The Harlem Hamfats was a
ChicagoChicago is the largest city in the U.S. state of Illinois, and with more than 2.8 million people, the 3rd largest city in the United States...
jazzJazz is a musical art form which originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States from a confluence of African and European music traditions....
band formed in 1936. Initially, they mainly provided backup music for jazz and
bluesBlues is the name given to both a musical form and a music genre created within the African-American communities in the Deep South of the United States at the end of the 19th century from spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts and chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads...
singers, such as
Johnny TempleJohnny Temple was an American blues guitarist, singer, and Chicago blues musician in the 1930s. An acquaintance and near-contemporary of Skip James, Temple delivered sedate blues in the vein of Lonnie Johnson...
,
Rosetta HowardRosetta Howard was an American blues singer, who recorded in the 1930s and 1940s.Little is known of her life. She was born in Chicago, and moved into singing by joining in with jukebox selections at the club where she worked. Around 1932 she began singing professionally with Jimmy Noone and...
, and
Frankie JaxonFrankie "Half Pint" Jaxon was an African American vaudeville singer, female impersonator, stage designer and comedian, popular in the 1920s and 1930s.-Life and career:...
for
Decca RecordsDecca Records is a British record label established in 1929 by Edward Lewis. Its U.S. label was established in late 1934; later the link with the British company was broken for several decades...
, but when their first record "Oh Red" became a hit, it secured them a
DeccaDecca Records is a British record label established in 1929 by Edward Lewis. Its U.S. label was established in late 1934; later the link with the British company was broken for several decades...
contract for fifty titles. They launched a successful recording career performing danceable music.
The group were not from Harlem, and nor were they "hamfats".
The Harlem Hamfats was a
ChicagoChicago is the largest city in the U.S. state of Illinois, and with more than 2.8 million people, the 3rd largest city in the United States...
jazzJazz is a musical art form which originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States from a confluence of African and European music traditions....
band formed in 1936. Initially, they mainly provided backup music for jazz and
bluesBlues is the name given to both a musical form and a music genre created within the African-American communities in the Deep South of the United States at the end of the 19th century from spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts and chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads...
singers, such as
Johnny TempleJohnny Temple was an American blues guitarist, singer, and Chicago blues musician in the 1930s. An acquaintance and near-contemporary of Skip James, Temple delivered sedate blues in the vein of Lonnie Johnson...
,
Rosetta HowardRosetta Howard was an American blues singer, who recorded in the 1930s and 1940s.Little is known of her life. She was born in Chicago, and moved into singing by joining in with jukebox selections at the club where she worked. Around 1932 she began singing professionally with Jimmy Noone and...
, and
Frankie JaxonFrankie "Half Pint" Jaxon was an African American vaudeville singer, female impersonator, stage designer and comedian, popular in the 1920s and 1930s.-Life and career:...
for
Decca RecordsDecca Records is a British record label established in 1929 by Edward Lewis. Its U.S. label was established in late 1934; later the link with the British company was broken for several decades...
, but when their first record "Oh Red" became a hit, it secured them a
DeccaDecca Records is a British record label established in 1929 by Edward Lewis. Its U.S. label was established in late 1934; later the link with the British company was broken for several decades...
contract for fifty titles. They launched a successful recording career performing danceable music.
Biography
The group were not from Harlem, and nor were they "hamfats". The name 'hamfat' derives from early 20th century slang in which the word was used to designate something as second-rate or a poor substitute. There is some disagreement about the roots of the word. Some believe it refers to a 'hamfat' cut of meat, which was cheaper and of poorer quality than the lean part of the ham. Others hold that it refers to a method black face comedians had of adhering burnt cork makeup with hamfat. Regardless, the name was most likely adopted in a spirit of facetiousness, since by all measurable standards the band members were talented musicians.
Despite their name, the Hamfats were based in
ChicagoChicago is the largest city in the U.S. state of Illinois, and with more than 2.8 million people, the 3rd largest city in the United States...
, and were put together by record producer and entrepreneur
J. Mayo WilliamsJay Mayo "Ink" Williams was a pioneering African-American producer of recorded blues music. Ink Williams earned his nickname by his ability to get the signatures of talented African-American musicians on recording contracts.-Career:Williams was born in Pine Bluff, Arkansas, the son of Daniel and...
simply for the purpose of making records - perhaps the first group to be so created. None of the members of the band were actually from New York.
"Kansas" Joe McCoyKansas Joe McCoy was an African American blues musician and songwriter.-Career:McCoy played music under a variety of stage names but is best known as "Kansas Joe McCoy". Born in Raymond, Mississippi, he was the older brother of the blues accompanist Papa Charlie McCoy...
(guitar, vocals) and his brother
"Papa" Charlie McCoyCharles "Papa Charlie" McCoy was an African American delta blues musician and songwriter.-Career:...
(guitar, mandolin) were from Mississippi;
Herb MorandHerb Morand was an American jazz trumpeter associated with the New Orleans jazz scene.Morand began on trumpet at age eleven after hearing King Oliver. He played with Nat Towles in New Orleans, then moved to New York City and played with Cliff Jackson...
