Little Miss Cornshucks

Little Miss Cornshucks or Lil 'Miss Cornshucks was the stage name of Mildred Jorman (born Cummings; born May 26, 1923 in Dayton , Ohio , † November 11, 1999 in Indianapolis , Indiana ). She was an American rhythm and blues and jazz singer and songwriter who was known for her extravagant stage show as a country girl in the 1940s and early 1950s and, with her singing style, became a model for R&B and soul singers like LaVern Baker, Ruth Brown or Aretha Franklin . Her stage name translates as Little Miss Maisstroh .

Live and act

1940s

Mildred Cummings was the youngest child in a large musical family of African American descent; she sang early on with her sisters, who performed as the Cummings Sisters in Dayton and the surrounding area, singing spirituals . As early as the 1930s she appeared as a teenager in amateur shows or in front of the family as a soloist. She preferred ballads and developed a stage wardrobe that was popular with many rural southerners who had moved to the cities in the north as country style .

An artist agent who worked for gospel artists in the Dayton area gave Cummings her first solo appearance in 1940 in Chicago. During this time, Cummings married Cornelius Jorman, who was six months older and with whom they then had three children. Her husband, who worked as her manager, always accompanied her during her performances. In Chicago she soon drew attention to herself with her extraordinary stage show, barefoot, wearing a straw hat, pigtails, backwoods clothes and a bast basket. Her performances were soon celebrated in Los Angeles and New York.

In addition to newer blues numbers, your stage program consisted of old Torch songs such as Time After Time or Why Was I Born? that Kern and Hammerstein wrote in 1929. Judy Garland , who often attended her concerts, later took on elements of this stage presence, for example for her concert at New York's Palace Theater in 1951. She repeated it in 1954 in the film A Star Is Born , which she starred in a country girl outfit based on Cornshucks shows black children dancing.

Joe Louis

Little Miss Cornshucks became a star in Chicago as early as 1942; she celebrated success in the Rhumboogie Club , which belonged to the boxer Joe Louis and in which the band leader and arranger Marl Young worked. When Marl Young moved to the then famous Club DeLisa to work with the Fletcher Henderson Orchestra, he took Cornshucks with him and gave her an engagement for several years.

The DeLisa enjoyed a reputation at that time like the New York Cotton Club , with the difference of a racially rather mixed audience; Artists like Gene Autry and Louis Armstrong were guests there. In 1945 the club organized themed revues in which dancers such as the Step Brothers or Cozy Cole , comedians such as George Kirby and well-known swing orchestras performed. Cornshucks was regularly accompanied by the Fletcher Henderson Orchestra; keyboardist Sonny Blount played in it, who closely watched the extravagant show surrounding Cornshucks' stage role. He later produced modern jazz revues himself and took over the stage role Sun Ra for himself .

Sun Ra in February 1992

Miss Cornshucks usually offered the rhythmic numbers desired by the audience in the rough jump blues style; Club owner Mike DeLisa wanted her to sing blues songs too, including the slow ballad So Long . This was a great success for her and soon became her signature tune. So Long was the closing theme on Russ Morgan's radio show earlier; as early as 1940 the song had been a hit with the Ink Spots singing vocal group Charioteers from Dayton, which appeared on Bing Crosby's radio show in 1943 . Cornshucks took over their song and reworked it for themselves.

The future owner of Atlantic Records , Ahmet Ertegün , wrote in his memoirs:

“In 1943 I was about 19 years old; I went to a nightclub in the northeastern black district of Washington, DC and heard a singer named Little Miss Cornshucks and thought, 'Oh God!' It was better than anything I'd heard before. She came along like a country girl, wearing a headscarf and a basket in her hand and so on; but she could sing the blues better than anyone I've heard to date. That night I asked her if I could make a record with her. We then played Kansas City and a few other blues numbers and the song So Long . It had such a wonderful sound and I remember thinking, 'Oh my god, and I don't have a record company; I can only make the record for myself '. "

Cornshucks recorded songs privately with Ahmet Ertegün during a tour in Washington DC in 1943 before he had his own label . She made her first official recordings in 1947 for the short-lived Sunbeam label , including her signature tune So Long , which became a regional hit.

During the So Long Sessions the song I Don't Love You Anymore , composed together with Marl Young , was one of the most remarkable of the six pieces in the Sunbeam session. The song was a swinging upbeat blues number. In the lyrics “she mocks the abusive man who threw her on the street and now lets her go from door to door; and Cornshucks turns the song into a moment of self-discovery of newly discovered freedom, into a triumph of female independence ”.

