When
I asked Jeanette some while ago what she most wanted to do at this point
in her life, she said. "I Like working with children, and I hope one day
to open a home for abused and neglected kids. My second most cherished
occupation is to watch old movie musicals and mysteries - it's the only
way I can feel totally relaxed, '' she said.
Johnny Flamingo, the great L.A. nightclub baritone singer who recorded
for Huggy Boy's Caddy label during the 1950s and to whom Jeanette has been
married for thirty five years, started complaining of intense pain at the
small of his back. Cursory examination by his doctors led them to suspect
a pinched nerve.
Jeanette, who had enjoyed a close and lasting relationship with her
husband over all these years, was suspicious. Furthermore, she was annoyed
by the fact that at the hospital emergency unit, the doctors tried to palm
Johnny off with pills. Only after Jeanette explained to the physicians
just exactly whom they were dealing with did they undertake tests, which
resulted in the discovery of multiple cancers.
As
many Americans, Jeanette is appalled by the health system, or lack thereof,
and longs for the day when she will be able to pull up stakes and in retirement
make a fresh life for herself either in Australia or Western Canada where
health care, as in most of the world, is free and basic humanitarian values
are respected. Jeanette Baker and Johnny Flamingo were the perfect couple.
They adored one another and shared everything in life, the kind of relationship,
which grew out of devotion and mutual respect. When it came time to pursue
musical careers, they took their own directions although at times Jeanette
had to rescue Johnny from crooked promoters.
Jeanette's lengthy and successful marriage probably had something to
do with her having good family role models to build upon to begin with.
She was born June 7th, 1938 in Denver, Colorado to Freddie Baker and Jane
Catherine Martin. Freddie Baker was an actor who appeared in some of the
earliest black Hollywood movies of the silent screen. The best remembered
was a short entitled "Double Deal." Freddie was blessed with a magnificent
baritone voice, with which he sang ballads from the Billy Eckstine songbook.
Jane Catherine Martin was an intellectual who studied her way up to become
Professor of Linguistics at Pepperdine University in Malibu, California.
The legendary Josephine Baker was Jeanette's great aunt, Bixie Crawford
was Jeanette's mother's first cousin, and an uncle Eugene Jackson, appeared
as one of the original "Our Gang'' child actors during the 1920s, under
the direction of Hal Roach. The family soon moved out to Los Angeles.
At
the age of six Jeanette made the first of many frequent trips out to Denver
during the summer months, staying with favorite aunts. She made her acting
debut as a 3 year old "extra" in George Marshall's "Star Spangled Rhythm."
During the shooting Jeanette got sick and her baby sister Constance Baker
took over the part. Other big parts included Tarzan films with Johnny Weismuller
and Lex Barker. It was in Denver that she first met Vernon Green of the
Medallions. Vernon and Jeanette did "The Showboat.'' The Showboat was a
sort of summer talent contest held at City Park on a stage wagon. Would-be
hopefuls from all over Denver entered the talent contest. During the first
week's sing-off, Jeanette stepped up and sang Nellie Lutcher's 1947 Capitol
hit, "He's a real gone guy'' and won first prize. The second week Vernon
came on to do a solo and also won first place. The Green and Baker families
knew each other well and were close friends.
A man by the name of Martin Talley got Vernon and Jeanette involved
in film work. This lead to Jeanette getting a minor role as a kid in the
background on Michael Curtis's 1950 tobacco empire- building drama, "Bright
Leaf," starring Gary Cooper. Cameo roles in other Hollywood movies lead
up to a minor role in Allen Reisner's 1958 musical drama "St. Louis Blues''
starring Nat King Cole and Eartha Kitt. Jeanette remembered Nat King Cole
from her childhood when he appeared at the Fairmount Club in St. Louis.
Growing up, Jeanette did all the things young, talented middle class girls
usually do: sang in the Carver Junior High School Choir, was a member of
the Herons of Jericho Methodist Youth Fellowship, served as band majorette,
girl scout and camp-fire girl was a member of the YWCA and played both
violin and xylophone in her high school band. She also had a talent for
journalism and wrote columns for leading black tabloids. Her regular chat
column was called "Teen Town USA." As a teen she was singing in night clubs
from St. Louis to New York. She was under age and nobody knew it. She also
performed in church gatherings, weddings, birthdays, along with many other
events.
Jeanette
became a member of The Wesley Methodist Church on Fifty-second Street and
Main. She joined the church's Youth Choir under the direction of Marguerita
Chapman, an accomplished vocalist who was under contract with the MGM studios.
The Youth Choir's reputation was such that is gave programs at other Methodist
churches. In the surrounding area "I remember," says Jeanette, "after choir
practice, my friends and I would run down to Fifty-first and Main, to the
coffee and malt shop on the corner. At other times I'd hang out at Jesse
Belvin's house where Alex and Gaynel Hodge, Richard Berry, Bobby Day, Eugene
Church and of course Jesse would hang out and we would all sing songs together.”
