The Queen Ascends

"She doesn't knock at the door -- she breaks it down!" Aretha Franklin's debut Columbia album, 1961

If you asked most people what their favorite Aretha Franklin song was, you'd very likely hear a fairly predictable list of the usual suspects: "Respect," of course. "A Natural Woman." "Chain of Fools." "Think." "Rock Steady," maybe. "I Never Loved a Man," perhaps, and someone might even throw in a curveball like "Dr. Feelgood" or "Call Me." All classics, certainly. And all from the golden age of Aretha at Atlantic, the heyday of which -- 1967 through 1971 -- found her arguably the most famous female singer on the planet.

Aretha arrives: June 22, 1968 cover of Time magazine

Sam Cooke

But, as some know, the story does not begin with Aretha's arrival at Atlantic in '66; her recording career dates back to 1956, when the Baptist minister's daughter recorded a gospel album entitled Songs of Faith. Following the lead of her childhood idol and family friend, Sam Cooke, Aretha risked the disapproval of the gospel community by opting to revert to secular music. Her background was steeped in the church, and it would never leave her; but her musical hunger expanded to the blues, jazz, and what was only beginning to be known as "soul music." Recognizing his daughter's extraordinary talents, the formidable (and feared) Reverend Clarence Franklin encouraged Aretha's ambitions; although he turned down an offer from Motown Records, based in the Franklins' hometown of Detroit, deeming the fledgling label too localized to launch Aretha to true stardom. (Another Detroiter with a firm-minded parent was also denied the chance to launch their career at Hitsville: Freda Payne.) Cooke offered to get Aretha a deal at RCA, for whom he was having such crossover hits as the #1 pop smash, "You Send Me" (1957), but ultimately, a two song demo landed on the desk of Columbia Records' Artists and Repertoire executive, John Hammond, who knew a good thing when he heard it.

Billie Holiday

Aretha was excitedly hailed by Hammond as the greatest singer he had heard since Billie Holiday. As one who had been instrumental in ushering Holiday from the bandstand into the recording studio in the 1930's, and who had guided Lady Day through some of her most revered recordings for Columbia, this was no short praise. And although Aretha's run at Columbia proved, in hindsight, to be somewhat unsatisfactory, this is largely because we can only view it through the glittering prism of her later, all-encompassing success at Atlantic. She recorded enough material for 10 albums at Columbia (two of which were issued only after she had already left the label, with the others recycled and reissued constantly to cash in on her later success), and if none of them scaled the heights of, say, Lady Soul (1968), they cannot be completely disregarded, either.

Aretha in the Columbia Records studios, early 1960's

Revisionists tend to paint Aretha's Columbia years in broad strokes, leading the uninitiated to believe that she recorded nothing but dross, uncomfortably shoehorned into being a black Doris Day, or, worse, a female Robert Goulet (both of whom were her label mates). The truth, of course, is more nuanced than that. Witness the opening track of Aretha's debut Columbia disc, recorded with the Ray Bryant Combo (studio version followed by a live performance):

 

Dinah Washington

We propose that this tight little slice of proto-funk -- which, incidentally, is what we would name as our favorite Aretha tune -- is as good, as soulful, as anything that Aretha ever cut at Muscle Shoals. Another criticism leveled at Aretha's Columbia years is that her repertoire was too heavily based on show tunes and standards. In fact, nearly all of Aretha's albums contained a mix of that type of material as well as rhythm and blues/pop originals;  and this format was most likely no accident. When Aretha came to Columbia in 1960, her closest role model and contemporary, respectively, were Dinah Washington and Etta James. Both were blues-and-gospel-steeped vocalists, proudly and defiantly African-American; if Dinah and Etta liked fancy dresses and blonde wigs, that was one thing, but they certainly didn't fit the sleek, soignée mold of another emerging talent, Nancy Wilson, who was being groomed for supper club stardom over at the glossiest of all labels, Capitol. But, crucially, Dinah Washington and Etta James had both just exploded over the pop barrier with pretty, string-drenched renditions of older pop standards: Dinah's "What a Difference a Day Makes" (1959) and Etta's "At Last" (1960). It's not a stretch to imagine that the powers-that-be at Columbia saw Aretha's similarities to Washington and James, and mapped her career accordingly. For contrast here are those two classics by Washington and James, along with Aretha's version of "Unforgettable" (1964), recorded as a tribute to Washington, who died in 1963. String-laden standards they may be; soul-less, they are not.

