 |
| A reason you may have heard of them... |
I often type “this post will be short” at the top of these posts, only to delete after going on for four pages. This post, however, will be short. Because it cannot be otherwise.
The Harlem Hamfats barely survived to the Internet age. The entries on individual members top out after a couple paragraphs at most (e.g., Kansas Joe McCoy, and he was the long one) and their Wikipedia page doesn’t run much longer. Normally, that’s enough to convince me to skip an act, but two things recommended them for a short entry. First:
“They were perhaps the first studio recording band to become a performing act in their own right, and they recorded extensively.”
Chicago's pioneering producer J. Mayo Williams brought together The Harlem Hamfats to give Decca Records an in-house band to record that labels talent in the second half of the 1930s. For anyone familiar with the name, Williams bounced between Chicago labels from the mid-1920s until leaving Decca in the mid-1940s. Specializing in what the times dubbed “race records,” Williams recorded several of the early blues greats (e.g., Blind Lemon Jefferson (profiled here), Tampa Red (profiled here with Son House), plus jazz trailblazers, Jelly Roll Morton (profiled here) and King Oliver. By the time he'd moved onto Decca, the trend toward popular singers had picked up steam - i.e., the same shift that, along with the musicians strike of the early 1940s, did in the big bands - which meant Williams needed a stable of musicians he could rely on for recording sessions. Enter the Harlem Hamfats.
As sometimes happens, Wikipedia's entry on Kansas Joe McCoy (guitar/vocals) omits Williams’ role and states that he formed the Harlem Hamfats with his younger brother, Papa Charlie McCoy (guitar/mandolin), after divorcing his wife, a guitarist known as Memphis Minnie. As suggested by Kansas Joe’s name, he didn’t hail from Harlem. None of the Hamfats did. The McCoy’s weren’t even from Kansas; both grew up in Mississippi and came up in the New Orleans’ music scene. Some other members came from New Orleans as well - Herb Morand (trumpet/vocals), John Lindsay (bass), and Odell Rand (clarinet) - while the rest - Horace Malcolm (piano), Freddie Flynn (drums) and Pearlis Williams (also, drums) came from Chicago. It’s likely other members came in and out, but that’s the list I have.
The second thing that recommended the Harlem Hamfats for an entry actually involves a couple things:
The Harlem Hamfats barely survived to the Internet age. The entries on individual members top out after a couple paragraphs at most (e.g., Kansas Joe McCoy, and he was the long one) and their Wikipedia page doesn’t run much longer. Normally, that’s enough to convince me to skip an act, but two things recommended them for a short entry. First:
“They were perhaps the first studio recording band to become a performing act in their own right, and they recorded extensively.”
Chicago's pioneering producer J. Mayo Williams brought together The Harlem Hamfats to give Decca Records an in-house band to record that labels talent in the second half of the 1930s. For anyone familiar with the name, Williams bounced between Chicago labels from the mid-1920s until leaving Decca in the mid-1940s. Specializing in what the times dubbed “race records,” Williams recorded several of the early blues greats (e.g., Blind Lemon Jefferson (profiled here), Tampa Red (profiled here with Son House), plus jazz trailblazers, Jelly Roll Morton (profiled here) and King Oliver. By the time he'd moved onto Decca, the trend toward popular singers had picked up steam - i.e., the same shift that, along with the musicians strike of the early 1940s, did in the big bands - which meant Williams needed a stable of musicians he could rely on for recording sessions. Enter the Harlem Hamfats.
As sometimes happens, Wikipedia's entry on Kansas Joe McCoy (guitar/vocals) omits Williams’ role and states that he formed the Harlem Hamfats with his younger brother, Papa Charlie McCoy (guitar/mandolin), after divorcing his wife, a guitarist known as Memphis Minnie. As suggested by Kansas Joe’s name, he didn’t hail from Harlem. None of the Hamfats did. The McCoy’s weren’t even from Kansas; both grew up in Mississippi and came up in the New Orleans’ music scene. Some other members came from New Orleans as well - Herb Morand (trumpet/vocals), John Lindsay (bass), and Odell Rand (clarinet) - while the rest - Horace Malcolm (piano), Freddie Flynn (drums) and Pearlis Williams (also, drums) came from Chicago. It’s likely other members came in and out, but that’s the list I have.
The second thing that recommended the Harlem Hamfats for an entry actually involves a couple things:
