Erline Harris – Rock And Roll Blues

1st December 2021 · 1940s, 1949, Music, Rock'n'Roll

Erline Harris, whose career burned brightly and briefly at the end of the 1940s, was a rare female artist in the proto-rock’n’roll era.

I cannot help noticing that all the artists of the late 1940s who began the mutation into rock and roll had two things in common.

They were all black. And they were all men.

Then, in 1949, along came Erline Harris with Rock And Roll Blues – followed by another called Jump And Shout.

Erline, born Erlyn Johnson back in Arkansas, was black. She was also a woman – and a second cousin of Louis Armstrong.

Those two songs are vital pieces in the jigsaw of proto-rock’n’roll and it tells you all you need to know about misogyny in the music biz that you almost certainly haven’t heard them.

Few people even knew her name until after her death when, at the behest of her daughter, a magazine called Juke Blues published an article about her life and brief career in 2010.

Recorded in New Orleans and released in 1949, Rock And Roll Blues was her debut single – and the first recorded example of the term “rock and roll” being used in its euphemistic context.

“I’ll turn out the lights,” promised Erline, the saucy minx, “And we’ll rock and roll all night.”

Her next record, Jump And Shout, is another strong contender in the proto-rock’n’roll stakes, with its strong bassline and honking sax solo but neither song was a hit and Erline did not record again after 1951.

Two years later, having performed for a while in clubs in Georgia, she gave up the music biz altogether and moved to Los Angeles to raise a family. She died in Las Vegas in 2004 at the age of 89.

I cannot help noticing that all the purveyors of jump blues in the late 1940s who began the mutation into rock and roll had two things in common.

They were all black. And they were all men.

Then along came Erline Harris with a song that’s the very definition of doing what it says on the tin – Rock And Roll Blues – followed by another called Jump And Shout.

Erline, born Erlyn Johnson back in Arkansas, was black. She was also a woman – and a second cousin of Louis Armstrong.

Those two songs are vital pieces in the jigsaw of proto-rock’n’roll and it tells you all you need to know about misogyny in the music biz that you almost certainly haven’t heard them.

Few people even knew her name until after her death when, at the behest of her daughter, a magazine called Juke Blues published an article about her life and brief career in 2010.

Recorded in New Orleans and released in 1949, Rock And Roll Blues was her debut single – and the first recorded example of the term “rock and roll” being used in its euphemistic context.

“I’ll turn out the lights,” promised Erline, the saucy minx, “And we’ll rock and roll all night.”

Her next record, Jump And Shout, is another strong contender in the proto-rock’n’roll stakes, with its strong bassline and honking sax solo but neither song was a hit and Erline did not record again after 1951.

Two years later, having performed for a while in clubs in Georgia, she gave up the music biz altogether and moved to Los Angeles to raise a family. She died in Las Vegas in 2004 at the age of 89.