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Contrary to Feminist beliefs, women were not very well represented at the 'birth' of Jazz, ---still............ Up to about 1850, women typically studied the piano, harp, guitar, and singing. Their involvement with music was secular, centered on the home, and non-professional. In the second half of the 19th century, that began to slowly change. From circa 1900 on, African-American women especially were quite active in spirituals, gospel and blues. Historically, piano skills were considered "appropriate" both for 'Black' and for 'White' women. (Race is forever with us!) In the early 1900s, many feminine pianists and composers were participants in the Ragtime craze. Women pianists, and occasionally brass, reeds and rhythm players, often found work in family bands, Vaudeville circuits, circuses, carnivals and tent shows. Decadal Overviews:
1930s Overview:
Among the African-American all-girl bands were:
Among the "White" All-Girl bands"
1940s Overiew:
There were also some individual women playing in "All-Men" bands, among these were:
Among the 'White' all-girl bands:
1950s Overview:
1960s-1970s Overview:
In private correspondence, Ms. Jill McManus, Leader and pianist for "The Jazz Sisters" has advised that this 1970s group was comprised of McManus, Willene Barton (ts); Jean Davis (tpt); Janice Robinson (tb), who left to join Thad Jones/Mel Lewis but don't know which year; Lynn Milano (b); and Paula Hampton ("Slide" Hampton's niece) (dr & voc). (nb: Do not confuse with the "Sisters in Jazz", a group that Line Hilton began in Western Australia, Hilton subsequently moved to the U.S.A. There are now (2007) two SIJ groups, -one in the U.S. and one in Australia.) 1980s-current
Early on, Women were also very active in the Classical Music field. While little recalled now, 25 to 30 all-women orchestras may have been operating in such diverse areas as Chicago, Los Angeles, and New York City. Included among the women conductors of those groups were Antonia Brico (June 26, 1902, Rotterdam, Netherlands, d. Aug. 3, 1989, Denver, CO, USA, perhaps the best known), Ethel Leginska, Frederique Petrides, and Ebba Sundstrom. The 1920s also saw the rise to fame of Parisienne Nadia Boulanger. While her influence was not specific to Jazz or to Swing, we include her here as a woman who was very important to music in our time. Most non-musicians have never heard of Nadia, and never heard any of her music. Still, she had a very profound effect on American and world music. Starting with Virgil Thompson and Aaron Copland, nearly every American composer of the 1920s era, studied under her tutelage, including Elliot Carter, Walter Piston, Marion Bauer, and Roy Harris. And it wasn't only Americans who studied with Nadia, others (to name just a few) include Francis Chagrin, the Romanian who found a career in London, England, Philip Glass, and Wojciech Kilar In the late 1920s, the Bee Palmer Orchestra (an "all-boy" orchestra with a female leader/dancer) was often seen on the vaudeville stages. A visitor to our site has sent this photo (source unknown) of Bee Palmer who was professionally known as "the Shimmy Queen". She often appeared in vaudeville with her own Jazz orchestra. It was a 'real' Jazz orchestra in the sense that the sidemen (yes - all men) were some of the best known stars of Dixieland Jazz. According to trombonist Santo Pecora's recollections, Bee's Jazz band consisted of (L-R) Freddie Neumann (Piano), Sharkey Bonano (Trumpet), Joe Capraro (Banjo), Sidney Arodin (Clarinet), "Chink" Martin (Tuba), and Augi Schellang (Drums). On March 3, Bee Palmer and Al Siegel were secretly married. Most folks easily recall the many African-American female vocalists