In the choir, Jeanette took the solo spots on traditional songs like
"Get on board little children'' and let us break bread together on our
knees," But Jeanette really wanted to break into the vocal group scene
and wail like Jesse Belvin and his friends, Luckily, she had a supportive
grandmother, Lilly B.R. Baker. She had been a fan of the Platters back
when she was in St. Louis. She was determined to put together a group of
her own modeled after Zola Taylor and the Platters. Like many young people
she tuned into the local teen radio programs. One of these was Dick Hugg
(Huggie Boy) show aired over KRKD from John Dolphin's Dolphins of Hollywood
Record Store at Vernon and Central.
Jeanette who did not want to let it be known that she did not have a
recording contract of a vocal group at all pretended that all she needed
was a tenor singer for a group she called the Dots. When she drove over
to visit with Hugg to have him put out over the all that she was looking
to complete her quartet, his face lit up. “Huggy Boy” on his show had expressed
interest in finding vocal groups to record as he was planning on starting
up his own label, Caddy Records. He even insisted on having Jeanette's
outfit audition for him before making records for anyone else.
The next day, Jeanette was flooded with telephone calls from aspiring
singers. One of these was from husband-to-be Johnny Flamingo who passed
the audition. Others chose from the pack were tenor Pete Smith plus a fellow
named Ed whose last name Jeanette can’t remember. After hearing that Jeanette
had finally put the Dots together "Huggy Boy'' asked if she had any songs
to record. Although she told him she had songs ready to go, In reality
the Dots hnd not hammered out arrangements on anything. In the car on the
way to the studio, Jeanette and the Dots frantically struggled to work
up material. They came up with a tune called "I confess," a romantic ballad
lead with verve and gusto by Jeanette herself. She had finally managed
to convince "Huggy Boy'' that the Dots had been together some while and
that they were well rehearsed. According to writer/deejay Steve Propes,
Jeanette Baker was the first artist ever to pull the wool over "Huggy Boy's"
eyes.
The chart chosen for the flip, "I wish'' (I could meet her), was a rocking
and stopin' jumper with unknown male lead Johnny Flamingo that tends the
supporting ''Handsome Jim Balcom Band In full throttle, with shrieking
sax and pounding piano "I confess'' made a little noise in the L.A. area
but did not pick up too much notice until it was introduced by Ernie Freeman
to the fourteen-year-old Paul Anka at Modern Records in September 1956
Anka, who had traveled south on his father's money from his hometown of
Ottawa, Canada to seek fame and fortune in Hollywood garnered very little
commercial success out of the record and promptly returned to Ontario.
Paul Anka's version of “I confess” was backed by Aalon Collins and
the Cadets who recorded Stranded In the Jungle for Modern the same year.
When
Jeanette and Johnny met It was love at first sight but they had to wait
a while to get married as Johnny was already hitched to his first wife.
Ray Brewster joined the Dots in Johnny Flamingo's place In 1957 and the
quartet enjoyed two releases. The first was the sweetly sung, mid tempo
ballad "Johnny" (dedicated to It not concerning Jeanette's romance with
her new beau) backed by the breathy compulsive "I lost you'' (Caddy 107).
Jeanette's high pitched soprano reminds one of the vocal timbres projected
by Shirley Goodman of Shirley & Lee fame. "Johnny" made a fair bit
of noise around Southern California but did not dent any charts.
The Dots' third and final single release was "Good luck to you'' coupled
with "Heartsick & lonely'' (Caddy 111 ). "Good luck to you'' is yet
another sulky, heartfelt ballad sung prettily to basic rhythm accompaniment.
By now, the original Dots had gone their separate ways and had been replaced
by singers with a good deal more professional experience. ''Good Luck to
you" sounds very much as if Jeanette was backed by Pete Smith, Johnny Flamingo,
Jesse Belvin, and Gaynel Hodge.
Due to poor sales, ''Good luck to you'' is an extremely rare record
to find and today fetches an outrageous sum of money. Back in 1955, while
still in St. Louis, Jeannette was taken by Oscar McLollie's November release
on Modern of a string-pulling ballad entitled "Convicted." "Convicted,"
sung with an almost effortless, smooth delivery, put the Los Angeles-born
Oscar McLollie and his band, the Honey Jumpers, on the map.
By the following May, Oscar McLollie was singing ''Convicted'' on Alan
Freed's CBS network show, broadcast out of Hollywood. Jeanette wished and
hoped she would someday get an opportunity to meet McLollie. As luck would
have it, when she came out to Los Angeles, Leon and Oscar Rene asked her
to record with Oscar McLollie for Class Records. "Leon was from the old
school," says Jeanelte. He thought a worthwhile song needed a lot of work
and a good set of complex arrangements, like back in the old days.
