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Before he was dubbed “The King of the Jukebox,” Louis Thomas Jordan was born on July 8, 1908, in Brinkley, Arkansas. After his mother died, he was sent to live with his aunt Lizzie Reid and grandmother Maggie Jordan. His father, James Jordan, was a music teacher and bandleader for the Brinkley Bass Band, as well as the Rabbit Foot Minstrels.
Because of his father’s musical background, little Louis Jordan learned how to play the clarinet, the piano, and the saxophone when he was still a small boy. When he became a teenager, he joined the Rabbit Foot Minstrels. During the early 1930s, Jordan performed in venus located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, as well as New York City. He performed and recorded with notable artists such as Charlie Gaines, Clarence Williams, the Chick Webb Orchestra, and the Stuff Smith Orchestra. Starting in 1938, he started his own band, Tympany Five.
Right at the start of his career, Louis Jordan had a knack to combine comedy with music as he performed as the frontman for his own band for over two decades. He also collaborated with other big-name artists such as Louis Armstrong, Bing Crosby, and Ella Fitzgerald. In addition to his career as a bandleader, multi-instrumental musician, singer, and songwriter, he was also an actor and film personality. Fans familiar with “Caldonia” are likely to recognize this promotion film clip as one of his best-known appearances.
Jumpin’ Music
The career of Louis Jordan started in the 1930s as a big-band swing jazz performer. He quickly earned a name as one of the elite performers popularizing a dance craze known as the jump blues. It was a swinging dance style that fused blues, boogie-woogie, and jazz. Known as jump music, smaller bands sized at five or six players would perform shouted, syncopated vocals, along with comedic lyrics of an urban contemporary nature. There was a strong emphasis on rhythm, using bass, drums, and piano. Once the mid-1940s came along, the electric guitar joined in on the fray. It was also during this era Jordan’s Tympany Five bands introduced the use of the electric organ.
The popular musical genres of today owe their existence to Louis Jordan and the rest of the pioneering acts that shaped blues, R&B, and rock-and-roll into what they are today. Via Decca Records, Louis Jordan released hit after hit that earned him “The King of the Jukebox” monicker. Jordan’s recordings influenced the styles of popular rhythm and blues and soul music that began to spring up in the late 1940s. Several of his recordings were produced by Milt Gabler, the same man who refined and developed the qualities of his recordings in his later work with Bill Haley. This includes the recording for the cult classic, “Rock Around the Clock.”
The first roster of Tympany Five featured members from Jesse Stone’s band that first began as a nine-man group before downsizing to six. They often performed at the Elks Rendezvous, located at 464 Lenox Avenue in Harlem, New York. at the time, there was a need to spell Louis Jordan’s name “Louie” as a means to stop people from pronouncing the “S” in his name.
The 1940s
After Louis Jordan relocated to Los Angeles, California, in 1942, he took his band with them. It was while he was there he began making soundies. At the time, this was the entertainment industry’s equivalent of a music video. There were several Jubilee radio shows he appeared on, as well as programs featured on the Armed Forces Radio. These would be prepared for distribution overseas for the American military to enjoy. Aside from a four-week camp tour in the United States Army, Louis Jordan was able to avoid engaging in military action. At the time, he had a hernia condition that exempted him from being drafted.
It was also during the 1940s that Louis Jordan and the Tympany Five became popular with a string of hits that have since become soul music standards. Aside from enjoying a prolific recording career, he also made several film appearances. In the meantime, due to the spike in Jordan’s popularity, the price to hire Tympany Five jumped from $350.00 USD to $2,000.00 USD for an evening’s worth of entertainment.
This, however, was minuscule compared to the level of influence Jordan had on the music industry. Because of his multi-instrumental talent, he and his band served as a threat to bigger bands. Even at $2,000.00 USD, it was cheaper to hire the equally entertaining Jordan and the Tympany Five than it was to hire a much larger group.
Throughout the 1940s, Louis Jordan and the Tympany Five held a solid dominance on the R&B charts. At the time, it was referred to as the “race” charts before US Billboard updated its musical categories. The 1940s witnessed Jordan score eighteen number one hit singles, along with fifty-four top ten hits. Between July 1946 and May 1947, Jordan spent forty-four straight weeks between five of his chart-topping hits. Because of his popularity, Decca Records received the full benefit as a label powerhouse back in the day.
Adding to that popularity were the soundings he made for his hit songs. He also starred in short musical films, singing, and acting that appealed to all audiences. In 1944, he and the Tympany Five performed “Deacon Jones” for the movie, Meet Miss Bobby Socks. In 1945, the short film musical, Caldonia, served as a big boost to Jordan’s career as there were roadshow screenings used to support his live performances.