It's undeniably true that Columbia really didn't know what to do with Aretha in the long run; their one major black star, Johnny Mathis, could hardly be held up as an example for Aretha, and the business model they had followed from Washington and James ended abruptly with the former's early death and the latter's sharp left turn from pop standards to gutbucket rhythm and blues. Of course, that's exactly what Aretha would end up doing to perfection in a few years, but Columbia was ill-equipped to deliver or even understand that kind of material, their biggest-selling stars being Mathis, Doris Day, Barbra Streisand, Tony Bennett, and The Ray Conniff Singers.

It's not that the times were necessarily stacked against her; within just a few years of Aretha's arrival, young, black, female vocalists like Mary Wells and Dionne Warwick were emerging as consistent pop hit makers -- a concept unthinkable in the 1950's; even Washington, James and other trailblazers like LaVern Baker and Ruth Brown were seen as strictly rhythm and blues performers who sometimes got lucky with a pop hit. But what these newly-minted, 1960's-model divas had that Aretha lacked was a partnership with a songwriter and producer in complete sympathy with her needs and qualities. Wells and Warwick both had their mentors, and to underscore the importance of these men to their enormous success, consider that, unlike Aretha, they were doing it on independent labels, rather than a mighty industry giant like Columbia. We mean no disrespect to the individual talents of Wells and Warwick when we say, with absolute certitude, that neither of them would have scaled the same heights without Smokey Robinson and Burt Bacharach, respectively, providing them with the best possible vehicles for those talents.

There was no Smokey or Burt at Columbia for Aretha, and it shows in the sometimes haphazard way in which she was recorded. But it does a disservice to Columbia (especially John Hammond, who truly did champion the budding genius he saw and heard in young Aretha) and, most especially, to Aretha herself, to completely negate those early years of trial and error and experimentation. On paper, Aretha Franklin singing "Rock-a-Bye Your Baby with a Dixie Melody" sounds horrendous, and surely, there were countless better choices to be had: but just listen to how she manages to inject her own personality, her own soul into such a banal piece of material:

 

However, there were no big crossover successes for Aretha, perhaps because, as noted before, there was scant in-house songwriting to accommodate her unique talents; instead, she had to rely on Artists and Repertoire men like Hammond to bring her potential pop hits. It was here that Columbia was the most short-sighted; in her six years with the label, two dozen singles were released, only one ("Rock-a-Bye") making the Top 40, and most not even inching into the Top 75. And there seemed to be no rhyme or reason to them (unlike the albums, which were largely well-thought out); a good, original tune like "Runnin' Out of Fools" (1964), which fared much better than many of Aretha's singles, wasn't supported by a quality follow-up, but, rather, an album titled after the single, containing mainly cover versions of other popular hits of the day. The eventual choice for the next single? "The Christmas Song (Chestnuts Roasting on an Open Fire)."

Without any real connections with the rhythm and blues market, Columbia let potential hits like "No, No, I'm Losing You" (1965) and "Until You Were Gone" (1966) languish on the vine. Had there been a little more attention paid to getting a real hit out of Aretha Franklin at Columbia, who knows what might have been? She could certainly take even bubblegum girl group pop and make it sound dynamite, as evidenced by her fabulous cover of Betty Everett's "The Shoop Shoop Song (It's in His Kiss)," which she recorded for the Runnin' Out of Fools album, and performed on Shindig! Look for Darlene Love and the Blossoms giving 'Re a "Go on with your bad self, girl!" moment starting at the 1:40 mark:

She had been praised by the critics, seen her albums sell moderately well, and had received a not-inconsiderable amount of television coverage, given her status as a black, female singer without a major hit to her name. But someone like Aretha Franklin knew that her calling was greater, and she was frustrated by her relative lack of success at Columbia. "They know," she said in 1964, "and they know I know, that they haven't given me the same 'big build-up' that they've given...Barbra Streisand." And, unlike Streisand, who had an iron-clad clause in her contract which allowed her complete creative control over her own career, Aretha was relatively powerless. When her contract came up for renewal in 1966, she knew it was time for a change. And that's when Atlantic came calling.

Take that, Barbra: "People" from Soft and Beautiful (1969), eventually released after Aretha's departure from Columbia

So, what to make of Aretha's stay at Columbia? To our ears, there are many riches to be found. What marks it as ultimately less satisfying for many people is the fact that, unlike her subsequent work, Aretha had relatively little control or input as to what she was recording. There was less consistency, to be sure, in the quality of material -- or, more to the point, less suitability and consideration of what Aretha herself would have chosen to sing, given the chance. Her rendition of "You Made Me Love You," for instance, is almost certainly a less personal interpretation than "(You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman." But the fact that Aretha Franklin could still imbue material which she may have felt less than a great affinity for with the same intensity and passion as anything else she recorded speaks to her professionalism and her genius. And her best work for Columbia stands with her best from Atlantic, albeit facing opposite directions. The world was a different place in 1967 than it was in 1960, and Aretha changed with it -- and made a few changes to it, along the way. To judge what she did prior by the same criteria misses the point, as well as the pleasure of hearing a young talent taking flight, and slowly making her way toward the throne.

