BRITAIN’S HOMEGROWN MUSIC
Skiffle: Shortlived But Highly Influential
Bear Release Historic 6 CD + Book Box Set
It had a relatively short life yet was highly influential. It launched the careers of several artists and influenced others. It was a music that was homemade, comprised such instruments as guitar, washboard and tea chest bass, and didn’t need highly skilled musical ability in its presentation. The result was that more amateur groups were created than at any other time in Britain’s music history and it was estimated that there were 30,000 – 50,000 groups performing the music in the mid/late 1950s. The music was called skiffle.
Now Bear Family Records presents its overview on the phenomenon with a six cd box set, complete with an 88 page hardcover book, tracing the music from its’ New Orleans roots to its height of success in the British Isles.
WASHBOARDS KAZOOS BANJOS: THE HISTORY OF SKIFFLE
Bear Family ECD 16099 FK
In his well informed, detailed account of skiffle in this set’s accompanying book, Ulf Krüger (who began his own career in an amateur skiffle group and worked/recorded with Lonnie Donegan several times over the years) begins his account by mentioning that George Harrison, Eric Clapton and Joe Brown were among the artists to have been influenced by skiffle, noting that – although it was primarily a British phenomenon – its origins were in the USA. Comprising songs from various styles and sources, and although performed by street musicians, it wasn’t just restricted to such performers. A number of jazz and blues musicians made use of improvised instrumentation and this collection begins with a trio of tracks – The Memphis Jug Band, Alabama Washboard Stompers and Leadbelly – representative of this style. Once over here, thanks to jazzman Ken Colyer, it soon bred stacks of exponents, a headquarters in London – the 2 I’s coffee bar in Soho's Old Compton Street – and weekly exposure on radio via the Light Programme’s Saturday Skiffle Club.
Jazzman Ken Colyer – “who may have lived in London but his heart was in New Orleans” – headed groups that one time or another featured such formidable figures as Chris Barber, Lonnie Donegan, Alexis Korner as well as his brother Bill Colyer. Presenting a cool approach to his music (and, on stage, with a look adopted by many skifflers – beard, check shirt and corduroy trousers), he’s heard here with 26 tracks taking up most of this collection’s first disc, the material being mainly drawn from traditional sources – Midnight Special, Casey Jones, Down By The Riverside, Muleskinner Blues and The Gray Goose, although occasionally interspersed with a bluesman (Huddie Ledbetter’s Ella Speed) or Nashville (Nobody’s Child) title slipped in. The tracks were recorded at West Hampstead’s Decca Studios during the period 1954-57.
Colyer was the first person to record skiffle, with its original introduction coming as an interval in his concert jazz performances, a presentation that was later adopted by one-time skiffler cum jazz band leader Chris Barber. Working with Colyer, then Barber, was Glasgow born Lonnie Donegan, who became the undisputed “King of Skiffle”. Unlike Colyer, who presented his music with a calmness, Donegan abounded with energy that undoubtedly attracted wider audiences and made him a regular visitor to the British charts. He was also the first person to have a skiffle hit, happening as a member of Chris Barber’s Skiffle Group with a revival of Ledbetter’s Rock Island Line. This Top Ten entry began a run of around two dozen chart entries before the 1950s were over, although by the decade’s end he had moved on from skiffle to novelty and country with Does You Chewing Gum Lose Its Flavour On the Bedpost Overnight and Battle Of New Orleans respectively. Disc Two is completely devoted to the King of Skiffle’s skiffle recordings which commenced on Decca (as a member of the Barber band), briefly moved to Polygon and continued on to Pye’s Nixa label where he was one of the real heavy-hitters. 27 titles are featured here which not only embrace hits Rock Island Line, Stewball, Cumberland Gap and Puttin’ On The Style but also country and blues titles including Wreck Of the Old 97, My Dixie Darling, Midnight Special, Jimmie Brown, The Newsboy and The Grand Coulee Dam.
Donegan’s former employer Chris Barber – the third of the original skiffle groups - kicks off Disc Three with four titles from his catalogue. Featuring (here) arrangements of traditional numbers by singers Dickie Bishop and Johnny Duncan, both moving on to lead groups of their own while Barber settled down to be one of Britain’s foremost traditional jazz musicians. Although the former didn’t enjoy chart success he scored a near-miss with his original No Other Baby while American born Duncan (not to confused with the country singer that emerged a couple of decades later) provided skiffle with one of the biggest hits with Last Train To San Fernando in 1957, backed by his group The Blue Grass Boys.
