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Schoolboy Porter


The Magnificent Goldberg

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Schoolboy Porter discography and career

John “Schoolboy” Porter – Porter (ts), Jesse Hart (p), Walter Broyle (b), Carl Scott (d). Chicago. Prob Sep 1950.

Schoolboy’s boogie – Chance 1101

I’ll never smile again – Chance 1101

Kayron – Chance 1105

Deep purple – Chance 1105

Tennessee waltz pt 1 – Chance 1103

Tennessee waltz pt 2 – Chance 1103

…………

Porter (ts, bars), Jesse Hart (p), Walter Broyle (b), Carl Scott (d). Chicago. 15 Nov 1950

High tide – Chance unissued

Nevertheless – Chance 1104

Walk heavy (aka Wig deal) (Porter bars) – Chance 1104

…………

Porter (ts), Art Hoyle (tp), Peterson (bars), Eugene McDuffy (Jack McDuff) (p), Floyd Dungy (b), Vaciro (d). Chicago. 25 Jul 1951.

Soft shoulders (aka School’s blues) – Chance 1114

Rollin’ along (aka Tojo’s boogie) – Chance 1114

Top hat (aka Question mark) – Chance 1111

Stairway to the stars – Chance 1111

Sentimental journey – Chance 1117

Fire dome (aka Land of the misch) – Chance 1117

As Clyde Wright & the Chanceteers

I may be down – Chance 1112

…………

Same band (but McDuffie now on organ). Chicago. 1 May 1952.

Small squall – Chance 1132

Lonely wail – Chance 1132

Break thru – Chance 1119

Junco partner – Chance 1119

Brother John Sellers (voc) added. Record issued as by Johnny Sellers.

Josie Jones – Chance 1120

Rock me in the cradle – Chance 1120

………….

Roosevelt Sykes. Sykes (p,cel*), Schoolboy Porter (g), Ransome Knowling (b), Jump Jackson (d), Remo Biondi (vln). Chicago. 21 Aug 1952.

Walkin’ this boogie – United 129

Four o’clock blues (tk 12) – United 139

Four o’clock blues (tk 4) – Delmark DE642

Too hot to hold – United 139

Something like that – P-Vine Special (J) PLP-9039

Toy piano blues * – P-Vine Special (J) PLP-9039

Security blues – United 129

Listen to my song (aka She’s the one for me) (tk2) – Delmark DE642

Listen to my song (aka She’s the one for me) (tk 17) – Delmark DE642

 

………..

Porter was from Gary, Indiana. He was 24 when he made his first recording session in 1950. He’d served in the Navy for 2.5 years during WWII. In the summer of 1947, he joined Cootie Williams’ band but didn’t make any recordings. In 1948, he enrolled in Midwestern College of Music, where he stayed for a year.

Porter’s first session was with a non-union band. When the local union realised this (after the second session) Chance Records was banned from making records. During the gap, Porter joined Lionel Hampton’s band for a while, before making his final sessions for Chance and United.

He stopped being a professional musician in 1952 and joined the US Air Force. He was a member of the 750th Air Force Band, then the 541st. After retiring from the USAF, sometime in the late seventies, he moved to Phoenix, Arizona, where he took up being a musician again and was still performing occasionally in 1991.

All that very interesting info comes from Clemson University’s The Red Saunders Foundation’s pages on Chance Records, and on United Records. You can look at it here:

http://campber.people.clemson.edu/chance.html

None of his sax work has been reissued on CD (or even LP) except for “Rollin’ along”, which appeared on the Pontiac compilation “Rare R&B honkers vol 1”, the first of a 3 CD set.

Despite Pontiac’s release, Porter wasn’t truly a honker. Clemson accounts for this by the shortness of his stays with the two main bands from which the honkers graduated: those of Cootie Williams and Lionel Hampton. Having heard only three of his sides, which doesn’t make me much of a Porter expert, I’d say he was a strongly forthright player who fitted well into both leaders’ personal and musical predilections. I suspect that, had he stayed with either for a longer period, he would have become a very well respected honker.

But honkers were, in a way, two a penny in the period during which Porter was working. His real importance, as far as I can see,  is that he was a pioneer of the tenor-organ style. Go back up to that little discography; Jack McDuff was recording with him on organ in May 1952. Few jazz organists had recorded at that time (Wild Bill Davis, Jackie Davis, Milt Buckner, Bill Doggett). And that was also the year in which Jaws made his first tenor-organ session, for Roost, with Bill Doggett. We don’t know the month of the Jaws session; it could be that Porter was ahead of Jaws. But it’s probable that neither knew what the other was doing.

Clemson says nothing about McDuff having been persuaded to use organ for his May 1952 session. But that McDuff and Porter were long time associates is sure. And I doubt if an organ is just something one can sit at and play, just like that. “Rollin’ along” features a surprisingly articulate piano solo from McDuff, which is not the case with his organ playing, which does seem to argue that the organ may have been a spur of the moment decision. But I rather think not; he was always a Wild Bill Davis man, very chordal in his approach; much more so prior to absorbing lessons from Jimmy Smith, and always retained a swing band approach throughout his career. So someone, somewhere in Chicago, may well have seen them working this up on the bandstands.

In my view this puts Porter, historically, in a more or less equivalent position to Jaws.

OK, personal stuff now. My mate had a 78 of “Lonely wail”/”Small squall”, which was one of his treasures. In the mid-seventies, when we both had tape recorders and then lived in different towns, he recorded them, along with other forthright tenor players etc, for me. At some time, I lost the tape but, as it was something I didn’t play all that often, I didn’t notice.

