Harry Gibson
Encyclopedia
Harry "The Hipster" Gibson (June 27, 1915 – May 3, 1991) was a jazz
pianist
, singer and songwriter
.
Gibson played New York style Stride piano
and boogie woogie while singing in a wild, unrestrained style. His music career began in the late 1920s, when as the young Harry Raab, his birth name, he played stride piano in Dixieland
jazz bands in Harlem
. He continued to perform there throughout the 1930s, adding the barrelhouse
boogie of the time to his repertoire, and was discovered by Fats Waller
in 1939 and brought down to mid-town Manhattan, where he made a splash and changed his surname to Gibson. Between 1939 and 1945, he played at various Manhattan
jazz clubs on 52nd Street ("Swing Street"), most notably the Three Deuces, run by Irving Alexander, and Leon and Eddies, run by Leon Enkin and Eddie Davis.
styles, and for his intricate mixture of a hardcore, gutbucket boogie
rhythm
s with ragtime
, stride
and jazz
piano styles. Gibson took the boogie woogie beat of his predecessors, but he made it frantic; similar to the rock and roll
music of the 1950s Examples of his wild style are found in the songs "Riot in Boogie" and "Barrelhouse Boogie". An example of his strange singing style is in the song "The Baby and the Pup." Other songs that Gibson recorded were "Handsome Harry, the Hipster", "I Stay Brown All Year 'Round", "Get Your Juices at the Deuces", and "Stop That Dancin' Up There." Gibson recorded a great deal, but there are very few visual examples of his act. However, in New York in 1944, he filmed three songs for the Soundies
film jukebox
es, and he went to Hollywood in 1946 to guest star in the feature-length film musical Junior Prom. Gibson preceded the first white
rock and rollers by a decade, but the Soundies he recorded show significant similarities to rock and roll.
While working on "Swing Street" at night, Gibson was a fellow at the Juilliard Graduate School during the day. At the time, Juilliard was strictly a classical music academy, and Gibson excelled there, which partly explains the richness of the music he brought to the jazz world. The other part of the explanation is, his own inventiveness, and Gibson was almost always billed and promoted as a musical genius.
Unlike Mezz Mezzrow
, who was white
but consciously abandoned his heritage to adopt the black
music and culture as a "white negro," Gibson grew up near Harlem, New York City. Gibson's constant use of black jive talk
was not an affectation; it was simply his uptown New York dialect. His song, "I Stay Brown All Year Round" is based on this issue. In his autobiography, Gibson says he coined the term hipster
some time between 1939 and 1945, when he was performing on Swing Street and he started using "Harry the Hipster" as his stage name.
His career went into a tailspin in 1947, when his song "Who Put the Benzedrine
in Mrs. Murphy's Ovaltine
" put him on the music industry blacklist. His own drug use led to his decline, and with the rising popularity of young rock-and-roll musicians among teenagers in the 1950s, older musicians were not in demand. In the 1960s, when Gibson saw the huge success of The Beatles
, he decided to switch over to rock-and-roll. By the 1970s, he was playing hard rock
, blues
, bop
, novelty songs and a few songs that mixed ragtime
with rock-and-roll, and his hipster act became a hippie act. His old records were revived by Dr. Demento
, particularly "Benzadrine" which was included in his 1975 compilation album Dr. Demento's Delights.
His comeback resulted in three more albums. Harry the Hipster Digs Christmas, made of new recordings in 1974, is a home recording and is not noteworthy. Two professionally produced albums were released after this, which were Everybody's Crazy but Me, (its title taken from the lyrics of "Stop That Dancin' Up There"), by Progressive Records in 1986, and Who Put the Benzedrine in Mrs. Murphy's Ovaltine released in 1989 by Delmark Records
. Those two albums include some jazz, blues, ragtime, and rock and roll
songs about reefer
, nude bathing, hippie
communes
, strip club
s, male chauvinists, "rocking the 88s
", and even about how hip Shirley MacLaine
is.
Harry Gibson may have been the only pianist of the 1930s and 1940s to go on to play in full-scale rocking blues bands in the 1970s and 1980s. Unlike his 1940s contemporaries, most of whom continued to play the same music for decades, Gibson gradually shifted gears between the 1940s and the 1970s, switching from jazz to rock. The only elements that remained constant were his tendency to play hard-rocking boogie woogie, and his tongue-in-cheek references to drug use.
Harry's family did a biographical movie short on Harry's life and music in 1991, shortly before his death, which came about by suicide. The movie is called Boogie In Blue and was published as a VHS video that year.