ARETHA FRANKLIN
March 25, 1942

We and Mr. Jones

Distilling the 60 year career of the perennially cool Quincy Jones down to a brief list of highlights would probably read something like this: was the first African-American vice president of a major record label (Mercury); released a string of successful instrumental albums under his own name for Mercury, one of which spawned the worldwide hit, "Soul Bossa Nova" (1962); composed for such motion pictures as The Pawnbroker (1965), In the Heat of the Night (1967), and The Color Purple (1985); produced Michael Jackson's Off the Wall (1979) and Thriller (1983); organized and produced the We Are the World project (1985). This, of course, leaves a lot of his work as composer, performer, conductor, arranger and producer unmentioned. To honor the man's 80th birthday, we offer some of our personal favorites from our favorite decade, the 1960's.

1966 E.P. re-issue of 1956 recordings by Dinah Washington, arranged and conducted by Quincy Jones

Jones had his background in jazz, fronting his own acclaimed band, as well as arranging and conducting for Mercury Records' jazz subsidiary, EmArcy. One of his most felicitous pairings was with the legendary Dinah Washington. She was hailed as "Queen of the Blues"; and while La Washington always (correctly) protested that she could sing anything, "anything at all," she still cherished her royal title, quite often taking it a bit too literally for some! Everything about Dinah was big: her talent, her personality, and her voice, and she found the perfect partner in Jones, who stroked her queenly ego, but also matched her toe to toe in the studio, both in terms of his control of the sessions, and the muscular, yet sympathetic arrangements he created around her magnificently lusty voice. 

Quincy and the Queen made four proper albums together, as well as collaborating on a number of sessions which found their way onto various singles and compilation albums. All have their merits, but their first pairing, For Those in Love (1955), is one of the few true "jazz" albums in Washington's catalog, and arguably the best. The eight tracks are split between Tin Pan Alley standards like Rodgers and Hart's "This Can't Be Love" and Cole Porter's "I Get a Kick Out of You," and more contemporary Broadway and film fare of the highest quality. "You Don't Know What Love Is" has since been recorded to death by nearly every chanteuse of all stripes, but it was new to most ears when the Queen recorded it for this album. In true regal fashion, hers is the definitive version. (For the record, the subsequent Washington/Jones albums were The Swingin' Miss D [1956], Tears and Laughter [1961] and I Wanna Be Loved [1962]. All four are available on individual CD's/downloads, with the exception of Tears and Laughter, the songs from which are available on the final installment of the massive The Complete Dinah Washington on Mercury.)

Also benefitting from Jones' deft hand was the the rococo diva of jazz, the empress of embellishment, Sarah Vaughan. If Dinah earned her sovereignty, then Sassy was due her appellation of "The Divine One," thanks to her astonishing range, which she exuberantly displayed from basso rumblings to operatic trills. Like Washington, Vaughan's album output during her long stay at Mercury was curiously spotty; the other jazz divas -- Ella Fitzgerald and Billie Holiday on Verve, Carmen McRae on Decca/Kapp, even Gloria Lynne on Everest -- all seemed to have better luck. Unlike Washington, however, Vaughan's collaboration with Quincy Jones didn't result in her jazziest album -- as the title Vaughan and Violins suggests, it is lush, plush, and decidedly pop-oriented. However, unlike many other Sassy-plus-strings recordings from the era, which bathed the already rich chocolate mousse Vaughan voice in so much whipped cream, Vaughan and Violins was once again a triumph of Jones' innate good taste and restraint. The strings gently accent the make-out mood without overwhelming it, and the Divine One reels her luxurious instrument in just enough to make her occasional embellishments, when she employs them, thrilling rather than overbearing. The "hit" from these sessions was "Misty," but to our ears, the real gem is a truly haunting rendition of "The Thrill is Gone." We love the amount of reverb Jones adds to the final "gone," as Sassy slides down the note to shattering silence. (There were four more Vaughan/Jones studio collaborations: You're Mine You [1962], Vaughan and Voices [1964], Viva Vaughan [1964], and Sarah Vaughan Sings the Mancini Songbook [1965], plus one live recording, Sassy Swings the Tivoli [1963]. The latter is considered one of the classic live jazz albums; the rest contain some good, some bad, and some ugly. Vaughan and Voices is particularly to be avoided; Viva Vaughan and Sings Mancini [which contains overlap material from Voices and Viva] are mostly harmless 1960's camp with a few gems among the rhinestones. You're Mine You is the best of the bunch, although the strings, and Sassy's needs-to-be-heard-to-be-believed rendition of "Maria" from West Side Story, may have jazz purists running for the hills.)