Miss Cornshucks had to interrupt her career more often for health reasons and then returned to Ohio . Eventually she separated from her husband Cornelius, who was involved in drug deals; he then moved to his hometown of Indianapolis. But through the divorce Cornshucks lost more and more control over her psyche and became an alcoholic .

Apollo Theater in Harlem

After the short-lived Sunbeam label ended, Arthur Bryson, a theater agent on Broadway , became its manager. The Sunbeam recordings have now been successfully re-released on the Old SwingMaster label . In the mid-1940s she enjoyed success in Detroit , where she replaced jump blues star Wynonie Harris in the Frolics Bar ; in New York she appeared in the Club Baby Grand and appeared on a tour called Around The World in many theaters: the Howard in Washington DC, the Earle in Philadelphia , the Regal in Chicago and the Apollo Theater in New York.

During one of these tours she met the dancer Henry "Henny" Ramsey in Detroit, with whom she then went on guest tours for several years while her children stayed with her family in Dayton. Ramsey and Cornshucks lived for a while - without being married - in Los Angeles, where they performed in the clubs on Central Avenue, such as in the Last Word Room , accompanied by the Joe Lutcher Jump Band and Joe Liggins , as well as in Club Alabam , where also T-Bone Walker , Johnny Otis and Wynonie Harris played.

The singer was accompanied by the two leading bands, Otis and Harlan Leonard's Kansas City Rockers at Club Alabam . Cornshucks also appeared in early 1948 at the Million Dollar Theater in Downtown Los Angeles, a former movie palace; it was announced as "the new look in comedy" and "a rustic comedienne". Her comedic talent also earned her a small film role in Campus Sleuth , a B-movie by Monogram Pictures in November 1947 , which also produced films by the Bowery Boys and Charlie Chan .

Little Miss Cornshucks
In the Rain (1948)
contemporary 78s by
the singer
OldSwingMaster Label
Link to the picture
(Please note copyrights )

In May 1948 she recorded more songs for the small label Miltone in California under the saxophonist and producer Maxwell Davis , who was a leading exponent of rhythm and blues on the west coast and at that time on recordings of Percy Mayfield , BB King and the early Charles Mingus participated. He recorded nine songs with Cornshucks, including the ballad In the Rain , which was later covered by Ruth Brown , as well as the jazz standard He’s Funny That Way and the blues number Cornshucks Blues from the film Campus Sleuth .

The 78s records released by Miltone were released as Little Miss Cornshucks with The Blenders . The Blenders was a studio band that also took part in recordings by label owner Roy Milton . The ballad Keep Your Hand on Your Heart was arranged by the pianist Calvin Jackson . Cornshucks then returned to Chicago, had other engagements in the city's clubs, where she also interpreted the old Harry Woods song Try a Little Tenderness . During a further stay in California, recordings for Aladdin as Miss Cornshucks & Her All-Stars were made in 1949 , including the songs Waiting in Vain and (Now That I'm Free) You Turned Your Back on Me , again with Maxwell Davis as producer.

In New York, Ahmet Ertegün and Herb Abrahamson founded their company Atlantic Records in 1948 ; Ertegün remembered Cornshucks' performances well, but didn't know where to find the singer for planned recordings. Atlantic Records then signed Ruth Brown . Their first successful song So Long was a copy of Cornshucks' singing style in 1949. Ertegün remembered:

“Have you ever heard Ruth Brown's recording of So Long ? Well, that doesn't sound like Ruth Brown, that sounds like a completely different singer. And it doesn't sound like any other recording she's ever made, either. We signed her because she could sound like Cornshucks. "

Ruth Brown was more direct: “I stole it from her! For me it was a big hit - and it could have been hers. "

The 1950s

In the summer of 1950, she mentioned Ebony magazine in a cover story about jump blues singers like Arthur Crudup , Ivory Joe Hunter , Roy Brown and Amos Milburn . In 1950, You Turned Your Back on Me became a regional hit in the Midwest .

After performing in the Midwest, she toured the US West Coast with the Joe Lutcher Jump Band . In 1951 further R&B recordings were made in Los Angeles for the Decca sub-label Coral , where the single Cause I Lost My Helping Hand / So Long was first released, followed by their version of the classic Try a Little Tenderness , the Bing Crosby , Ruth Etting and others had already sung in the early 1930s. In 1946 Frank Sinatra had also published a recording of the song on his album The Voice of Frank Sinatra , with which he reached number 1 on the US Billboard charts . Sinatra's accentuation of the closing lines is also reflected in Miss Cornshuck's recording from 1951, in which with the plaintive-pleading end of the song "Awww-oh ... oh, it's so easy - try a little ... tenderness!" the famous versions that were to follow continued.

