SUGAR CHILE ROBINSON (By Dave
Penny)
Born Frank Issac Robinson, 26 December 1938, Detroit,
Michigan
The history of 20th century entertainment has been
littered with the often ultimately tragic stories of its
child prodigies; from Jackie Coogan in the 1920s,
Shirley Temple in the 1930s, Toni Harper in the 1940s
and Frankie Lymon in the 1950s. On the whole, although
precociously talented, child entertainers were usually
saddled with inferior, childish material that, while
perhaps cute at the time, usually resulted in the
youngster being regarded as a flash-in-the-pan novelty
act which grew tiresome pretty quickly. The fall from
grace, when they reached adolescence, was usually
brutal, and some couldn't handle the swift drop in
popularity and turned to drink or drugs, while others
accepted that their time in the spotlight had ended and
retired more gracefully to concentrate their energies in
other directions. One such was that tiny bundle of
Detroit dynamite, "Sugar Chile" Robinson.
Born Frankie Robinson in Detroit on 28th December
1938, the youngest of seven children born to Clarence
and Elizabeth Robinson, neither of whom were musicians,
while yet a toddler "Sugar Chile" began pounding on the
piano left at his house by an aunt - he reputedly
hammered out a recognisable version of Erskine Hawkins'
current hit "Tuxedo Junction" at the age of two and by
the following year was allegedly able to copy any music
he heard on the radio. His nickname was bestowed about
the same time when he developed a liking for sugar
cubes, which his mother gave him to mollify him when he
was upset, and he became her little "Sugar Chile".
His father recalled:
"Sugar Chile was just able to walk when he started
thumpin' the piano. When he was about two, a friend of
mine came over one evenin'. We just sittin' around and
he says to Sugar Chile, `Here's a nickel, go play me a
piece on the piano.' We figured Sugar Chile would just
slide his hands along the keys and then run for that
money. Doggone it if that kid didn't thump out `Tuxedo
Junction'…"
In the early 1940s, aged about three, Sugar Chile
Robinson entered and won the under 18s talent show at
Detroit's Paradise Theatre, and for the next few years
he was an infrequent visitor to that famous theatre and
his fame began to spread. In 1945 - still only six years
old - he played guest spots at the Paradise with Lionel
Hampton's band and with Frankie Carle's Orchestra;
Hampton wanted to take the child on tour with his band,
but the US Child Labor Laws prevented it. Nonetheless,
the seeds had been sown, and after guesting with Carle's
band in October, before the month was out, he had been
signed to a film contract by MGM and was on his way to
Hollywood. While in Tinsel Town he filmed his cameo spot
in the romantic wartime comedy film No Leave, No Love
starring Van Johnson, performing Louis Jordan's then
current hit "Caldonia". Reviews for Sugar Chile's 90
seconds on screen were glowing, and MGM tried to
persuade his father, Clarence, to countersign another
contract for seven years, but the future looked bright
and Clarence refused to tie his son to such a long
sentence…and the same was true for the many recording
contracts which came his way in the mid- to late 1940s.
While in Los Angeles in November 1945, however, Frankie
hooked up again with Hampton, and was featured with the
bandleader and with Harry "The Hipster" Gibson on
several AFRS radio transcriptions.
In March 1946 Sugar Chile performed at a star-studded
bill in Washington DC for President Truman, contributing
four full numbers including his speciality "Caldonia"
during which he shouted out, "How'm I Doin', Mr
President?" which became something of a catch-phrase.
1946 was a halcyon year for little Frankie, with star
spots on syndicated radio shows and his own revue at
Detroit's Downtown Theatre. Within a week of playing for
President Truman, he headlined for a week at Chicago's
Regal Theatre and grossed over $36,000, a record that
remains the biggest one-week attraction of the theatre's
entire history easily beating the jazz royalty of the
day like Count Basie and Duke Ellington, and he began
smashing box office records wherever he appeared; by
August he was out in California, employing the likes of
Sammy Davis Jr and Dorothy Dandridge to appear in his
revue! At the year's end, his earnings were reported as
$148,000.
