Jimmy Scott

Through historical circumstances and the various labels he's recorded for, jazz balladeer Jimmy Scott (formerly known as "Little Jimmy Scott") has been lumped into the rhythm & blues category since the 1950s. In the '50s, he would perform with blues singers like Ruth Brown and Big Maybelle. But Scott has always insisted he's a jazz balladeer. He should know. Despite his misinformed dealings with unscrupulous record-company executives over the years and the misclassification of his artistry, he's emerged from a lot of difficult circumstances relatively unscathed. His last three albums for Warner Bros. prove it.

Scott's career got a boost when he was a senior citizen. He sang at the funeral of his friend songwriter/blues singer Doc Pomus (Jerome Felder) in March, 1991, and Seymour Stein from Sire Records was in the audience. Stein was so blown away by Scott's rendering of one of Pomus' favorite songs, the Gershwins' "Someone to Watch over Me," that he practically signed Scott on the spot to a five-album deal with Sire/Warner Bros. (Scott later recorded for Warner Bros.) His first album for Sire/Warner Bros., the Tommy LiPuma-produced All the Way, was one of the best-produced and -engineered jazz albums of the 1990s, and certainly one of Scott's absolute best recordings. Other recent releases for Warner Bros. include Dream, produced by Mitchell Froom in 1994, and his 1996 release, Heaven, produced by Cassandra Wilson producer Craig Street.

But there's so much more to Scott than just his interpretations of classic songs from the great American songbook for Warner Bros. Born and raised in Cleveland, where he lost his mother to an auto accident when he was in his early teens, Scott's recording career began in 1948-49 with Lionel Hampton's band, when he recorded three sides for Decca, "I've Been a Fool," "Everybody's Somebody's Fool," and "Please Give Me a Chance." After being encouraged to pursue a career on his own, he began recording for Roost Records, or Royal Roost Records, in 1950. There, he cut more than a dozen singles before jumping to Coral Records in 1952. After recording more than a dozen sides for Coral in 1952, he didn't record again until February of 1955, when he began a long and difficult relationship with Herman Lubinsky's Savoy Records label. His notable sides for Savoy, like "When Did You Leave Heaven?" "Everybody Needs Somebody," and "Imagination," have now been reissued on compact disc. Scott, by then based in Newark, N.J., recorded with Savoy until 1962, when had a chance to record for (longtime admirer) Ray Charles' Tangerine Records. The album that resulted, Falling in Love Is Wonderful, was pressed and released, but Lubinsky got in the way by bluffing Tangerine Records into thinking they had an exclusive recording contract with Scott, which Scott maintains is incorrect. As a result, Falling in Love Is Wonderful was pulled back from distribution, but the copies that did get out there now fetch upwards of $250. Scott's next album deal come about until 1969, when he recorded The Source for Atlantic Records. Scott's other albums include Can't We Begin Again for Savoy in 1975, recorded while Lubinsky was on his death bed, and Doesn't Love Mean More, recorded for his own J's Way Jazz label in 1990.

In 1989, Scott was the first of a handful of inductees into the R&B Foundation's Lifetime Achievement Awards, (along with Ruth Brown and Charles Brown). Using part of the $15, 000 he was awarded, he started J's Way Records, thus jump starting his own career with Doesn't Love Mean More, and those of others around him. Musicians Scott has recorded for his own label include saxophonist Harold Ousley and vocalists Connie Speed and Arthur Leeks.

These days, Scott divides his time between homes in Las Vegas and northern New Jersey, while doing club shows on the East and West coasts and the occasional tour of Europe. Scott's newfound fans include Madonna, Bruce Springsteen, Lou Reed, Kim Bassinger and Alec Baldwin. Scott sang at the wedding of the thespian couple and sang on Reed's Magic and Loss album.

Now in his early 70s, Scott still retains his unique, behind the beat phrasing. Offstage, his eternally optimist spirit has touched the hearts and minds of many fans, friends, admirers and associates. What Scott does so well is put his own stamp on the standards, and while his voice is not what it once was, it's still one of the most captivating voices in the world of jazz. Several film documentaries about his life and times were begun in the late '90s. ~ Richard Skelly, All Music Guide

Conga player Jimmy Scott, like others (see Alan Civil), is known for a tangential brush with the Beatles that resulted in a cameo appearance on a Beatles record, although in fact he had a long musical career, much of which took place outside of rock music. Born Jimmy Anonmuogharan Scott Emuakor in Nigeria, he came to England in the 1950s to work in London jazz clubs. For a while he played with Georgie Fame and the Blue Flames. Here's guessing that it's Scott we see in the filmed TV appearance of Georgie Fame at the 1965 Richmond Jazz and Blues Festival, dressed in African clothing and taking a long conga solo that brought a touch of world beat to the lineup of British Invasion bands. Scott also formed the Ob-la-di Ob-la-da Band, and was a backing musician for Stevie Wonder on the Motown singer's 1965 tour of Britain.

Paul McCartney got to know Scott in London clubs in the 1960s. He borrowed Scott's catch phrase "ob-la-di ob-la-da" -- a Yoruba phrase meaning "life goes on" -- for the title line in one of the White Album's more famous cuts, "Ob-La-Di Ob-La-Da." Scott also played congas on the track, recorded in July 1968. Apparently he wanted a bit more than an opportunity to play on a Beatles record. As McCartney told Playboy in 1984, "He got annoyed when I did a song of it because he wanted a cut. I said 'Come on, Jimmy. It's just an expression. If you'd written the song, you could have had the cut.'" According to Steve Turner's -A Hard Day's Write: The Story Behind Every Beatles Song, when Scott was imprisoned around the end of the 1960s for failing to pay alimony, McCartney paid for his legal bill, in exchange for Scott dropping contentions that he was owed something for the title phrase.

Also according to -A Hard Day's Write: The Story Behind Every Beatles Song, Scott played on the Rolling Stones' Beggars Banquet, and at the Rolling Stones' free concert at London's Hyde Park in July 1969. If that's so, he probably played on "Sympathy for the Devil," the track on which African-style percussion can be heard. In the 1970s he gave workshops on African music and drumming at the Pyramid Arts project in East London. In 1983, he joined the ska-rock band Bad Manners, and was still with them when he died in 1986. Doug Trendle of Bad Manners said that Scott caught pneumonia during an American tour, and died the day after a strip-search upon re-entry to Britain, where he was left naked for two hours. ~ Richie Unterberger, All Music Guide