson and Grice. Later Emerson was replaced by his sister Claudette Rogers who later married Robinson, and guitarist Marv Tarplin joined the group in 1958.

With Robinson as lead singer, the Matadors began touring the local Detroit venues. In 1958, Robinson met songwriter

Berry Gordy, who co-wrote for them the single "Got a Job", an answer song to the Silhouettes' hit single "Get a Job". The group renamed itself the Miracles, and issued singles on both End Records and Chess Records before Robinson suggested to Gordy that he start a label of his own.

In 1959, Gordy founded Tamla Records, which he soon reincorporated as Motown. The Miracles were among the label's first signees. Gordy and Robinson had a synergistic relationship, with Robinson providing a foundation for Motown's hit-making success and Gordy acting as a mentor for the budding singer and songwriter. By 1961, Gordy had appointed Robinson vice-president of Motown Records, a title Robinson held for as long as Gordy remained with the company.

 The 1960 single "Shop Around" was Motown's first number one hit on the R&B singles chart, and the first big hit for The Miracles. The song was also Motown's first million-selling hit single. They scored many more hits over the years. Besides penning hits for his own group, Robinson (often assisted by the other Miracles ), also wrote and produced hits and album tracks for other Motown artists. Mary Wells had a big hit with the Robinson-penned "My Guy" (1964), and Robinson served as The Temptations' primary songwriter and producer from 1963 to 1966.

 His hit ballads also earned him the title "America's poet laureate of love". During the course of his 50-year career in music, Robinson has accumulated more than 4,000 songs to his credit.

After marrying Claudette Rogers, Robinson started a family, and named both of his children after Motown: his son was named Berry after the company's founder, and his daughter Tamla after the Motown imprint for which Robinson and The Miracles recorded.

The Miracles remained a premier Motown act through most of the 1960s. Albums were released as "Smokey Robinson & the Miracles" after 1965. By 1969, the group's fortunes began to falter, and Robinson decided to quit The Miracles so that he could remain at home with his family and concentrate on his duties as vice president. The group stopped recording and Robinson prepared to leave the group. Unexpectedly, however, their 1969 recording "Baby Baby Don't Cry" hit the national Billboard Pop Top 10, and when their 1966 recording of "The Tears of a Clown" was released as a single in 1970, it became a number-one hit in both the United States and the United Kingdom.

 

With the surprise success of "The Tears of a Clown", Robinson was convinced to remain with The Miracles for a few more years. In 1972, however, he followed through on his original plans to leave the group, and The Miracles began a six-month farewell tour. On July 16, 1972, Smokey and Claudette Robinson gave their final performances as Miracles at the Carter Barron Amphitheater in Washington, DC, and Robinson introduced the group's new lead singer, Billy Griffin. The Miracles went on for a while, even having another number one hit, "Love Machine", in 1976.

During the mid-1980s, Robinson fell victim to cocaine addiction. His recording slowed, and his marriage to Claudette faltered; the two were divorced in 1986. With the help of friend Leon Kennedy, Robinson was dramatically healed of his addiction at a religious service. He eventually revitalized his career, scoring hits in 1987 with the Grammy Award-winning "Just to See Her" (a U.S. #8 hit) and "One Heartbeat" (U.S. #10).

Upon Motown's sale to MCA in 1988, Robinson resigned from his position as vice president. After one last album for Motown, Love, Smokey (1990), Robinson departed the company. Eight years later, he returned to Motown, which by then was a subsidiary of Universal Music Group, and released Intimate (1999). The same year, Robinson received the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. Since then, Smokey has continued to periodically perform and tour.  In 2009, he issued the album, Time Flies When You're Having Fun on his own label, Robso Records. Time Flies has been the last album Robinson has released. (info edited from Wikipedia)

Here's a great video clip (wrongly titled), should be "You Really Got A Hold On Me"

Irma Thomas born 18 February 1941

Irma Thomas (b. February 18, 1941, Ponchatoula, Louisiana) is a Grammy Award winning soul and rhythm and blues singer from New Orleans. She is known as the "Soul Queen of New Orleans."

Thomas is a contemporary of Aretha Franklin and Etta James, but never experienced their level of commercial success; still, she has a large cult following among soul aficionados. In 2007, she won the Grammy for Best Contemporary Blues Album for After the Rain, her first Grammy in an acclaimed career spanning over 45 years.

Born Irma Lee, as a teen she sang with a Baptist church choir, auditioning for Specialty Records as a 13-year old. By the age of 19 she had been married twice and had four children. Keeping her second ex-husband's surname, she worked as a waitress in New Orleans, occasionally singing with bandleader Tommy Ridgley, who helped her land a record deal with the local Ron label. Her first single, "(You Can Have My Husband but) Don't Mess with My Man," was released in spring 1960, and reached number 22 on the Billboard R&B chart.

