During the 1930s swing-era, no one got the crowd moving and shaking more than East Baltimore’s Chick Webb. His pulsating drumming and stunning solo riffs earned him the moniker of “The King of Drums.”
Webb had risen from the slums of East Baltimore, overcame physical difficulties and attained musical stardom in an albeit too short life.
In a city that has produced such outstanding musical greats — some of which include Eubie Blake, Cab Calloway, Philip Glass, Leon Fleisher, Frank Zappa, Mama Cass Eliot, Spiro Malas and James Morris — Chick Webb certainly earned his place in that noble pantheon of artists.
Born William Henry Webb in Baltimore in either 1902 or 1909 — there is some discrepancy as to the year — he was raised in poverty near Madison Street and Ashland Avenue.
He was the son of William H. and Marie Webb and was one of four children.
When he was a child, he fell down a flight of stairs which resulted in a lasting deformity, limited use of his legs and shoulders, and a hunchback.
Webb’s physicians suggested he take up playing the drums as a form of physical therapy to loosen his bones.
When he was three, he began tapping away on pots and pans and as he grew older started beating out rhythms on iron railings and marble steps as he walked around his neighborhood.
As a youth, he dropped out of school, performed odd jobs and sold newspapers, and with the money he earned purchased a drum set and began performing with local Baltimore musicians.
Webb joined John Truehart, a Baltimore banjo player and guitarist, and the duo began playing on steamboats that plied the Chesapeake Bay between Baltimore and Norfolk, Virginia.
They went to New York in 1924, and two years later, Webb established the Jungle Band.
In his first combo was his cousin, Johnny Hodges, who became one of the most acclaimed jazz alto saxophonists as a member of Duke Ellington’s orchestra.
Webb cut his first record for Brunswick in 1929, playing “Dog Bottom” and “Jungle Man.”
A year later, with his fame growing, he became a regular at such coveted venues as the Savoy and Roseland ballrooms, the Casino de paree, the Coconut Grove and the Park Central Hotel.
“Surmounting the handicaps of Jim Crow and of his own physical deformity, Webb rose to become one of the most dynamic manic figures in jazz, a powerful, pulsating drummer whose magnificent control of bass drums and cymbals lent the band much of its personality, both in ensemble work and occasional solos,” wrote Leonard Feather, jazz historian.
The year 1934 proved to be a pivotal one for Webb and his Savoy Orchestra. He had recorded that year “On the Sunny Side of the Street,” “Blue Mirror,” “Don’t Be That Way” and “Blue Lou.”
It was also suggested that he find a popular female vocalist and bring her onboard with the Savoy Orchestra.
The next year, he hired Ella Fitzgerald, a young, struggling singer from Newport News, Virginia, who had won first prize at an amateur talent show at Harlem’s famed Apollo Theater.
With Fitzgerald’s arrival, the orchestra’s popularity soared not only from live performances but on coast-to-coast radio broadcasts.
“Despite the trite material Ella chose (or was obliged ) to sing, her innate talent shone through,” wrote Gunther Schuller in his book, “The Sing Era.”
“Indeed, she lifted these banal songs to heights they did not deserve by her impeccable pitch,” he wrote.
One novelty song rendered in her then-girlish life which became synonymous for the rest of her life was “A Tisket, A-Tasket,” which she recorded in 1938.
Other hits she recorded with Webb included “F.D.R. Jones,” “I Want to Be Happy,” “Organ Grinder’s Swing,” “Little White Lies,” and “I’ll Choose the Blues Anyway.”
Webb was playing a date aboard a Potomac River steamer near Washington when he collapsed.
He was taken to the Johns Hopkins Hospital where it was diagnosed that tuberculosis had spread to his kidneys.
With relatives surrounding his bedside, Webb asked his mother to raise him up.
He grinned, stuck out his jaw and announced, “I’m sorry I got to go,” and died.
It was June 16, 1939.
Webb’s death earned him a two-column headline in The Evening Sun, a rare honor at a time when such newspaper lavishness was reserved for only the socially and business prominent and other local movers and shakers.
Webb’s funeral at Waters African American Methodist Episcopal Church on Aisquith Street drew such Big Band notables as Duke Ellington, Cab Calloway, Gene Krupa, Jimmie Lunceford and Fletcher Henderson, while others jammed the church and thousands lined the streets and hung out of rowhouse windows and lined roofs.
“It was all that Ella could do to sing two choruses of ‘My Buddy,'” reported The Sun.
“She was sobbing without restraint when she finished — this sultry voice vocalist whose rise to the top of swing fame was due to Chick’s band,” the newspaper observed.
On Feb. 12, 1940, a Chick Webb Benefit was held in Baltimore and those attending — in addition to a crowd of 7,500 — included his wife, Martha Lorretta “Sally” Ferguson, his mother and a sister, fighter Joe Louis and Maryland Governor Herbert R. O’Conor.
Fitzgerald became leader of the band until 1942 when she decided to leave and pursue a solo career.
Webb is commemorated in the recently renovated Chick Webb Memorial Recreation Center, and in 1974, the University of Maryland Eastern Shore, named its art center the Ella Fitzgerald Center for the Performing Arts.
Webb’s final resting place is Arbutus Memorial Park, 1101 Sulphur Spring Road, Arbutus, where his grave is sometimes marked with crossed drumsticks.
Fred writes with enlightened affection for our city and the Chick Webb is a perfect demonstration of getting the facts right and telling the story with perspective and style.