Belford Hendricks - With Other Artists

With Other Artists

Among other stars with whom Belford Hendricks worked were big band leaders Jimmie Lunceford and Sy Oliver, early R & B great Ivory Joe Hunter, jazz diva Carmen McRae on several Mercury Records sessions and, spanning across to the 1960s generation, big-voiced Timi Yuro and soul legend Aretha Franklin, for whom Hendricks arranged songs such as A Mother's Love, Runnin' Out of Fools and his own composition, Can't You Just See Me.

When Al Martino, whose sub-operatic singing style had gone out of fashion in the early 1960s, wanted to develop a more understated vocal technique, Nat King Cole recommended that he contact Hendricks for help. Martino duly got his desired new sound and, to go with it, his biggest hit for years - a Hendricks-arranged reworking of the country song I Love You Because, which got to number 3 on the Billboard pop chart in 1963. A full album followed, with Hendricks at the helm.

Hendricks composed over a hundred songs, more than half of them co-written, using either a variant of his real name or his complete pseudonym, Bill Henry. As well as the compositions for other stars mentioned above, these included Call Me, a US number 21 for Johnny Mathis in 1958 (not to be confused with the later Tony Hatch-composed song of the same name), First Star I See Tonight for Patti Page, I'm Too Far Gone (to Turn Around) for blues singer Bobby Bland and The Mixed Up Cup for another R & B trailblazer, Clyde McPhatter.