This was the first step...

I have to say that this song is very special to me. For me, it's a story dating back more than 30 years. At that time, a 16 years old, good friend of mine in Switzerland, much younger than I was then (he still is), great lover of 78rpm's and already a crazy collector, introduced me -with no special reason- to Bunty Pendleton. For me this proved the real beginning of a constant search for the forgotten, underrated or neglected female singers. For many years, I only had a K7 tape of that song (no computers, no mp3 at that time!) when once again, some years later, this same friend phoned me to tell me he saw an LP with this track on it at a pawn shop in the Paris fleamarket! I jumped there and got it right the same day! My musical life turned better! Many years later that song came out on a CD in the catalog of a very large French collection of Jazz oldies. Guess who was the writer of the liner notes of the almost 1000 cd's in that collection? Yes! Thank you A. I'm glad to have you here with us...



Bunty Pendleton recorded only once in her life, and only this song "Horizontal". It was in 1946, accompagnied by the pianist Pat Flowers and his group. This is, for me, a fantastic song and nobody can understand why Bunty never get further with recording...

We do know nothing about Bunty except that she was, at that time, married to Bob Sylvester, the "Daily News" musical critic. The only pictures I found is this set by William P. Gottlieb, taken at "Riverboat on the Hudson" in 1947, where she was jamming with Baby Dodds, Marty Marsala and Albert Nicholas.

Lay Horizontal, close your eyes and listen to Bunty... that's the only chance you'll ever have.

HORIZONTAL (The one and only track)

7 comments:

Jaffa said...

... and I am glad to be "on board" !

Reading your kind words made me realize how that commodity called time flies... Yes that must have been in 1974 or 75; some 30 years ago !

A.

T-Bone said...

excellent song. reminds me of Nina Simone's "The Laziest Gal in Town." too bad she didn't make anything else.

lowgroove said...

I loved the selection. What a seductive voice and so appropriately backed by the band. Makes me thirsty to hear more of the artists on your site, many of which are completely unknown to me... and I'm OLD.

Luis said...

The correct surname is "Pendleton"

Searching under this surname I found that she used to play at restaurants in 1953:
http://www.tipsontables.com/embers.html

Also she was a frequent player at St.Regis, NYC.

Luis

JUST ME said...

LUIS, THX, YOU'RE PERFECTLY RIGHT. I MISPELLED THE NAME. IT'S FIXED NOW. EMOTION, MAYBE... SHE PLAYED IN CLUBS, THAT'S SURE, BUT NO RECORDINGS! IT'S MAYBE BETTER SO... DANIEL

soilworker said...

Indeed a nice song as well as a great singer. And of course I haven't known her before. That's what I like about this blog: to discover unknown artists of such great talent.

kiken said...

Thank you so much for your invitation! The story of how you discovered Bunty Pendleton is fascinating, for it makes me want to know about you and your friend, I discovered Billie Holiday when I was a teen. That time I was living in Japan and did not understand English well. Although I did not quite know what she was singing, I sensed something special was going on. I listened to her same record, "Lady In Satan", which I only had then over and over again. Then something clicked. The emotions! I was hooked into her beauty. For a long time I could not hear nor appreciate any other singers, until I moved to the U. S.
Kiken