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local spot - Willie's Den on New Orleans; Rampart Street. It was the 23rd Atlantic release. It saved the company, going to # 2 on the R & B chart and # 26 on the pop chart. It was one of the first party, drinking songs. Here is:

Drinkin' Wine Spo-Dee-O-Dee -1:14

The man most responsible for the smaller six-piece rhythm 'n' blues band was Louis Jordan. His success coincided with Billboard renaming "race' music "rhythm 'n' blues in 1949. Born in Brinkley, Arkansas in 1908, he formed his own band in 1938, renamed it the Tympany five, adopted the costumes of the zoot-suiters, and began turning out a string of rhythm 'n' blues hits. Between 1938 and 1946, he sold five milion 78s. Jordan's material, Nelson George writes, developed with his white producer Milton Gabler, "didn't necessarily express Jordan's experience but was thought to mirror that of big-city blacks often not one generation removed from life in the rural South. The titles - Beans and Cornbread," Saturday Night Fish Fry.' 'Ain't Nobody Here but the Chickens,' - suggest country life, yet the subject of each is really a city scene."²³ "Saturday Night Fish Fry" celebrates good time black life, in the tradition of Bessie Smith's "Gimmie A Pigfoot". Here is:

Saturday Night Fish Fry - 1:27

New Orleans figures prominently in rock 'n roll history. "Louisiana,: Adam Fairclough writes, "is the most diverse and unique Southern state".²⁴ and much of the music that has emerged from its largest city is unique. One of New Orleans' most