Ronnie Hawkins--The Ultimate Song Thief
Ken Whiton
*-* On 19 Jan 97 07:54:42,
*-* Norm Katuna wrote
*-* About Ronnie Hawkins--The ultimate song thief
> This was discussed at length a year or so ago in a.r.o and I thought I
> would do a little constructive trolling here.
> What I am about to talk about has nothing to do with Ronnie Hawkins'
> singing ability. I am not knocking that.
> To me Ronnie Hawkins was the biggest thief in R n R song writing that
> there ever was. I know that I am attacking the sacred cow of a few
> people around here, but Oh Well?
I seem to recall being a catalyst in that a.r.o discussion. :-)
> I have three original 45s in front of me, all on Roulette. There may
> be more examples of the following on some of his LPs, but this is what
> I have as proof right now.
I have Roulette album R 25078, titled simply "Ronnie Hawkins" in front
of me at the moment, and it does provide further examples.
> Mary Lou: Roulette 4177. A lot of people in this group probably think
> that he had the original of this, but that's not the case. It was
> originally done by Young Jessie in 1955 for Modern records. It was
> written by Jessie Obediah. The Roulette release by Hawkins has the
> writers as Hawkins-Magill.
> Forty Days: Roulette 4154. This is the exact same song as Chuck
> Berry's "Thirty Days" with only the amount of days changed. Chuck
> Berry wrote the song but on the Roulette 45 it shows the writers as Ron
> Hawkins-Jaqueline Magill. Not that Chuck Berry was any peach. He stole
> and took writers credits for his only # 1 hit song "My Ding-a-ling".
> Ruby Baby: Roulette 4249. This was originally done by the Drifters in
> 1956. Writers credits for this on the Hawkins record show,
> Hawkins-Magill again. This one to me was the ultimate theft, since
> they took credit for a song that one of our(this group) group's most
> prolific song writers (and legendary too) wrote.
The first cut on Side 1 is Forty Days, and on this album it's credited
to Chuck Berry. The other eleven cuts are all credited to Hawkins-Magill,
with the publisher listed as "Patricia Music Publ. Corp.-BMI".
The eleven "Hawkins-Magill" cuts are:
Side 1: Odessa, Wild Little Willy, Ruby Baby, Horace, Mary Lou
Side 2: Need Your Lovin' (Oh So Bad), Dizzy Miss Lizzy, One of These
Days, Oh Sugar, What'cha Gonna Do (When the Creek Runs Dry),
My Gal is Red Hot
They do appear to have been a talented and prolific writing (or ?)
team, don't they? :-)
Ken Whiton
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Norm Katuna
On 12/13/52 Billboard magazine reviewed Federal 12113, The Royals------"Are You
Forgetting", giving it a rating of 75 , and on Sat, 25 Jan 1997 09:38:00 GMT, on
a totally different subject, Ken.W...@cereal.mv.com (Ken Whiton), wrote:
::: I have Roulette album R 25078, titled simply "Ronnie Hawkins" in front
::: of me at the moment, and it does provide further examples.
::: The first cut on Side 1 is Forty Days, and on this album it's credited
::: to Chuck Berry. The other eleven cuts are all credited to Hawkins-Magill,
::: with the publisher listed as "Patricia Music Publ. Corp.-BMI".
:::
::: The eleven "Hawkins-Magill" cuts are:
:::
::: Side 1: Odessa, Wild Little Willy, Ruby Baby, Horace, Mary Lou
:::
::: Side 2: Need Your Lovin' (Oh So Bad), Dizzy Miss Lizzy, One of These
::: Days, Oh Sugar, What'cha Gonna Do (When the Creek Runs Dry),
::: My Gal is Red Hot
:::
::: They do appear to have been a talented and prolific writing (or ?)
::: team, don't they? :-)
:::
::: Ken Whiton
To the group and to Ken by e-mail.
On the Chuck Berry: In the 50s, the 45 usually came first and then came the
album. Not like later on when a single would be released from an album. So it
looks like they corrected things by the time the album came out.
The only other two from the list that I can cofirm as being plagarized also are
"Dizzy Miss Lizzy" written by Larry Williams and "My Gal is Red Hot" which we
all know has credit by Billy the Kid Emerson, and as was discussed in a.r.o
several months ago, Emerson's was a hybrid from a couple of other similar songs
from the late 40s early 50s. So these along with "Mary Lou" and "Ruby Baby"
(Leiber and Stoller wrote "Ruby...") make at least four confirmed songs that
they took credit for but did not write.
So Ken, thanks for the support and the additions.
_________________________________
Norm Katuna
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