B.B. King, Ben E King & Other R&B & Jazz Figures

BB King ~ 89 ~ Iconic Blues singer & guitarist from the 1950's on. Born in Mississippi as Riley B King, he learned blues and gospel including having singer Bukka White as a mentor. When White moved to Memphis King went as well. King became a performer on Beale Street where he picked up the name "B.B" meaning "Blues Boy" King. He met T Bone Walker and appeared on Sonnyboy Williamson's radio show and was recorded by Sam Phillips' (later owner of Sun Records) for King Records in 1949. He began a string of hits that lasted all through the 1970's including "You Know I Love You", "Woke Up This Morning", "Please Love Me", "When My Heart Beats like a Hammer", "Whole Lotta Love", "You Upset Me Baby", "Every Day I Have the Blues", "Sneakin' Around", "Ten Long Years", "Bad Luck", "Sweet Little Angel", "On My Word of Honor", "Please Accept My Love" and "The Thrill Is Gone". In 1988 he scored a comeback hit in a duo with U@ on "When Love Comes To Town". He developed a distinctive style based on his dislike of playing and singing simultaneously by instead singing a line then backing it up with a guitar line as a call and response. He was cited as a major influence by Buddy Guy, Otis Rush, Jimi Hendrix, Stevie Ray and Jimmie Vaughn, Eric Clapton, Peter Green and Gary Moore, all of whom he played with. He also appeared in movies and TV commercials including "Blue Brothers 2000". He continued to tour until late last year when health issues finally sent him into hospice care.

BB KING ON TV 1968 pt.1;


BB KING Pt.2;


BB KING, ALBERT KING, STEVIE RAY VAUGHAN, with PAUL BUTTERFIELD;


Bo Diddley, BB King, Smokey Robinson, Paul Butterfield, Chuck Berry - "Hey! Bo Diddley";


Ben E King ~ 76 ~ R&B singer best known for the classics "Stand By Me" and "Save The Last Dance For Me". King was singing with Doo Wop group the Five Crowns around 1958 when the manager of The Drifters, an established group, hired the Five Crowns to replace the original Drfiters who had quit or been fired. The Drifters had several hits including "There Goes My Baby", "Save The Last Dance", "This Magic Moment" and "I Count The Tears" (the melody and chorus of which was later lifted for the Grassroots hit "Live For Today". He would later go on to many more solo hit including "Spanish Harlem", "Stand by Me" and "I Who Have Nothing". Also recorded with LaVern Baker, Dee Dee Sharp, Bo Diddly and The Average White Band.

BEN E KING ~ "STAND BY ME":


BEN E KING ~ "SPANISH HARLEM";


Percy Sledge ~ 74 ~ R&B singer with Atlantic Records, had hit with classic hit version of "When A Man Loves A Woman"

PERCY SLEDGE ~ "WHEN A MAN LOVES A WOMAN";


Harold Battiste ~ 83 ~ New Orleans Jazz pianist, saxophonist, composer and arranger/ worked with Sam Cooke ("You Send Me"), Joe Jones, Lee Dorsey ("Ya Ya"), Sonny and Cher ("I Got You Babe"), Dr. John, Ellis Marsalis, Joe Jones, Tom Waits

SAM COOKE ~ "YOU SEND ME";


LEE DORSEY ~ "YA YA";


SONNY & CHER ~ "I GOT YOU BABE";


Ornette Coleman ~ 85 ~ Iconic Jazz Sax player and founder of Free Jazz from 1950's on.

ORNETTE COLEMAN ~ "THE SOUNDTRACK";




Nat Peck ~ 90 ~ American Jazz trombonist from the 1940's on, played with Glenn Miller, Dizzy Gillespie, Coleman Hawkins, James Moody, Roy Eldridge, Don Byas, Duke Ellington, Quincy Jones, Benny Goodman, Kenny Clarke, Lucky Thompson

LUCKY THOMPSON BAND IN PARIS:


DIZZY GILLESPIE IN DENMARK;


Smokey Johnson ~ 78 ~ New Orleans Jazz and R&B drummer from the 1950's on; played with Fats Domino, Johnny Adams and Earl King as well as solo. Had hit with "It Ain't My Fault"

SMOKEY JOHNSON ~ "IT AIN'T MY FAULT";


SMOKEY JOHNSON ~ "I CAN'T HELP IT";


SMOKEY JOHNSON ~ "THE FUNKY MOON";


Herbie Goins ~ 76 ~ American R&B singer from the 1950's on, sang with Alexis Korner

HERBIE GOINS & THE NIGHTIMERS ~ "CRUISIN";


HERBIE GOINS & THE NIGHTIMERS ~ "COMING HOME TO YOU";

RIP to Jerry Leiber

Exhibit A;
"Hound Dog" ~ Big Mama Thorton w/ Buddy Guy;




Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller were the greatest songwriters of the early rock & Roll/R&B era bar none. Their catalog reads like a how-to list for everything Rock & Roll, was, is and always should be. Which it is.

