Camden NJ - Savannah Churchill

SAVANNAH CHURCHILL was born on Savannah Valentine to Creole parents on August 21, 1920, in Colfax, Louisiana. She was raised in Brooklyn, and started singing in 1941 to support her family after her husband David Churchill was killed in a car accident. She had a successful career as a singer of pop, jazz, and blues music in the 1940s and 1950s until she was injured in a nightclub accident in 1956.

Savannah Churchill's first recordings, including the risqué "Fat Meat Is Good Meat", were issued on Beacon Records in 1942. These were followed the next year by recordings on Capitol with the Benny Carter Orchestra, including her first hit "Hurry, Hurry".

In 1945 she signed with Manor Records, and that year "Daddy Daddy" reached # 3 on the R&B chart. Two years later she had her only R&B # 1 with "I Want To Be Loved (But Only By You)", which topped the charts for eight weeks. The record was billed as being with vocal group The Sentimentalists, who soon renamed themselves The Four Tunes. Subsequent recordings with The Four Tunes, including "Time Out For Tears" (# 10 R&B, # 24 pop) and "I Want To Cry", both in 1948, were also successful.

Billed as "Sex-Sational", she performed to much acclaim, and appeared in the movies Miracle in Harlem (1948) and Souls of Sin (1949). She toured widely with backing vocal group The Striders, including a visit to Hawaii in 1954. From 1949 she recorded with Regal, RCA Victor and Decca Records, recording the original version of "Shake A Hand", later a big hit for Faye Adams, and also recording with the Ray Charles Singers. In 1956 she was one of the first artists signed to the Argo label, set up as a subsidiary to Chess Records.

Tragedy struck later in 1956 to end her career. She was singing on stage in a club, when a drunken man fell on top of her from a balcony above, causing severe debilitating injuries from which she would never fully recover. Although she recorded an album of her earlier hits for the Philadelphia-based Jamie label in 1960, her health declined greatly until her death in 1974, at the age of 53.

Recordings
1942	Fat Meat is Good Meat- Jimmy Lytell and his All Star Seven
1942	Tell Me Your Blues - Jimmy Lytell and his All Star Seven
1943	Hurry, Hurry with Benny Carter
1943	Just A Baby's Prayer at Twilight with Benny Carter
1945	Daddy-Daddy
1945	All Alone
1945	Foolishly Yours
1945	Too Blue To Cry
1945	I Can't Get Enough of You
1947	I Want To Be Loved (But Only By You)
1948	Movie Version of I Want To Be Loved with the Lynn Proctor Trio from Miracle In Harlem
1948	Time Out For Tears
1948	How Could I Know
1948	I'll Never Belong to Anyone Else
1949	The Things You Do To Me
1949	All of Me
1950	I'll Never Be Free
1950	Get Another Guy
1950	Ain'tcha Glad I Love You b/w Changeable You
1950	The Devil Sat Down And Cried b/w Can Anyone Explain (No, No, No)
1951	Once There Lived A Fool
1951	When You Come Back To Me
1951	And So I Cry b/w Wedding Bells Are Breaking Up That Old Gang Of Mine
1951	In Spite Of Everything You Do b/w Don't Grieve, Don't Sorrow, Don't Cry
1951	Sin (It's No Sin)
1952	Walking By The River b/w If I Didn't Love You So
1952	My Affair
1952	I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry
1952	If I Didn't Love You So
1952	Waiting For A Guy Named Joe b/w Don't Worry 'Bout Me
1953	Shake A Hand
1953	Shed A Tear
circa 1954	Stay Out of My Dreams
circa 1954	Weep My Heart
circa 1954	My Memories of You b/w I Cried
circa 1954	Just Whisper b/w The Gypsy Was Wrong
1953	Shed A Tear
1956	They Call Me A Fool
1956	Let Me Be The First One To Know
1960	Time Out For Tears
1960	Summertime
1960	It's Too Soon To Know