Benny Carter

During the Coral recordings, she was accompanied by a band led by Benny Carter . Were taken at the time Papa Tree Top Blues and one of the earliest compositions Carter from the pre- rock era, the uptempo number Rock Me to Sleep .

In 1951, Miss Cornshucks songs appeared on three different labels: at the beginning of the year she had a recording contract with Coral; Cause I Lost My Helping Hand and So Long were released in February . In April, Aladdin Records released more tracks from the 1949 session - Time after Time and Waiting in Vain . Around this time, Cornshucks recorded a song with the Red Saunders Orchestra, Four AM , for Columbia , which was released on Okeh Records .

In 1951 Miss Cornshucks performed in the Detroit Flame Show Bar , accompanied by Maurice King's band ; Okeh / Columbia Records started their live performance. It was then that a young white man, Johnnie Ray , attended their concerts; critic Ralph J. Gleason later suggested that Ray's famous rock-anticipating emotional style was heavily influenced by Miss Cornshucks. Meanwhile, the singer herself suffered a series of strokes of fate.

Miltone owners Warr Perkins and William Reed sold the rights to Cornshucks' recordings to Aladdin, Gotham and Deluxe Records; however, the singer did not receive any royalties from the labels. Rumors of a nervous breakdown surfaced after she was tricked by a fraudulent manager who had promised her to tour South America . Ertegün later explained why Atlantic had not signed the singer: "Well, then we heard that she had psychological problems".

Around 1951/52 Mildred Cummings Jorman had reached the zenith of her career with her Little Miss Cornshucks Show. In Chicago, Delores Baker, a young niece of the blues singer Memphis Minnie , began performing under the name "Miss Sharecropper" in an outfit that was confusingly similar to her in the clubs where Cornshucks had also sung. Confusion was inevitable, especially since "Miss Sharecropper" had also recorded So Long for National Records in 1950 .

Instead of Cornshucks, Atlantic brought out their rival Baker in 1953 under the name "Little Miss Sharecropper", who soon became known under the name LaVern Baker . During this time, interest in artists who did not fit the model of the new " rock 'n' roller " was also lost, especially since many old-style nightclubs closed. Lil 'Miss Cornshucks, who was now 39, did not want to adapt to this new style.

Budland concert
with Little Miss Cornshucks
and Eddie Boyd
Concert announcement (1956)
Link to the picture
(Please note copyrights )

Mildred Jorman left Chicago and moved to near Kenosha, Wisconsin , ended touring, stopped recording, but occasionally returned to Chicago to perform. She has now made guest appearances in smaller venues such as Little Joe's High Hat Lounge , the Flame Show Lounge and again in DeLisa , as well as in revues and in 1956 in the Budland Club with the King Kolax Band as an accompanying group. In Budland she also appeared in a “Battle of the Blues” program with the blues musicians Floyd Dixon and Clarence Gatemouth Brown . In October / November 1956 she was accompanied by the Sun Ra Orchestra.

In the late 1950s, she sometimes caused a stir on days when she had no engagements by marching on stage while singing and interrupting the performers. The jazz historian and musician Charles Walton recalls:

“We were in a pub playing, and then suddenly she came and did some weird things. First she threw her wig on me, then she pulled her dress over her head ... lots of crazy things. "

Ruth Brown reports a similar incident in the mid-1950s:

“I was just performing at the Crown Propeller in Chicago . We were friends then, but she came in and sat at the bar and at that moment she really scared me for singing her song So Long - and she whirled her wig around and threw it at me. "

Charles Brown at the Long Beach Blues Festival 1996

In 1958, Cornshucks made another attempt at a comeback in Los Angeles, as her old colleague and friend Marl Young worked there as an arranger in the Desilu Studio and was supposed to become musical director on Lucille Ball's television show. Miss Cornshucks was eventually put in a little speaking role; Young was supposed to prepare her for the role, but this failed completely because she had problems keeping the lines. Shortly thereafter, she got a performance opportunity in the Cincinnati area through the blues musician Charles Brown .

