Spade Cooley facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Spade Cooley
Spade Cooley (1944)
Born	Donnell Clyde Cooley (1910-12-17)December 17, 1910 Grand, Oklahoma, U.S.
Died	November 23, 1969(1969-11-23) (aged 58) Oakland, California, U.S.
Other names	King of Western Swing
Details
Date	April 3, 1961
Musical career
Genres	Western swing
Occupation(s)	Big band leader, actor, television personality
Instruments	Fiddle, vocals
Years active	c. 1940–1961 November 23, 1969 (half-show)
Labels	Westernair, Columbia, RCA, Decca, OKeh

Donnell Clyde "Spade" Cooley (December 17, 1910 – November 23, 1969) was a former Western swing musician, big band leader, actor, and television personality. In 1961 he was arrested and convicted for the April 1961 murder of his second wife, Ella Mae Evans.

Early life

Donnell Clyde Cooley was born in Grand, Oklahoma. Being part Cherokee, he was sent to the Chemawa Indian School in Salem, Oregon, in his youth. In 1930, his family moved to California during the Dust Bowl. It was here that he took the nickname "Spade" after he played a poker game and won three straight flush hands all in spades.

Music career

Cooley joined a big band led by Jimmy Wakely which played at the Venice Pier Ballroom in Venice, California, playing fiddle. Several thousand dancers would turn out on Saturday nights to swing and hop: "The hoards (sic) of people and jitterbuggers loved [Cooley]." When Wakely got a movie contract at Universal Pictures, Cooley replaced him as bandleader. To capitalize on the pioneering success of the Bob Wills–Tommy Duncan pairing, Cooley hired vocalist Tex Williams, who was capable of the mellow deep baritone sound made popular by Duncan. Cooley's eighteen-month engagement at the Venice Pier Ballroom was record-breaking for the early half of the 1940s.

Cooley wrote and recorded "Shame on You", released by Okeh Records; recorded in December 1944, it was No. 1 on the country charts for two months, while covers of the song by Red Foley with Lawrence Welk, and by Bill Boyd, opened at No. 3 and No. 4 (respectively) on Billboard's "Most Played Juke Box Folk Records" chart (the chart which evolved into today's Hot Country chart) for 30 August 1945. Soundies Distributing Corp. of America issued one of their "music video like" film shorts of Cooley's band performing "Shame on You" in the fall of 1945. "Shame on You" was the first in an unbroken string of six Top Ten singles including "Detour" and "You Can't Break My Heart".

Cooley appeared in thirty-eight Western films, both in bit parts and as a stand-in for cowboy actor Roy Rogers. Billed as Spade Cooley and His Western Dance Gang, he was featured in the soundie Take Me Back To Tulsa released July 31, 1944, along with Williams and Carolina Cotton. Corrine, Corrina was released August 28, 1944 minus Cotton. The film short Spade Cooley: King of Western Swing was filmed in May 1945 and released September 1, 1945. It was followed by Melody Stampede released on November 8, 1945. Spade Cooley & His Orchestra came out in 1949. In 1950, Cooley had significant roles in several films.

In the summer of 1946, the Cooley band fragmented after the bandleader fired Williams, who had offers to record on his own. A number of key sidemen, including guitarist Johnny Weis, left with Williams, who formed the Western Caravan, which incorporated a sound similar to Cooley's. Williams had his hit recording of "Smoke! Smoke! Smoke! (That Cigarette)" in 1948. Cooley reconstituted his band with former Bob Wills sidemen, including steel guitarist Noel Boggs and the guitar ensemble of Jimmy Wyble and Cameron Hill. He also added full brass and reed sections to the band.

Beginning in June 1948, Cooley began hosting The Spade Cooley Show, a variety show on KTLA-TV in Los Angeles, broadcast from the Santa Monica Ballroom, on the pier. The show won local Emmy awards in 1952 and 1953. Guests included Frankie Laine, Frank Sinatra and Dinah Shore. The Spade Cooley Show was viewed coast-to-coast via the Paramount Television Network. KTLA eventually cancelled Cooley's program by 1956 and replaced it with a competing show brought over from KCOP, Cliffie Stone's Hometown Jamboree.

Cooley was in a so-called "battle of the bands," the date of which has not been documented, with Bob Wills and His Texas Playboys at the Venice Pier Ballroom. Afterward, Cooley claimed he won and began to promote himself as the King of Western Swing. Some music aficionados insist Wills deserved the title "King of Western Swing", and Fort Worth's Milton Brown should be called "Father of Western Swing". But apparently the first documented use of Western swing for this style of music was in 1942 by Cooley's promoter at the time, Forman Phillips. Cooley was honored by the installation of a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. The foundation was laid on February 8, 1960.

Death

On August 5, 1968, the California State Adult Authority voted unanimously to parole Cooley on February 22, 1970. He had served less than nine years of a life sentence and was in poor health from heart trouble.