Way over on the other side of the musical spectrum, perhaps Jones' biggest commercial success of the 1960's came from a little story about a girl with a louse of a boyfriend named Johnny, who dumped her for a witch named Judy -- but it's her party, and she'll cry if she wants to. That's right, Quincy "Thriller" Jones also discovered and produced the Tenafly teen queen, Lesley Gore.

Left to right: Quincy Jones, Millie "My Boy Lollipop" Small, Lesley Gore, 1964.

With the aid of arranger Claus Ogerman and his trademark "big" pop sound (Jones stayed strictly in the production booth for these sessions), Jones helped the 17 year old Gore become an overnight superstar. Her remarkable run of hits in 1963-64 all benefitted from the unmistakable mark of quality that Jones no doubt insisted upon. Not only was the song craft of "It's My Party," "She's a Fool," "That's the Way Boys Are" and "Maybe I Know" impeccable (Jones would help Gore cherry pick only the best), but hold these spit-polished-to-a-gleam productions up to much of the slapdash claptrap that too many would-be Lesley Gores were forced to endure, and there's simply no comparison. Although other factors certainly had a part in the result, the fact that the very talented Gore only managed one more Top 40 hit after she and Jones parted ways in 1965 speaks volumes. Here's our absolute favorite  Gore/Jones collaboration: the legendary "sleigh bells" single mix of "Look of Love," from the pens of the extraordinary Jeff Barry and Ellie Greenwich, with the fabulous Miss Ellie helping out on background duty with session queens Jean Thomas and Miki Harris.

Lesley Gore wasn't the only bouffant blonde to benefit from Quincy Jones' finesse in the 1960's, however. Peggy Lee also swung under his baton, although despite their professional and personal respect for one another, they strangely only recorded two full albums, If You Go (1961) and Blues Cross Country (1962). Even more strangely, these two albums don't even really constitute essential listening for either Lee or Jones fans. The latter, with its punchy big band arrangements, and cute concept and song selection (from "Kansas City" to "St. Louis Blues" to "I Left My Sugar in Salt Lake City"...get it?), is the better of the two, tapping into both singer and arranger's jazzy, swinging side. If You Go has an impeccable track listing, but the purple prose of the liner notes ("...Magnificent misty-eyed performances of beautiful love songs...") is unfortunately matched by Jones' unusually precious backings, while Lee sometimes seems less misty than hazy. Five years later, however, Lee would provide lyrics to a song Jones had written for the score to Walk, Don't Run (1966), Cary Grant's final film. This tender bossa nova became a minor standard, and its poignancy, and the fact that it resulted in a direct writing collaboration between the two, speaks far more eloquently than their actual recorded teaming. (That same year, Peggy Lee co-wrote [with composer Johnny Mandel] and recorded one of her all-time finest songs, "The Shining Sea," which many have interpreted as a love letter to Jones: "...his strong, brown hands..."). Here, Peggy sings her collaboration with Jones, "Stay with Me," as a duet with Andy Williams; the song only appeared on one of her Capitol singles, paired with "Happy Feet," also from Walk, Don't Run, and also written with Jones.

As noted previously, Jones was a hit recording artist under his own name, and the string of instrumental albums he and his orchestra released from 1962 through 1966 are all perfect examples of early-to-mid Sixties cool. "Soul Bossa Nova," from Big Band Bossa Nova (1962), is the best known "hit" from this period, an original composition from an album otherwise comprised of either legitimate Brazilian songs "souled up," or American pop hits given similar treatment. It was later used and rediscovered, for better or worse, on the soundtrack of Mike Myer's Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery (1997). Camp contrivance and lounge lizards aside, all of Jones' subsequent 1960's albums are worth rediscovering, but our absolute favorite is Quincy Plays For Pussycats (1965), which features an insanely groovy treatment of Ramsey Lewis' too-cool-for-school "The In Crowd." If this doesn't make you want to slip on some go-go boots and Pony all night long, you're probably reading the wrong blog.

Jones' groundbreaking work for movie scores deserves an entire blog (or book) of its own; and of course, his monumental successes in the prevailing decades are for someone else to write about. We hope we've shed a little light on what perhaps may be more neglected nuggets from an exhaustive and commendable lifetime of achievement. 