1947 was much the same, with guest spots on many
popular radio programmes and even an operetta My
Maryland, while touring the nation's theatre circuit
with his father as manager and chaperone. Also in 1947
his success was celebrated with the filming of a
seven-minute film featurette simply entitled Frankie
"Sugar Chile" Robinson; a fine showcase for his talents,
but still no contract resulted from the US recording
industry.
Throughout the whole of 1948 the AFM strike meant
that the recording studios were out of bounds to
musicians. Not that that would have bothered Frankie
anyway, as he was still too young to belong to the
musicians union - Union boss J C Petrillo personally
provided written consent for him to be included, making
him the youngest ever member of the AFM at that time.
With his special dispensation, in July 1949, he made his
first records for the Capitol label in Los Angeles,
when, in the consummate company of Leonard Bibbs on bass
and drummer Zutty Singleton, Robinson took his first two
releases into the Billboard R&B chart in late 1949;
"Numbers Boogie" made it to number four, while "Caldonia
(What Makes Your Big Head So Hard?)" only reached number
14.
Robinson toured with Count Basie in 1950 and made a
celebrated musical short with the Basie Sextet and
Billie Holiday in Hollywood in September to showcase his
hits. The Christmas season of 1950 witnessed Sugar
Chile's first European release and "Christmas Boogie"
c/w "Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer" sold well enough to
spark a two-month tour of the UK in the summer of 1951,
including rave reviews for his spot at the London
Palladium, guest spots on BBC TV and a Melody Maker
interview. He was a big hit on US radio and TV all
through 1951 and was asked to return to Britain for the
summer season of 1952, but it was the beginning of the
end.
He was growing up and was at that awkward age, as a
teenager, when his novelty effect had worn off, but he
was still too young to be seriously considered a jazz
musician. He still received a lot of fan mail from
Europe and Africa, but at home in the US he was
struggling. He had also missed out on a childhood, and
he begged his Father to allow him to stop the touring
and go to school. He told music historian Dan Kochakian:
"I stopped recording after the Capitol sessions in 1952.
All during that time I had a tutor, so even on the road,
I was studying. That wasn't what bothered me. I wanted
to go to school…I wanted some school background in me
and I asked my Dad if I could stop and I went to school
because I honestly wanted my college diploma. I was
ahead of my age group in school. I graduated from
Northern High School at age 15 and most of my friends
were seventeen or eighteen when they graduated. I
graduated from Olivet College here in Michigan around
1960. I have a degree in psychology."
His last single release was issued in August 1952,
shortly followed by a 10" compilation LP of boogie
woogie that featured many of his 1952 recordings. There
were one or two more reports in the trade papers of the
day - he played four engagements in 1953, followed in
1954 by another three engagements, one of which, in
August 1954, was at The Blue Note in Chicago with modern
jazz saxophonist Gerry Mulligan. Now billed as Frank
Robinson, he played just two engagements throughout 1955
and 1956 - and at the ripe old age of eighteen he
retired from show business.
In the 1960s he got a job with WGPR-TV, selling TV
commercials, and briefly regained some contact with the
music business, by co-owning the Detroit-based Lando and
Lendo labels, which released 45s by Rufus Wonder
- cousin to Stevie - and Carl Carlton. On the strength
of these minor successes, Frank opened his own recording
studio and started the AutoCap label, which also enjoyed
a minor hit with "Don't Walk Away" by The Superlatives.
Nothing more was heard of "Sugar Chile" for many
years and the worst was feared, until July 2002 when the
63 year old former child star made a surprise appearance
at a special concert celebrating the pre-Motown legends
of Detroit music and then, in 2007 for the first time in
fifty-five years, he was persuaded out of retirement to
make the journey across the Atlantic to perform once
again for his European fans at the "Rhythm Riot"
weekender, where he delighted a generation of rock `n'
roll fans who had spent the last thirty years dancing to
his popular club favourites such as "Numbers Boogie",
Whop Whop" and "Go Boy Go".
Dave |