The other consistent chart-breakers were The Vipers Skiffle Group, an outfit that book authorKrüger describes as “closest to the general perception of a skiffle group, being neither as relaxed or grown-up as Ken Colyer, nor as explosive and extrovert as Lonnie Donegan, but trod the middle ground”. Founded by Wally Whyton (vocals and guitar), the group’s biggest hits came with the Top Tenner’s Don’t You Rock Me Daddy-O and Cumberland Gap while further contributions in this selection include other traditional/arranged Whyton songs It Takes A Worried Man To Sing A Worried Song and Maggie May. The group was produced by George Martin for Parlophone and later, when simply known as The Vipers, included soon-to-be Shadows musicians Hank Marvin and Jet Harris. Whyton, of course, then moved on to folk, tv and radio successes which clearly displayed his considerable talents.
The other skiffle big hitmaker was another Glaswegian Chas McDevitt who, with singer Nancy Whiskey (who came to the group after winning a Radio Luxembourg-sponsored talent contest), went Top 5 on Oriole Records with Freight Train – and then became a hit in the USA where, up until then, only Donegan had achieved chart success. Later Whiskey (who never really cared for skiffle) left the group and was replaced by Shirley Douglas. An interesting aside, McDevitt went into competition with himself by recording a cover version for Woolworth’s label Embassy under the name Crane’s Skiffle Group, though it did nothing to halt the success of the original.
Also featured on Disc Three are The Bob Cort Skiffle Group and Les Hobeaux. The first was formed by an advertising man/jazz lover, the group never scoring any hits but recorded the theme song for “Six Five Special”, the first tv show to cater for a teenage audience. The second featured an international line-up of students at the London Polytechnic, recorded for HMV and became resident group at the 2 I’s Coffee Bar, taking over from The Vipers, then an in-demand touring act after their chart successes.
The fourth and fifth discs present an interesting pot-pourri of outfits, twenty-one of them in total and several differing from the template of the British skiffle groups.
*** The Barnstormers Spasm Band duplicated the jug band sound of the ‘20s, recorded one single for Parlophone (under George Martin’s auspices) – Won’t You Come Home Bill Bailey c/w Whistling Rufus – before moving on to Tempo Records;
*** The City Ramblers Skiffle Group (led by a more elderly Russell Quaye) added kazoo, jug, trumpet mouthpiece and fiddle to skiffle's more familiar line-up and presented a diverse programme that appealed to audiences far afield as Moscow. Nine of their Storyville recordings are to be heard here, including 900 Miles, When The Saints and Mama Don’t Allow;
*** While in the Britain, Alan Lomax (the son of famed folklorist John Lomax) led a group – The Ramblers - that included Peggy Seeger and Ewan MacColl. As can be surmised, it was closer to folk than skiffle;
*** Beryl Bryden, named the “Queen of the Washboard”, was a major figure in the British Trad Jazz Revival and played on Donegan’s Rock Island Line. Although her Backroom Skiffle Group was short-lived, she continued to play into old age and reportedly played the same washboard for 50 years;
*** Alexis Korner started off with Colyer and joined Bryden before launching his own skiffle group, which helped lay the foundation for the British blues boom;
*** Ray Bush & The Avon Cities Skiffle and Bob Wallis’ Washboard Beaters were both created by jazz musicians, the first fitting “the band within a band” concept while the second was heard following a one-off recording at a skiffle party in a Danish hotel;
*** 2:19 Skiffle Group, Station Skiffle Group and The Delta Skiffle Group were first, second and third placed winners in the 1957 First National Skiffle Contest and had recordings released on the Esquire label, with the second including an accordion in its line-up. Very little is known about another act on the label, Johnny Christmas & The Sunspots;
*** The Blue Jeans Skiffle Group was one of many groups that originated out of the famed 2 I’s coffee bar, another was The Worried Men Skiffle Group who took over from the aforementioned Les Hobeaux. This group had a string of talented players that passed through its ranks, including Tony Meehan and Brian Bennett (both to become members of Cliff Richard's Shadows);
*** The Coffee Bar Skifflers was formed especially for Woolworth's budget label Embassy and while the musicians’ identities were unknown, it was suggested that Diz Disley and Nancy Whiskey took part in the sessions;
*** Former drill instructor Jimmy Jackson was bought out of the RAF by Columbia Records, groomed as an all-round entertainer with a sound that was billed as rock ‘n’ skiffle;
*** Although Skiffle was primarily known as a British phenomenon, Europe also had it own contributors and disc five concludes with five of them. Robert ‘Roban’ Broberg, a multi-talented performer from Sweden who created Roban’s Skiffle Group after hearing an English skiffle record; Holland’s Mozam Skiffle Group beat 400 groups in a national talent contest, winning a record deal with Philips; the Lighttown Skiffle Group had a repertoire that included skiffle classics, gospel, Dutch folk songs and originals compositions; Havel City Ramblers, hailing from “skiffle boom” city Berlin, comprised school kids and apprentices and launched a “first” by singing German lyrics to their English sourced repertoire; and immensely successful piano/accordion playing bandleader Horst Wende, whose Skiffle Boys were studio musicians who had nothing to do with skiffle, but their rendition of You Are My Sunshine is included to show how artists outside a genre always attempt to jump on a bandwagon.