Jordan also appeared in full-length movies such as 1944’s Follow the Boys and 1946’s Beware! In 1947, Jordan also starred in Reet, Petite, and Gone, and Look-Out Sister. On film, he was just as visually entertaining as he was in music. This was a formula of success that forever paved how the entertainment industry merged music to boost the appeal of movies and vice versa.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?
The 1950s
Starting in the early 1950s, Louis Jordan stepped away from his iconic rhythm and blues style in favor of big band performances. This proved to be a bad career choice, causing his shining star to dim down at that time. It didn’t help that he fell ill at this time, causing him to spend more time in his home in Arizona than on tour. Come July 1, 1952, he performed at Wrigley Field in Los Angeles, California, for Leon Hefflin, Sr.’s eighth Cavalcade of Jazz concert. He appeared again on June 20, 1954, this time with Tympany Five.
In 1954, he signed with the label, Aladdin, and recorded twenty-one songs. Nine of them were released while the other three remained unreleased. Among different labels, Jordan continued as a prolific recording artist until 1974’s JSP. Some of those recordings included remakes of previous hits, including “Caldonia.” Unfortunately for Jordan, the 1950s didn’t have enough room for his style of music anymore as the fans were enthralled with the rock n’ roll genre. By 1953, not only was his popularity declining but so were his finances.
More Woes
As successful as Louis Jordan was as an entertainer, his personal life saw him go through five wives. The first wife, Julia, gave birth to a daughter he learned belonged to another man. In 1932, he met his second wife, Ida Fields. However, she sued him in 1943 for bigamy as he married Fleecie Moore in 1942. Ida, who was also an entertainer, won $30,000.00 USD in the settlement and later billed herself as Mrs. Louis Jordan, Queen of the Blues, and her Orchestra.
Her ex-husband put a stop to it by stalling payments. Unfortunately, this cost him another $50,000.00 USD when Ida took him to court again. In 1947, his marriage to his third wife, Moore, ended after she discovered he was having an affair. What used to be his childhood sweetheart attacked him with a knife and was charged with assault. Jordan married his lover, Vicky Hayes in 1951, but the two separated nine years later. His fifth and final marriage was to Martha Weaver in 1966.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?
Adding to Jordan’s burdens was a 1961 tax lean against him and his estate by the Internal Revenue Service. His property needed to be sold in order to pay off the debts. Of the many songs he wrote, he did not reap the financial rewards for them. His wife at the time, Fleecie Moore, got the credit for his work, plus all the royalties. This was a judgment call Jordan made to avoid existing publishing issues and it was a bad one on his part. Even after the couple divorced, she managed to retain ownership of those songs.
On February 4, 1975, Louis Jordan had a heart attack and died while he was in Los Angeles. His body was taken to the hometown of his wife, Martha, which was in St. Louis, Missouri.
Louis Jordan Legacy
Louis Jordan’s legacy saw a star in his prime from the late 1930s until the early 1950s. As “The King of the Jukebox,” he was at the peak of his career near the end of the swing era. In 1983, Jordan was inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame, then again in 1987 into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. In statistics, Jordan ranks as the fifth most successful African-American recording artist, at least according to the R&B category of Billboard Magazine.
In his time, he was the most popular rhythm and blues artist, thanks to the jump blues style. In addition to dominating the R&B charts at the time, Jordan also experienced a series of crossover hits as the mainstream audience found his music too irresistible at the time. During an era where the pop charts were typically dominated by white people. Jordan’s musical influence spoke volumes too loud for the entertainment industry to ignore.
In 2008, the United States Postal Service featured Louis Jordan and his film, Caldonia, as a tribute to Vintage Black Cinema. As far as the Blues Foundation is concerned, Jordan was a precursor to R&B and was the biggest African-American star of his era. It was suggested by many that the musical style of Chuck Berry was fashioned after Louis Jordan’s. The only twist was the references made in the lyrics that set them apart.
As for the opening guitar riff of his signature single, “Johnny B. Goode,” there was too much in common with 1946’s hit single, “Ain’t That Just Like a Woman,” to be denied. Performed by guitarist Carl Hogan while he was part of Jordan’s Tympany Five, this was one of the earliest examples of legendary electric guitar influence.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?
The Grammies awarded Jordan in 2018 for lifetime achievement, citing he paved the way for the birth of rock and roll in the 1950s. Included in the Grammy Hall of Fame are the singles, “Ain’t Nobody Here but Us Chickens,” “Caldonia Boogie,” “Choo Choo Ch’Boogie,” and “Let the Good Times Roll.”
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