who, in the 1920s-'30s, were recording what is today termed the "classic blues". But in addition to the singers, many feminine pianists were also active in various towns and cities. In New Orleans, pianists Dolly Adams and Emma Barrett were well regarded. Pianist, composer, and arranger Mary Lou Williams was greatly influential in Kansas City Jazz, and her musical concepts would spread far beyond that town. In Chicago, Lovie Austin and Lil Hardin Armstrong were active. Lil was the pianist in the Joe "King" Oliver Orchestra, where she met Louis Armstrong and convinced him to marry her, and to form a band of his own with herself on piano. One can hear many of her concepts when listening to the early Armstrong Hot Five and Hot Seven recordings. There were a few, -not many, female horn players, -mother and daughter trumpeters Dyer and Dolly Jones stand out as an excellent example. As one can see, all of these ladies collaborated with male musicians. In the 1920s, most women who played instruments other than piano frequently did so in 'all-woman' bands. Still, many of those 'all-women' bands that were popular in the 1920s and early '30s, such as Edna White's Trombone Quartet, or female Jazz orchestras like Bobbie Grice's Fourteen Bricktops, The Dixie Sweethearts, and Bobbie Howell's American Syncopators, never shook off their novelty status. "The Darlings of Rhythm" was another of the all-woman orchestras that toured the U.S. Margaret Backstrom was their star Tenor Sax player, - a lady capable of improvising really 'hot licks' on any tune for 30 minutes. Their alto saxophone player Josephine Boyd, had previously played with Eddie Durham's All-Star Girl Orchestra. (Organist Sarah McLawler said of her: "She was a genius.") "Boyd may have been instrumental in the birth of bebop." ---Lillian Carter Wilson. In 1936, one critic wrote: "One more girl band is about all this country needs to send it right back into the depths of the Depression." (Saturday Evening Post, 1936 - Stormy Weather article, p.45)
The Great 1930s Economic Depression affected both Male and Female musicians. Many women musicians (and other women workers) were released in an effort to provide jobs for unemployed men. Fortunately, it was an era when nightclubs could provide work for many Jazz musicians, -both male and female. Women could find work as pianists in "male" Jazz bands, as well as instrumentalists in all-woman bands. Women were especially useful if they could perform multiple services, perhaps singing and dancing as well as playing an instrument, as did Valaida Snow -"Queen of the Trumpet". In this way, the contractor obtained the services of several entertainers for the price of one. Never-the-less, some all-girl bands did manage to persevere, one rare example being the Melody Maids (1933). The 'Maids' were originally formed by sisters Omie (b. ?) and Mary Sue Berry (b. Sept 13, 1912) Their mother, (Cora Alma Berry, b. Dec. 1888) not wanting her girls on the road by themselves, learned to play the drums, and toured with the band. Still, (sadly) public opinion often considered the "All-Girl" bands, and individual female artists to be a novelty. In the 1930s, several "White" all-girl bands gained some popularity. In private correspondence, Mr Robert Whiteside, has told us of the all-white 'Dixie Rhythm Girls', Jazz band, from the St. Louis, Missouri area ca.1935-45. Another band, perhaps the best known of the American all-girl bands was Ina Ray Hutton and her Melodears. Here's a publicity photo of Hutton's Brass Section, and here's a photo of Ina Ray Hutton, whose sister, June Hutton sang with the Charlie Spivak band. (When June Hutton and Startdusters left Spivak, vocalist Irene Daye took June's place.)