Finally disc six - Rarities, which lives up to its title with music from two groups, The Eden Skiffle Group and The Soho Skiffle Group. The first established itself in history by having a mail order album available only on transparent flexi-disc – in fact, ten flexi-discs (one for each song), packaged in an EP sized cover, for ten shillings inc. packing and postage. Featured on radio and television, this six member that sounded similar to the Vipers, never secured a regular record contract and it wasn’t until 2009 that these recordings, alongside twelve other newly found recordings, enjoyed a more standard release. More in it for the fun rather than the money, the Soho Skiffle Group was short-lived though they toured regularly. “Big” Jim Sullivan (later to claim fame as a top session guitarist) was in the line-up and they recorded for the specialist Melodisc, and the highlight of their career came when they appeared in a thirty film short transmitted on 62 US television stations.
The accompanying book is an invaluable source of information as Ulf Krüger reveals himself as someone who not only loves the music but also possesses the personal music experience. The introductory article provides the background to skiffle, alongside its rise and fall in Britain, before moving on to biographies information and photographs of all the artists featured in this six cd collection alongside recording information. There’s also reproductions of record labels, album and songbook covers, reprints of advertisements and newspapers articles, some disingenuous to the music – “Skiffle or Piffle” wrote Alexis Korner in Melody Maker (July 28, 1956), with a “don’t care” PS from Ken Colyer, and one-time Vipers member Jean Van Den Bosch bit the hand that once fed him, “The Hell of Skiffle” (MM: April 19, 1958). Providing a positive view, Fred Dallas sings its praises, “Skiffle Won’t Die” (MM: July 6, 1957).
Skiffle has been available on cd before, usually compilations featuring various artists, but Washboards … Kazoos … Banjos is the first time it’s been presented in a historic context. And only Bear Family would take on such a project, with the final result adding to a set worthy of a place in any serious collector’s library.
Also available on Bear Family Records:
LONNIE DONEGAN: More Than “Pye In The Sky” (complete recordings 1954-66)(8 cd box set with 60 page book) – BCD 15700 HI
JOHNNY DUNCAN: Last Train To San Fernando (complete recordings 1956-73)(4 cd box set with 28 page book) – BCD 15947 DI
THE VIPERS SKIFFLE GROUP: 10,000 Years Ago (complete recordings 1956-60)(3 cd box set with 36 page book) – BCD 15954 CI
CHAS McDEVITT: The Chas McDevitt Skiffle Group (cd with 28 page booklet) – BCD 16156 AH
WALLY WHYTON: Leave Them A Flower (minus 1)/It’s Me Mum (cd with 20 page booklet) – BCD 16158 AH
WALLY WHYTON: Children Songs of Woody Guthrie (cd with 20 page booklet) – BCD 16125 AH
Also available, and finely complimenting this box set, is Chas McDevitt's "Skiffle: The Definitive Inside Story" (Rollercoaster books), now fully revised and updated.
For more information on this and other Bear Family releases, please contact Richard Weize at Bear Family Records - bear@bear-family.com .