Exhibit B;
"Jail House Rock" ~ Elvis Presley;



How it took a couple of nice Jewish kids from New York to figure out how to take the the raw sounds of blues and doo-wop and modernize them for an new audience of white kids is one of those great unanswerable questions of pop culture history but Leiber and Stoller were there even before Phil Spector, Alan Freed, Bill Haley or Elvis. If not Sam Phillips. But while Phillips was a producer with a fine ear, he was no songwriter Leiber and Stoller were.

Exhibit C;
"Love potion number 9" ~ The Searchers;



The list of songs in their catalog includes no less than a hundred chart hits for a bewildering array of artists including, but not limited to;
The Beatles, Elvis Presley, Walker Bros, Rolling Stones, Ben E King, Drifters, Coasters, Wilbert Harrison, Beach Boys, Dion, Billy Thorpe, Searchers, Little Richard, The Crystals, Drifters, Brenda Lee, Bad Company, Tony Sheridan, The Hollies, Diamonds, Cheers, Freddie Bell, Big Mama Thorton, Jimmy Witherspoon, The Kinks, Lords, Groupies, Ronnie Hawkins, Dr.Feelgood, Otis Redding, Mickey Gilley, Jimi Hendrix, Johnny Burnett, Gene Vincent, Albert King, Koko Taylor,Dave Clark Five, Manfred Mann, Paramounts, Del Shannon, Animals, Merle Haggard, Link Wray, Frankie Lymon, Carl Perkins, Wayne Fontana, Ventures, Freddie & The Dreamers, Sha Na Na (of course) and ...ummm...Alvin and the Chipmunks, several times.

Exhibit D;
"Poison Ivy" ~ Billy Thorpe & The Aztecs;




The Duo started out in the 1950's as writers with hits for such blues and R&B figures as Big Mama Thorton, Wilbert Harrison and Jimmy Witherspoon before they were surprised to find one of those songs, "Hound Dog", become a hit for a young largely unknown white kid named Elvis. They would write a series of other hit song for him including "Love Me", "Loving You", "Don't", "Jailhouse Rock" and "King Creole". However most of their time would be writing numerous hits for black artists like the Coasters and Ben E King throughout the 1960's.

Exhibit E;
"I'm a hog for you" ~ The Lords;




They would also also branch out into owning record label Red Bird Records, which issued the Shangri-Las' "Leader of the Pack" and the Dixie Cups' "Chapel of Love" which they did not write however. As producers they also acted as mentors to the young Phil Spector. They also won a ton of awards.

Exhibit F;
"Kansas City" ~ The Beatles;



As time went on their tastes went to more elaborate pop songs that would lead to hits for Edith Piaf and Peggy Lee. They would continue into the 1970's with hits for Stealer's Wheel, Earth Wind and Fire, Elkie Brooks, George Benson, Steely Dan and Mezzo-soprano Joan Morris and her pianist-composer husband William Bolcom, which had little to do with rock and roll.

Exhibit G;
"Ruby Baby" ~ Dion;



However they also lived to see their early Rock and R&B hots are still covered down to the punk era by the likes of Dr.Feelgood, The Lambrettas, Los Straitjackets, Mink DeVille, El Vez, Queen, Mötley Crüe, Brownsville Station, Patti Smith, ZZ Top, Twisted Sister, The Cramps, AC/DC, MDC, White Stripes, Flotsam & Jetsam, Motorhead, Pennywise and The Blues Brothers (This version was the ending song of the movie, performed with other musicians such as Aretha Franklin, Ray Charles and Cab Calloway), even Negativeland and John Oswald. They were usually good sports about that, if somewhat bemused.

Exhibit H;
"Searchin'" ~ The Coasters;




Jerry Leiber died at the age of 78 on August 22, 2011, from cardio-pulmonary failure.

Exhibit I;
"Stand by me" ~ Ben E. King;



Exhibit J;
"There goes my baby" ~ The Walker Bros.;



Exhibit K;
"Stand by me" ~ John Lennon;