Fontella Bass

From the legends to the little-known, there are artists who write songs that touch us in many ways and stay with us for many years. In 1965 came such a song. It was often hailed as the national anthem for the soldiers of Vietnam. Today, the younger generation hears it in commercials for American Express, Pledge and Pizza Hut, in movies like Sister Act,Cinderella Story, Mo' Better Blues, I Robot and Air America, and on TV shows such as Murphy Brown and Young and The Restless. The song is "Rescue Me" and was co-written and sung by Fontella Bass.

Music has always been a part of Fontella's life. Her mother, Martha Bass, was a member of the Clara Ward Singers, a gospel group that toured with the Reverend C. L. Franklin, Aretha Franklin's father. Her grandmother, Nevada Carter, raised her when her mother was on the road singing. Fontella got her start at an early age:

"Beginning at age 5, Fontella would perform at funeral services, providing the piano accompaniment for her grandmother's singing. And by the time she was 9, Fontella was accompanying her mother on tours throughout the South and Southwest. Fontella continued touring with her mother until the age of 16. . ."

During her teens, her uncles would sneak her out to Blues clubs where she would often get up and play with them. She was destined for a career in music and the moment finally came:

"When I was 17, I started my career working at the Showboat Club near Chain of Rocks overlooking the Mississippi. The following year I accepted a friend's dare and auditioned for the Leon Claxton carnival show. I made $175 a week during the two weeks they were here. It was fantastic. I wanted to tour with them but my mother wouldn't let me go on the road -- she literally dragged me off the train. Oliver Sain and Little Milton heard my playing at the carnival, and as a result I got a job backing Little Milton on the piano."

This was Fontella's big break and she was excited. Milton and Sain weren't just any old musicians, they were making a name for themselves:

"In the late 1950's and early 1960's, the St. Louis area was a thriving center of rhythm and blues. The patriarch of the scene was a bandleader-guitarist Ike Turner, who, like many St. Louis musicians before and after, had come up from rural Mississippi by way of Memphis. Turner had been here for a couple of years, leading a band called the Kings of Rhythm, when blues singer Little Milton Campbell arrived in 1955. Soon, an old friend from the Deep South, saxophonist Oliver Sain, joined Milton and became his bandleader. They began recording on the locally owned Bobbin label, offering Ike Turner some stiff competition . . . With Sain sharing the song writing and adding the fluid drive of his saxophone, Milton (like Chuck Berry) became well known enough to be picked up by the pre-eminent blues label of the time, Chess, in Chicago."

Fontella Bass started off playing piano with the band but eventually she began singing as well, "One night, Milton didn't show up on time, and finally Oliver asked me to sing something. I was scared, but I went ahead anyway, and everybody liked it. So after that, I had a little featured spot in the show for my vocals." Milton and Sain eventually split up, however, and Fontella left with Sain; they became known as the Oliver Sain Soul Revue featuring Fontella and Bobby McClure, which is when Bobby McClure entered her life.

Fontella's music career began to grow. Recording opportunities came her way as she and members of the band recorded songs on the Bobbin label and at Technosonic Studio's, which Ike Turner produced. Fontella wanted to perform with other bands, though she and Oliver began to have their differences. In January of 1965, they had an argument over a New Year's Eve gig and Fontella decided to go her separate way: "Bass and her husband, trumpet player Lester Bowie, moved to Chicago . . . and she signed with Checker, Chess' R&B subsidiary label."

It was through Milton that Fontella met Leonard Chess, of Chess Records. Fontella and McClure recorded their Top 10 R&B hit "Don't Mess Up a Good Thing" early in 1965 under Chess and by August Fontella would take the music world by storm with a No. 1 R&B and Top 10 pop hit, "Rescue Me." Fontella vividly recalls the day "Rescue Me" was created:

"I went upstairs and Raynard was in one of the rehearsal rooms and he was playing. So he says, come on, come on in, I got this great idea. I said well good, let me hear it and I said well, why don't you do this or why don't you do that, you know, I put my input in and he said, "Oh ya, well that's great." So we just worked on like a rhythm but the actual melody was not there. In that day that’s the way records were recorded. They would come in and somebody would give you some paper with some lyrics and they would play the rhythm and you could put any melody you wanted over those rhythms . . . So that's writing and a lot of artists, not only I, but a lot of artists wrote songs that way. . ."

The song was released in October 1965. It hit the R&B charts and stayed in the top 40 for 19 months and went gold in two months. "Rescue Me" was not only popular but had a style all its own with some talented people behind it who helped make it a success:

"The song featured a crack horn section led by soul tenor Gene Barge. It boasted heated call-and-response vocals, with Minnie Riperton among background singers. And it was driven by a crack rhythm section including drummer Maurice White (pre-Earth, Wind and Fire) and bassist Louis Satterfield, whose monster riffs are frequently credited with the song's success."

