ROCK PIONEER DAVE BARTHOLOMEW TURNS 100

Ultimate Classic Rock ^ | 12/24/2018

[Borges]

Dec. 24, 2018, marks Dave Bartholomew's 100 birthday.

While not a household name, the New Orleans legend helped create rock 'n' roll by working on R&B hits by such names as Smiley Lewis, Huey "Piano" Smith, Shirley and Lee, Lloyd Price and, most of all, Fats Domino.

Plans to celebrate Bartholomew's birthday with a tribute concert had to be postponed until 2019 after he was hospitalized last week due to complications stemming from medication he was taking for a urinary tract infection.

According to Offbeat Magazine, he's in good spirits. “He kept me up talking until two in the morning,” Bartholomew's son Don said. “I was ready to get out of there!” Born in Edgard, La., on Dec. 24, 1918, (though some sources list his birth year as 1920), Bartholomew started out playing the tuba and then moved on to trumpet, taking lessons from Peter Davis, who also taught Louis Armstrong. His family moved to New Orleans while in his teens and began playing jazz professionally. In 1939, he was hired to be in Walter "Fats" Pichon's band, playing up-and-down the Mississippi River for $25 a week.

Pichon eventually turned the band over to Bartholomew, but that ended when the U.S. entered World War II, and Bartholomew joined the 196th Army Ground Forces Band, where he learned to notate music, which served him well as an arranger in the years to come.

Returning to New Orleans after the war, he soon got signed to Lew Chudd's Imperial Records as both a recording artist and A&R man. In 1949, they went to the Hideaway Club on Desire Street to hear a young pianist named Antoine "Fats" Domino. They signed him on the strength of his rendition of Champion Jack Dupree's "Junker's Blues."

Bartholomew and the young pianist rewrote the song's lyrics and recorded it at Cosimo Matassa's J&M Studio on Rampart Street. It took only three months for "The Fat Man" to reach No. 2 on Billboard's R&B chart and launch Domino's career.

[Borges]

[Fiji Hill]

In 1949, they went to the Hideaway Club on Desire Street to hear a young pianist named Antoine "Fats" Domino. They signed him on the strength of his rendition of Champion Jack Dupree's "Junker's Blues."

Bartholomew and the young pianist rewrote the song's lyrics and recorded it at Cosimo Matassa's J&M Studio on Rampart Street. It took only three months for "The Fat Man" to reach No. 2 on Billboard's R&B chart and launch Domino's career.

Junker Blues--Champion Jack Dupree (1941)

The Fat Man--Fats Domino (1950)

[Fiji Hill]

Dave Bartholomew also wrote this gem, which Chuck Berry turned into his biggest hit in 1972:

Toy Bell--The Bees (1954)

And that demands an answer--also written by Bartholomew.

The Real Thing--The Spiders (1954)

[Responsibility2nd]

I can’t place my finger on the links, but I’ve read the R&B history of men like these and how a fusion of Jazz, R&B and other music genres in the 30’s and 40’s paved the way for Rock and Roll.

Very interesting stuff.

[Fiji Hill]

One of Bartholomew's big hits as a writer:

Blue Monday--Smiley Lewis (1954)

Blue Monday--Fats Domino (1957)

[Fiji Hill]

Another smash hit for Dave Bartholomew, featuring Fats Domino at the piano.

Lawdy, Miss Clawdy--Llloyd Price (1952)

[Fiji Hill]

This opus from Bartholomew contains references to "Caldonia", "Who Threw the Whiskey in the Well?", "Sweet Lorraine", "Junker Blues" and "Lawdy, Miss Clawdy."

Caldonia's Party--Smiley Lewis (1953)

[SMGFan]

what does he credit for a long life?