Blanche Calloway (and her Joy Boys)

Did she have what it takes? Listen and see for yourself...

Blanche Calloway was born in 1902, and started performing professionally as a singer by the age of 19.  She became a successful composer and bandleader who headlined through the late 1920’s and most of the 1930s.  Yet today, if she is remembered at all, it is as the (older) sister of Cab Calloway. During the height of her career, she was more famous and better paid than her little brother, and she actually mentored him, helping him establish his career.  They remained close and often performed together, but biographies of Cab (including his Wikipedia entry) as well as musical histories of the Big Band era, barely mention her.  It’s a huge oversight.

Calloway was the first female headliner with male sidemen, and the first to lead an all male jazz band, the Joy Boys.  Her early sidemen included Louis Armstrong and Richard M. Jones (who later went on to become Armstrong’s producer); the Joy Boys included future bandleaders Ben Webster, Cozy Cole, Benny Moten and Chick Webb. Calloway wrote high-energy songs, with often scandalous lyrics, and reviews of the time note her showy performances and big stage presence.  Cab Calloway, himself famous for his stage persona, credited his sister with inspiring his style and teaching him how to work the stage.

In retrospect, the 1920s and early 1930s seem to have been more open to women and to Black musicians than the following decades.  Even so, Calloway had to deal with the dual challenges of being Black during the era of segregation, and being a woman in a male-dominated industry.  While on tour, she had to use racially segregated facilities, and was arrested on at least one occasion for using a whites-only bathroom (her husband was pistol-whipped just for good measure).

In my prior posts, I featured some high-profile women bandleaders who sank out of sight by the late 1940s.  The last big window for women instrumentalists was during WWII, when many of the male musicians were serving in the military.  This mirrored the general influx of women into traditionally male work (as symbolized by Rosie the Riveter:) 

Once the men returned, there was a big shift back toward traditional roles for women, and show business was no exception. Blanche Calloway eventually left live performing after her bookings dried up, but she stayed involved in music.  She began managing other acts (mainly female singers), as well as running a night club.  For a time, she worked as a radio station DJ and program director. 

Calloway’s story is certainly not a tragedy. She was ambitious and engaged, and became politically active, spending her last decades campaigning for voting rights for women and Blacks (she became the first Black woman to vote in the state of Florida) and serving with major civil rights organizations like the NAACP.  She was also an entrepreneur, founding a company marketing personal care products aimed at Black women.  She lived to be 76.  Upon her death, the New York Times even printed a (short) obituary.

No, the tragedy is ours.  We are poorer for the fact that even dedicated fans of swing band-era music have rarely heard of her.  This is not just due to passive forgetting, but to active erasure. For example, Calloway’s recordings with Armstrong and Jones were later re-released under their names instead of hers.  Histories of her brother Cab’s biggest hit, “Minnie the Moocher”, omit the fact that she sang about Minnie in a song published a year before his, or that he based his famous “Hi De Ho” chorus on the call-and-response routines in her live performances. 

In Cab’s own memoir, he fully credits her with having inspired his career and his style, so the fault for erasing her is not his.  It is the fault of record label executives and historians who took it upon themselves to decide she didn’t matter.  Fortunately, a few dedicated music archivists and feminist historians have rescued her and other pioneering female musicians from oblivion, largely by mining private collections of 78s.  I hope you enjoy these gems.

“Growlin’ Dan” (1930)

One of Calloway’s bigger hits, it’s a hilarious description of a (possibly) fictitious boyfriend. It also mentions Minnie the Moocher, and includes a hint of the “Hi De Ho” chorus later made famous by her brother Cab.

“Just a Crazy Song”  (1931, with the Joy Boys including Ben Webster, Cozy Cole)

This is almost an all-star lineup of musicians—most of them would go on to fame in their own right as bandleaders or headlining stars.  Written by Calloway, this is a pretty straightforward invitation that would be right at home in today’s anything-goes pop culture.  Only it’s more clever. 

“I Got What it Takes” (1931, with the Joy Boys)

This is a gloriously bawdy song, performed with unapologetic gusto.  She puts a bit of growl in her voice just to help make the point.