(trumpet, vocals), John Lindsay (bass), and Odell Rand (clarinet) were from New Orleans; Horace Malcolm (piano), Freddie Flynn (drums) and Pearlis Williams (drums) were from Chicago.
The diverse geographical backgrounds of the musicians played a strong role in the band's sound, which blended blues,
dixielandDixieland music, sometimes referred to as Hot jazz or New Orleans jazz, is a style of jazz which developed in New Orleans at the start of the 20th century, and was spread to Chicago and New York City by New Orleans bands in the 1910s...
and swing jazz. Led by Morand and Joe McCoy, the main songwriters, the group initially provided instrumental backing to Williams' stable of artists, including
Frankie JaxonFrankie "Half Pint" Jaxon was an African American vaudeville singer, female impersonator, stage designer and comedian, popular in the 1920s and 1930s.-Life and career:...
, Rosetta Howard, and
Johnny TempleJohn Ellis Temple was a Major League Baseball second baseman who played for the Redlegs/Reds ; Cleveland Indians , Baltimore Orioles and Houston Colt .45s . Temple was born in Lexington, North Carolina. He batted and threw right-handed.Temple was a career .284 hitter with 22 home runs and 395 RBI...
. They were perhaps the first example of a studio recording band becoming an act in their own right and recorded extensively.
Their first major hits were "Oh! Red", recorded in April 1936, and "Let's Get Drunk And Truck" (originally recorded by
Tampa RedTampa Red , born Hudson Woodbridge but known from childhood as Hudson Whittaker, was an influential American musician....
), recorded in August of the same year. "Oh! Red" was popular enough to be covered by
Count BasieWilliam "Count" Basie was an American jazz pianist, organist, bandleader, and composer. Widely regarded as one of the most important jazz bandleaders of his time, Basie led his popular Count Basie Orchestra for almost 50 years...
,
The Ink SpotsThe Ink Spots were a popular African American vocal group that helped define the musical genre that led to rhythm & blues and rock and roll, and the subgenre doo-wop...
,
Blind Willie McTellWilliam Samuel "Blind Willie" McTell was an influential American blues singer, songwriter, and guitarist...
and, later,
Howlin' WolfChester Arthur Burnett , better known as Howlin' Wolf, was an influential American blues singer, guitarist and harmonica player....
. Some of their other recordings, such as "We Gonna Pitch A Boogie Woogie", more clearly presage the later rhythms of
rock and rollRock and roll is a genre of popular music that evolved in the United States after World War II in the late 1940s, from a combination of the rhythms of the blues, from the African American culture, and from America's country music and gospel music scenes...
. Their most recognizable work may be the modern jazz tune "
Why Don't You Do Right?"Why Don't You Do Right?" is an American blues standard and jazz standard written in 1936 by Kansas Joe McCoy. It is a twelve-bar blues written in a minor key and is considered a classic "woman's blues."-Composition:...
", which was written by Joe McCoy and included on their 1936 record under the title "The Weed Smoker's Dream". The song had numerous drug references. The lyrics were later changed and the tune refined.
Lil GreenLil Green was an American blues singer and songwriter.-Life and career:She was born Lillian Green in Mississippi but after the early deaths of her parents she went to Chicago, Illinois, where she began performing in her teens and where she would make all of her recordings.Green was noted for...
recorded it as "Why Don't You Do Right", a tune about a conniving mistress and her broke lover, in 1941, and it was later recorded by
Peggy LeePeggy Lee was an American jazz and popular music singer, songwriter, composer and actress. She first came to prominence in the 1940s with her #1 hits Somebody Is Taking Your Place and Mañana, having a string of successful albums and top 10 hits in three consecutive decades...
with the
Benny GoodmanBenjamin David Goodman was an American jazz musician, clarinetist and bandleader, known as "King of Swing", "Patriarch of the Clarinet", "The Professor", and "Swing's Senior Statesman"....
Orchestra.
By 1939, singer Morand had returned to New Orleans, and changing fashions had made their sound less commercially attractive. The Harlem Hamfats were not thought to be the most innovative group of the time, and many of the band's original works dealt heavily with sex, drugs and alcohol, which may have hindered their music from being more widely available. However, as a small group playing entertaining music primarily for dancing they are considered an important contributor to 1930s jazz, and their early riff-based style would help pave the way for
Louis JordanLouis Jordan was a pioneering American jazz, blues and rhythm & blues musician, songwriter and bandleader who enjoyed his greatest popularity from the late 1930s to the early 1950s. Known as "The King of the Jukebox", Jordan was highly popular with both black and white audiences in the later years...
's small group sound a few years later, rhythm and blues, and later rock and roll.
Selected discography
| Year |
Title |
Genre |
Label |
| 2004 |
Let's Get Drunk and Truck |
Swing jazz |
Fabulous |
| 1997 |
Hamfats Swing 1936-1938 |
Swing jazz |
EPM Musique |
| 1994 |
Harlem Hamfats, Vol. 4 (Import) |
Swing jazz |
Document Records |
| 1994 |
Harlem Hamfats, Vol. 3 (Import) |
Swing jazz |
Document Records |
| 1994 |
Harlem Hamfats, Vol. 2 (Import) |
Swing jazz |
Document Records |
| 1994 |
Harlem Hamfats, Vol. 1 (Import) |
Swing jazz |
Document Records |