The success of Ina Ray's band spawned the International Sweethearts of Rhythm. When performing, The Sweethearts usually wore jackets, white shirts and skirts. Anna Mae Winburn very ably fronted the band. Also in the band was Vi Burnside. Not too much is known of her background. She was a high school classmate of Sonny Rollins, and had been featured soloist with "The Harlem Playgirls" in 1930s, after which she joined the ISR. When the ISR disbanded, Vi continued playing into the 1950s and led her own small groups in the Washington, D.C. area. (I do not have any dates for her birth or demise, but believe she died in the 1950s.) One may hear her work as a Tenor sax soloist in the tune "Sweet Georgia Brown", recorded by the ISR. (On a double CD entitled '40 years of Jazz') Another such orchestra was Phil Spitalny and his All Girl Orchestra. This was an all-girl band, but formed and led by a man. While it was a good band, many considered it a novelty. When the novelty died off, Phil disbanded, moved to Florida, and married his star instrumentalist, "Evelyn and her Magic Violin". Here's a publicity photo of some of the girls surrounding the shows announcer Richard Stark. Spitalny's drummer was Viola Smith who joined him in 1942. She had begun playing professionally in the late 1920's and 30's in Wisconsin with 'The Schmitz Sisters', a family orchestra organized by her father. Popular in their time, but forgotten today, were such all-female African-American ensembles as the Harlem Playgirls. There were regional groups too, like 'Babe Egan and her Hollywood Redheads 'on the West coast, and the 'Flo Burnside Quintet' on the East. There was a band called The Parisian Redheads, - who came from Paris, Indiana... not France, and another group calling themselves 'The Twelve Vampires'. Some of the best all-female bands, such as the Harlem Playgirls, were all-Black, while a few bands were integrated, -most notably the International Sweethearts of Rhythm. "The Melody Maids" were originally a group of young ladies working at the Gibson Guitar company.
"The Melody Maids' orchestration was listed in one article as four
Caution: There was another musical group also called "The Melody Maids", but they were a vocal group only, homebased in Texas. In 1942, music teacher Eloise Milam was asked to arrange entertainment for a World War II bond rally at the Jefferson Theater in Beaumont, TX. Milam had a group of private voice students, consisting of teen-age girls, whom she presented as a choral group, all dressed in white, under the name of "The Melody Maids", They were a great hit and were soon traveling coast to coast singing mostly at military bases and military hospitals. The group made four tours of Europe, several to England, three to the Far East, seven to the far North, four to the Caribbean, five to Mexico, seven to Hawaii, and four to Bermuda, Iceland, and the Azores. The girls financed some of the tours themselves by holding bake sales, style shows and other fund-raisers. After 1956 all of the Melody Maid tours were financed by the Entertainment Branch of the Department of Defense. Of all the performers who traveled with the Entertainment Branch, the Melody Maids were requested the most. They sang for the troops at military bases and hospitals from 1942 to 1972. (This information quoted from Handbook of Texas Online, s.v. "," http://www.tsha.utexas.edu/handbook/online/articles/MM/xgmru.html (accessed September 23, 2007. Article by: Mamie Bogue ). Later, the International Sweethearts of Rhythm, which had started off as a 'school' band hired truly excellent, seasoned professional performers including alto-saxist Roz Cron (one of the three White women in the band), and Anna Mae Winburn who had not only sung with, but also directed an all-male orchestra ( Lloyd Hunter's Serenaders ). Singer/trumpeter Ernestine "Tiny" Davis was also in the band. Louis Armstrong tried to hire her away by offering her ten times her salary. Tiny's lifelong lesbian companion was drummer/pianist Ruby Lucas. "Tiny" Davis, (on the Right, with Ruby Lucas' hand on her shoulder) was born in 1913 in Memphis Tennessee. She attended Washington High School. Later, in Kansas City, Tiny began to passionately listen to Count Basie, Mary Lou Williams, and Eddie Durham. Initially, she used a style much like Lil Armstrong's, but soon developed her own technique. In the