Biography: Elgie Stover, Earl Gaines, Eli Toscano, Earl Gilliam, Earl Hooker, Elisabeth Withers, Earl King, Elizabeth Washington, Earl Palmer, Ella Johnson,

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Elgie Stover Biography, Photos, Pictures

You see Elgie Stover’s (aka Russaw) name on songs and wonder who the man is who usually collaborated with the late Marvin Gaye Stover is one of those music business hustlers who hung around the business for years

Earl Gaines is a kind of hard-luck case as a recording artist His biggest hit, far and away, was “It’s Love Baby (24 Hours a Day)” But that record wasn’t credited to him, as it was the work of Louis Brooks & His Hi-Toppers, the group with which he was singing lead, and he was never able to duplicate its impact

Eli Toscano co-owned the Cobra label, whose roster listed top blues artists such as Buddy Guy, Otis Rush, Magic Sam, Guitar Shorty, and Harold Burrage Based on Chicago’s west side, Toscano had a TV repair and record shop that was the base of his one-stop (meaning that record store owners could buy the various label releases that needed from one location — making “one stop” — rather than going to the different label branches to buy the releases) distributorship and eventually his record label

Earl Gilliam Biography, Photos, Pictures

Texas piano and organ ace Earl Gilliam started playing piano at the local Baptist church when he was ten years old, and by the time he was 17, he was fronting his own blues band

If there was a more immaculate slide guitarist residing in Chicago during the 1950s and ’60s than Earl Hooker, his name has yet to surface Boasting a fretboard touch so smooth and clean that every note rang as clear and precise as a bell, Hooker was an endlessly inventive axeman who would likely have been a star had his modest vocal abilities matched his instrumental prowess and had he not been dogged by tuberculosis (it killed him at age 41)

Elisabeth Withers Biography, Photos, Pictures

Best known for her Tony Award-nominated portrayal of Shug Avery in the Broadway musical version of The Color Purple, vocalist Elisabeth Withers is also a longtime singer/songwriter with a bent toward neo-soul and R&B

Unilaterally respected around his Crescent City homebase as both a performer and a songwriter, guitarist Earl King was a prime New Orleans R&B force for more than four decades

Elizabeth Washington Biography, Photos, Pictures

Elizabeth Washington was a St Louis blues singer She cut four sides in 1933, including “Riot Call Blues,” with accompanist Aaron “Pinetop” Sparks ~ Joslyn Layne, All Music Guide

Earl Palmer was a first-call drummer on the New Orleans R&B recording scene from 1950 to 1957 Talk about a supreme recommendation — in a city renowned for its second-line rhythms and syncopated grooves, Palmer was the man, playing on countless sessions by all the immortals: Little Richard, Fats Domino, Smiley Lewis, Dave Bartholomew, and too many more to list here

Ella Johnson Biography, Photos, Pictures

Ella Johnson made her mark as the vocalist with Buddy Johnson’s big band during the ’40s and ’50s, and it is in that context she really shines Her later solo sides for Mercury are pale imitations of her work with the band

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