Sophie Tucker • Red Hot Mama

Today, Sophie Tucker (1886-1966) is primarily remembered for being billed as “The Last Of The Red Hot Mamas” and for introducing her trademark song “Some Of These Days.” But as the double-CD Red Hot Mama shows, there was more to her than that.

Born as Sofia Kalish in Russia, her family fled the country the following year, settling in Boston and later Hartford, Connecticut where they opened a successful restaurant. Young Sophia sang at the restaurant as a child for tips. She was married to Louis Tuck when she was 16 although they were separated within two years. She moved to New York and broke into show business as Sophie Tucker. Because she was not a classic beauty, she at first appeared in blackface in minstrel shows before stopping that, embracing her Jewish heritage and her looks. By 1909 she was performing with the Ziegfeld Follies. When the Follies’ star Nora Bayes became jealous of her success and had her fired, Sophie Tucker became a major attraction at William Morris’ many theaters. In 1910 she began to record.

Tucker had a powerful voice that overcame the primitive recording equipment of the 1910s, she enjoyed doing risqué material, and was masterful at putting across numbers whether they were medium-tempo or torch songs. While she was at the peak of her career in the 1920s when she was a big star in vaudeville and toured England, Sophie Tucker continued performing for another 40 years. She essentially became a nostalgia act by the 1930s, had her own radio show during 1938-39, appeared on television regularly in the 1950s and early ‘60s (including the Ed Sullivan Show), and was singing up until just weeks before her passing at the age of 80.

Red Hot Mama, which is subtitled All The Hits And More 1911-37, features Sophie Tucker on 49 songs from her prime years. She was not a jazz singer although there are bits of jazz from her sidemen, particularly from her long-time pianist Ted Shapiro. In 1922 her group was called “Her Five Kings Of Jazz;” drummer Danny Alvin was in that combo. Sophie Tucker’s delivery was often dramatic, she talked through some of the lyrics, and she was virtually the whole show on nearly every number. In addition to a lot of lesser-known songs that were popular at the time, she is heard on this collection singing “You’ve Got to See Mama Every Night,” “Aggravatin’ Papa,” “Down By The River,” “The One I Love,” “After You’ve Gone,” “I Ain’t Got Nobody,” “There’ll Be Some Changes Made,” “Moanin’ Low,” “The Lady Is A Tramp,” and three versions of “Some Of These Days” including its debut recording from 1911.

The music on Red Hot Mama is more showbiz than jazz but it is certainly the definitive reissue of Sophie Tucker’s recordings.

Sophie Tucker • Red Hot Mama
Acrobat ADDCD 3573
www.acrobatmusic.net and www.mvdb2b.com

Scott Yanow

Since 1975 Scott Yanow has been a regular reviewer of albums in many jazz styles. He has written for many jazz and arts magazines, including JazzTimes, Jazziz, Down Beat, Cadence, CODA, and the Los Angeles Jazz Scene, and was the jazz editor for Record Review. He has written an in-depth biography on Dizzy Gillespie for AllMusic.com. He has authored 11 books on jazz, over 900 liner notes for CDs and over 20,000 reviews of jazz recordings.

Yanow was a contributor to and co-editor of the third edition of the All Music Guide to Jazz. He continues to write for Downbeat, Jazziz, the Los Angeles Jazz Scene, the Jazz Rag, the New York City Jazz Record and other publications.