She then began recording on the Minit label, working with songwriter and producer Allen Toussaint on songs including “It’s Raining” and “Ruler of my Heart”, which was later reinterpreted by Otis Redding as "Pain In My Heart". Imperial Records acquired Minit in 1963, and a string of successful releases followed. These included "I Wish Someone Would Care” (her biggest national hit), its B-side " Break-a-Way” (later covered by Tracey Ullman among others), "Anyone Who Knows What Love Is”, and "Time Is on My Side" (a song previously recorded by Kai Winding, and later by the Rolling Stones).

 

Although her first four Imperial singles all charted on Billboard's pop chart, later releases were less successful, and, unlike her contemporaries Aretha Franklin, Gladys Knight and Dionne Warwick she never managed to cross over into mainstream commercial success. She recorded for Chess Records in 1967/68 with some success, the Otis Redding song "Good To Me" reaching the R&B chart. She then relocated to California, releasing records on various small labels, before returning to Louisiana, and in the early 1980s opened her own club, the Lion's Den.

After several years’ break from recording, she was signed by Rounder Records, and in 1991 earned her first-ever Grammy nomination for Live! Simply the Best, recorded in San Francisco. She subsequently released a number of traditional gospel albums, together with more secular recordings. The album Sing It! was nominated for a Grammy in 1999.

Thomas is still active as a performer, appearing annually at the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival. She reigned as Queen of the Krewe du Vieux for the 1998 New Orleans Mardi Gras season. She often headlined at her own club, which is now out of business due to the effects of Hurricane Katrina. Thomas relocated to Gonzales, Louisiana, 60 miles (97 km) from New Orleans, after Hurrican Katrina, but, according to her web site, she is now back in her home in New Orleans.

During Easter 2011, Thomas performed twice at the Bluesfest music festival in Byron Bay, New South Wales, Australia. On April 24, she performed on the Crossroads stage, coming on after Mavis Staples; then on April 25, she headlined the Crossroads stage, coming on after Jethro Tull and Osibisa.

(Info edited from Wikipedia)

Tommy Edwards born 17 February 1922

Tommy Edwards (February 17, 1922 — October 22, 1969) was an African American singer and songwriter. He delivered one giant hit in the late 50's for which he is known to this day, and several smaller hits, before he died at a young age.

He was born Thomas Edwards in Richmond, Virginia. By age nine he was performing locally. He learned to play the piano and tried his hand at songwriting, beginning  began his professional career in 1931.

Louis Jordan recorded Tommy's composition of That Chick's Too Young To Fry and it went to #3 on the R&B chart in the late 40's. In 1949 he moved to New York City and began recording demos to earn a living. He signed with the Top label but by 1950 had moved on to MGM. In 1951 he put two songs in the top forty, The Morning Side Of The Mountain and It's All In The Game. He had a few other minor hits but his career went into decline and he met with some financial problems.

The song he had recorded titled It's All In The Game is one with a curious history. It had been written in 1912 as Melody In A Major by Chicago banker Charles Gates Dawes. Dawes would later become the co-winner of the Nobel Peace Prize and served as Vice President of the United States from 1925 to 1929 under Calvin Coolidge. Songwriter Carl Sigman added lyrics to Dawes' composition in 1951 and it became It's All In The Game.

By 1958 Tommy Edwards was still with MGM but the label was getting ready to drop him. At the suggestion of the record label he worked with producer Harry Myerson on a new arrangement for It's All In The Game and recorded it at what is alleged to have been scheduled as his last session at MGM. In August of 1958 the reworked version, sung by Tommy in his smooth velvety voice, entered the charts and became an immediate sensation. It went to number one and held its position for six solid weeks. As well as topping the U.S. Billboard Hot 100, the song also got to number one on the R&B chart, and in the UK Singles Chart. The single sold over 3.5 million copies globally, earning gold disc status. Tommy appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show that September and his career was in high gear. The gold disc was presented in November 1958.

Edwards made it a point to pay off all his debts. He re-recorded some of his other songs from the early 50's, including The Morning Side Of The Mountain, and met with some chart success over the next couple of years. One of these records was Edwards' version of Johnnie Ray's Please Mr.

Sun. His final top forty entry was I Really Don't Want To Know in 1960. "I Really Don't Want to Know," "Don't Fence Me In," and "It's Not the End of Everything" were as smooth and affecting as anything he had ever done, but subsequent releases faltered. Experimental LPs, featuring Hawaiian and string-oriented sounds, did nothing to reverse his downward career spiral.