Leon told me that Oscar McLollie (who had just signed with Class Records)
needed a flip-side for a release he was cutting with his son Googie's band
called "Let me know, let me know,'' (a fast-paced rocker with ensemble
chorus in the "My babe'' vein.) I told Leon to call my mother as she spoke
several languages and could come up with words to suit our purpose. That's
how we came up with the hook for the song “Hey boy, hey girl.”
"Hey
boy, hey girl'' was written and recorded in May 1958. By June, Leon had
reported to Billboard that "Hey boy, hey girl'' was moving fast. 250,000
copies were reported to have been sold in just three weeks. "I first heard
the song while riding around in my car," says Jeanette. "Hunter Hancock,
who was the first to break the B-side on KGBF, launched the song. He preferred
the duet to the jumping side, and it seemed a lot of people went along
with that. I couldn't believe it at first, I was shocked.'' says Jeanette.
Jeanette Baker and Hunter Hancock later became firm friends. ''Hunter is
a nice, genuine person," says Jeanette, "and he was always a man of his
word."
"Hey boy, hey girl'' peaked at the number sixty-one spot in the Hot
100. "The song took me all over the world," says Jeanette, "and would have
lead to bigger and better breaks had not been for the fact that McLollie
was an extremely difficult person to work with." Jeanette was the song's
co-writer but was never given credit. Nor did she receive royalties or
payment for any of the many night club engagements she and McLollie filled.
"He was a good congo player and all-round entertainer," says Jeanette,
"but we just didn't get along.''
"Hey boy, hey girl'' is a bright, breezy jumper with a good beat and
a catchy hook. McLollie is best known today for his hit "Convicted" which
he re-recorded twice, one in 1958 for Class and again for Chess in the
1970s. "Hey boy, hey girl'' was picked up by Louis Prima and Keely Smith
in the 1950s. Louis and Keely used the song for the title of their low
budget movie made for David Lowell Rich in 1960. Surprisingly, the Louis
and Keely version of "Hey boy, hey girl'' sounds almost like a carbon copy
of the original but unlike the original, it did not set the world on fire.
Jeanette's version of the song was used recently in a T.V. commercial for
Mervyn's Department Stores.
Dick "Huggy Boy'' Hugg at Caddy Records, like most young, enterprising,
small record label owners, sold masters on his artists to major or larger
independent record companies. Johnny Flamingo's April 1957 Master Recorders
session was certainly sold to Ed Mesner at Aladdin who put out two single
releases, including Johnny's extremely popular "So long." This might also
have been the case with Jeanette Baker whose November 1958 Master Recorders
session (which included "Everything reminds me of you'' and "Crazy with
you") ended up on a December 1958 release schedule as Aladdin 3443 (billed
as by Jeanette & Decky.) Billboard Magazine's (week of December 8)
new release column awarded both sides a top four-star rating as indeed
the record sounded like a winner but subsequent sales did not match the
hype.
Aladdin 3443 resurfaced as by Jeanette Baker in 1963 on Imperial 5964.
In November 1959 Jeanette recorded "He really belongs to me'' / "Moonbeam"
for Class Records. Although "Moonbeam" remains Jeanette's favorite record
it failed to generate much sales action. Right after this, Class let her
go. Office staff told her that she was dropped because she was not a Catholic
which of course was quite ridiculous. Jeanette subsequently recorded for
a variety of labels.
Jeanette continued to work as singer around the worls during the 1960s,
for the USO in Alaska and Viet Nam. One proposed Viet Nam trip did not
work out as expected. "I had a premonition one day that I wouldn't make
it back alive," says Jeanette. At the very last minute, she decided not
to go. Sure enough her replacement was killed by an enemy bullet in the
temple.
Jeanette saved wisely and bought real estate namely in Eagle Rock, California
and a house on the desert near the Joshua Tree National Park between the
Mojave and California desert regions. Later she opened a night club at
Arlette and Van Nuys Boulevard called Miss B's. The nitery served as a
showcase for her group, Miss B & the Stingers in which Jeanette held
forth on vocals and piano. Apart from planning to build herself a home
in San Felipe, Baja California, she is also striving to promote young talent.
In 1984 Jeanette opened Miss B's Chicken Supreme Restaurant in Eagle
Rock. The place was opened for several years. She was president of LACRA
(Los Angeles Club of Recording Artists) and has worked hard for artists'
rights.
Johnny Flamingo died as a result of cancer and emphysema on Christmas
Eve, 2000. Jeanette is currently working on her new CD that will be released
soon with her producers Ron Steele and son Clarence Steele who is also
her engineer with Studio 79.