Bass was thrilled with her success but the music business was quite different back then and success came with its share of disappointments, "I had the first million seller for Chess since Chuck Berry about 10 years before," recalls Bass. "Things were riding high for them, but when it came time to collect my first royalty check, I looked at it, saw how little it was, tore it up and threw it back across the desk." Her royalties never amounted to what she deserved, particularly because she had co-written the song. Fontella demanded a better royalty rate and artistic control. "At the time, these were things women singers rarely asked for but I really thought I could change that as part of a new breed. What happened really snatched my heart out." Fontella tried to take care of the business side of things. She approached her manager, Billy Davis, about signing the papers for "Rescue Me" only to be told not to worry about it. Even after the record came out and her name was still not on it she was told it would be on the legal documents. This, of course, never happened either.

Fontella knew the role she played in "Rescue Me" and she also knew what it meant to have her name in the credits. She made a fuss for a couple years but admits, "It actually side-stepped me in the business because I got a reputation of being a trouble maker." Fontella's follow-up to "Rescue Me" was "Recovery." The two songs sounded very similar. Chess wanted to "keep the same groove." Fontella couldn't explore her musical creativity and her husband, who was then experimenting in avant-garde jazz, sympathized, "Lester was getting as disgusted as I was with the music scene, so in 1969 we moved to Paris with the [Art Ensemble of Chicago]." They were welcomed warmly with their musical performances in Europe but returned to the States three years later. Fontella was ready to try again:

"She had received an offer to record for the Paula/Jewel label, a small, independent operation in Shreveport, La., run by Stan Lewis . . . but the record never was able to get good distribution.
In 1973, Bass signed with Epic Records, a major division of CBS. Things finally seemed to be falling into place, but the erratic world of the music business soon ended those hopes."

Unfortunately, there was a turnover in management and "no dollar signs were by [Fontella's] name" so the deal fell through. Although her music career was seemingly over, Fontella rediscovered her roots and began to start again.

Fontella was discouraged with the music business, but by this time, she also had a family to raise. Fontella and Lester had four children together, two boys and two girls; Fontella was very devoted to them:

Bass spent the latter half of the 70s and most of the 80s dedicating herself to raising her children. She slowly began to perform again in public in the late 80s, working on occasion with Oliver Sain, doing European tours . . . While she was away from the popular-music scene; Bass also rediscovered her love for gospel music.

In 1990, she made a gospel album with her mother and brother; David Peaston called Promises: A Family Portrait of Faith. The album was quite popular with gospel fans, so much so, Fontella was invited to join a "fall tour of the West Coast, called Juke Joints and Jubilee, which [featured] both traditional gospel and blues performers." Fontella rediscovered what had been with her all along:

"Gospel was something that I ran away from, because I was raised up on it," says Bass. "When I would sing, I'd fight to get away from my gospel sound, and then somebody would hear that flavor and say, 'Why don't you keep that there?' I'd think, wow, they really liked that? I wouldn't think it would fit other types of music, but finally I realized that music is about emotion and feeling, and it doesn't really have anything to do with labels."

Gospel is what Fontella is true to now and performs it almost exclusively. She can usually be found singing every Sunday at several different churches around St. Louis. As far as "Rescue Me," it is always a part of her act when she tours, of course, but gospel is where her heart is and it shows in her performances.

In February of 1995, Fontella released her new album, No Ways Tired. Although she has chosen the non-secular path, her recent comeback is due in part to secular music. Soon after the Juke Joints and Jubilee tour, an old friend from St. Louis, Hamiet Bluiett, called. Hamiet, also a musician, is a member of the World Saxophone Quartet. Hamiet had Fontella on his mind when it came time for his band's most recent album, Breath of Life:

"I've known Fontella since I was a kid . . . and she's a friend of the family, so she's always somewhere at the top of my brain when I'm thinking of vocalists. I went to (Nonesuch general manager Bob Hurwitz) and said I wanted to use a vocalist on the album and asked him what he thought, should we get a male or female. He said, "Well, saxophones always make me think of a woman. Who do you have in mind?" I said, "Fontella Bass," and he turned around in his seat and looked at me and said, (excitedly) "Do you know her? Can you get her?" I just jumped on the telephone and that was it."

