The Students
By Marv Goldberg
based on an interview with Dorsey Porter
© 2003, 2009 by Marv Goldberg
The Students left us a legacy of four songs which became oldies
favorites in the early 60s and have remained popular to this day. In
spite of this, surprisingly little has been known about the group.
Six guys from the Avondale neighborhood of Cincinnati, who knew each
other from Samuel Ach Junior High School, got together to start singing
in 1956. They were: Leroy King (lead), Dorsey Porter (first tenor), Roy
Ford (second tenor), John Bolden (baritone), Richard Johnson (bass), and
Ralph Byrd (guitar and occasional lead singer at gigs).
For reasons unremembered, they called themselves the D'Italians for
around two years (an incredibly strange name for a black group). Their
repertoire, as usual, consisted of the current hits that they heard on
the radio. Unlike most other groups, however, they had mentors: Otis
Williams and the Charms, the most successful Cincinnati group, helped
them with both their singing and in getting appearances.
There were talent contests in Cincinnati (at the Regal Theater, the
State Theater, and Castle Farms), and the D'Italians entered them all.
They won a major show at the State Theater and got to split the $300
grand prize. When they won at Castle Farms, the prize was supposed to be
a recording contract, but it turned out to be a hoax.
William "Prez" Tyus, a student at Central High, was
desperately in love with a girl named Patricia Pearson, and he'd written
a song for her called "I'm So Young." Through Roosevelt Lee,
the school custodian (who seemed to know which groups were hot), Prez
found out about the D'Italians and sought them out because of their
local fame. ("If you're a hot group, you draw songwriters,"
says Dorsey.) He gave them "I'm So Young" and another of his
compositions: "Every Day Of The Week."
Possibly through the efforts of Roosevelt Lee, the D'Italians fell in with Mel Herman, a distributor for Chess Records. It was Herman who got them their recording contract with Checker Records, a Chess subsidiary, in mid-1958. Since they were, according to Dorsey, a
"hot group" in the tri-state area of Ohio, Indiana, and
Kentucky, Chess took Herman's word for their talent and they never had
an audition with the company. (They had thought about hometown King
Records, but that company wasn't interested at the time, being busy with
James Brown and the Midnighters.)
Mel Herman's brother, C.G. "Jerry" Herman, owned the Note
label in Indianapolis (Mel was possibly a part owner), and it was to
that city that the D'Italians went to practice prior to their session.
The band they rehearsed with was that of sax player Jimmy Coe (who had
future guitar great Wes Montgomery with him at the time). The songs were
recorded informally at Jerry Herman's house, so that everyone could get
a good idea of what they sounded like. After a few trips to
Indianapolis, they felt they were ready and a session was arranged with
Chess. At this time, they were all 16, except for Leroy, who was two
years younger.
About a week before the session, the Chess a&r man questioned why they
called themselves the D'Italians ("none of you guys are
Italian!") and suggested that they change it. On the spot, Mel came
up with "the Students." Dorsey feels that Mel had this in
reserve for the time when a name change became inevitable.
But, if you're relatively famous, how do you let all your fans know that
you've changed your name? They went to the DJs at WCIN: Jockey Jack,
Bugs Scruggs ("the man with the plug"), and Ernie Wait. Thus,
it was broadcast over Cincinnati's big R&B station that the D'Italians
were now the Students.
One Friday, they all piled into a car and drove up to the Chess studios in Chicago; the Jimmy Coe band met them there. "Jimmy Coe and the Cohorts" consisted of Coe (sax), Pookie Johnson (sax), Henry Cain (piano), Wes Montgomery (guitar), Will Scott (bass), and Earl Walder (drums). They were in the studio
all day Saturday and half of Sunday recording "Every Day Of The
Week" and "I'm So Young." (Note that the lead guitarist
was their own Ralph Byrd, not Wes Montgomery, who just played in the
background.)
They kept recording and re-recording the songs over and over. Dorsey
remembers that it took 17 takes to get "Every Day Of The Week"
down pat; they kept having trouble with the beat of the bass drum. There
were a lot of mistakes made; Dorsey says: "I thought 'Man, this is
hard!'"
Once their masters were finished, they turned around and backed up Jimmy
Coe on his recording of "Wazoo!!",
which was done right after "I'm So Young.." Actually,
"backed up" is being generous. All they did was shout
"Wazoo!!" after each chorus of the song (sort of like what's
going on in "Tequila"). In fact, the tune sounds somewhat like
"Tequila" meets "Peter Gunn" (although, it's true,
"Peter Gunn" hadn't been recorded yet). At least the lyrics
were easy to learn!
This is mostly conjecture, but I've seen a pattern like this before. It
looks like the Hermans made a deal with Chess that "I'm So
Young" would be pressed up on Note in Indiana and Ohio, and on
Checker in the rest of the country. This way, their company could make
some bucks on the deal without having to worry about competing with a
major label. Note was the original label, probably releasing the tunes
in July 1958; Checker followed in late August. Since the song made #8 on
Milt Nixon's show (over WGEE in Indianapolis) in August, this argues for
the Note release being earlier than Checker.
The Checker release was reviewed favorably the week of September 1, 1958
(Note releases didn't seem to get reviewed), along with Little Richard's
"Baby Face," the Moonglows' "Ten Commandments Of
Love," King Curtis' "IFIC," the 5 Shillings' "Letter
To An Angel," Faith Taylor & Sweet Teens' "Your Candy
Kisses," and the Chanters' "Five Little Kisses."
By the week of October 20, "I'm So Young" was a Territorial
Tip in St. Louis. During November, it was rated #2 on Dave Dixon's show
(over KATZ in St. Louis).
