Hi-de-ho:The Life of Cab Calloway [Format Kindle]

At the start of the `30s, bassist Gene Ramey played on a band that competed against singer-dancer-bandleader Cab Calloway's group in a "battle of the bands." At the end of the first set, Ramey was pretty certain the band he played with would win. Then the second set began. Here's Ramey describing Calloway's performance:

When Calloway came on for the second set he made a remarkable entry, leaping over chairs, turning somersaults, and indulging in all manners of non-musical showmanship, all the while singing . . . in his most eccentric manner. This so won over the audience that [Ramey's band] didn't dare go on again.

The great bop trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie, who played in Cab's orchestras until Cab fired him for one too man shenanigans, declared that "Cab was no musician." And when Calloway recruited Chu Berry to play tenor for him, Berry famously agreed on the condition that Calloway would promise never to play alto sax on stage again while Chu was in the band.

I've been a jazz enthusiast since I was thirteen, sixty-one years ago. Cab Calloway has always figured in my imagination as a hack --maybe a good popular entertainer but certainly not a figure to take seriously in jazz. I admired the way he looked -always impeccably dressed, whether in the zoot suits he helped popularize or his classy all--white tuxedo, with over-long tails and white bowtie, shoes and socks. Though I didn't take it seriously (apparently neither did he all the time), I loved his `jive' talk. (In 1944, his lexicon of hipsterese, The New Cab Calloway's Hepster's Dictionary, appeared, but it was more of a publicity stunt than anything serious.)

On the evidence of this well researched and well written biography, though, Calloway deserves much more credit than I've given him. Maybe he couldn't play an instrument that well and he was a mediocre conductor, but he was an exceptional though mannered singer who improvised fluently on the fringe between jazz vocalese and show biz clowning; he was also a very good bandmaster who paid attention to all of the details of the music his band produced and steadily improved the quality of its performance as a functioning jazz band in the 30s and early 40s. He may have fired Dizzy, but first he hired him and then he gave him solo room in his band (thought less with itme3 as he became disenchanted with his clowning and the outré music he produced as he moved rapidly into the new musical realm of bop). The list of notables who played in his very popular band at one time or another is impressive: tenor sax players Ben Webster, Chu Berry, Illinois Jacquet, Ike Quebec, and Sam `the Man' Taylor, altoist Hilton Jefferson, trumpeter Jonah Jones, trombonist Keg Johnson (Budd Johnson's brother), multi-instrumentalist Tyree Glenn (trombone, vibes, vocals...), bassist Milt Hinton and drummers Cozy Cole and J. C. Heard. That's not shabby! Most of his bandsmen seemed to appreciate him and not all complained about lack of solo time, or the grueling schedule of performances they play (up to four shows a night), or having to play the same songs night after night, or the monotony of backing Cab's vocals. Not all of them condemned his musicianship either.

In later life, Calloway rebounded from the death of the Big Bands and recreated himself, first as front man for small combos (usually Cab on vocals, Jonah Jones on trumpet and a rhythm section) and then as a stage performer. He soared in the Leontyne Price-Paul Warfield production of Porgy and Bess and later in the all-black staging of Hello Dolly, in which he outshone even Pearl Bailey. In the 70s, he had a cameo in The Blues Brothers and appeared on Sesame Street. THe long and the short of it is that Cab Calloway was still at it up until almost his death, and that's encouraging too!

Shipton brings impeccable credentials to this book. He is jazz critic for the London Times, has written A New History of Jazz and Groovin' High: The Life of Dizzy Gillespie. He ascends to hyperbole a little too often for my comfort, as when at the end of the book, he claims Calloway as the possible inspiration for today's hip-hop. But this is a small cavil about a generally admirable, and genuinely enjoyable, book.

Cab Calloway was (among other things) a powerful singer, an unforgettable frontman, a celebrated bandleader, a magnetic stage performer, and a pure delight in his various film appearances. In sum, he is someone who should be remembered. And yet, despite his importance as a jazz-era bandleader and his leading role at both the Savoy and the Cotton Club, he barely gets a mention in Ken Burns' "Jazz" and is rarely treated respectfully by music and cultural critics who have written jazz histories. Perhaps this is due to his overwhelming urge to entertain his audiences, or perhaps this is due to his lack of outstanding proficiency as an instrumentalist. Alyn Shipton's book does a great job not only of placing Cab Calloway within context, but also reminding us of why we should care about him.

The first couple of chapters of "Hi-De-Ho" are slow-moving and vague, partly due to the lack of concrete details about much of Calloway's childhood. Once we get into Calloway's early adulthood, the book truly takes off. Calloway's drive to succeed is phenomenal, and oftentimes includes the difficulty of replacing certain bandmembers due to changing venues or musical styles. Calloway comes across as a very complex man far removed from the exhuberant stage persona he developed. While the book by no means attempts to present him as a man haunted by demons, it does detail his relationship and family difficulties, drinking, gambling, and Calloway's infamous sparring with Dizzy Gillespie. Calloway seems to have spent most of his bandleader years replacing bandmembers with more proficient musicians and then having to cope with said musicians finding his pop orientation restricting to their improvisatory natures. The rising arc of Cab Calloway's career gets the lion's share of attention, and the long coda to his career is dealt with graciously yet with candor.

Given that Calloway gets very little attention in general jazz books, much of the material here will be novel and surprising to most readers. The various attempts by other entertainers to cash in on his name during the Jazz Age are truly amusing, and Calloway seemed to have great luck in narrowly avoiding projects from the 1940s on that presented African-Americans in blatantly stereotypical ways. Who knew that Cab tried out for "Amos and Andy," for example?

In sum, this was a biography that I enjoyed reading and strongly recommend to anyone who cares about vintage jazz.

Painstakingly researched and deliciously detailed, Alyn Shipton's biography of Cab Calloway gives us an insiders look into the heyday of Hi-De-Ho, the Jazz Era, when Harlem was The Place for hot music. We go backstage at the Cotton Club, meet villians and mobsters, hep cats, and the greatest music makers of the era.

The book starts out slow, because Shipton is nothing if not thorough. We learn of Calloway's early years, about his family, and his constant struggle for recognition not merely as a novelty, but as a jazz great. His family history has many interesting tidbits. For instance, Callaway's sister became a cosmetics tycoon with skin preparations designed for women of color. She was a talented musician herself and walked away from her skin care empire to start her own career as a bandleader.

The man who gave us "Minnie the Moocher" is an icon, and his story lives up to the image. If you love jazz and the Jazz Age, you'll get lost in this book. And if you're down on your luck and can't afford to buy it, go make eyes at the King of Sweden. Maybe he'll send you some things you've been needin' -- including "Hi-De-Ho: The Life of Cab Calloway."