Early Career
Born and raised in Cleveland, Ohio, Hawkins studied classical piano as a child and learned guitar in his twenties. His initial goal was to become an opera singer (Hawkins has cited Paul Robeson as his musical idol in interviews), but when his initial ambitions failed he began his career as a conventional blues singer and pianist.
He served in the United States Army Air Force in the Pacific theater during World War II, primarily as an entertainer. Although he claimed to have been tortured for some time as a prisoner of war, stories of the circumstances of his actual capture vary. According to the documentary I Put a Spell on Me, upon liberation he blew his chief tormentor's head off by taping a hand-grenade into his mouth and pulling the pin. Hawkins was an avid and formidable boxer. In 1949, he was the middleweight boxing champion of Alaska.
In 1951, Hawkins joined guitarist Tiny Grimes's band, and was subsequently featured on some of Grimes's recordings. When Hawkins became a solo performer, he often performed in a stylish wardrobe of leopard skins, red leather and wild hats.
Read more about this topic: Screamin' Jay Hawkins
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“No doubt they rose up early to observe
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“It is a great many years since at the outset of my career I had to think seriously what life had to offer that was worth having. I came to the conclusion that the chief good for me was freedom to learn, think, and say what I pleased, when I pleased. I have acted on that conviction... and though strongly, and perhaps wisely, warned that I should probably come to grief, I am entirely satisfied with the results of the line of action I have adopted.”
—Thomas Henry Huxley (1825–95)