Nii-lante Augustus Kwamlah Quaye (3 September 1921 – 13 March 2000), known professionally as Cab Kaye, was an English jazz singer and pianist of Ghanaian descent. He combined blues, stride piano, and scat with his Ghanaian heritage.
Early life Cab Kaye, also known as Cab Quay, Cab Quaye and Kwamlah Quaye, was born on St Giles High Street in Camden, London, to a musical family. His Ghanaian great-grandfather was an asafo warrior drummer and his grandfather, Henry Quaye, was an organist for the Methodist Mission church in the former Gold Coast, now called Ghana. Cab's mother, Doris Balderson, sang in English music halls and his father, Caleb Jonas Quaye (born 1895 in Accra, Ghana), performed under the name Ernest Mope Desmond as musician, band leader, pianist and percussionist. With his blues piano style, Caleb Jonas Quaye became popular around 1920 in London and Brighton with his band The Five Musical Dragons in Murray's Club with, among others, Arthur Briggs, Sidney Bechet and George "Bobo" Hines.
When Kaye was four months old, his father was killed in a railway accident in Blisworth, Northamptonshire, on 27 January 1922, on his way to perform in a concert. Kaye, his mother, and his sister Norma moved to Portsmouth, where a life insurance policy provided temporary financial support. Between the ages of nine and twelve, he spent three years in hospital while a tumor in his neck was irradiated. British radiation therapy was still in its infancy, and Kaye's treatment was experimental. A scar remained on the left side of his neck.
His first instruments were timpani, introduced to him by a Canadian soldier who taught him how to count and use the mallets. At fourteen, Kaye began to visit nightclubs where black musicians were welcome, such as The Shim Sham and The Nest; he won first prize in a song contest, a tour with the Billy Cotton band. During this tour, he met the African-American trombonist and tap dancer Ellis Jackson. Jackson convinced Cotton to engage Kaye as an assistant and as a singer in his band. Engaged as a tap dancer with Billy Cotton's show band in 1936, Kaye recorded his first song, "Shoe Shine Boy", under the name Cab Quay.
The war years During 1937, Kaye played drums and percussion with Doug Swallow and his band in April, the Hal Swain Band in the summer, and Alan Green's band in September in Hastings, England. Until 1940, he sang and drummed with the Ivor Kirchin Band, with Steve Race on piano, in the Paramount Dance Hall on Tottenham Court Road, London, where he was one of the only black people around. When a guest was refused entrance because of their skin colour, Kaye refused to perform. The incident led to the regular acceptance of black people, and the Paramount Dance Hall grew into a sort of "Harlem of London".Melody Maker, 26 May 1973. After a short period with Britain's first black swing band leader, Ken Snakehips Johnson (and His Rhythm Swingers), Kaye played in several radio broadcasts. Shortly thereafter he joined the British Merchant Navy, which provided support services to the allies during World War II. Three days after Kaye enlisted, Ken "Snakehips" Johnson and saxophonist David Williams were killed on 8 March 1941, when a bomb fell on the Café de Paris nightclub in London's West End where they were performing. Around this time Kaye's mother was also killed when her house in Portsmouth was the only house on her street to be hit by a bomb.
While on leave from the Merchant Navy, Kaye sang with Don Mario Barretto in London. His ship was hit by a torpedo in the Pacific Ocean in 1942. He was saved, but the convoy continued to be attacked by enemy ships, and during the following three nights two other ships were sunk. These experiences stayed with him for the rest of his life. En route to an Army hospital in New York he was hurt when his plane crashed before landing. While recuperating in New York, he went to concerts and played in clubs in Harlem and Greenwich Village with Roy Eldridge, Sandy Williams, Slam Stewart, Pete Brown, Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, and Willie "The Lion" Smith. The story was told in a two-page article in Melody Maker (December 1942) headlined: "TORPEDOED... SHIPWRECKED... INJURED... BUT HE MET ALL THE SWING STARS!"Melody Maker, December 1942 – "Torpedoed... Shipwrecked... Injured... But he met all the swing stars!" After his return to London, Kaye sang in February and April 1943 with clarinettist Harry Parry.
