Cabell Cab Calloway İ (Dec.25,1907 - Nov.18,1994) was a famous American jazz singer and bandleader.\r
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Calloway was a master of energetic scat singing and led one of the United States most popular African American big bands from the start of the 1930s through the late 1940s. \r
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Calloways Orchestra featured performers that included trumpeters Dizzy Gillespie and Adolphus Doc Cheatham, saxophonists Ben Webster and Leon Chu Berry, New Orleans guitar ace Danny Barker, and bassist Milt Hinton. Calloway continued to perform until his death in 1994 at the age of 86.\r
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The Cotton Club was the premier jazz venue in the country, and Calloway and his orchestra (he had taken over a brilliant, but failing band called The Missourians in 1930; later on, the band changed its name to Cab Calloway and His Orchestra) were hired as a replacement for the Duke Ellington Orchestra while they were touring (he joined Duke Ellington and Mills Blue Rhythm Band as another of the jazz groups handled by Irving Mills). Calloway quickly proved so popular that his band became the co-house band with Ellingtons, and his group began touring nationwide when not playing the Cotton Club. Their popularity was greatly enhanced by the twice-weekly live national radio broadcasts on NBC at the Cotton Club. \r
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In 1931 he recorded his most famous song, Minnie the Moocher. That song, along with St. James Infirmary Blues and The Old Man of the Mountain, were performed for the Betty Boop animated shorts Minnie the Moocher (1932), Snow White (1933), and The Old Man of the Mountain (1933), respectively. Through rotoscoping, Calloway not only gave his voice to these cartoons, but his dance steps as well. He took advantage of this and timed his concerts in some communities with the release of the films in order to make the most of the attention. As a result of the success of Minnie the Moocher, he became identified with its chorus, gaining the nickname The Hi De Ho Man. He also performed in a series of short films for Paramount in the 1930s.\r
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Cab Calloway and his Orchestra - Black Rhythm (1931)