Attempted comeback in the early 1960s

It wasn't until the early 1960s that working conditions improved for Little Miss Cornshucks. For a week she performed in the Roberts Show Lounge in Chicago, once with the young comedian Dick Gregory as MC ; there she saw the music producer Ralph Bass , who she knew from her performances on Central Avenue in Los Angeles. He wanted to record songs with string accompaniment for Chess Records with her - based on the model of Ray Charles' success Georgia on My Mind .

At the sessions in Chicago in October and November 1960, her well-known songs from the early 1950s were re-recorded with strings; there were also some rock-style R&B numbers from the 1950s. In the liner notes , Miss Cornshucks said:

“I was nervous and intimidated that day; I got into the recording studio ... I'm not a rock 'n' roll singer. Did people like me? It took a while for everything to relax. Finally I could go and sing what I felt and do the best I could ... what else should I have done? "

Little Miss Cornshucks
cover of the Chess album
1961
Link to the picture
(Please note copyrights )

The Chess company sent her on promotion appointments, which she was unable to cope with. The label released two of the new R&B songs, No Teasing Around and It Do Me So Good , together on a single . But although it was also on the radio, it was unsuccessful in the charts.

In early 1961 her first long-playing record, The Loneliest Gal, was released in Town with new versions of her old songs So Long , Try a Little Tenderness , Why Was I Born? and You Turned Your Back on Me . The LP's title track, The Lonesomest Girl in Town , was a slow tin-pan-alley song; The new R&B numbers included a version of the Johnny Ace song Never Let Me Go and No Teasing Around . With her soul ballad style, Miss Cornshucks anticipated the Stax Volt recordings that would soon follow, especially in Tenderness with its dramatic ending "try a little ... try a little" .

Aretha Franklin 2007

After Cornshucks' LP was released, Try a Little Tenderness was also played on the radio - but not in its version, but in that of Aretha Franklin . That version was released in April 1962 on the LP The Tender, The Moving, The Swinging Aretha Franklin by Columbia; it was decisively influenced by Cornshucks' interpretation, right up to the introduction "I may be weary" and its particular phrasing . While Franklin's version hit the charts, Cornshucks' label Chess did not release a Tenderness single, and the LP was soon forgotten.

Last years

She must have been completely overwhelmed by the great disappointment; Mildred Jorman ended her regular appearances in late 1961. She last appeared in July 1963 at a show in the Jazz Room of McKie's Lounge at the side of Ruth Brown, which was aiming for a comeback. In 1975, she met boogie-woogie pianist Jimmy Walker while shopping, persuaded her to record with him and set rehearsals in his apartment, but they failed.

The bassist and sound engineer who was present at the time, Twist Turner, remembers:

“The following week, Miss Cornshucks showed up in our rehearsal room; she wore normal street clothes; She had brought a bottle of white port with her . We played a number of songs, but she and a friend of hers just stood around and drank the port. (…) I was really interested in hearing her sing, excited to be part of her comeback. Jimmy gave her the mike, but she tore off her wig and flung it on the floor. She then sang a little, bald-headed, but couldn't get it right. "

Mildred Jorman did not appear in public again until 1980, when she - surprisingly for many due to her then well-known poor physical condition - performed a song at the funeral service for the dance producer with whom she had worked in previous years. In March 1980 the editor of the blues magazine Longtime Living Blues , Jim O'Neal, tried to interview her, but nothing came of it; instead, the magazine accidentally reported the singer's death.

Mildred Jorman lived in Dayton for several years without receiving much attention. After suffering a first stroke in the early 1990s , she moved to live with her daughter Francey and other Jorman family members in Indianapolis; her ex-husband Cornelius had already died in the 1970s. Her health deteriorated after further strokes. In her final years, she held Bible Studies with family members. According to her daughter Francey, she was bitter about being forgotten and offended that others had earned on her musical achievements. She died in Indianapolis on November 11, 1999 at the age of 76.

Little Miss Cornshucks
cover picture of
the magazine
No Depression
Issue 45 (2003)
Link to the picture
(please note copyrights )

Appreciation

The American alternative country magazine No Depression dedicated a special issue to the singer in a 2003 issue; it contained a lengthy essay by Barry Mazor. He praised her as a "unique live artist in the brief era of the 'after-hours blues' between swing and rock 'n' roll , when the break between jazz and popular R&B was not yet a schism ." He regretted that As early as the 1960s, nobody could remember that Miss Cornshucks with the song Try A Little Tenderness was the crucial link between the early crooners and the modern soul ballad singers like Otis Redding , Sam Cooke and Aretha Franklin, who took over their ideas.