mid-1930s, she played with the Harlem Playgirls, (led by Sylvester Rice), but soon joined the International Sweethearts of Rhythm, - playing trumpet and vocals. She remained with them for 10 years. In the 1950s, she led her own group called the "Hell DIvers" that played festivals and concerts in Chicago. Her life-long friend Ruby Lucas was also in the group. She appeared in a 1988 short film by Andrea Weiss and Grete Schiller entitled "Tiny and Ruby - Hell Divin' Women", which was shown at the San Franciso Gay and Lesbian Festival. Another lady who must be mentioned is Blanche Calloway and Her Joy Boys orchestra. Blanche led an all-male band that was rated among the best in the land. Earl "Fatha" Hines has said that it was Blanche who taught her brother Cab Calloway how to lead a band and perform in public. Blanche wanted to have her own orchestra, and found help in the form of an Andy Kirk orchestra trumpet player named Edgar "Puddin Head" Battle. He put together a group, which at times included Ben Webster and Cozy Cole, and they named it 'Blanche Calloway and Her Joy Boys'. Blanche Calloway became the first Black woman to front an all-male orchestra. They toured the U.S. and recorded for RCA Victor, and were considered one of the better Black groups. Later the name was changed to 'Blanche Calloway and Her Orchestra'. In 1938, due to financial troubles, they disbanded. Blanche continued to perform as a solo act, but the changing times resulted in her audience shrinking. In 1940, she formed an all-female orchestra, but it too soon disbanded due to slack bookings. In 1944, she retired from show business. In the early 1950s, she managed a Washington, DC nightclub where she "discovered" R&B singer Ruth Brown. In the 1960s, she was a disc jockey and music director for radio station WMBM in Miami, FL, remaining with the station for 20 years before relocating to Baltimore, MD, where, in 1978, she lost her battle with breast cancer. (Note: Blanche's "Joy Boys" should not be confused with others. During the 1920s and '30s, several bands used the name "Joy Boys". Besides Blanche Calloway and her Joy Boys, there was also 'Fess Williams and his Joy Boys', -another of his orchestras was called "Fess Williams and the Royal Flush Orch." Still another "All-Girl" band was "Rita Rio and Her Mistresses of Rhythm", Let's watch the ladies performing now, -with a young future screen star, Alan Ladd, singing. And, there was trumpeter Clora Bryant. While most people think of New York City, Chicago, Kansas City and New Orleans, as Jazz centers, there was a fourth locus of Jazz, - Los Angeles, CA. More accurately, the Central Avenue (Black) section of Los Angeles which was a Jazz mecca from the 1920's to 1950's. It was both a training ground for musicians such as Lionel Hampton, Charlie Mingus, Charles Brown, and Buddy Collette, and also a magnet drawing men like Duke Ellington, Art Tatum, Count Basie, Charlie Parker, and others. Clora Bryant often praised her father for encouraging her musical career. He even relocated his family to Los Angeles for that very purpose. Clora frequented the great jam sessions at the Downbeat Club. One of the tunes then popular with the public and musicians alike was Charlie Barnet's "Cherokee". Her musical peers, including Dizzy Gillespie, were impressed when Bryant played the tune. Bryant wanted equal treatment from her peers while never losing her own femininity. On stage she made her sexuality quite clear. She has said, "People thought you were playing trumpet because you had male tendencies, which I didn't have..... (the audience would) never forget I was a female.... I always dressed as a female." To enhance her sexiness, she'd wear mesh stockings with a seam up the back of her big legs. Clora would ocassionally have problems with jealous wives or girl friends of the male musicians, and had to prove she was only there to play music. Working conditions were not always favorable for the ladies. Sometimes they would have to put up with predatory male members of a band. (There was a rumor that bandleader Phil Spitalny auditioned prospective band members in his underwear.) Many bandleaders wound up marrying their vocalists (some 'unofficially'). Trombonist and arranger Melba Liston was another player who experienced the dangers of working in a male big band when she was raped by fellow musicians. She