And the Students began to tour, doing their share of one-nighters
throughout Kentucky and Tennessee. They got to play a week at the
Apollo, beginning on September 26, 1958, sharing the stage with the
Moonglows and Ruth Brown. Then they did a week at the Uptown Theater in
Philadelphia, with Ray Charles and Roy Hamilton. (Mel Herman got them
work all over Philadelphia in the hopes of generating enough interest to
force Dick Clark to have them appear for free on American Bandstand, but
his scheme didn't work and he had to pay for them to sing "I'm So
Young" on national television.) When they got back to Chicago, they
also sang "I'm So Young" on a local TV dance show.
When they toured, they had a deal with their school: they'd get
assignments that had to completed on the road and turned in when they
came back to Cincinnati. As long as the assignments were done, they'd
get credit for them. John Sears was their road manager, and he made sure
these assignments were done on time.
On May 10, 1959 ("It was on Mothers' Day") they went back to
Chicago to record two more of their tunes: "My Vow To You" and
"That's How I Feel." Once again the Jimmy Coe band accompanied
them, although by this time Wes Montgomery had left them, as had Pookie Johnson. (Strangely,
although Coe was specifically chosen for both sessions, the Students
never toured with him.)
"My Vow To You" was written by Dorsey Porter, but
"because I was a team player," the credit on the record says
"The Students." "That's How I Feel" was another Prez
Tyus composition, but for some reason, it too was credited to "The
Students."
The second record was released in mid 1959, but this time it only came
out on Note. It's anyone's guess why another deal wasn't worked out, but
it's probable that Note didn't have the resources to distribute the
record nationwide. Possibly Chess was holding back to see if it made any
noise before committing to a Checker issue. However, it wasn't as
successful as "I'm So Young," and the Students started
changing their direction: they began practicing modern harmony
arrangements.
That summer, they joined the All-American Shows, which was a tent show
(or traveling circus) out of Florida. The Students traveled all over the
south and Midwest by train, until the show finished up in Davenport,
Iowa. Not only did they sing at shows, but they did the
"bally" (being what we would call "barkers"), and
were occasionally roustabouts, helping to set up the tents.
Along the way, guitarist Ralph Byrd left the Students, and was replaced
by Wilbert Longmire, who eventually became a jazz guitarist.
In late 1959 or early 1960, Chess asked them to record a song called
"Cathy's Clown." They listened to the demo, decided it wasn't
for them ("it was too 'white'"), and
passed on it. "We didn't realize it would be a great big one [as
eventually recorded by the Everly Brothers]." Dorsey feels that
this was the beginning of the break with Chess.
The next time the Students showed up to record at Chess (probably in
1960), they did their modern harmony treatments of "Misty" and
"If I Were King." This became their final Chess session, and,
since Chess didn't like their direction, the tunes were never released.
Jimmy Coe wasn't present on this session; they were backed by some jazz
musicians.
At last, with no hits and with a recording company that wasn't
interested in the way they wanted to sing, the Students drifted apart.
Some joined the service and some just got on with their lives.
But this isn't the end of their story. In March of 1961, thanks mostly
to the efforts of Irving "Slim" Rose, owner of Times Square
Records, "I'm So Young" and "Every Day Of The Week"
were re-released on Chess's Argo subsidiary. This time out the record
did better than originally, reaching #26 on the national R&B charts. (It
would be issued one further time, on Chess's Cadet subsidiary, sometime
around 1964.) Amazingly, the Students were still together at this time,
and never even found out they had a national hit!
In January 1962, "That's How I Feel" and "My Vow To
You" were re-released on Checker. The Students didn't know about
that either, and 1962 was probably the year that they broke up. The last
release of a Students record was in 1973, when "I'm So Young"
and "My Vow To You" were paired for a release on Chess itself.
"I'm So Young" did so well for the Students over the years
that Chess actually sent them royalties.
In June 1971, John Bolden and Richard Johnson, managed by Prez Tyus, put
together a Students group that appeared at Gus Gossert's "Fifth
Rock & Roll Show" at Manhattan's Academy Of Music. The other
members were lead Ricky Kennedy and tenor Frank Stanford.
The last time the original Students got together was in 1983, for a show
at New York's Radio City Music Hall. Since that time, Roy Ford and John
Bolden have passed away. Dorsey Porter and Richard Johnson
still live in Cincinnati. Leroy King passed away on Christmas Eve, 1998.
Forty years later, "Every Day Of The Week" is still played on
popular "oldies" stations, with occasional spinnings of
"I'm So Young" and "My Vow To You." Not bad for a
group that only made two records. (Considering that "I'm So
Young" was the "big" side at the time, Dorsey is amazed
that it's "Every Day Of The Week" that receives the most
airplay today.)
NOTE: The Students on Red Top were a group from Philadelphia. The
Cincinnati Students were not the group backing up Annie Laurie on
"It Hurts To Be In Love."
NOTE
10012 I'm So Young/Every Day Of The Week - ca. 7/58
10013 Wazoo!!/[Shuffle Stroll - Jimmy Coe Orchestra] - ca. 7/58
(The Students are present on Jimmy Coe's recording of "Wazoo!!"
CHECKER (subsidiary of Chess)
902 I'm So Young/Every Day Of The Week - 8/58
NOTE
10019 My Vow To You/That's How I Feel - mid-59
ARGO (subsidiary of Chess)
5386 I'm So Young/Every Day Of The Week - 3/61
CHECKER
1004 My Vow To You/That's How I Feel - 1/62
CADET (subsidiary of Chess; note: same number as Argo)
5386 I'm So Young/Every Day Of The Week - ca. 1964
CHESS
9024 I'm So Young/My Vow To You - 73