 Tommy Edwards returned to his native Richmond, where he suffered a brain aneurysm and died on October 22, 1969, at age 47. The liner notes of his 1994 Eric Records release The Complete Hits of Tommy Edwards, claim his death was caused by alcoholism. While the two may be related, there is no confirmation of this.

His record It's All In The Game was recorded by many other artists and returned to the top forty in versions by Cliff Richard in 1964 and the Four Tops in 1970. It sold over 3-1/2 million copies, and to this date is the only record ever to make the top forty that was written by a Vice President of the United States. Edwards received a Virginia Highway Marker in 2008, erected near Pemberton Elementary School, off Quioccasin Road, in Henrico County. In July 2008, Richmond mayor L. Douglas Wilder signed a proclamation declaring 15 October 2008 "Tommy Edwards Day."
(info edited mainly from Wikipedia & Tom Simon)

I managed to find one rare clip of Tommy Edwards singing "I've Been There" taken from the TV show Dick Clark Beechnut Show from August 1959. Quality poor but better than nowt!

Kalin Twins born 16 February 1934

The Kalin Twins (b. February 16, 1934, Port Jervis, New York) were a pop music recording duo, (comprising twin brothers Hal and Herbie Kalin d. August 24, 2005 and July 21, 2006, respectively). They sang like a pop-focused version of the Everly Brothers, and they charted a few catchy records in 1958, including one Top Five hit. They represent one of the better acts to find a compromise between rock & roll and pop music, even if they weren’t the Everlys by a long shot.(Many references give their birth date as 1939 but this was a Decca 

Records diversion, in an attempt to make them appear younger than they were).

Their first public performances came at just five years of age at a local Christmas party, and the bug stayed with them. They graduated from Port Jervis High School in June 1952, but plans to break into the music industry were delayed when Hal was drafted into the Air Force as a radio operator. They kept in touch during this period, recording and writing songs on a tape recorder and sending them back and forth. After Hal’s discharge in 1956 they set about resurrecting their double act. During these early struggles a demo single was pressed, combining the compositions ‘Beggar Of Love’ and ‘The Spider And The Fly’. The result was an audition for Decca, and their first single proper, ‘Jumpin’ Jack’/‘Walkin’ To School’.

While searching through piles of writers’ demo tapes to find a suitable follow-up the twins discovered a song entitled ‘When’, written by Paul Evans and Jack Reardon. It became their second single. However, the record company chose to plug its flip side, ‘Three O’Clock Thrill’, instead. It was not until disc jockeys belatedly began to play ‘When’ that the single took off. It reached number 5 in the Billboard charts but topped the UK charts for no less than five weeks (selling over two million copies worldwide). 

 

 

Coast to coast touring of the USA ensued before a two week engagement at the Prince Of Wales Theatre in England (later dates introduced Cliff Richard as support artist on his first national tour). The subsequent ‘Forget Me Not’ and ‘Oh! My Goodness’ both made reasonable showings in the Billboard charts, but neither entered the UK equivalent. Two more minor US hits followed, ‘It’s Only The Beginning’ and ‘Sweet Sugar Lips’, but their remaining Decca sides failed to sell. With the arrival of the Beatles there seemed little place in the market for the Kalin Twins’ innocent harmonies, although a further single, ‘Sometimes It Comes, Sometimes It Goes’ for Amy Records, did appear in 1966.

Disillusioned with their diminishing rewards, the brothers mutually agreed to return to their day jobs, with each pursuing college degrees. They did not perform again until 1977 when a friend booked them to appear weekly at his new night spot, the River Boat Club. This led to further one-off engagements, in which they were sometimes joined by younger sibling Jack to appear as the Kalin Brothers. A brace of singles appeared for small labels: ‘Silver Seagull’ and ‘American Eagle’ both used the same backing track. They disappeared again until old support hand Cliff Richard invited them to play at his 30th Anniversary shows in 1989. Harold Kalin was killed in an automobile accident in August 2005. His brother suffered a fatal heart attack less than a year later.

(Info mainly from The Encyclopedia of Popular Music)

Kokomo Arnold born 15 February 1901

Kokomo Arnold (February 15, 1901 – November 8, 1968) was an American blues musician.
 

Born James Arnold in Lovejoy's Station, Georgia, Arnold received his nickname in 1934 after releasing "Old Original Kokomo Blues" for the Decca label; it was a cover of the Scrapper Blackwell blues song about the town of Kokomo in Indiana.