Erik Hage wrote in his tribute to the singer in Allmusic that Little Miss Cornshucks could certainly be described as one of the most influential artists in music history if she had not been unfortunately prevented from doing so by the vagaries of the time, bad luck and personal problems. Cornshucks' influence extends to early soul singers like Aretha Franklin and Otis Redding, to R&B greats like Ruth Brown and LaVern Baker, and even to 1950s pop singers like Johnnie Ray . Mainly because of the song Try a Little Tenderness , Ahmet Ertegün considered her the best blues singer he had ever heard and compared her to Dinah Washington and Esther Phillips .

Ruth Brown called it "the most important voice I had ever heard and - I'm proud to say this - it had a huge impact on me. That was something very deep in their meaning. It was this way of stylizing myself that I imitated. "

Little Miss Cornshucks
Cornshucks Blues (1948)
contemporary 78s by
the singer
OldSwingMaster Label
Link to the picture
(Please note copyrights )

Discographic notes

Albums

• The Chronological Little Miss Cornshucks 1947–1951 ( Classics , contains the early Sunbeam, Miltone, Aladdin and Coral recordings)
• The Loneliest Gal in Town ( Chess Records , 1961)

Singles

Recording dates	Pieces	Label	Line-up, accompanist
Chicago, September 1946:	So Long, Gonna Leave Here Walkin '(Cummins), Have You Ever Loved Somebody	Sunbeam	Little Miss Cornshcks with Marl Young's Orchestra
Chicago, October 1946:	For Old Time's Sake, I Don't Love You Any More, When Mommy Sings a Lullaby	Sunbeam	Marl Young Orchestra with Marl Young (p, dir, arr); Melvin Moore (tp); Nick Cooper (tp); Nat Jones (as); Frank Derrick (as); Moses Gant (ts); Rail Wilson (b); Oliver Coleman (d).
Los Angeles, May 1948:	Cornshuck's Blues, In the Rain	Miltone / DeLuxe	Little Miss Cornshucks with Maxwell Davis & The Blenders
Los Angeles, May 1948:	He's Funny That Way	Miltone	Little Miss Cornshucks with Calvin Jackson & The Blenders
Los Angeles, May 1948:	True (You Don't Love Me), Why Was I Born, Teardrops	Miltone	Little Miss Cornshucks with Maxwell Davis & The Blenders
Los Angeles, August 12, 1949:	Waiting in Vain, (Now That I'm Free) You Turned Your Back on Me, Keep You Hand on Your Heart, Time After Time	Aladdin	Little Miss Cornshucks and Her All-Stars (Maxwell Davis (ts))
Los Angeles, 1951:	Papa Tree Top Blues, So Long, Rock Me to Sleep, Try A Little Tenderness, Don't Marry Too Soon, Cause I Lost My Helping Hand	Coral	Lil Miss Cornshucks with Orchestra: Benny Carter , Bumps Meyer, Que Martyn, Charles Waller (sax), Eddie Beal (p) Billy Hadnott (b)
Chicago, 1961	No Teasing Around, It Do Me So Good	Chess	Studio tape (p, git, bb, dr), strings