Bear Family Records, PO Box 1154, D-27727 Hambergen, Germany. phone: (+49) 47488216-0
DISC ONE – THE ANCESTORS
The Memphis Jug Band: It Won't Act Right • Alabama Washboard Stompers: Pigmeat Stomp • Lead Belly: There's A Man Going Round Taking Names • Ken Colyer: Midnight Special • Casey Jones • K.C. Moan • Take This Hammer • Down By The Riverside • Go Down Old Hannah • Streamline Train • Old Riley • Down Bound Train • Stack-O-Lee Blues • Muleskinner Blues • The Grey Goose • Sporting Life • House Rent Stomp • I Can't Sleep • This Train • Midnight Hour Blues • Go Down Sunshine • Ella Speed • Ham'n Eggs • Nobody Knows The Trouble I've Seen • Down By The Riverside • Hard Time Blues • Nobody's Child • You Don't Know My Mind • Midnight Special
DISC TWO – THE KING
Lonnie Donegan: Rock Island Line • John Henry • Wabash Cannonball • Midnight Special • When The Sun Goes Down • New Buryin' Ground • Worried Man Blues • The Ballad Of Jesse James • Railroad Bill • Stewball • Dead Or Alive • Wreck Of The Old 97 • Cumberland Gap • Gamblin' Man • Puttin' On The Style • My Dixie Darling • Jack O'Diamonds • The Grand Coulee Dam • Lonesome Traveller • Light From The Lighthouse • The Goldrush Is Over • Jimmy Brown, The Newsboy • Diggin' My Potatoes • On A Monday • Brother Moses Smote The Water • Ella Speed • Glory
DISC THREE – THE PROFESSIONALS
The Chris Barber Skittle Group: Gypsy Davy • Can't You Line Em • Where Could I Go • Doin' My Time • Dickie Bishop & His Sidekicks: No Other Baby • Cumberland Gap • Johnny Duncan: Last Train To San Fernando • Rock-A-Billy Baby • The Vipers Skiffle Group: Ain't You Glad • Pick A Bale Of Cotton • It Takes A Worried Man To Sing A Worried Song • Don't You Rock Me Daddy-0 • 10 000 Years Ago • Hey Liley, Liley Lo • Jim Dandy • The Cumberland Gap • Maggie May • Streamline Train • The Chas McDevitt Skiffle Group: Freight Train • It Takes A Worried Man • Greenback Dollar • I'm Satisfied • The Bob Cort Skiffle Group: Don't You Rock Me Daddy-0 • Maggie May • Ain't That A Shame • Six-Five-Special • Les Hobeaux: Mama Don't Allow • Hey, Hey, Daddy Blues • Toll The Bell Easy • Oh, Mary Don't You Weep
DISC FOUR – PURISTS & JAZZERS
Barnstormers Spasm Band: Won't You Come Home Bill Bailey • Whistling Rufus • City Ramblers Skiffle Group: 900 Miles • Picket Line • Midnight Special • I Shall Not Be Moved • When The Saints • Keep Your Pistol Good And Loaded • I Want A Girl • Mama Don't Allow • 2:19 Blues • Alan Lomax And The Ramblers: Hard Case • Railroad Man • Oh Lula • Beryl Bryden's Backroom Skittle Group: Kansas City Blues • Casey Jones • Alexis Korner Skiffle Group: I Ain't Gonna Worry No More • Sail On • Death Letter • Ray Bush & The Avon Cities Skittle: Green Corn • This Little Light Of Mine • Fisherman's Blues • Hey Hey Daddy Blues • Lonesome Day Blues • I Don't Know • How Long • Julian Johnson • Bob Wallis' Washboard Beaters: Meeting At The Building • Tight Like That • Julia Johnson • K.C. Moan
DISC FIVE: STUDENTS
2:19 Skittle Group: Hand Me Down My Walking Cane • Trouble In Mind • Station Skiffle Group: Steamboat Bill • Titanic • The Delta Skiffle Group: John Brown's Body • Skip To My Lou • The Lea Valley Skiffle Group: Streamline Train • I'm Gonna Walk And Talk • Johnny Christmas & The Sunspots: Mister And Mississippi • (I'm Gonna) Sing, Sing, Sing • Blue Jeans Skiffle Group: Lonesome Traveller • The Worried Men Skiffle Group: This Little Light of Mine • The Coffee Bar Skifflers: Steamboat Bill • Ella Speed • Jimmy Jackson: I Shall Not Be Moved (featured in the film 'Baby Doll') • Good Morning Blues • Roban's Skittle Group: Railroad Bill • Worried Man Blues • Sometimes • John B. • Mozam Skiffle Group: Midnite Special • Jim Crawl • Lighttown Skittle Group: Trula, Ol, Trula • He Marie druk toch niet op die Bel • Doe je Ruimtepakkie aan • Komm doch ZurGck (Sloop John B.) • Havel City Ramblers: Swing Low • Bei mir bist do schOn • Yes Sir That's My Baby • Fraulein Helene • Horst Wendy & Die Skittle Boys: You Are My Sunshine
DISC SIX: RARITIES
The Eden Street Skittle Group: Don't You Rock Me Daddy-0 • This Land Is Your Land • Pay Me My Money Down • Puttin' On The Style • Hey Liley Liley Lo • 10,000 YearsAgo • Liza Jane • Hand Me Down My Walking Cane • I Wanna Go Home • Maggie May • Get Along Home Cindy • Do Lord Remember Me • Man Taking Names • Mary, Don't You Weep • Gloryland • Judy Drowned • Black Girl • Old Smokey • Raise The Ruckus Tonight • Heaven • Easy Rider • Ain't That A Shame • The Soho Skittle Group: Streamline Train • Frankie & Johnny • I Shall Not Be Moved • Give Me A Big Fat Woman
