Moms Mabley performing a comedy act (1948) one of her lines “Cab Calloway once call me a dog. I would like to be a dog if Cab Calloway would be my tree.” Continue reading
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Tag Archives: Cab Calloway
4/10/17 O&A NYC HOLLYWOOD MONDAY: Cab Calloway- Minnie The Moocher (The Blues Brothers 1980)
Cab Calloway’s performance of his million selling 1931 jazz classic Minnie the Moocher in the 1980 comedy The Blues Brothers. Continue reading
10/30/16 O&A NYC SUNDAY AFTERNOON JAZZ CONCERT: Cab Calloway And Betty Boop- Minnie the Moocher (1932)
Cab Calloway And Betty Boop- Minnie the Moocher cartoon begins with actual film footage of Cab Calloway dancing a slow and sensuous dance in front of his orchestra as they perform the Prohibition Blues. This is the oldest known film footage of Cab.
The haunting and beautiful instrumental, Prohibition Blues, is an old Missourians piece that was recorded by them in early 1930, right before Cab took over as leader of their band. This cartoon has the only recording of the piece with Cab Calloway. By early 1932, when this cartoon was produced, the group had been renamed Cab Calloway and His Orchestra, but in this film, they are still wearing their old Missourians uniforms.
Cab Calloway And Betty Boop- Minnie the Moocher (1932)
5/28/16 O&A NYC ITS SATURDAY- ANYTHING GOES: Stormy Weather- Featuring Katherine Dunham And Her Dance Troupe
Stormy Weather is a 1943 film musical produced and released by 20th Century Fox. The movie is considered one of the best Hollywood musicals with an all African-American cast and serve to showcase of some of the top African-American performers of the time. Continue reading
2/4/16 O&A NYC THROWBACK THURSDAY: Moms Mabley (comedian) 1948
Moms Mabley performing a comedy act (1948) one of her lines “Cab Calloway once call me a dog. I would like to be a dog if Cab Calloway would be my tree.” Continue reading
2/1/16 O&A NYC HOLLYWOOD MONDAY: Lena Horne – Stormy Weather featuring “Katherine Dunham with her dance troupe.” (1943)
Stormy Weather, the title song and dance sequence for the 1943 film of the same name, starred Lena Horne and Bill “Bojangles” Robinson and Katherine Dunham with her “dance troupe”. Other notable performers in the movie were Cab Calloway and Fats Waller (both appearing as themselves), the Nicholas Brothers dancing duo, comedian F. E. Miller, and singer Ada Brown. Despite a running time of only 77 minutes, the film features some 20 musical numbers. This was Robinson’s final film (he died in 1949); Waller died only a few months after its release. Continue reading
2/23/15 O&A Hollywood Monday: Cab Calloway’s Hi De Ho (1934)
Cab Calloway’s Hi-De-Ho (also known as Hi-De-Ho) is a 1934 musical short film. The film stars Cab Calloway, Fredi Washington, Ethel Moses and the Cab Calloway Orchestra. This jazz musical short written by Milton Hockey and Fred Rath has a comedy plot about marital infidelity. Continue reading
2/20/15 O&A Shall We Dance Friday: Dances From The Cotton Club
Out and About NYC Magazine is proud to present three dance and music clips from the legendary Cotton Club. Opened in 1923, the Cotton Club on 142nd St & Lenox Ave in the heart of Harlem, New York. The Cotton Club was operated by white New York gangster Owney Madden who used the club as an outlet to sell his alcohol to the prohibition crowd.
The Cotton Club at first excluded all but white patrons although the entertainers and most of staff were African-American. Dancers at the Cotton Club were held to strict standards; they had to be at least 5’6” tall, light-skinned with only a slight tan, and under twenty-one years of age.
Shows at the Cotton Club were musical reviews that featured dancers, singers, comedians, and variety acts, as well as a house band. Duke Ellington led that band from 1927 to 1930, and sporadically throughout the next eight years. The Cotton Club and Ellington’s Orchestra gained national notoriety through weekly broadcasts on radio station WHN some of which were recorded and released on albums. In this clip Duke Ellington and his orchestra perform Rockin in Rhythm & Bugle Call Rag with dancers Bessie Dudley and Florence Hill from 1933.
Cotton Club Dancers Bessie Dudley and Florence Hill
The entertainers who played at the Cotton Club were some of the most widely known blues and jazz performers of their time including Cab Calloway. This is one of Cab’s broadcasts from The Cotton Club in the 30’s after Duke Ellington took to touring on the road. They later became co- house bands at the club.
Cab ( Cotton Club) Calloway 1934 Zaz Zuh Zaz
Elegant black show girls ditch Opera for Jazz as they get seduced by a hot jazz tune in Red Hot. You’ve never seen this kind of action from the 1930s main stream Hollywood before, it was cut by the Hays Code. Red Hot stars Dorothy Salter and Maurice Rocco.
Red Hot 1930s Cotton Club Show
The Silver Belles of Harlem are dancers who performed at the Cotton Club during its heyday era. Group members include Marion Coles, Elaine Ellis, Cleo Ellis, Fay Ray, and Bertye Lou Wood were featured in the 2006 documentary directed by Heather Lyn MacDonald, entitled Been Rich All My Life.
Been Rich All My Life
1/9/16 O&A NYC (REPOST) Bambi and Thumper – Diamonds Are Forever featuring Trina Parks- The First African American Bond Girl
Trina Parks was born on December 26, 1946 in Brooklyn, New York. Her father Charles Frazier, was a renowned tenor saxophonist with Cab Calloway’s orchestra. Parks majored in modern dance at the New York High School of Performing Arts. She also studied with Katherine Dunham and subsequently joined Dunham’s professional dance company in 1964. Additional concert dance credits include Donald McKayle, Anna Sokolow, Talley Beatty, Geoffrey Holder, Eleo Pomare and Rod Rodgers. Parks performed in numerous Broadway productions as a vocalist and dancer, including a lead role in the 10th anniversary touring production of Duke Ellington’s Sophisticated Ladies. She was the first African- American Bond girl Thumper in the 1971 James Bond classic Diamonds are Forever. Continue reading
Apollo Club Harlem
By Walter Rutledge
Apollo Club Harlem returned to the Apollo Theater for four performances Thursday, February 20 through Sunday, February 23, 2014. The evening consisted of a pre-show musical interlude by pianist Isaac Ben Ayala, a lively revue and post show dancing on stage for orchestra patrons. The stylish evening was a true up-scale date night combining entertainment, dining and dancing while celebrating the history of Harlem’s most venerable performance venue. Continue reading
