Fw: APO Press Release...Provine"Little" Hatch

["Donnie MorTone" <mortone@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

This message is from Jimmy Rogers son...
on the passing of Little Hatch....RIP

~Donnie~

- ----- Original Message -----
From: "Jimmy D. Lane" <jimmydl@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <BLUES-L@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Wednesday, January 15, 2003 3:37 PM
Subject: APO Press Release...Provine"Little" Hatch


> Kansas City Bluesman Little Hatch Dead at 81
>
>
> Provine Hatch Jr. (1921-2003)
>
> "Harp players are a dying breed." So once said a man who knew. Little
Hatch
> likely was the best harp player ever to make Kansas City home. He died
> Tuesday night, 81 years old, and with Hatch went Blues as thick and dirty
as
> the smoke-filled air in the bars he ruled.
>
> Little Hatch was born Provine Hatch Jr. in Sledge, Mississippi in 1921. He
> picked up the Blues harp for good at 8 years old. By his teenaged years,
> after his family had moved to Helena, Arkansas, Hatch was under the direct
> spell of Sonny Boy Williamson II. The Blues, and that harmonica, overcame
> him. "I slept with it, ate with it and everything else I could do with
it,"
> Hatch said of his first harmonica in an APO Records interview about a year
> ago. The obsession turned into a profession for Hatch once he added vocals
> to his act.
>
> The Navy drafted Hatch in 1942, and he served in World War II until 1946.
On
> his way home to Arkansas, Hatch stopped in Kansas City. He liked the
city's
> feel, Hatch told his family, and after meeting a woman he decided to make
> his home there.
>
> Hatch worked as a trash-hauler, owning his own truck and accumulating 650
> stops. He worked for Hallmark Cards for 32 years as a security guard and
as
> a mailman, earning a pension. But the Kansas City Mayor's Office declared
> his October 25 birthday Little Hatch Day because of his Blues. For more
than
> 40 years, Hatch was a Kansas City star. On and off, he was the bedrock of
> well-known KC clubs like Cotton-eyed Joe's, Nightmoves, The Levee, the
Grand
> Emporium and B.B.'s Lawnside BBQ.
>
> Hatch first picked up the nickname Little Walter Jr., but he dropped it
when
> he decided his music needed a unique tag. He was named Little Hatchet,
which
> gradually became Little Hatch. His legend made him a hero and a reluctant
> tutor to harp up-and-comers. "I can sit down, and I can play and play and
> play, and then we'll just have to see what you can do," Hatch said about
> teaching harmonica. "Some of them just don't have it, you know? They ask,
> 'How did you get that?' I can't tell them. I don't know what I did myself.
> See, those keys have numbers, but you don't have no eyes in your mouth."
>
> In his prime, Hatch's performances were raucous. He'd dance and stomp his
> feet until his audience felt a fever. Sometimes Hatch would blow solos 10
> minutes long. And as he aged, Hatch's voice grew as rich as his favorite
> whiskey. Hatch was a Bluesman of the real variety.
>
> But it's those Bluesmen who are most often overlooked. Hatch's fame and
most
> of his gigs were limited to Kansas City. Still, for the world that was
> listening, Hatch could be heard. A tiny German label, M&M Records,
released
> "The Little Hatchet Band" (LP-30001) in 1972 but distribution was very
> limited. In 1992, the Modern Blues Label released a second live Hatch
> performance with "Well, All Right!" (MBR 1204), but the album suffered the
> same small-scale fate. APO Records owner Chad Kassem couldn't believe that
> Little Hatch wasn't a recording star when he first saw him perform in the
> early 1980s. By the late '90s, Kassem had established Blue Heaven Studios
> and the Blues label APO in Salina, Kansas. He of course remembered Hatch,
> and the two formed a relationship that produced "Goin' Back" (APO 2007) in
> 1998 and "Rock With Me Baby" (recorded with Jimmy D. Lane and Ron Edwards)
> (APO 2012), which will be in stores around the world next month. A third
> Hatch album remains in the APO can.
>
> Hatch leaves behind three daughters, two sons, seven grandchildren, three
> great-grandchildren and his 10-year companion Debbie Dennis.
>
> Artists are never replaced. Neither are legends. That's to say nothing of
> harp players, a species Little Hatch once called "a dying breed."
>
>
> APO Records
> Media Contact: Marc Sheforgen
> marcs@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> PO Box 1905
> Salina, KS 67401
> Tel: 785-825-8609
> Fax: 785-825-0156
>
>
>
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