Clarence “Frogman” Henry
New Orleans, United States • 1937-03-19 – 2024-04-07
Biography
Clarence Henry was singing at the Tigerette Club on Bourbon Street when Paul Gayten from Chess Records caught the set and heard that weird, croaking vocal trick. They dragged him into Cosimo Matassa’s studio in 1956 with the standard-issue New Orleans heavyweights—Earl Palmer on drums and Frank Fields on bass—to cut 'Ain't Got No Home.' The label didn't think they had a hit; they thought they had a novelty act for the kids, but that session captured the absolute filth of the Crescent City shuffle before the industry cleaned it up. He wasn't just a voice actor for the funny frequencies. The guy was a legitimate piano player who had been gigging since he was fifteen, but he got stuck in the 'novelty' bin because he could mimic a frog and a girl. By the time he hit his second wind in the early sixties with Allen Toussaint and the A&R guys at Argo, he was leaning harder into the Fats Domino lane, trading the gimmicks for a sophisticated, brassy R&B that made him a bigger draw in the UK than in his own backyard.
