![]() The choir still didn’t work, so Lambert, Hendricks, and Ross decided to just record it themselves. To help train the choir, they brought in singer Annie Ross, a singer and comedienne who also recorded some vocalese in the past. They put together a choir, but the singers couldn’t swing. They began to arrange the music of Count Basie, and soon landed a deal to record it with ABC-Paramount. With Lambert’s gift of vocal arranging and Hendricks gift for writing vocalese lyrics, they began to construct vocal versions of their favorite jazz songs, like Jimmy Giufree’s “Four Brothers.” Lambert was a pioneer in bebop vocal jazz from the 1940s, and Hendricks made a point to get in touch with him so they could collaborate. Jon Hendricks’s biggest success came alongside jazz singer Dave Lambert. King Pleasure, Eddie Jefferson, and Jon Hendricks in 1954 performing the tune “Don’t Get Scared.” The music there is based on a saxophone solo by Stan Getz, with new vocalese lyrics by Hendricks. Jon Hendricks, Eddie Jefferson, and King Pleasure with “Don’t Get Scared,” on Afterglow. In this case though, he made one alteration to make it fit with Getz’s music: he changed the title from “Don’t Be Afraid” to “Don’t Get Scared.” It was the Stan Getz tune “Don’t Be Afraid.” Hendricks had a way of taking just the title of the song and constructing an entire story around it. In 1954, he recorded one of his first attempts at vocalese lyrics alongside King Pleasure and Eddie Jefferson. It was from then on he focused his songwriting energy on composing vocalese lyrics. ![]() Hendricks said that hearing this new vocalese style struck a chord in his soul. This is the art of vocalese, adding new lyrics to an existing instrumental jazz solo. This song is called “Moody’s Mood For Love,” with new lyrics by Eddie Jefferson, and performed by the mysterious one-hit wonder known as King Pleasure. Then one day in 1952, while sitting at a coffee shop, he heard this song, a vocal version of that James Moody saxophone solo we were just listening to. He had a great sense of rhythm, but a raspy, gritty tenor voice. He wrote a few songs here and there, but Hendricks didn’t possess a naturally beautiful voice. His early career got off to a slow start. It was Charlie Parker, who he met in Toledo, who told Hendricks to move to New York. Hendricks was drafted into the army during World War II Hendricks found his way to New York City to pursue a career as a jazz singer. At the time, he received one of the best jazz educations around: private lessons with his neighbor, jazz pianist Art Tatum. He started singing at a very young age, and soon became famous as a child star around Toledo. He was a preacher’s son, which may say something about the singer’s gift of gab. Jon Hendricks was born in Toledo, Ohio in 1921. This recording plays an important role in the development of Jon Hendricks as an artist, and I’ll explain why in a moment. The song you’re hearing right now is “I’m In The Mood for Love” the old Jimmy McHugh and Dorothy Fields song, as recorded by saxophonist James Moody in Sweden in 1949. This hour, I’ll be chronicling his career. Hendricks would have turned 100 years old this week. Hendricks passed away at age 96 on Novem. This week, we mourn the loss of we’re celebrating a jazz icon, Jon Hendricks, the gravelly-voiced poet laureate of jazz, who helped revitalize vocal jazz for a new generation in the late 1950s. Jon Hendricks with “Out Of The Past” by Benny Golson from his album A Good Git-Together from 1959. It’s Jon Hendricks: The Poet Laureate Of Jazz, coming up next on Afterglow I’ll be chronicling Hendricks’ entire career in this next hour. In the 1950s, he and his group Lambert, Hendricks, and Ross took the jazz world by storm, by performing fun and clever vocal versions of famous instrumental jazz tunes, all with lyrics by Hendricks. Hendricks was a singer, composer, but most of all a groundbreaking jazz lyricist. This week on the show, I’ll be celebrating Jon Hendricks, a jazz icon who would have turned 100 years old on September 16th. Welcome to Afterglow, I’m your host, Mark Chilla.
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