Blow Top Blues

Donna Drake



Blow Top Blues

From the album "Donna Sings Dinah" featuring the Wynton Kelly Trio (Alma Records, 1968), Redd Foxx introduces Miss Donna Drake.

Info from the LP's back cover:

Since the Queen's passing, Redd Foxx has seen and heard dozens of new voices and faces in the many clubs he works, but none that compared to the great Dinah Washington, that is, until he heard Donna Drake.  Since that first listen, Redd has been determined to let the World hear her too.  That determination led to the making of [the] album

Donna Drake was born in Wheeling, West Virginia and come to Detroit at age 3.  The oldest child of four children, she attended Detroit's Northern High chool where she first sang with the school choir and participated in variety show with such school chums as Paul Chambers, Donald Byrd and Barry Harris. After winning a Windsor, Ontario, talent contest, she received a contract for a television show. (...) She worked for a while with the late great Charlie Parker till the time of his death.  After that, a tour of the East and Midwest and parts of Canada, and then a supporting singer for such stars as Gloria Lynn, Betty Carter, Brook Benton and Joe Williams.  Donna's meeting with Redd Foxx took place while he was appearing at Detroit's Charade Club.  Backing Donna is the Wynton Kelly Trio, the same group who for so many years backed Dinah Washington.