LaVern Baker
Chicago-born LaVern Baker was a well-built and undeniably sexy
black girl who learnt to sing in church before gravitating into
night clubs, where it's rumoured she instructed Johnnie Ray in
the art of blues singing.
Unlike her contemporaries, including
Sarah Vaughan and Dinah Washington - black singers who inclined
towards the jazzier side of R&B - LaVern was an out and out
rocker.
After losing her battle with the song Tweedle Dee (which
was covered by white singer Georgia Gibbs), LaVern eclipsed her
closest rival, Etta James, to become the most consistent female
rock & roller of the fifties, scoring hits with Jim Dandy,
Jim Dandy Got Married and her biggest hit, I
Cried A Tear, before retiring to Japan with her husband.
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