A left-handed slide guitarist, his intense slide style of playing and rapid-fire vocal style set him apart from his contemporaries.

Having learned the basics of the guitar from his cousin, John Wiggs, Arnold began playing in the early 1920s as a sideline while he worked as a farmhand in Buffalo, New York, and as a steelworker in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. In 1929 he moved to Chicago and set up a bootlegging business, an activity he continued throughout Prohibition. In 1930 Arnold moved south briefly, and made his first recordings, "Rainy Night Blues" and "Paddlin' Madeline Blues", under the name Gitfiddle Jim for the Victor label in Memphis, Tennessee. He soon moved back to the bootlegging center of Chicago, though he was forced to make a living as a musician after the ratification of the Twenty-first Amendment to the United States Constitution ending Prohibition in 1933. Kansas Joe McCoy heard him and introduced him to Mayo Williams who was producing records for Decca.

From his first recording for Decca on September 10, 1934 until his last on May 12, 1938, Arnold made eighty-eight sides, seven of which remain lost. He, Peetie Wheatstraw and Bumble Bee Slim were dominant figures in Chicago blues circles of that time. Peetie Wheatstraw & Arnold in particular were also major influences upon musical contemporary seminal delta blues artist Robert Johnson and thus modern music as a whole. Johnson turned "Old Original Kokomo Blues" into "Sweet Home Chicago", "Milk Cow Blues" into "Milkcow's Calf Blues", while another Arnold song, "Sagefield Woman Blues", introduced the terminology "dust my broom", which Johnson used as a song title himself.

Arnold's "Milk Cow Blues" was covered by Elvis Presley (as "Milk Cow Blues Boogie") at the Sun Studios produced by Sam Phillips and was issued as one of his early singles, it was later performed by Tyler Hilton who played Elvis in the 2005 film Walk the Line. Aerosmith covered "Milk Cow Blues" on their 1977 album Draw the Line, Dead Moon covered it on their 1990 album Defiance, George Strait on his 1991 album 

Chill of an Early Fall and Willie Nelson on the 2000 album Milk Cow Blues.

In 1938 Arnold left the music industry and began to work in a Chicago factory. Rediscovered by blues researchers in 1962, he showed no enthusiasm for returning to music to take advantage of the new explosion of interest in the blues among young white audiences.

He died of a heart attack in Chicago at the age of sixty-seven in 1968, and was buried in the Burr Oak Cemetery in Alsip, Illinois. (Info Wikipedia)

Al Terry born 14 January 1922

Al Terry, born Allison Joseph Theriot, 14 January 1922, Kaplan, Louisiana, USA, d. 23 November 1985, USA. An early country music performer, singer and guitarist Terry was among the first artists to develop the rockabilly sound.

He began singing with his brothers and made an appearance at the age of 13 on radio KVOL. He formed his first band while still in high school. After graduation he spent a period in Beaumont, Texas to learn about radio broadcasting with KRIC. He actually entered the world of professional entetainment as a radio announcer and disc jockey during World War 11.

After one of Terry's featured recordings wom extensive airplay in Texas, Louisiana and Mississippi. Mel Foree of the Roy Acuff & Fred Rose - owned Hickory recording company signed Terry  to a contract with that label. Terry’s best-known recording is the self-penned 1954 Cajun hit ‘Good Deal, Lucille’, which often appears on compilations.

                               

 In 1955 Country & Western Jamboree magazine voted Terry number 1, above Elvis Presley, in their New Male Country Singer category. In the mid-50s he was a featured guest on The Louisiana Hayride. Among artists with whom Terry worked was Jimmy C. Newman, appearing in several recordings in the late 40s/early 50s. Terry also worked as a disc jockey on KROF radio in Abbeville, Louisiana.

As interesting as his songs have been, it was the Al Terry voice and style that made him one of the best country singers of that or any other time. His soothing baritone voice anticipated the country pop vocalists, like Jim Reeves, Tommy Overstreet and Stu Phillips who emerged a short time later, but his vocal range surpassed that of most country singers.Unlike most of the country pop singers that followed him, Terry has never sung with anything but honky-tonk accompaniment, and his voice, though velvet-smooth and marked by the precise articulation gained during years of radio announcing, has never been bland.

Al Terry never took his place among country music's elite. Not only could he have been a contender, he should have been one. Terry was immensely popular throughout the Southwest with widespread fan loyalty in Louisiana and Southeastern Texas. Unfortunately, not much has been written about his legacy and as his aging fan base diminishes, so does the Al Terry saga.

(Info mainly from The Encyclopedia of Popular Music)