A while ago, I started looking for this tape and couldn’t find it (or the other two he did) ANYWHERE! After a month of panic, I shrugged my shoulders and lived without it. But when I was beginning to rip my African cassettes, I opened up a box, buried deep in the garage, containing spare copies of those cassettes, to rip some material from unplayed, and sometimes sealed, tapes. And there the three of them were, submerged amongst a bunch of African stuff!!!!

So I ripped them.

If anyone is interested enough to want to hear these three sides I’ve got, I’d be happy to e-mail them. Just send me a PM.

MG

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Thanks for this bio and discography. Schoolboy Porter is a name that comes up here and there in 50s R&B and to those interested in the music (like me) rings a loud bell but somehow is never explored in depth. I even seem to remember that somewhere his name was mentioned as being an alias or byname for Jake Porter, probably in some liner notes. And somehow it seems to me that apart from the Pontiac CD you mention a track or two by him are out there on some other RB& reissue compilation. I've searched but cannot pinpoint them right now (and they are not on the Savage Kick/Stompin' V.A. LPs) so I may be mistaken and it might actually be his guitar sideman appearances I saw but this triggers a sort of "deja vu" feeling here.

P.S: Just for the record: To the best of my knolwedge, the name/spelling of that bassist on the Roosevelt Sykes session is Ransom Knowling. Not to be confused with Fela Ransome Kuti. (An African-influenced slip of the typing finger, maybe? ;))

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3 hours ago, Big Beat Steve said:

Thanks for this bio and discography. Schoolboy Porter is a name that comes up here and there in 50s R&B and to those interested in the music (like me) rings a loud bell but somehow is never explored in depth. I even seem to remember that somewhere his name was mentioned as being an alias or byname for Jake Porter, probably in some liner notes. And somehow it seems to me that apart from the Pontiac CD you mention a track or two by him are out there on some other RB& reissue compilation. I've searched but cannot pinpoint them right now (and they are not on the Savage Kick/Stompin' V.A. LPs) so I may be mistaken and it might actually m his guitar sideman appearances I saw but this triggers a sort of "deja vu" feeling here.

P.S: Just for the record: To the best of my knolwedge, the name/spelling of that bassist on the Roosevelt Sykes session is Ransom Knowling. Not to be confused with Fela Ransome Kuti. (An African-influenced slip of the typing finger, maybe? ;))

Interesting Steve. Never heard of those labels/album titles.

Not a slip of my finger on Ransom I think: I seem to remember copying it from Clemson.

MG

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3 hours ago, The Magnificent Goldberg said:

Interesting Steve. Never heard of those labels/album titles.

Not a slip of my finger on Ransom I think: I seem to remember copying it from Clemson.

MG

"Grey label" reissues in the UK from the late 80s through the 90s, found mostly at sellers present at (real 50s style) rock'n'roll concerts and festivals (outside the UK too, of course). All in all running the whole gamut from (danceable/uptempo) country blues via jump blues/ R&B to "electric" 50s blues/R&B and black r'n'r and even very early R&B-ish soul. The Stompin' LP series (Vols. 1 to 26) was superseded and augmented by a CD series under the same name relased thereafter. Most of it is still listed here, for example:

http://www.nortonrecords.com/stompin/?sort=alphaasc

 

As for copying from Clemson, not so. I just checked the United/States entry. ;)

Edited by Big Beat Steve
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The Roosevelt Sykes United sides (with Porter on guitar) are good stuff - also don't miss Remo Biondi's bluesy violin. All are included on Delmark 642 - Raining in My Heart.

I think that saxophone and guitar are an unusual double. Perhaps I'm just not thinking, but offhand I can't remember another case like that. I know Little Walter recorded on both harp and guitar, but that's at least a bit different. Probably someone will come up with an obvious example that I overlooked.

Edited by paul secor
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19 hours ago, Big Beat Steve said:

As for copying from Clemson, not so. I just checked the United/States entry. ;)

Ha! The quickness of the hand deceives the mind :g

So I guess you've heard the Porter recordings issued on those grey labels...

MG

16 hours ago, paul secor said:

The Roosevelt Sykes United sides (with Porter on guitar) are good stuff - also don't miss Remo Biondi's bluesy violin. All are included on Delmark 642 - Raining in My Heart.

I think that saxophone and guitar are an unusual double. Perhaps I'm just not thinking, but offhand I can't remember another case like that. I know Little Walter recorded on both harp and guitar, but that's at least a bit different. Probably someone will come up with an obvious example that I overlooked.

Clarence "Gatemouth" Brown also played hca and g (and vln).

Joe Cohn (Al's son) played g & tpt on the album "The new Al Grey Quintet". But, now you mention it, I can't think of anyone else who plays sax and g.

I bet someone does.

MG

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3 hours ago, The Magnificent Goldberg said:

So I guess you've heard the Porter recordings issued on those grey labels...

 

Like I said, I had initially checked this (vinyl) series as this was my primary candidate where tracks by him might hide but it turned out he was not on there. The search willl have to continue ... and right now I am stumped.

Edited by Big Beat Steve
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15 hours ago, The Magnificent Goldberg said:

 

Clarence "Gatemouth" Brown also played hca and g (and vln).

Joe Cohn (Al's son) played g & tpt on the album "The new Al Grey Quintet". But, now you mention it, I can't think of anyone else who plays sax and g.

I bet someone does.

MG

Not quite guitar, but Wilton Felder, sax and bass. Although there is also Olu Daru, trumpet and guitar, Blood Ulmer, flute and guitar. 

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