Cab Calloway: Minnie the Moocher
Musicians:
Cab Calloway (vocals),
R.Q. Dickerson, Lammar Wright, Reuben Reeves (trumpet); De Priest Wheeler, Harry White (trombone); Arville Harris, Andrew Brown (clarinet, alto sax); Walter “Foots” Thomas (tenor sax, baritone sax), Earres Prince (piano), Morris White (banjo), Jimmy Smith (tuba), Leroy Maxey (drums)
.Composed by Cab Calloway, Clarence Gaskill & Irving Mills
.Recorded: New York, March 3, 1931
Rating: 93/100 (learn more)
The word hep, signifying "in the know," had appeared by the early 1900s, but its greatest vogue came during the 1930s, when hepcat lingo was codified in Cab Calloway's Hepster's Dictionary (1936) by the leather-lunged, hugely popular singing & dancing bandleader. In his greatest hit, "Minnie the Moocher," Cab's jive so masterfully veiled references to cocaine and opium that even Hollywood came running. By the time he revisited her for The Blues Brothers (1980), Cab had been mooching off Minnie for half a century, but neither he nor his audiences ever seemed to tire of the Moocher's infectiously nonsensical call-&-response scatting.
Reviewer: Alan Kurtz
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Tags: 1930s jazz · dope ditties
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