After the war In 1946, Cab Kaye sang for the British troops in Egypt and India with Leslie "Jiver" Hutchinson's "All Coloured Band". After that, he performed as a singer and entertainer in Belgium. In 1947, he returned to London to sing in the bands of guitarist Vic Lewis, trombonist, Ted Heath, accordionist Tito Burns, and the band Jazz in the Town Hall. That year, he was voted number thirteen by readers of Melody Maker in their annual jazz poll.
From 1948 he performed mainly as leader of his bands, such as the Ministers of Swing with saxophonists Ronnie Scott and Johnny Dankworth and pianist Denis Rose. For the new wave of London musicians from the West Indies, as well as English musicians, Kaye was an inspiration as band leader. In 1949 he played with Tommy Pollard (piano, accordion, vibes), Cecil Jacob "Flash" Winston (drums, vocals and piano) and Paul Fenhoulet's Orchestra. On 13 October 1949 Kaye recorded with clarinettist Keith Bird and The Esquire Six.
In this period he also led Cab Kaye and his Coloured Orchestra and co-led The Cabinettes with Ronnie Ball, featuring "blues singer" Mona Baptiste from Trinidad. Both bands played regularly in the Fabulous Feldman Club (100 Oxford Street, London), featuring Kaye on electric guitar. Kaye's band was, in 1948, the first musical ensemble featuring people of colour to play in Amsterdam's Concertgebouw. With his All Coloured Band,"Cab Kaye launches all-coloured band", Melody Maker, 12 March 1955, p. 11. featuring Dave Wilkins, Henry Shalofsky (Hank Shaw) and Sam Walker, Cab Kaye then toured in France, Belgium, Germany, and the Netherlands in 1950 and 1951.
In Paris at the end of the 1940s early 1950s, Kaye met Tadd Dameron, who was playing with Miles Davis. Dameron gave Kaye his first and only piano lesson. In the Club St. Germain, Kaye played with guitarist Django Reinhardt, who had become more interested in bebop. Also in Paris, Kaye reunited with Roy Eldridge, who introduced him to Don Byas. The Ringside was frequented by such jazz musicians as Art Simmons, Annie Ross, James Moody, Pierre Michelot, and Babs Gonzales.
In 1950. Kaye played in the Netherlands. In March 1950, he performed in the Rotterdam club Parkzicht with jazz trumpeter Dave Wilkins from Barbados, Jamaican tenor saxophonist and clarinetist George Tyndale, Sam Walker (tenor sax), Cyril Johnson (piano), Rupert Nurse (bass), Cliff Anderson (drums), and Chico Eyo (bongos). A performance with the Skymasters was recorded by the Dutch radio network AVRO in May 1950. In 1951, Kaye recorded for Astraschall Records in Germany with George Tyndale (tenor sax), Dave Wilkins (trumpet), Sam Walker (tenor sax), Cyril Johnson (piano), Owen Stephens (bass) and Aubrey Henry (drums). Kaye also regularly accompanied saxophonist Don Byas on piano in the early 1950s.
The 1950s and Hot Sauce Between December 1950 and May 1951, Kaye's Latin American Band was booked by Lou van Rees to tour France, Germany, and the Netherlands (where Kaye met Charlie Parker). In the Netherlands, Kaye played in the newly opened Avifauna in Alphen aan den Rijn, the world's first bird park.
In 1951, Kaye played a small role in the movie Sensation in San Remo directed by Georg Jacoby. Although the New Musical Express announced "Cab Kaye gets Big Film Break" on 20 March 1953,New Musical Express, 20 March 1953, "Cab Kaye gets Big Film Break". the movie was unsuccessful, though he would return to films. In the Montpellier Buttery Club he organized dance contests: cha-cha, mambo, and jive. In 1952, he recorded with the Gerry Moore Trio on 1 March, and the Norman Burns Quintet on 17 May. From late 1952 to mid-1953, he played with drummer Tommy Jones from Liverpool and bassist/guitarist Brylo Ford from Trinidad. In 1953, Ford and Deacon Jones (drums) played in a trio of that appeared in the movie Blood Orange directed by Terence Fisher.
