Rock & Roll Hall of Fame songwriting legend Mike Stoller says he wants to help honor Alabama native Willie Mae “Big Mama” Thornton, who made a hit of the now-classic “Hound Dog.”
Stoller and songwriting partner Jerry Leiber wrote the song for her seven decades ago when the two men were still teenagers.
Thornton, a native of Ariton in Dale County in southeast Alabama, has been called the Mother of Rock ‘n’ Roll for the influence she and her music had during the dawn of the genre in the 1950s. Thornton was 57 when she died in Los Angeles in 1984. She is buried with two other people in a paupers grave in Inglewood Park Cemetery.
Stoller, in an interview with blues historian Gil Anthony of Dothan, who has been working for two-plus decades to bring recognition to Thornton, suggested placing a monument honoring her at the Inglewood cemetery. “I think we should try, and I will certainly help, to put a monument there,” said Stoller, who lives in Los Angeles.
Anthony mentioned his ideas for paying tribute to Thornton. They include bringing her remains back to Alabama, turning a building that was the old bus station in Ariton into a museum and erecting a monument in her hometown.
“A monument, I think it could be done. I’ll help you with that project,” Stoller said.
Anthony pushed the recent effort to rename a street in Ariton, which is now Big Mama Thornton Circle. Stoller saw a story on Alabama NewsCenter about the Oct. 22 renaming ceremony and wanted to get in touch with Anthony to see how he could help.
Stoller was disappointed that when he read the story, the ceremony had already taken place, said Bobbi Marcus, Stoller’s longtime publicist. Otherwise, Stoller would have tried to attend. Marcus contacted Alabama NewsCenter to help connect Stoller and Anthony, resulting in the interview.
Anthony aired portions of the interview Nov. 28 on his “Blues Power” radio show on WDIG in Dothan.
‘Talking about Big Mama’
“I’m happy that we’re talking about Big Mama because she was a fabulous, fabulous singer,” Stoller said.
He recounted when he and Leiber, both just 19 years old at the time, met Thornton. They had written a few songs for Little Esther, who later became known as Esther Phillips and sang with Johnny Otis’ band.
Because of that connection, Otis called Stoller in August 1952 and asked the pair to come meet Thornton with the idea they would write some songs for her.
“So we met Big Mama, who was extremely impressive. She was a big woman. She wore overalls and heavy boots and we started to talk to her about songs,” Stoller recalled. “She didn’t seem too interested at first. Johnny came running over and he said, ‘Listen, Mama, these boys write hits,’ which was a little bit premature, but at any rate she started to sing and knocked us out.”
After the meeting, the two hopped into Stoller’s car and raced back to his house. “By the time we got to my house, Jerry was already working on some lyrics and singing. I didn’t even get to sit down at the piano. I started playing, and we wrote ‘Hound Dog’ in about 10-15 minutes, jumped in my car and went back and presented the song to her.”
When Thornton picked up the lyrics, “she started sort of crooning it,” Stoller said, which wasn’t what he and Leiber had in mind. The next day on the way to the studio for a recording session, the pair agreed that Thornton needed to growl the song. The question was, who was brave enough to tell her.
“It was Jerry who summoned up his … strength and said, ‘Big Mama, I think you ought to growl it.’ And she said, ‘Listen, boy, don’t be telling me how to sing the blues.’
“However, immediately, the idea was implanted and she growled the first take,” Stoller said. “It was fabulous, and the second take was even better. The second take is the one you’ve all heard.”
Thornton’s – and Presley’s – biggest hit
That second take, released in February 1953, became Thornton’s biggest hit. “Hound Dog” topped the R&B chart for seven straight weeks, according to Billboard, and sold 2 million records. Three years later, Presley’s version became his best-selling song, hitting No. 1 on the U.S. pop, country and R&B charts at the same time and selling 10 million copies.
“Even though I became a big Elvis fan, for me, ‘Hound Dog’ was Big Mama’s record,” Stoller said. “No question.”
Leiber and Stoller became more than Elvis fans; they wrote “Jailhouse Rock,” “Love Me,” “Loving You,” “Don’t” and “King Creole,” among others. Dozens of their songs charted for artists including the Coasters, the Drifters, Ben E. King, Jay and the Americans, the Clovers and Peggy Lee.
The songwriting duo also wrote three other songs specifically for Thornton: “Nightmare,” “I’ve Searched the Whole World Over” and “I Smell a Rat.”
Leiber died at age 79 in 2011, while Stoller, 89, continues to create music.
“I’m busier now than I’ve been in a long time,” Stoller told Anthony.
Stoller is writing the music for a musical based on the novel “Beaches,’’ by Iris Rainer Dart, which was made into the 1988 film of the same name starring Bette Midler.
Dart has written the song lyrics “and she asked me to write the music,” Stoller said. “I am really enjoying it.”
As they were wrapping up their conversation, Anthony said he would send Stoller a Big Mama Thornton T-shirt from the annual Wiregrass Blues Festival in Dothan.
“Oh, wonderful. I’ll wear it with pride,” Stoller said.
Anthony asked Stoller to send a picture of himself wearing the shirt.
“I would be happy to do that,” Stoller said.
(Courtesy of Alabama NewsCenter)
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