The Temprees

Last updated
The Temprees
Origin Memphis, Tennessee, U.S.
Genres Soul
Years active
  • 1970–1976
  • 1990s–present
Labels
Members
  • Harold Scott
  • Deljuan Calvin
  • Larry Dodson
  • Walter Washington
Past members
  • Jasper Phillips
  • JC Calvin
  • Solomon Young

The Temprees are an American soul vocal trio from Memphis, Tennessee, most popular during the 1970s. The band released several albums on We Produce Records, an offshoot of Stax Records. In 1972, the band performed in front of more than 100,000 fans at the famous Wattstax festival in Los Angeles.

Contents

History

Originally formed as The Lovemen, the trio—lead singer Jasper "Jabbo" Phillips, whose powerful falsetto featured on most of their recordings, Harold "Scotty" Scott and Deljuan "Del" Calvin—met in the mid-1960s, when they were in junior high school, [1] along with Larry Dodson, future lead singer of The Bar-Kays. The group was first signed to Stax Records in 1970 by producer Josephine "Jo" Bridges on her 'We Produce' Stax subsidiary. Later, with the collapse of Stax, they moved briefly in 1976 to Epic Records, a subsidiary of CBS, for two singles.

The band released three albums, Lovemen, Love Maze, and Temprees 3 on We Produce, mainly produced by Bridges, Stax executive/producer and former Motown engineer Tom Nixon and arranger-producer Lester Snell, a regular collaborator with Isaac Hayes. Their catalog was later re-released on CD, [2] [3] [4] along with a greatest hits compilation entitled, The Best of the Temprees. [5]

The trio's last hit was 1976's "I Found Love On A Disco Floor," their first release on Epic, again produced by Jo Bridges. . [6]

The band reunited in the 1990s and released a fourth original album on the small Memphis label, High Stacks in 2000 called "Because We Love You," produced by the group. Lead singer Jasper "Jabbo" Phillips died on February 21, 2001. [1] Jabbo was replaced by Del's brother Jerry "JC" Calvin. The Temprees' rendition of "Dedicated to the One I Love" was one of 50 songs featured in the double album box set, Stax 50th Anniversary Celebration in 2007. [7] This song was the group's biggest seller, reaching # 17 R&B and #93 pop in 1972. In 2016, they released their fifth studio album From The Heart, which also included a cover of Earth, Wind & Fire's "Reasons". Sometime before this album, JC Calvin was replaced by Solomon "Sol" Young, who was later replaced by current member Walter "Bo" Washington.

Singles

On We Produce/Stax Records

On Epic Records

Albums (all on We Produce/Stax Records, except where noted)

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Isaac Hayes</span> American musician and actor (1942–2008)

Isaac Lee Hayes Jr. was an American singer, songwriter, composer, and actor. He was one of the creative forces behind the Southern soul music label Stax Records, serving as both an in-house songwriter and as a session musician and record producer, teaming with his partner David Porter during the mid-1960s. Hayes and Porter were inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2005 in recognition of writing scores of songs for themselves, the duo Sam & Dave, Carla Thomas, and others. In 2002, Hayes was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Booker T. Jones</span> American musician

Booker Taliaferro Jones Jr. is an American musician, songwriter, record producer and arranger, best known as the frontman of the band Booker T. & the M.G.'s. He has also worked in the studios with many well-known artists of the 20th and 21st centuries, earning him a Grammy Award for Lifetime Achievement.

Stax Records is an American record company, originally based in Memphis, Tennessee. Founded in 1957 as Satellite Records, the label changed its name to Stax Records in 1961. It also shared its operations with sister label Volt Records.

Memphis soul, also known as the Memphis sound, is the most prominent strain of Southern soul. It is a shimmering, sultry style produced in the 1960s and 1970s at Stax Records and Hi Records in Memphis, Tennessee, featuring melodic unison horn lines, organ, guitar, bass, and a driving beat on the drums.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Steve Cropper</span> American guitarist, songwriter, and record producer

Steven Lee Cropper, sometimes known as "The Colonel", is an American guitarist, songwriter and record producer. He is the guitarist of the Stax Records house band, Booker T. & the M.G.'s, which backed artists such as Otis Redding, Wilson Pickett, Sam & Dave, Carla Thomas, Rufus Thomas and Johnnie Taylor. He also acted as the producer of many of these records. He was later a member of the Blues Brothers band. Rolling Stone magazine ranked him 36th on its list of the 100 greatest guitarists of all time, while he has won two Grammy Awards from his seven nominations.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Charles Pitts</span> Musical artist

Charles "Skip" Pitts was an American soul and blues guitarist. He is best known for his distinctive "wah-wah" style, prominently featured on Isaac Hayes' title track from the 1971 movie Shaft. He is widely considered to have been one of the architects of soul, R&B and funk guitar.