Jazz
Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...
pianist
Pianist
A pianist is a musician who plays the piano. A professional pianist can perform solo pieces, play with an ensemble or orchestra, or accompany one or more singers, solo instrumentalists, or other performers.-Choice of genres:...
, singer and songwriter
Songwriter
A songwriter is an individual who writes both the lyrics and music to a song. Someone who solely writes lyrics may be called a lyricist, and someone who only writes music may be called a composer...
.
Gibson played New York style Stride piano
Stride piano
Harlem Stride Piano, Stride Piano, or just Stride, is a jazz piano style that was developed in the large cities of the East Coast, mainly in the New York, during 1920s and 1930s. The left hand may play a four-beat pulse with a single bass note, octave, seventh or tenth interval on the first and...
and boogie woogie while singing in a wild, unrestrained style. His music career began in the late 1920s, when as the young Harry Raab, his birth name, he played stride piano in Dixieland
Dixieland
Dixieland music, sometimes referred to as Hot jazz, Early Jazz or New Orleans jazz, is a style of jazz music which developed in New Orleans at the start of the 20th century, and was spread to Chicago and New York City by New Orleans bands in the 1910s.Well-known jazz standard songs from the...
jazz bands in Harlem
Harlem
Harlem is a neighborhood in the New York City borough of Manhattan, which since the 1920s has been a major African-American residential, cultural and business center. Originally a Dutch village, formally organized in 1658, it is named after the city of Haarlem in the Netherlands...
. He continued to perform there throughout the 1930s, adding the barrelhouse
Barrelhouse
Barrelhouse can refer to:*A "juke joint", a bar or saloon. Originates from the storage of barrels of alcohol.*An early form of jazz with wild, improvised piano, and an accented two-beat rhythm ....
boogie of the time to his repertoire, and was discovered by Fats Waller
Fats Waller
Fats Waller , born Thomas Wright Waller, was a jazz pianist, organist, composer, singer, and comedic entertainer...
in 1939 and brought down to mid-town Manhattan, where he made a splash and changed his surname to Gibson. Between 1939 and 1945, he played at various Manhattan
Manhattan
Manhattan is the oldest and the most densely populated of the five boroughs of New York City. Located primarily on the island of Manhattan at the mouth of the Hudson River, the boundaries of the borough are identical to those of New York County, an original county of the state of New York...
jazz clubs on 52nd Street ("Swing Street"), most notably the Three Deuces, run by Irving Alexander, and Leon and Eddies, run by Leon Enkin and Eddie Davis.
Career
In the 1940s, Gibson was known for writing unusual songs, which are considered ahead of their time. He was also known for his unique, wild singing style, his energetic and unorthodox pianoPiano
The piano is a musical instrument played by means of a keyboard. It is one of the most popular instruments in the world. Widely used in classical and jazz music for solo performances, ensemble use, chamber music and accompaniment, the piano is also very popular as an aid to composing and rehearsal...
styles, and for his intricate mixture of a hardcore, gutbucket boogie
Boogie
Boogie is a repetitive, swung note or shuffle rhythm, "groove" or pattern used in blues which was originally played on the piano in boogie-woogie music. The characteristic rhythm and feel of the boogie was then adapted to guitar, double bass, and other instruments. The earliest recorded...
rhythm
Rhythm
Rhythm may be generally defined as a "movement marked by the regulated succession of strong and weak elements, or of opposite or different conditions." This general meaning of regular recurrence or pattern in time may be applied to a wide variety of cyclical natural phenomena having a periodicity or...
s with ragtime
Ragtime
Ragtime is an original musical genre which enjoyed its peak popularity between 1897 and 1918. Its main characteristic trait is its syncopated, or "ragged," rhythm. It began as dance music in the red-light districts of American cities such as St. Louis and New Orleans years before being published...
, stride
Stride piano
Harlem Stride Piano, Stride Piano, or just Stride, is a jazz piano style that was developed in the large cities of the East Coast, mainly in the New York, during 1920s and 1930s. The left hand may play a four-beat pulse with a single bass note, octave, seventh or tenth interval on the first and...
and jazz
Jazz
Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...
piano styles. Gibson took the boogie woogie beat of his predecessors, but he made it frantic; similar to the rock and roll
Rock and roll
Rock and roll is a genre of popular music that originated and evolved in the United States during the late 1940s and early 1950s, primarily from a combination of African American blues, country, jazz, and gospel music...