QUINCY JONES

March 14, 1933

It's Good to Be Queen, Part Two

The benevolent Queen D, waving her sceptre, and spreading joy and mink across the land.

MISS DINAH WASHINGTON
August 29, 1924 - December 14, 1963

Trifecta of Greatness

Here at Stirred, Straight Up with a Twist, we are nothing if not democratic: to us, greatness is greatness, whether it means being a great singer, a great movie star, or a simply great Weezy Jefferson. August 29's birthdays encompass yet another TV Immortal, plus the Queen of the Blues and one of the greatest Hollywood Goddesses of all time. It's good to be a Virgo!



By all accounts as fiery, lusty and tart as her magnificent voice, Dinah Washington (August 29, 1924 - December 14, 1963) had three ruling passions: music, minks and men, not necessarily in that order. Officially married seven times (some sources claim eight or nine), La Washington worked hard and lived harder. Pink champagne was demanded -- and provided -- at her recording sessions, and Washington was well aware of, and not afraid to tout, her own abilities. "I can sing anything," she once remarked, "anything at all." And she could, and did: dirty blues, straight R&B, pop ballads, jazz standards, pseudo-rock pop trifles -- all received the Washington treatment at one time or another, and although they varied wildly in songwriting quality and craftsmanship, Washington's authoritative presence and voice somehow made them work.

A superstar of the black community during the 1950's, with such singles as "Baby Get Lost" (1949), "I Won't Cry Anymore" (1951), and "TV is the Thing This Year" (1953) staples on R&B radio and jukeboxes, Washington finally earned the respect of the jazz community with a legendary appearance at 1958's Newport Jazz Festival. The following year, she "crossed over" to the pop charts in a big way, with her million-selling revival of "What a Diff'rence a Day Made." The Queen of the Blues was bigger than ever, but she didn't live much longer to enjoy her worldwide acclaim: four years later, she was dead at age 39, after combining too much liquor and the diet pills she used constantly to battle her bulge.



The beloved Isabel Sanford (August 29, 1917 - July 9, 2004) first came to national attention with her role as Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn's maid in the 1967 social comedy, Guess Who's Coming to Dinner? A few years later, she created the role which made her a TV superstar: Louise "Weezy" Jefferson, wife of blowhard dry cleaning magnate George Jefferson. The couple made their debut as recurring characters on All in the Family, then were given their own show, The Jeffersons, in 1975. It ran for a remarkable 11 seasons, with Sanford winning a Best Actress in a Comedy Series Emmy in 1981; even more remarkably, she was the first African-American actress to do so.

After The Jeffersons ended its run, the public affection for George and Weezy remained so strong, that Sanford and co-star Sherman Hemsley continued to recreate their characters on both series television (Roseanne) and in commercials (Old Navy, Nick at Nite). The only one of seven children to survive infancy, Isabel Sanford passed away in 2004 from complications stemming from heart disease.



Not unlike her predecessor as Hollywood's #1 Swede, Garbo, Ingrid Bergman (August 29, 1915 - August 29, 1982) had very definite ideas about stardom and her own image. After being signed by producer David O. Selznick in 1939 to star in his Intermezzo, she flatly refused to change her name or alter her appearance in any way (which he suggested include capping her teeth and plucking her eyebrows). This naturalness and independent spirit made the luminous Bergman stand out among her lacquered sisters, and she became one of the decade's reigning superstars.

Aside from Casablanca (1942), which she herself referred to dismissively as "the one I made with Bogart," some of Bergman's most acclaimed films included Gaslight (1944, Best Actress Oscar), The Bells of St. Mary's (1945) and Notorious (1946). She also appeared extensively on stage, winning the first-ever Best Actress Tony for Joan of Lorraine in 1947. Shortly after, Bergman met Italian director Roberto Rossellini; the two began an affair, which resulted in a pregnancy while Bergman was still married to her first husband, Aron Lindstrom. The resulting scandal was shocking at the time, and seemingly ruinous for Bergman's career; she was off the American screen for over half a decade.

In 1956, Bergman made her comeback via Anastasia, perhaps not ironically as an exiled princess. She won her second Best Actress Oscar the following year; her friend Cary Grant accepted it on her behalf. She made her first post-scandal public appearance in 1958 at the next Oscars ceremony, and was given a standing ovation. Although her days as a viable leading lady were nearing an end, Bergman continued to act in Hollywood and European productions, as well as the occasional television event and on stage. In 1974, her supporting role in the all-star Agatha Christie mystery, Murder on the Orient Express, won her a third Academy Award.

Ingrid Bergman died on her 67th birthday in 1982, after a long battle with breast cancer.