In the early fifties, vocal harmony groups were among the most popular performers. The first group signed to Vee-Jay Records was the Spaniels in 1953. At the record shop that Vivian Carter had set up with Jimmy Bracken, Vivian was approached by the Spaniels, who were a group of schoolboys from Roosevelt High School in Gary, where Vivian had herself been a pupil. The boys had won a talent show at the school and asked Vivian’s advice about getting a record deal. She listened to them, organized some rehearsal space in her mother’s garage, and set up a recording session at Chicago’s Chance Records, where they recorded “Baby It’s You”. Calvin Carter recalls that Vivian borrowed five hundred dollars from a local pawn shop to fund the recording. The boys were singing Doo Wop songs and looking to break into the Pop market. Between 1953 and 1960 Vee-Jay issued two albums and twenty singles (the first of them on Chance Records), with the most successful “Goodnight Sweetheart, Goodnight”. Many of the songs were sung largely a capella, just built around the distinctive voices of Thornton James “Pookie” Hudson (lead vocal) and Gerald Gregory (bass). The other original members were Ernest Warren (first tenor), Willie C. Jackson (second tenor) and Opal Courtney Jr. (baritone), the last to join.
Calvin Carter explained what made the group stand out: “[Gerald] Gregory was outstanding because his bass singing actually sounded like an instrument, and Pookie had that great quiver in his voice. And the Spaniels were the first group I remember who had two falsetto voices on top.” (In Marv Goldberg’s article The Spaniels 2006, 2009)
In 1956, the Spaniels were part of a US tour featuring a “Cavalcade of Vee-Jay Stars”, which included performances in Chicago, Milwaukee, Dallas, Tucson, Phoenix, Los Angeles, and Seattle. The group continued to do well locally, but by the end of 1960 things were getting harder. Vee-Jay let the group go and in 1961 Gregory left. The group continued working into the seventies and there have been a few reunion concerts.
There are several compilations of the Spaniels songs, including a two-volume “Very Best of The Spaniels” from Vee-Jay/ Collectables in 2000.
The second vocal harmony group signed to Vee-Jay was the El Dorados, who started out in Chicago as Pirkle Lee and the Five Stars in 1952. Following a name change to the El Dorados in 1954, they attracted the attention of Vivian Carter, who signed them to Vee-Jay. The group members were Pirkle Lee Moses Jr. (lead vocalist), Arthur Basset and Louis Bradley (tenors), Jewel Jones (tenor/baritone), Richard Nickens and James Maddox (baritones/ basses), who had been students at Chicago’s Englewood High School. Their manager was John C. Moore, previously a janitor at the school. It was Moore who wrote their early songs.
Two singles were released in 1954 and two in 1955. The third song became their first hit. “At My Front Door” (sometimes known as “Crazy Little Mama”) was co-written by Moore and Vee-Jay executive Ewart Abner. It reached number seventeen on the Billboard Hot 100 Singles Chart and number one on the Billboard R&B Singles Chart. The follow-up “I’ll Be Forever Loving You” also entered the R&B top ten. Five further singles failed to make an impression.
When Nickens and Basset left in the mid-fifties, the group continued for a while as a quartet, before breaking up in 1957. Three members went to California, leaving Moses to set up a new version of the El Dorados with John Brunson and members of the Kool Gents. With the original group gone, Vee-Jay issued an album “Crazy Little Mama”, featuring the El Dorados and the Magnificents, before dropping the group in 1958. With various changes of membership, the group continued to perform into the new century.
The El Dorados were essentially a doo-wop group, with an emphasis on good dance rhythms in the best of their songs. The slow ballads are good but possibly not original enough to make the kind of impact Vee-Jay were hoping for. The most interesting El Dorados release was a song that featured a guest female vocalist. Hazel McCollum’s vocal adds real punch to “Annie’s Answer”, written by bass player Al Smith as a response to the Midnighters’ song “Annie Had A Baby”! The single was issued by Vee-Jay in 1954 in the name of the Al Smith Combo, the session band used by Vee-Jay.
The next group signed by Vee-Jay started out in 1953. Six school friends at Thornton Township High School in the southern Chicago suburb of Harvey formed The El-Rays. The members were Marvin Junior (lead baritone), Johnny Funches (lead tenor), Lucius McGill and Verne Allison (tenors), Mickey McGill (baritone) and Chuck Barksdale (bass). The group duly released their first recording in 1954 on Chess Records’ subsidiary label Checker Records. This was “Darling I Know”, a slow ballad that made no mark.
Lucius McGill left, and the boys continued as a quintet. A visit to see Vivian Carter resulted in a switch to Vee-Jay Records in 1955, where they recorded their second release with the Al Smith Orchestra, featuring two Verne Allison compositions entitled “Dreams of Contentment” and “Zing Zing Zing”, which was a minor hit on the R&B chart. Vivian Carter had suggested that a name change might be a good idea and Verne Allison came up with the Dells. The rest of the story can be read elsewhere on the site, at The Dells at Vee-Jay.