music of the 1950s Examples of his wild style are found in the songs "Riot in Boogie" and "Barrelhouse Boogie". An example of his strange singing style is in the song "The Baby and the Pup." Other songs that Gibson recorded were "Handsome Harry, the Hipster", "I Stay Brown All Year 'Round", "Get Your Juices at the Deuces", and "Stop That Dancin' Up There." Gibson recorded a great deal, but there are very few visual examples of his act. However, in New York in 1944, he filmed three songs for the Soundies
Soundies
Soundies were an early version of the music video: three-minute musical films, produced in New York City, Chicago, and Hollywood between 1940 and 1946, often including short dance sequences. The completed Soundies were generally released within a few months of their filming; the last group was...
film jukebox
Jukebox
A jukebox is a partially automated music-playing device, usually a coin-operated machine, that will play a patron's selection from self-contained media...
es, and he went to Hollywood in 1946 to guest star in the feature-length film musical Junior Prom. Gibson preceded the first white
White people
White people is a term which usually refers to human beings characterized, at least in part, by the light pigmentation of their skin...
rock and rollers by a decade, but the Soundies he recorded show significant similarities to rock and roll.
While working on "Swing Street" at night, Gibson was a fellow at the Juilliard Graduate School during the day. At the time, Juilliard was strictly a classical music academy, and Gibson excelled there, which partly explains the richness of the music he brought to the jazz world. The other part of the explanation is, his own inventiveness, and Gibson was almost always billed and promoted as a musical genius.
Unlike Mezz Mezzrow
Mezz Mezzrow
Milton Mesirow, better known as Mezz Mezzrow was an American jazz clarinetist and saxophonist from Chicago, Illinois. Mezzrow is well known for organizing and financing historic recording sessions with Tommy Ladnier and Sidney Bechet. Mezzrow also recorded a number of times with Bechet and...
, who was white
White people
White people is a term which usually refers to human beings characterized, at least in part, by the light pigmentation of their skin...
but consciously abandoned his heritage to adopt the black
Black people
The term black people is used in systems of racial classification for humans of a dark skinned phenotype, relative to other racial groups.Different societies apply different criteria regarding who is classified as "black", and often social variables such as class, socio-economic status also plays a...
music and culture as a "white negro," Gibson grew up near Harlem, New York City. Gibson's constant use of black jive talk
African American Vernacular English
African American Vernacular English —also called African American English; less precisely Black English, Black Vernacular, Black English Vernacular , or Black Vernacular English —is an African American variety of American English...
was not an affectation; it was simply his uptown New York dialect. His song, "I Stay Brown All Year Round" is based on this issue. In his autobiography, Gibson says he coined the term hipster
Hipster (1940s subculture)
Hipster, as used in the 1940s, referred to aficionados of jazz, in particular bebop, which became popular in the early 1940s. The hipster adopted the lifestyle of the jazz musician, including some or all of the following: dress, slang, use of cannabis and other drugs, relaxed attitude, sarcastic...
some time between 1939 and 1945, when he was performing on Swing Street and he started using "Harry the Hipster" as his stage name.
His career went into a tailspin in 1947, when his song "Who Put the Benzedrine
Benzedrine
Benzedrine is the trade name of the racemic mixture of amphetamine . It was marketed under this brandname in the USA by Smith, Kline & French in the form of inhalers, starting in 1928...
in Mrs. Murphy's Ovaltine
Ovaltine
Ovaltine is a brand of milk flavoring product made with malt extract , sugar , cocoa, and whey...
" put him on the music industry blacklist. His own drug use led to his decline, and with the rising popularity of young rock-and-roll musicians among teenagers in the 1950s, older musicians were not in demand. In the 1960s, when Gibson saw the huge success of The Beatles
The Beatles
The Beatles were an English rock band, active throughout the 1960s and one of the most commercially successful and critically acclaimed acts in the history of popular music. Formed in Liverpool, by 1962 the group consisted of John Lennon , Paul McCartney , George Harrison and Ringo Starr...
, he decided to switch over to rock-and-roll. By the 1970s, he was playing hard rock
Hard rock
Hard rock is a loosely defined genre of rock music which has its earliest roots in mid-1960s garage rock, blues rock and psychedelic rock...
, blues
Blues
Blues is the name given to both a musical form and a music genre that originated in African-American communities of primarily the "Deep South" of the United States at the end of the 19th century from spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts and chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads...
, bop
Bebop
Bebop differed drastically from the straightforward compositions of the swing era, and was instead characterized by fast tempos, asymmetrical phrasing, intricate melodies, and rhythm sections that expanded on their role as tempo-keepers...
