Born in Algiers, Louisiana, into a veritable musical dynasty, (his father led several bands and his grandfather was an early jazz pioneer and contemporary of Louis Armstrong) the noted New Orleans legend Emmett Hardy Jr first came to prominence in the '50s and '60s when his fabled New Orleans band blazed a trail from coast to coast playing every leading jazz club in the USA.
Emmett started out tap dancing in the French quarter for nickels and dimes when just a child with his boyhood pal, Earl Chalmers under the name 'Jingles & Jangles'. He learned the rudiments of music when he strung a diddley-bow wire up the side of his father '"Papa Sweetback" Hardy's "Lucky Dog" Hand Cart'.
A child prodigy, Emmett claims to have started playing when rummaging through a battered trunk in his father's attic he found an old wax cylinder belonging to his grandfather, Emmett listened entranced—he had found his calling. In his early years he took lessons from the great Henry 'Red' Allen to whom it is rumoured he is distantly related. As a teenager he played and arranged music for the 'Young Onward Brass Band' and also became a trail chief for the 'Guardians of the Flame' Mardi Gras Indians. In New Orleans he formed his own marching band, 'Emmett Hardy Jr's High Steppers Social Aid & Pleasure Club'.
Around this time he cut a string of sides for the short-lived Black Mattie label in Chicago. These 78s are rightly regarded as classics of the genre and are highly sought after by collectors. Indeed, one, a V+ copy of '666, 35th & Dupont Blues' named after Emmett's old rooming house address in Gretna, Louisiana, recently fetched a staggering $2,000 when it changed hands at a Los Angeles Record convention. It was during this period he had a spell as a studio musician in New York, and it was there where he issued his infamous quote about Thelonius Monk, after cutting Monk's head during an all night jam session at Minton's Emmett's remark, 'That Monk man ain't playin' nuttin' but air music' caused outrage amongst the jazz cognoscenti and led to Emmett being ostracised by the jazz critics in The Big Apple. Severely chastened by the backlash, Emmett returned back down south to his beloved New Orleans.
It was around this time that he had to switch instruments when he lost the use of his little finger in a notorious shooting fracas in a bar he was playing in Bogalusa, Louisiana. It was this incident, plus the non-appearence of his legendary A.F.O. album (a session still discussed in revered tones throughout the jazz world) that he gradually withdrew from live work to concentrate on his writing and arranging. This period is known as 'Emmett's lost decade' amongst knowledgeable jazz fans. A mentor and spiritual teacher, Emmett has tutored many young New Orleans players such as Clarence 'Short Stuff' Bocage and Wendell 'Kid Chocolate' Brown who describes Emmett as '[a] stone genius'.
After writing and arranging a double album for Captain John Handy (another session that was mysteriously shelved when his record label went bankrupt) Emmett became disillusioned and quit the music scene altogether. He opened a soul food restaurant ('Mama Laveaux's Pig Ears') in Baton Rouge, Louisiana and opted for the quiet life. When Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans his family perished and he lost everything when his ninth ward home was completely destroyed in the storm. Fortunately for us, Emmett was cooking pig's foot gumbo at his restaurant and survived, though he lost his collection of priceless musical instruments and all his band arrangements in the flood. Destitute, Emmett once again turned to music. By a strange twist of fate (his manager has South Yorkshire connections) Emmett has relocated to Sheffield where he has put this band together to take New Orleans music forward in the twenty-first century. Emmett is writing and arranging material exclusively for The Rhythm Shakers and will even make occasional live appearances. As Emmett himself said when we first met him at Robin Hood Airport when his flight to England finally touched down, 'Plenty more Soul in the Bowl!'