did however rise above the tragedy, and continued to work. In time she became a prominent New York studio musician, and then an instructor of music studies at several educational institutions in Jamaica. Oftentimes, Black ladies found it impossible to get food and lodging, or even access to rest room facilities. The rest room sign "Ladies" referred to "White" ladies. There is the well known tale of Cab Calloway's bandleading sister, Blanche Calloway, being thrown into jail for using a "ladies" room in a road side gas station at six o'clock in the morning. However, this situation was not limited to the ladies. Black musicians who were on the road touring with the band found it very difficult to obtain lodgings and meals for the night. Very often, the word was spread about and someone(s) in the local Black comunnity would provide food and lodging for the night. This situation is a story all by itself, and rarely noted by biographers. For Black Ladies, there were additional dangers in the "Jim Crow" laws of the Southern U. S. states. If a White woman was "passing" for Black, or vice-versa, it meant that the races were conmingling, - working, traveling and eating together. That constituted a 'crime' under 'Jim Crow' laws. Once, during a police search of Eddie Durham's All-Star Girl Orchestra Bus, his bass player put her legs and coat over the band's trumpet player who hid on the floor while the police searched the bus. Her 'crime'? She was a White woman traveling with a Black women's band, -a violation of the 'Jim Crow' laws. It made the front page of many newspapers when Toby Butler, the White trumpet player with The Darlings of Rhythm orchestra was arrested. Let Violet Wilson of the band tell you in her own words: (see below: Sherrie Tucker, 221-2 )
"But you know what happened? [Trombonist] Jessie Turner went up and
"Oh, she just kept talking, and they kept looking, -country hicks, they
During World War II, Many all-woman bands were formed when the men went to war. One example was 'Ada Leonard's All-American Girls'. Another band was Prairie View A&M University, in Texas, with their 'Prarie View Co-Eds band'. It was the women who kept the Jazz flowing when the school's all-male dance band went off to war. Margaret Grigsby, then a student at the school, has said "We showed that women could play Jazz. We set out to do what we could for the war effort by playing in place of the men." Many of the girls had been previously turned down because playing music was not ladylike. Soon, these 16 young Black girls from small, segregated towns in Texas, were earning money playing throughout the South at servicemen clubs, and even toured to New York playing at Harlem's famed Apollo Theatre. Still another was Virgil Whyte's All Girl Band. Formed in Racine, Wisconsin, that World War II all-women swing band had a hot musical style and toured some 400 military installations. Between 1944-1948, tens of thousands of World War II GI's and civilians heard Virgil Whyte's All-Girl Band. Reviewers called it a band with sock and punch. When astonished drummer Virgil Whyte was drafted off the tour (USO service was supposed to be exempt), his sister, drummer Alice Whyte, took over the leadership. Virgil and Alice often concluded their shows with vigorous sibling drum battles. In 1946, after his service discharge, Whyte returned to his band and continued touring as 'Virgil Whyte's Musigals'. An interesting comment on 'The Prairie View Co-Eds' is that they were well known for their improvisation. While not every Black all-girl bands emphasized improvisation, many did, and the Co-eds were one of them. Perhaps most all 'White' bands used arrangements, but the poorer bands Black or White couldn't afford to have arrangements written for them, and the Black bands were usually "poor". Curiously, the Black bands usually (certainly not all) placed the emphasis on the second and fourth beats of the music, while White bands played the four even beats and stayed fairly close to the melody. Roz Cron has noted that the International Sweethearts of Rhythm were somewhat unusual in that they had an arranger, Alto Sax player Maurice King, (later a force at Motown Records). "The Swinging Soundies" and the Ladies.
Thelma White led another of the 'All-Girl' bands.
Here's another of the original "Panoram Soundies" from April 20,1942, released by 'Minoco Productions'.
