We didn’t have any segregation at the Cotton Club. No. The Cotton Club was wide open, it was free.
Meaning of the quote
The Cotton Club was a famous music club in the 1920s and 1930s. Cab Calloway, a popular American musician, said that the Cotton Club was not segregated, which means they didn't separate people based on their race. Instead, the club was open to everyone, allowing people of all backgrounds to enjoy the music and performances.
About Cab Calloway
Cab Calloway was a legendary American jazz singer and bandleader who became known as the “Hi-de-ho” man of jazz. He had a long and successful career spanning over 65 years, and his energetic scat singing and popular dance bands made him a star of the swing era. Calloway was also a trailblazer, becoming the first African-American to have a nationally syndicated radio program and receiving numerous accolades, including the National Medal of Arts and a posthumous Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award.
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More quotes from Cab Calloway
He was a silly guy. Out – do the other guy. That was his effort at all times.
American jazz singer (1907-1994)
My audience was my life. What I did and how I did it, was all for my audience.
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A movie and a stage show are two entirely different things. A picture, you can do anything you want. Change it, cut out a scene, put in a scene, take a scene out. They don’t do that on stage.
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What opera isn’t violent? Two things happen, violence and love. And other than that, name something else. You can’t.
American jazz singer (1907-1994)
Everybody that you could name would join in our audiences from, Laguardia on down. Everybody came. Everybody came to the Cotton Club.
American jazz singer (1907-1994)
We didn’t have any segregation at the Cotton Club. No. The Cotton Club was wide open, it was free.
American jazz singer (1907-1994)
90%, 100% are going there to hear the singing. The story is another thing. Nobody’s interested in the story. Happiness is happiness.
American jazz singer (1907-1994)
I think it was just an opera. Now, you go to opera, you expect to see and hear what the opera is. So, it was Catfish Row. It was singers. Marvelous voices. It didn’t make no difference what color they were.
American jazz singer (1907-1994)
That’s what George wrote! He wrote it. Why change it? There was this European company that I was speaking about awhile ago – course, didn’t nobody know what Porgy was.
American jazz singer (1907-1994)
Bubbles was a very good dancer. Tremendous dancer. He was one of our leading dancers of the country at that time. And, of course, he didn’t have much of a voice.
American jazz singer (1907-1994)
We usually never got out of there before four or five o’clock in the morning. Every morning. So it was rough.
American jazz singer (1907-1994)
You don’t think it was because a white man wrote it, a black man wrote it, a green man wrote it. What – doesn’t make a difference! Doesn’t make a difference. I think he did a good job.
American jazz singer (1907-1994)
At times as a performer they segregated us in some of theatres.
American jazz singer (1907-1994)
Everybody did something. It was very entertaining. We had a lot of fun. Lot of fun. And there was no segregation, that I could see. I never saw any.
American jazz singer (1907-1994)
The only credit I can give them. They synchronize wonderful. That’s all. They synchronize very – you would have thought that they were actually acting, but they were synching all the time, and that’s a rough job.
American jazz singer (1907-1994)
It’s very difficult to photograph an opera. And they messed up on it. It just wasn’t there. And I don’t blame the Gershwins for taking it away. Of course, if they had gotten the original company to have done it, it would have been very good.
American jazz singer (1907-1994)