Hurwitz was so impressed with Bass' performance on the three tunes she sang on the WSQ album...that he offered her a recording contract. Nonesuch Records proved to be a company Fontella could trust, and one that understood her. In 1995, Fontella released her new album, No Ways Tired under the Nonesuch label:

"[The] album features Bass unaccompanied except for her own piano playing, singing songs in the manner you'd hear her perform at Mount Beulah Missionary Baptist Church in University City, where she is a church musician . . . Perhaps the most surprising aspect of the album is Bass' inclusion of a pair of pop tunes, Bill Withers' "Lean On Me" and the Burt Bacharach/Hal David Chestnut "What the World Needs Now." "These songs are still spiritual," she says. "We need a lot of love in this world, you know that. So if somebody's gonna listen to Fontella, why can't Fontella give them some kind of message of what they need in life?"

The Grammy Award nominated album not only took her to new heights, but also to new places. Soon after the album's release, she performed at Carnegie Hall and later the same year in Washington DC for the 25th Anniversary of the Kennedy Center. The weekend she was interviewed for this documentary she was playing at a Blues Fest and was proud of it. She said with confidence and joy, "Everybody's gonna be there doing the Blues and I'm gonna be there to spread the word!" Spread the word all right, Fontella Bass is back!

1990 proved to be a big turning point in Fontella's life. Despite the fact that in 1965 Fontella co-wrote and sang, "Rescue Me," she did not begin receiving credit or royalties until 1990. Why did it take almost 30 years for this to happen? She cites two reasons, the first being racism and the second, money. It's no secret that blacks, particularly black females, were taken advantage of in the music business:

"Fontella says she talked about it [getting her due credit for the song] with people, but she didn't take legal action because "I didn't have any documentation. I scribbled some words on a piece of paper when I recorded 'Rescue Me,' but I threw the paper away. Besides, things were different in 1965. Integration was just starting. I had to sleep in homes because blacks were not allowed in hotels. I had to go in the service entrance. When I was touring, I was one of the first blacks to stay in the Howard Johnson in Pulaski, Virginia. I say stay, not sleep. I was too scared."

In an interview with fellow musician Papa Ray, the two concur about the music business of days gone by: "people have to be reminded, especially black artists in a business predominantly controlled by white people, that the idea that artists can have autonomy and control over themselves was just unheard of in the past." She also admits, "You can be aware of things that go on but you still have to exist, you still have to work, you know, and you still have to make a living for your family." And although the money was never as much as it should have been, money was coming in, enough to put her gripes over "Rescue Me" on hold:

Fontella said there is one more reason she didn't pursue the songwriter's credit in 1965: "I was living in a housing project for $40 a month. All of a sudden I was making $125 a weekend for playing the piano. And $50 or $60 in tips. For 1965, that was big money." Years later, Fontella says she realized how important the songwriter's credit was.

The music business has come a long way since, however, and Fontella feels that her, and others like her, paved the way, "I think we were pioneers when it came down to talking about royalties and about money up front"

Finally, Fontella did fight back. Although it's not clear what finally gave her the proof she needed to reclaim her song, she was able to make a deal with MCA, which owns the rights to the Chess catalog. In 1990, when Fontella heard American Express using her song in a TV commercial for an ad campaign that ran in 1990 and 1991, she was finally able to fight back for her royalties. This day marked a turning point for her and the song and she remembers it with great detail:

"It was a very hard winter for me. This was a winter of just ice all over St. Louis and the home that I live in here now, I needed a new roof, I needed a furnace, I needed a hot water tank, I needed many, many, many things. As a matter of fact, my children . . . all came home for Christmas. And they said 'Mom,' you know they gave me a pep talk, 'you're gonna have to do what you know to do, you've taught us everything that you can teach us, we know, we understand, now it's time for you to be Fontella again and stop trying to be Mom.' That sort of snapped me back into it. And when everybody left, my youngest daughter stayed. And I was so out of it that morning, it was January 1, 1990 and she said 'Let me make you a cup of tea.' And she did, and when she made the tea, we had this little 12" black and white TV set up in the kitchen because there was no furnace in the house and we had the gas stove on for heat. And she said 'Let's cheer the New Year's in, things could be worse, we have our health, we have our strength.' Now she's teaching me all the things I used to tell her, right? And I heard da da da da da da, [the "Rescue Me" theme] and we had our cups in the air and our heads went to the TV."

In 1993, a suit was filed against American Express Corporation and its advertising agency, Ogilvy & Mather, for more than $50,000 and punitive damages. "The suit alleges that American Express and Ogilvy & Mather violated an American Federation of Television & Radio Artists agreement governing the commercial use of music to which Chess was a signatory. According to the action, the AFTRA contract requires parties licensing a performer's recordings to also obtain the performer's consent." American Express and Ogilvy & Mather apparently didn't bother to get consent even though they were supposedly aware they had to do so. Although Fontella was in much need of the money, the lawsuit meant more than that to her. It meant that Fontella had control over her song for the first time ever and now, she says, "the song is going great for me."