The Memphis Horns was an American horn section, made famous by their many appearances on Stax Records. The duo consisted of Wayne Jackson on trumpet and Andrew Love on tenor saxophone. An "offshoot of the Mar-Keys", they continued to work together for over 30 years. They lent their sound to 83 gold and platinum awards and over one hundred high-charting records, including Otis Redding's "(Sittin' On) The Dock of the Bay", Al Green's "Let's Stay Together", and Elvis Presley's "Suspicious Minds".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ain't No Mountain High Enough</span> 1966 song by Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell

"Ain't No Mountain High Enough" is a song written by Nickolas Ashford & Valerie Simpson in 1966 for the Tamla label, a division of Motown. The composition was first successful as a 1967 hit single recorded by Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell, and became a hit again in 1970 when recorded by former Supremes frontwoman Diana Ross. The song became Ross's first solo number-one hit on the Billboard Hot 100 chart and was nominated for the Grammy Award for Best Female Pop Vocal Performance.

Christopher Howard Jasper is an American singer, composer, and producer. Jasper is a former member of the Isley Brothers and Isley-Jasper-Isley and is responsible for writing and producing the majority of the Isley Brothers music (1973–1983) and Isley-Jasper-Isley music (1984–1987). He is also a successful solo musician and record producer, recording over 17 of his own solo albums, including 4 urban contemporary gospel albums, all written, produced and performed, both vocally and instrumentally, by Jasper. He also produces artists for his New York City-based record label, Gold City Records. Jasper's keyboard and Moog synthesizer work was a primary ingredient of the Isley Brothers' sound of the 1970s and 1980s when the Isley Brothers were a self-contained band.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Eddie Floyd</span> American soul-R&B singer and songwriter

Eddie Lee Floyd is an American R&B and soul singer and songwriter, best known for his work on the Stax record label in the 1960s and 1970s, including the No. 1 R&B hit song "Knock on Wood".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bar-Kays</span> American funk band

The Bar-Kays are an American funk band formed in 1964. The band had dozens of charting singles from the 1960s to the 1980s, including "Soul Finger" in 1967, "Son of Shaft" in 1972, and "Boogie Body Land" in 1980.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">William Bell (singer)</span> American soul singer and songwriter

William Bell is an American soul singer and songwriter. As a performer, he is probably best known for his debut single, 1961's "You Don't Miss Your Water"; 1968's top 10 hit in the UK "Private Number", a duet with Judy Clay; and his only US top 40 hit, 1976's "Tryin' to Love Two", which also hit No. 1 on the R&B chart. Upon the death of Otis Redding, Bell released the well-received memorial song "A Tribute to a King".

<i>Showdown</i> (Isley Brothers album) 1978 studio album by the Isley Brothers

Showdown is the sixteenth studio album by the Isley Brothers, released on April 22, 1978, on their T-Neck Records label. Singles released from the album include the #1 funk/disco hit, "Take Me to the Next Phase" and the top 20 R&B slower, "Groove With You". The album became another platinum album for the Isley Brothers. It was remastered and expanded for inclusion in the 2015 released CD box set The RCA Victor & T-Neck Album Masters, 1959-1983.

"Don’t Make Promises" was the first track on Tim Hardin's debut album Tim Hardin 1, released in 1966. The song, along with "Reason to Believe," was one of the two major songwriting hits from the album, with more than a dozen cover versions having been recorded following its release. British radio presenter and writer Charlie Gillett noted the song's ability to achieve "the elusive balance between personal miseries and universal sufferings," while author Mark Brend praised the song's "fragile pop sensibilities" and how it contrasted with the "swaggering" R&B of album track "Ain't Gonna Do Without."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Homer Banks</span> American soul singer-songwriter (1941–2003)

Homer Banks was an African American songwriter, singer and record producer. Although best known by many for his songwriting for Stax Records in the 1960s and 1970s, some of his own releases from the 1960s are considered classics on the Northern Soul scene. Many of the songs he wrote have become contemporary classics.

<i>Hold On, Im Comin</i> 1966 studio album by Sam and Dave

Hold On, I'm Comin' is the 1966 debut album by Atlantic Records soul duo Sam & Dave, issued on the Atlantic-distributed Stax label in 1966.

Stephen Craig Buckingham is an American record producer and musician working in Nashville, Tennessee.

Randy Brown is an American R&B singer.

<i>Solar Wind</i> (album) 1974 studio album by Ramsey Lewis

Solar Wind is an album by pianist Ramsey Lewis which was recorded in 1974 and released on the Columbia label. It was partly recorded in Memphis with former Stax producer and session guitarist Steve Cropper, a member of the Booker T and the MGs group.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bettye Crutcher</span> American songwriter (1939–2022)

Bettye Jean Crutcher was an American songwriter. She was a staff writer for Stax Records. Crutcher teamed with Homer Banks and Raymond Jackson as We Three, and co-wrote "Who's Making Love" for Johnnie Taylor, which earned a nomination for the Grammy Award for Best R&B Song. Crutcher also wrote music for the Staple Singers, Sam & Dave, and Albert King.

References