Ben Hewitt

Ben "Smokey" Hewitt (born September 11, 1935 in Tuscarora , † December 8, 1996 in Maryland ) was an American rockabilly musician.

Childhood and youth

Hewitt was born in 1935 in a wooden hut on an Indian reservation in Niagara County , New York State . He belonged to the tribe of the Tuscarora , who are counted among the Iroquois- speaking Indian peoples of North America . At the age of twelve he was given a ukulele and a year later his first guitar. Clayton Green taught Hewitt the basics of guitar playing.

Musical influences

In addition to country music , rhythm and blues music , which was becoming increasingly fashionable at the time, began to influence the young Hewitt in the early 1950s. He later heard the records of the Sun Records label and Elvis Presley . In an interview he gave to music historians Colin Escott and Hank Davis in the 1980s, he named Little Richard as another great role model.

Career

Hewitt had a band and regularly played his own pieces and songs by Little Richard in various bars. He was a frequent guest with his combo at DeFazios, a small bar in Niagara Falls . It was there that songwriter Julian Langford became aware of her, who wanted to persuade her to make demo recordings of his songs. Since the songs written by Langford were in Hewitt's opinion very similar to each other, he began to rewrite them. The only song Hewitt left in the original was Whirlwind Blues . There were also some numbers from Hewitt's pen, such as Queen in the Kingdom of My Heart and Bundle of Love , which were later credited as Julian Langford Songs. Langford paid for the studio and the drinks and they recorded a demo with the band. In 1958, a recording deal with Mercury Records and a management contract with Langford were signed. Two days later the first recordings started in New York City . The producer was Clyde Otis , who also worked with artists such as Brook Benton , Roy Hamilton and The Five Satins . Otis brought in a song of his own that he wrote with Brook Benton, I Ain't Givin 'Up Nothin' (If I Can't Have Something from You) . Most of the recording sessions took place in the Bell Tone Studio , where Hewitt later recorded various demos for Elvis Presley under the direction of Clyde Otis.

Hewitt's records didn't sell that well, but he still had numerous appearances and tours, all of which were booked through the Shaw Agency. At that time he was the only white artist with this concert agency. The highlight was a so-called package tour as part of the Alan Freed Show , which also allowed him to appear in the Paramount Theater in Brooklyn . In 1961, Hewitt separated from Mercury Records and lost interest in further recordings and record deals. A live album of a Far East tour was later released on BAB Records, as well as the country single Border City Call Girl on the Canadian label Broadland Records in 1975 , which was released in the USA on Plantation Records , a label of Shelby Singleton from Nashville .

Even if Ben Hewitt's recordings were not listed on the charts, he never turned his back on his music. He continued to perform at DeFazios for decades and was known by his nickname "Smokey". Hewitt said in an interview that he was "Smokey, the most famous stranger". He was even recognized as "Smokey" on a tour in Okinawa , and the radio station CBC in Toronto also wanted to produce a show with him - as "Smokey", not as Ben Hewitt.

comeback

When the rockabilly revival began in Europe at the end of the 1970s, people thought back to the US stars of the first hour and also to the great unknowns of the genre. Numerous records were re-released on various European labels, including recordings by unknown artists who never hit the charts. That happened to Ben Hewitt too. After Hewitt's Mercury recordings were rediscovered in the archives, Bear Family Records released them again in 1984, initially on record . This was followed by concerts at major European rock'n'roll and rockabilly festivals, to which he was booked as a headliner, celebrated as one of the pioneers of the genre.

With the help of musicians from the British rockabilly band Breathless and producers Paul Barrett and Robert Llewellyn, he recorded new material for a record in England , which was also released on vinyl and later on CD by Bear Family. In 1985, between concert dates in southern Germany, Hewitt recorded another LP entitled Ben Hewitt - Tore Up! in a studio in Munich . The backing band was the Munich group The Catlegs , and the album was released on the German label Hydra Records . During the Bear Family Festival in Bremen in 1990, Hewitt took the opportunity to make further recordings with the accompanying band Rumble on the Beach in Jörg Siemer's recording studio , which were only released on CD in 1997. Ben Hewitt died in Maryland on December 8, 1996 at the age of 61 .

Discography (excerpt)

Singles

• 1959: For Quite a While / Patricia June
• 1959: You Break Me Up / I Aint 'Givin' Up Nothin '(If I Can't Get Something From You)
• 1960: My Search / I Want A New Girl Now
• 1960: The Queen in the Kingdom of My Heart / Whirlwind Blues
• 1975: Border City Call Girl / Hobnobbin 'With The Goblins

Albums

• 1984: They Would Call Me Elvis! (LP)
• 1985: Good Times And Some Mighty Fine Rock'n'Roll (LP)
• 1985: Ben Hewitt - Tore Up! (LP)
• 1997: The Spirit of Rock'n'Roll (CD)
• 1997: You Got Me Shook (CD)
• 1990s: Lucky Records Presents Ben Hewitt - Best Of 1958-1960 (10 "LP)

Web links

• [1] Bear Family Records - Biography & Interview, Engl.
• [2] BlackCat Rockabilly Europe - Ben Hewitt
• [3] Discogs - Ben Hewitt

swell

• Colin Escott & Hank Davis, I Heard You Died In '64: Ben Hewitt
• All Roots Lead to Rock - Legends of Early Rock'n'Roll , edited by Colin Escott, (pp. 148–156). New York: Schirmer Books, 1999.
• Marc Mittelacher, interview with Ben Hewitt, 1990.