Kaye led multi-ethnic bands usually consisting of musicians from the UK, Africa, and the West Indies. Later that year he was in the revue Memories of Jolson,Steve Voce, "Obituary: Cab Kaye", The Independent, 17 March 2000. a musical with sixteen-year-old Shirley Bassey. The show toured Scotland, but Kaye left after the first performance because he thought the show was racist.Obituary: Correction, The Independent, 14 July 2000. He turned to variety shows, according to Melody Maker in 1953, and he founded a theatre booking agency, Black and White Productions, to book small theatre and film roles for himself and other musicians.Melody Maker, 26 March 1973. His career as a businessman was brief, and he returned to music.
In 1953, he worked with Mary Lou Williams. The group included Dizzy Reece (trumpet), Pat Burke (tenor sax), Dennis Rose (piano), Denny Coffey (bass), and Dave Smallman (bongos, congas). They accompanied dancer Josie Woods and performed as Cab Kaye's Jazz Septet at the London Palladium in 1953, as well as using other names. Several appearances followed, including performances with singer Billy Daniels and pianist Benny Payne (New Wimbledon Theatre, 26 July 1953).
Kaye performed in the Kurhaus at Scheveningen in the Netherlands in 1953. That same year, "Cab's Secret" hot sauce was sold in shops on Archer Street (East Finchley) in London. Although popular among Kaye's friends for many years, the sauce failed commercially. At the end of 1953, he formed the cabaret act The Two Brown Birds of Rhythm with Josie Woods. At the Ring Side club in Paris as "Kab Kay" he accompanied Eartha Kitt on piano. In April 1954, he played the role of "Kenneth – the coloured singer" in the film The Man Who Loved Redheads."Cab Kaye Gets Part in Moira Shearer Film", Melody Maker, No. 1073, 10 April 1954, pp. 8–9. Kaye received a salary of £35 per day.
During one of his tours of England (20 September 1954), he sang with a band led by pianist Ken Moule and including Dave Usden (trumpet), Keith Barr, Roy Sidwell (tenor saxophone), Don Cooper (bass), Arthur Watts (bass). and Lennie Breslaw (drums). Contracted by impresario Lou van Rees, he toured the Netherlands in 1955–1956 and performed at the Flying Dutchman club in Scheveningen. Van Rees had the idea to form a big band with twelve band leaders who were rarely heard on Dutch radio, including Wil Hensbergen, Max Woiski Sr., vibraphonist Eddy Sanchez, Johnny Kraaykamp, and Wessel Ilcken
Also in 1956, Kaye played at the Sheherazade jazz club in Amsterdam's with his All Star Quintet consisting of Rob Pronk (piano), Toon van Vliet (tenor sax), Dub Dubois (bass) and drummer Wally Bishop. The club, nicknamed "Zade" by friends, was located in the Wagenstraat until 1962 and was a popular meeting place for jazz musicians. Later in 1956 Kaye toured Germany and played in Hamburg, Düsseldorf, and Köln, followed in 1957 by a tour of England with the Eric Delaney Band Show with Marion Williams.
Kaye performed in Cab's Quintet on the British BBC television program Six-Five Special on 31 August 1957 (season 1, episode 29) with Laurence "Laurie" Deniz (1st guitar) and his brother Joe Deniz (guitar), Pete Blannin (bass), and Harry South (piano). Around this time Kaye also performed in Oh Boy!, the first British teenage all-music show. Oh Boy was an ABC show for ITV, produced by Jack Good, who had produced Six-Five Special on which Kaye had appeared. That same year, Kaye was voted eleventh in Melody Makers Jazz Music Magazine Poll. Kaye appeared again on Six-Five Special on 1 March 1958 (season 1, episode 57).