#bronze buckaroo

[milkandheavysugar]

“Herb Jeffries (1913-2014), a jazz balladeer whose matinee-idol looks won him fame in the late 1930s as the 'Bronze Buckaroo' — was the first singing star of all-black cowboy movies for segregated audiences. The jazz baritone had a seven-decade career, including singing with Duke Ellington’s Band. “

[nprfreshair]

Herb Jeffries, the smooth baritone, who recorded the 1940 hit Flamingo with the Duke Ellington orchestra, was also the movies' first black singing cowboy.

Nicknamed the Bronze Buckaroo, Jeffries died Sunday at age of about 100.  His exact age is uncertain. He made four westerns in the 1930's: Harlem Rides the Range; Harlem on the Prairie,Two Gun Man from Harlem, and The Bronze Buckaroo, and created the character of Bob Blake.  In each of those films he sang his theme song, "I'm a Happy Cowboy."

Jeffries had wanted to be a cowboy ever since he was a kid.  He grew up in Detroit, but he learned to ride a horse at his grandfather's and uncle's farms. It wasn't until he was touring the south, with the Earl Hines Orchestra, that he saw segregated movie theaters, and thought about the need for black cowboy films.  

Terry Gross spoke with Herb Jeffries in 1995. Here's that interview. 

Photo of Herb Jeffries via LIFE

[milkandheavysugar]

Jazz singer and actor Herb Jeffries, the first black singing cowboy to grace Hollywood screens, died of heart failure today in West Hills, CA, reports the LA Times. He was 100. 

A singer with the Duke Ellington band and other pop orchestras in the 1940s, the blue-eyed Jeffries embraced his mixed heritage and played up his African-American roots. He made his screen debut in 1937′s Harlem on the Prairie, the first of many “sepia movies” he would star in aimed at black audiences. In 1939′s The Bronze Buckaroo he warbled tunes like “I’m a Happy Cowboy” and established himself as Hollywood’s black Gene Autry.