Web links / sources

• A Soul Forgotten - Essay by Barry Mazor (2003) in (December 19, 2013 memento in the Internet Archive ) No Depression (accessed May 31, 2010)
• Erik Hage's biography at Allmusic (accessed May 31, 2010)
• Double portrait of Little Miss Cornshucks and LaVern Baker by JC Marion (accessed May 31, 2010)
• Short biography of Dave Perry at rockabilly.nl (accessed May 31, 2010)
• Information about the Sunbeam label and Marl Young (accessed May 31, 2010)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b c d e f g h i j k l m n} A Soul Forgotten - Essay by Barry Mazor (2003) in ( Memento from December 19, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) No Depression (accessed May 31, 2010).
2. ↑ cornshucks or cornhusks are the husks of the cob.
3. ↑ Forgotten Blues Ladies in Sundayblues.org
4. ↑ At that time he also worked with T-Bone Walker and Charlie Parker . See Barry Mazor.
5. ↑ Club DeLisa (also spelled Delisa or De Lisa ), founded in 1934, was located on the corner of State Street and Garfield Avenue, on the South Side of Chicago.
6. ↑ In the original: “In 1943, when I was 19 or so years old, I went to a nightclub in the northeast black ghetto section of Washington and heard a singer whose name was Little Miss Cornshucks and I thought, 'My God !!! ' She was better than anything I'd ever heard. She would come out like a country girl with a bandana around her head, a basket in her hand, and so forth, which she'd set aside fairly early on into the show. She could sing the blues better than anybody I've ever heard to this day. I asked her that night if she would mind if I made a record of her for myself. We cut Kansas City along with some other blues and she also sang a song called So Long . She had such a wonderful sound and I remember just thinking, 'My God! My God! And I didn't have a record company, I just made those records for myself '. "Ahmet Ertegun: What'd I Say: The Atlantic Story. Quoted from information at Rockabilly.nl (accessed on May 31, 2010)
7. ↑ These recordings, the first ever produced by Ahmet Ertegün and on which the pianist Johnny Malachi participated, were unfortunately lost. See Barry Mazor.
8. ↑ The short-lived Sunbeam label was owned by Marl Young and his brother. See Barry Mazor.
9. ^ Miltone Records discography . Koti.mbnet.fi. Archived from the original on July 20, 2014. Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Retrieved June 6, 2010. 
10. ↑ In the original: "taunt the abusive man who has tossed her out into the street, left her drifting door to door - and Cornshucks turns it, in a moment of self-discovery of newfound freedom, into a triumph of female independence". Quote from Barry Mazor
11. ^ Campus Sleuth in the Internet Movie Database
12. ↑ "You've heard Ruth Brown's record of 'So Long'?" Ertegun asks. “Well, that doesn't even sound like Ruth; she sounds like a different singer! And it doesn't sound like any other recording she made ever after, either. We signed her at first because she could sound like Cornshucks! ”Quoted by Barry Mazor.
13. ↑ In the original: Brown, charming in her candor, is even more blunt: “I stole that from her! It was a big hit for me - and it should have been hers. ” Quoted by Barry Mazor.
14. ↑ See Richard Havers: Sinatra. London: Dorling Kindersley, 2004. p. 113
15. ↑ The musicians of the Benny Carter Band included the saxophonists Bumps Meyer, Que Martyn and Charles Waller, the pianist Eddie Beal and the Mingus teacher Billy Hadnott as bassist.
16. ↑ ^{a b c} Double portrait of Little Miss Cornshucks and LaVern Baker by JC Marion (accessed May 31, 2010)
17. ↑ In the original: "Well, then we heard that she had mental problems." Quoted in Barry Mazor.
18. ↑ From Sonny Blount to Sun Ra: The Chicago Years. By Robert L. Campbell, Christopher Trent, and Robert Pruter ( Memento of the original from April 4, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (accessed on June 3, 2010) 
19. ↑ In the original: "We'd be in a place, playing, and she'd come by and do some nutty things," musician and local historian Charles Walton recalls. "First thing she'd do is throw her wig at you. She'd take her dress over her head… all kinds of nutty things. ”Quoted by Barry Mazor.
20. ↑ In the original: “I was playing in Chicago at the Crown Propeller. We'd been friends, but she came in and sat down at the bar, and just for that moment she got real angry at me, because I'd sung her song 'So Long' - and she just twirled her wig on her finger and threw it right at me! ”Quoted by Barry Mazor.
21. ↑ In the original: “I was nervous and scared the day I walked into the recording studio… I'm no rock and roll singer. Would the people like me? It took a while to get straightened out. Finally, I decided just to go on and sing what I felt, do the best I could… What else was there to do? ”Quoted by Barry Mazor.
22. ^ In the original: "The following week, Miss Cornshucks showed up at our rehearsal, wearing regular street clothes. She brought a bottle of white port and a package of Bugs Bunny brand lemon flavor Kool-Aid in her purse. We played a couple songs while she and a friend stood around and drank the port. "(...)" I was really interested to hear her sing, excited about being a part of her comeback. Jimmy gave her the mike, but the next thing I knew she just snatched off her wig and threw it on the ground. She did sing a little, baldheaded, but she just couldn't get it together to perform. ”Quoted by Barry Mazor.
23. ↑ The text passage “she was now 'gone' from the city” was not interpreted as a move to Dayton, but as her demise; See Barry Mazor.
24. ↑ In the original Ruth Brown said: “Little Miss Cornshucks was the most important voice that I'd heard, and, I'm proud to say, she was a big influence for me. There was something really deep in her meaning. That was the kind of stylist that I wanted to be; closing your eyes, you could say just what her meaning was. ”Quoted by Barry Mazor.

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