, novelty songs and a few songs that mixed ragtime
Ragtime
Ragtime is an original musical genre which enjoyed its peak popularity between 1897 and 1918. Its main characteristic trait is its syncopated, or "ragged," rhythm. It began as dance music in the red-light districts of American cities such as St. Louis and New Orleans years before being published...
with rock-and-roll, and his hipster act became a hippie act. His old records were revived by Dr. Demento
Dr. Demento
Barret Eugene Hansen , better known as Dr. Demento, is a radio broadcaster and record collector specializing in novelty songs, comedy, and strange or unusual recordings dating from the early days of phonograph records to the present....
, particularly "Benzadrine" which was included in his 1975 compilation album Dr. Demento's Delights.
His comeback resulted in three more albums. Harry the Hipster Digs Christmas, made of new recordings in 1974, is a home recording and is not noteworthy. Two professionally produced albums were released after this, which were Everybody's Crazy but Me, (its title taken from the lyrics of "Stop That Dancin' Up There"), by Progressive Records in 1986, and Who Put the Benzedrine in Mrs. Murphy's Ovaltine released in 1989 by Delmark Records
Delmark Records
Delmark Records is an independent American jazz and blues record label, based in Chicago since 1958. The label originated in St. Louis, Missouri, in 1953 when owner Bob Koester released a recording of the Windy City Six, a traditional jazz group, under the "Delmar" imprint.-History:Born in 1932 in...
. Those two albums include some jazz, blues, ragtime, and rock and roll
Rock and roll
Rock and roll is a genre of popular music that originated and evolved in the United States during the late 1940s and early 1950s, primarily from a combination of African American blues, country, jazz, and gospel music...
songs about reefer
Cannabis
Cannabis is a genus of flowering plants that includes three putative species, Cannabis sativa, Cannabis indica, and Cannabis ruderalis. These three taxa are indigenous to Central Asia, and South Asia. Cannabis has long been used for fibre , for seed and seed oils, for medicinal purposes, and as a...
, nude bathing, hippie
Hippie
The hippie subculture was originally a youth movement that arose in the United States during the mid-1960s and spread to other countries around the world. The etymology of the term 'hippie' is from hipster, and was initially used to describe beatniks who had moved into San Francisco's...
communes
Commune (intentional community)
A commune is an intentional community of people living together, sharing common interests, property, possessions, resources, and, in some communes, work and income. In addition to the communal economy, consensus decision-making, non-hierarchical structures and ecological living have become...
, strip club
Strip club
A strip club is an adult entertainment venue in which striptease or other erotic or exotic dance is regularly performed. Strip clubs typically adopt a nightclub or bar style, but can also adopt a theatre or cabaret-style....
s, male chauvinists, "rocking the 88s
88 (number)
88 is the natural number following 87 and preceding 89.- In mathematics :Eighty-Eight is a refactorable number, a primitive semiperfect number and an untouchable number...
", and even about how hip Shirley MacLaine
Shirley MacLaine
Shirley MacLaine is an American film and theater actress, singer, dancer, activist and author, well-known for her beliefs in new age spirituality and reincarnation. She has written a large number of autobiographical works, many dealing with her spiritual beliefs as well as her Hollywood career...
is.
Harry Gibson may have been the only pianist of the 1930s and 1940s to go on to play in full-scale rocking blues bands in the 1970s and 1980s. Unlike his 1940s contemporaries, most of whom continued to play the same music for decades, Gibson gradually shifted gears between the 1940s and the 1970s, switching from jazz to rock. The only elements that remained constant were his tendency to play hard-rocking boogie woogie, and his tongue-in-cheek references to drug use.
Harry's family did a biographical movie short on Harry's life and music in 1991, shortly before his death, which came about by suicide. The movie is called Boogie In Blue and was published as a VHS video that year.
Audio samples
- (30 seconds of) "Barrelhouse Boogie" http://sg1.allmusic.com/cg/smp.dll?link=haopnx9kem4oyywmfoug9iq&r=20.asx
- (30 seconds of) "Riot In Boogie" http://sg1.allmusic.com/cg/smp.dll?link=k7q7bc2u4yo664ikcpmwazu&r=20.asx
- (30 seconds of) "The Baby and The Pup" http://sg1.allmusic.com/cg/smp.dll?link=s2wyupcjpoq2q7cy4j28cba&r=20.asx
- (1 minute of) "Hipster's Boogie" http://www.artistdirect.com/nad/store/artist/album/0,,92037,00.html