On November 23, 1969, he received a 72-hour furlough from the prison hospital unit at Vacaville to play a benefit concert for the Deputy Sheriffs Association of Alameda County at the Oakland Auditorium (now known as the Henry J. Kaiser Convention Center) in Oakland. During the intermission, after a standing ovation, Cooley suffered a fatal heart attack backstage. He is interred at Chapel of the Chimes cemetery in Hayward.

In popular culture

John Gilmore has written an in-depth portrait of Cooley's life and death in Shame on You, a segment of Gilmore's non-fiction work, L.A. Despair: A Landscape of Crimes & Bad Times. Cooley is a recurring character in James Ellroy's fiction, including in the story "Dick Contino's Blues", which appeared in issue No. 46 of Granta magazine (Winter 1994) and was anthologized in Hollywood Nocturnes. Ellroy also features a fictionalized version of Cooley in his 1990 novel L.A. Confidential.

Country historian Rich Kienzle, who specializes in the history of West Coast country music and western swing, profiled Cooley in his 2003 book Southwest Shuffle.

He is referenced in one of The Honeymooners episodes, "My Aching Back (1956)" (from Art 'Ed Norton' Carney to Jackie 'Ralph Kramden' Gleason): "They wouldn't-a won [the National Raccoon Mambo Championship] except some guy slipped in a Spade Cooley record".

In the 1956 episode "Rochester Falls Asleep, Misses Program" (The Jack Benny Program), Benny talks about how he is not afraid to play his violin in front of an audience, saying to Mary Livingstone, "I'm certainly no Heifetz, or Isaac Stern, or Mischa Elman." Guest star Bob Crosby then jokes, "You can throw Spade Cooley in there too."

The Longmire novel Junkyard Dogs, by Craig Johnson, has Walt Longmire and Deputy Vic entering a truck stop that Vic refers to as "the Disneyland Redneck Ride". Music playing when they enter is "scratching the paint off the inside of the place". Vic: "What the hell is that?" Walt: "That'd be 'Three Way Boogie', Spade Cooley"

Ry Cooder's 2008 album I, Flathead features a reference to Cooley on the track "Steel Guitar Heaven" ("There ain't no bosses up in heaven / I heard Spade Cooley didn't make the grade"), as well as a track named "Spayed Kooley", the name of the singer's dog.

In 2015, the Ella Mae Evans murder was profiled in the episode "Fame and Misfortune" of the Investigation Discovery series Tabloid.

In 2018, Jake Brennan's podcast "Disgraceland" profiled Spade Cooley in the 12th episode of the season.

Discography

• Sagebrush Swing (Columbia H-9 [4-disc 78rpm album set], HL-9007 [10" LP], 1949)
• Square Dances (RCA Victor P-249 [3-disc 78rpm album set], 1949)
• Roy Rogers & Spade Cooley: Skip To My Lou and Other Square Dances (RCA Victor P-259 [3-disc 78rpm album set], 1949)
• Spade Cooley Plays Billy Hill For Dancing (RCA Victor P-275 [3-disc 78rpm album set], 1950)
• Spade Cooley & His Square Dance Six: Square Dance Jamboree (Decca 1-245/1-246/1-247/1-248 [4-disc 78rpm album set], 1953)
• Spade Cooley & His Buckle-Busters: Country and Western Dance-O-Rama, No. 3 (Decca DL-5563 [10" LP], 1955)
• Fidoodlin' (Ray Note RN-5007, 1959; reissue: Roulette SR-25145, 1961; CD reissue: Collectors' Choice Music CCM-431, 2004)
• The Best of The Spade Cooley Transcribed Shows (The Club of Spade 00101, 1978)
• The King of Western Swing (The Club of Spade 00102, 1978)
• The King of Western Music (The Club of Spade 00103, 1978)
• Mr. Music Himself, Volume One (The Club of Spade 00104, 1978)
• Mr. Music Himself, Volume Two (The Club of Spade 00105, 1978)
• Mr. Music Himself, Volume Three (The Club of Spade 00106, 1978)
• Spade Cooley & Tex Williams: As They Were (The Club of Spade CS-208, 1981)
• Spade Cooley & Tex Williams: Oklahoma Stomp (The Club of Spade CS-209, 1981)
• Swinging the Devil's Dream (Charly CR-30239, 1985)
• Spadella! The Essential Spade Cooley (Columbia/Legacy CK-57392, 1994)
• King of Western Swing (Collectors' Choice Music CCM-039, 1997)
• Swingin' the Devil's Dream (Proper PVCD-127 [2CD], 2003)
• Shame On You – Singles Collection 1945–1952 (Jasmine JASMCD-3704, 2019)
• The Spade Cooley Collection 1945–1952 (Acrobat ADDCD-3308 [2CD], 2019)

See also

In Spanish: Spade Cooley para niños

• Aragon Ballroom (Ocean Park)
• Spade Cooley's Western Swing Song Folio