Welcome
Welcome to Cozy Cole’s blistering R&B shaker, “Cozy’s Mambo.” This
music will make you dance, jump, and sing. Let’s get on with it, then.
Twenty-five Word Song
Review
Were there two drummers? Did Cozy have four arms? He owned a
trick drum kit, right? No, No, No. Was he tap-dancing? Oh, yeah!
We Know a Bit about
This Song
“Cozy’s Mambo” is an original.
The likely personnel include George Kelly (tenor sax); Gene
Redd (vibes); John Thomas (piano); John Faire, Fred Jordan (guitar); Edwyn
Conley (bass); and Cozy Cole (drums). Cozy recorded it in Cincinnati, Oh.
(1959) as “Cozy And Bossa” also known as “Cozy’s Mambo.” It was released as
Bethlehem 3067 and King 5303 in 1960.
We Know a Bit about Cozy Cole
Born William Randolph Cole, and given the nicknames “Colesy”
and “Cozy” by schoolmates, the young drummer first envied Duke Ellington
drummer Sonny Greer. As a kid, Cozy learned to tap dance, and incorporated that
style into his drumming. He would eventually bridge the worlds between swing,
bebop, and rock ‘n’ roll as a drummer. According to critics, he also pioneered “hand
and foot independence” (perhaps also termed “coordinated independence”) which may
form the basis of much modern drumming.
Cozy played on “Load of Coal” aka “Load of Cole” which Jelly
Roll Morton recorded in 1930. His subsequent recordings with Cab Calloway—including
“Paradiddle” and “Ratamacue”—emphasized drums, some of the earliest recordings to do so.
In addition to his activities with Jelly Roll Morton and Cab
Calloway, he toured, appeared, or recorded with Blanche Calloway, Benny Carter,
Willie Bryant [the unofficial mayor of Harlem], Stuff Smith, Louis Armstrong,
Benny Goodman, Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, Ella Fitzgerald, and Lionel Hampton.
He was one of the first African American musicians to play in a network band,
for CBS, in the early 1940s.
Cozy recorded as leader on Love, King, Coral, Columbia, Bethlehem,
Verve, and many other labels. He appeared in several movies, including I’m in the Revue (Italian), Don’t Knock the Rock, and The Glenn Miller Story. He also featured
in Broadway musicals: Carmen Jones
and Seven Lively Arts.
Together with Gene Krupa, he co-founded a drum school that
lasted 20 years until Krupa’s death in 1973. Well after he’d established
himself professionally, Cozy enrolled at Juilliard School of Music, where he
continued to study drumming. He toured Europe with Jack Teagarden and Earth “Fatha”
Hines. He toured Africa.
Cozy Is Best Known for “Topsy I” and “Topsy II”
In 1944, Cozy scored a minor hit with “Just One More Chance,” which he recorded on Keynote [1300] as the leader of the Cozy Cole All Stars. The song rose to #10 on Billboard’s Harlem Hit Parade.
Yet the drummer enjoyed national prominence when he released
“Topsy I” and “Topsy II”—a drum-inspired jazz piece spread out over two sides
of a 45—in 1958. Cozy was 49 at the time. “Topsy I” charted at #27 on Billboard’s
pop charts, but “Topsy II” reached #3 on Billboard’s pop charts and #1 on the
R&B charts. (It also reached #1 on Cash Box.) The same side also charted in
the U.K. (#29 on the pop charts.) The tiny Love Records label released “Topsy I”
and “Topsy II”; the record would sell one million copies and receive a gold disc.
In the same year, Cozy released “Turvy I” and “Turvy II.” The former didn’t
chart, but the latter would make the Billboard Hot 100, peaking at #36.
The title, “Topsy”, derived from a few different sources.
Ultimately, it may refer to Topsy herself, a character in Harriet Beecher Stowe’s
Uncle Tom’s Cabin, but it also refers
to a piece that appeared in Mr. Tom, a
folk opera written by jazz musicians Edgar Battle and Eddie Durham, also with
Peter Doraine. As Cozy recorded both “Topsy” and “Turvy”, obviously he punned
on the informal phrase, topsy-turvy. Battle and Durham composed the song “Topsy”
presumably in the 1930s, when Count Basie (1937) and Benny Goodman (1938)
recorded it.
Cozy’s Legacy
Preston Epps and Sandy Nelson both inherited from Cozy,
taking drum-themed rock ‘n’ roll recordings onto the charts. The English rock ‘n’
roll drummer Colin Powell changed his name to Cozy Powell, in tribute to his
idol. In older age, Cozy Cole earned a bachelor’s degree at Capital University
when he was awarded (as a junior) an honorary doctorate from the same school. He
passed away in 1981.
Sources of Information
Sources of Information
Black Cat Rockabilly Europe Cozy Cole page
Capital University Endowed Fund Listing
Discogs entry for Cozy Cole
Discogs entry for “Cozy’s Mambo”
Drummer World page for Cozy Cole
JazzDisco listing for Bethlehem Records discography (1958 onward)
Modern Drummer (background piece)
Modern Drummer (tribute/obituary) by Scott K. Fish
Way Back Attack (Michael Jack Kirby) Cozy Cole page
Wikipedia entry for Cozy Cole
resurrection week editorial schedule:
Wow. Awesome stuff. Maybe someday we'll have an "Early R&B Reference Tome" from Blood and Gutstein!? Think about it...
ReplyDeleteMr. LAudaP, Sir, thanks for your kind words and for the suggestion. The jump blues project ended, and might have ended my knocking-about for obscure, gratifying music, but the shocking amount of early rock and early r&b (usually between 1958 and 1964) (or the dates roughly between the arrival of Elvis and the arrival in the U.S. of the Brit Invasion) kept me digging. In short, between jump and what I call "shakers" I have a personal box set of about 40 hours of music. This music, ehhh, doesn't suck! To the contrary. The question is -- how specifically to account for it? Any suggestions would be welcome. Mostly, I hope all is well in your burgh, and with you and all your peeps. All righty. ------------------BA
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