Rhumboogie Café

The Rhumboogie Café,[1] also referred to as the Rhumboogie Club,[2] was an important, but short-lived nightclub at 343 East 55th Street, Chicago.

The Rhumboogie Café
Location343 East 55th Street
Chicago, Illinois, USA
TypeNightclub
Genre(s)Blues
Jazz
Bebop
Rhythm and blues
Soul
Opened1942
Closed1947

Opened with great fanfare in April 1942,[3] the Rhumboogie was owned by Charlie Glenn and boxing champion Joe Louis. The club closed as the result of a fire on December 31, 1945. Reopening in June 1946, it never regained its old form, and closed for good in May 1947.

Performances

The opening night's performance was the first of Tiny Bradshaw and His Orchestra's eight-week residency. This stint was followed by Horace Henderson. An early, regular performer was T-Bone Walker, who first performed there in August 1942,[3] with backing by the Milt Larkin band, during their 9-month residency there.[4]

Other acts over the years included:

The Rhumboogie label

In October 1944, the Rhumboogie Recording Company, coinciding with T-Bone Walker's third stint at the venue, recorded him accompanied by pianist Marl Young leading the Rhumboogie house band, which included Red Saunders.

By then distributed by the newly founded Mercury Records, Rhumboogie set up a second recording session with Walker for December 19, 1945.

After reopening the venue in June 1946, plans were announced to record other artists but, like the venue itself, the label closed shortly after. The only other artist to get a release on Rhumboogie was Buster Bennett, recording under the name of his trumpet player, Charles Gray. Mercury later re-issued the material from the December 1945 T-Bone session.

References
  1. The Red Saunders Research Foundation Archived 2013-04-03 at the Wayback Machine
  2. Pruter, Robert Doowop: the Chicago scene University of Illinois Press, 1997 ISBN 0-252-06506-9 ISBN 978-0-252-06506-4 at Google Books
  3. Pruter, Robert and Campbell, Robert L. "The Rhumboogie Label" Retrieved 3 July 2013.
  4. "Golden Oldies" Texas Monthly. Retrieved 3 July 2013.
  5. Allaboutjazz Archived 2010-06-20 at the Wayback Machine
  6. Campbell, Robert L. and Robert Pruter, George R. White, Tom Kelly, George Paulus “The Aristocrat Label” Retrieved 5 July 2013.
  7. McClellan, Lawrence The Later Swing Era, 1942 to 1955 Greenwood Publishing Group, 2004 ISBN 0-313-30157-3 ISBN 978-0-313-30157-5 at Google Books
  8. Owsley, Dennis City of Gabriels: the history of jazz in St. Louis, 1895-1973 Reedy Press, 2006 ISBN 1-933370-04-1 ISBN 978-1-933370-04-0 at Google Books
  9. "Big Road Blues Show 4/11/10: I Got What My Daddy Likes – Forgotten Blues Ladies Pt. 2", Big Road Blues.
  10. Campbell, Robert L.; Pruter, Robert and Büttner, Armin "The King Fleming Discography" Archived 2009-05-21 at the Wayback Machine
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