Ken "Snakehips" Johnson

Originally from British Guiana, Johnson at the age of 15 was sent by his parents to the United Kingdom, where he attended Sir William Borlase's Grammar School, Marlow, Buckinghamshire,[3] where he played the violin and cricket, and was a goalkeeper for the football team due to his height. [4] Johnson is rumoured to have attended The University of Edinburgh around 1931, though his matriculation records have never been found.[5]

Having gained an interest in dance, he sought lessons from American choreographer Buddy Bradley.[2] It was in dance work that Johnson earned his nickname, "Snakehips", from his "fluid and flexible style".[3]

After a visit to Harlem, New York in 1934, where he saw Cab Calloway and Fletcher Henderson performing, he abandoned thoughts of studying medicine and gained inspiration to form his own band, despite a limited musicianship.[4]

In 1936, Johnson was invited to lead Leslie Thompson's band,[6] before going on to start his own, called "Ken Johnson and his Rhythm Swingers" (later renamed "The West Indian Orchestra"), which played jazz and swing music and was composed largely of musicians from the West Indies.[2]

After the beginning of World War II, the 12-piece secured a residency at the fashionable London nightclub Café de Paris, a byword for sophistication. The band were also able to record here for broadcast on BBC radio, gaining them a much larger audience; they also made an early television appearance.[2] Critics acknowledged them as the first British band really to ‘swing’ and Johnson declared his wish to emulate Americans such as Count Basie. “I determined to play swing at the Café or die!” he told a Melody Maker reporter in 1939.

Thompson described Johnson as "a tall, lean fellow, and he could dance. Ken didn't know any music but he could wiggle and waggle himself to the time of the music, and so keep the onlookers amused and interested. Somehow he got his name put out there on the posters [...] he was such a nice boy, but he wanted money, and he got led off without being aware of the consequences."[4]

In 1940, despite his reputation for being a nice man with a kind word for everyone, Johnson became the lover of Gerald Hamilton, "the wickedest man in Europe", who was 20 years his senior. They moved together at 91 Kinnerton Street in Belgravia and later bought a cottage called "Little Basing" in Vicarage Road, Bray, Berkshire, where Johnson could go sailing, which was one of his hobbies.[4]

Hamilton was at that cottage, when he received a phone call on 9 March 1941, informing him of Johnson's death and asking him to come identify the body. He later recalled: "Again that awful feeling of nausea which I had felt when France fell, and again that sensation of the ground slipping from beneath my feet." From then on, Hamilton kept a picture of Johnson in a white tuxedo with white satin facings at all time with him, calling him "my husband."[7]

Johnson was killed at Café de Paris on 8 March 1941, during The Blitz, when a 50 kg high-explosive bomb came through the roof straight onto the dance floor soon after the start of a performance.[8] Time magazine reported that the orchestra was playing its signature tune Oh, Johnny, Oh Johnny, How You Can Love! when the club was hit.[9][10] The club had falsely been thought to be safe because of its location underground.

Around eighty people were injured and at least 34 killed,[10] including 26-year-old Johnson, who was decapitated.[11] His saxophonist, Dave "Baba" Williams, was also killed, cut in half by the blast.[12] Johnson's body, however, was found intact, a red carnation still at his buttonhole.[4]

After Johnson's cremation at Golders Green Crematorium,[13] his ashes were placed at his old school, Sir William Borlase's Grammar School, where they reside in the school chapel, together with a panel dedicated to him.[14] Johnson's ashes were interred on 8 March 1942, a year after Johnson's death.[4]

In 2019, BBC Radio 4 broadcast a documentary in which guitarist Joe Deniz described how he survived the air strike at the Cafe de Paris.[15] Professor Catherine Tackley, head of music at the University of Liverpool, also noted that the Johnson musicians who survived were soon absorbed into London's white dance bands, creating a remarkable number of racially integrated bands, unlike the prewar years.

DNB notes that Johnson's significance in maintaining the first established black British band was social as much as musical. “His musicians had an important influence on British jazz that continued beyond his death, [while] Johnson’s achievements provided a template for other black musicians to follow.”[1]

• "Ken "Snakehips" Johnson and His Orchestra", BBC Music.