Very few of these giant Panoram jukeboxes have survived. World War II curtailed civilian manufacturing, while post-War television undercut the economics of short films. (Up until the early 1960s, some three-minute original soundies -- were still used as fillers in TV programs, especially in small or regional broadcast markets.) Most of the original 16mm Soundie footage now resides in collections maintained by film and music historians; but several compilation volumes are available on videocassette. Some of the only surviving sound films of the 1940s all-woman Swing bands are these soundies produced for Jimmy Roosevelt's Panoram jukeboxes. In the past, the question of "Can women play Jazz?" always stirred controversy. One lady whose Jazz talents surpass many males is Marian McPartland; listening to her play is an absolute delight. Marian has also greatly helped young female pianists like Geri Allen, Renee Rosnes, and Eliane Elias. Lil Hardin Armstrong, not only contributed to her hubby Louis Armstrong's concepts, but also contributed to Joe "King" Oliver's Creole Jazz Band. Barbara Carroll who was a student of Bud Powell, is another lady should also be mentioned. She belongs to this current generation. Her playing is quieter and somewhat introspective - not Jazzy, rather Sophisticated. For a definitive answer, this writer could suggest that doubters listen to the work of Mary Lou Williams, whose influence was felt in the later Jazz and early Swing eras. She was born, Mary Elfrieda Scruggson on May 15, 1910 in Atlanta, Georgia., and was raised in Pittsburgh. As a child, she especially enjoyed listening to the music of Fats Waller, Jelly Roll Morton, and Earl Hines, and taught herself to play piano by listening to these men. By age 13, she already working in vaudeville while also playing with various local Pittsburgh bands, and even made guest appearances with Duke Ellington's Washingtonians. Three years later, at age 16, she met and wed saxophonist John Williams. They moved to Memphis where Mary Lou made her first recording (with a group called 'The Synco Jazzers'). Her husband joined 'Andy Kirk's Twelve Clouds of Joy' orchestra, one of the great 1930s Kansas City Swing bands. In 1929, Brunswick sent a crew to Kansas City to record Kirk's band. Three of those recordings featured Mary's compositions and arrangements ("Lotta Sax Appeal," "Mess-A-Stomp," and "Froggy Bottom") with herself at the keyboard for all of them. The following year, hubby 'John Williams and his Memphis Stompers' recorded her first piano solo, "Drag 'Em," in Chicago in April 1930. In 1931, Mary took over regular piano duties of Andy Kirk's band and proved to be the musical brains of the outfit, writing songs and arrangements The latter part of her career was spent as an artist in residence at Duke University. There she taught Jazz and conducted the university's Jazz orchestra. At age 71, Mary Lou passed away on May 28, 1981. During her long and wonderful career, Mary Lou wrote and arranged over 350 compositions, including "Little Joe From Chicago", "What's Your Story Morning Glory", "Zodiac Suite", and even the music cues for the 'Sesame Street' TV production. Today, in New York City, The Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts sponsors an annual festival named after Mary Lou -The Kennedy Center Mary Lou Williams Women in Jazz Festival, the purpose of which is to showcase women musicians. Her legacy lives on through her recordings and compositions The well known music historian George T. Simon once wrote ("The Big Bands" (1967, London: Macmillan), "Only God can make a tree, and only men can play good jazz." Until only very recently, Mr. Simon's has been the prevailing view. But if you think that's sexist, read this excerpt from Down Beat magazine's February 1938 issue editorial, headlined "Why Women Musicians Are Inferior."
Now a days, the concept seems hopelessly outdated. We live in an era with such commanding female jazz performers as saxophonists Claire Daly, Fostina Dixon, and Jane Ira Bloom, pianist-arranger Toshiko Akiyoshi (who has been nominated for 13 Grammy awards), and drummers such as Terri Lyne Carrington and Sylvia Cuenca. Still...., -even today, women who play Jazz often hear that haunting and ubiquitous refrain, "You play good for a girl!"
For interested readers, the pioneering book on this subject is "American Women in Jazz" by Sally Placksin (Wideview Books, 1982). It's out of print; but copies can still be found. Dozens of musicians and bandleaders from the 1920s through the '70s are profiled. Another good source of information on women in Jazz is author Leslie Gourse's "Madame Jazz: Contemporary Women Instrumentalists". A more recent release is by Sherrie Tucker, "Swing Shift: 'All-Girl' Bands of the 1940s" (Duke University Press, 2000 www.dukeupress.edu). her focus is on the World War II years, when women were simultaneously celebrated and distrusted for taking on what had long been regarded as men's work. There were female Swing bands in many other countries too. One good source is "Sweethearts of Rhythm: The Story of Australia's All-Girl Bands and Orchestras, To the End of the Second World War," by Kay Dreyfus (Currency Press, Australia: www.currency.com.au). |
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