Joe Bonsall was born in 1921 in Lake Arthur, La. He began playing music at the age of nine, playing the tit-fer while his mother played the accordion. He soon learned the accordion, guitar, and violin. At age of 14, he played with Lawrence Walker and Joe Falcon. In 1937 his family moved from Lake Arthur to the Gum Cove area north of Vinton in Calcasieu Parish. He was known to play house dances during this time with "Moot" Harrington.
The original Orange Playboys were formed by Joe around 1952-53 when Moot Harrington retired from performing. Over the next couple of years a steady stream of musicians played with the Orange Playboys. They recorded numerous sides for Eddie Shuler's Goldband, T-Bruce's Cajun Jamboree, and Floyd Soileau's Swallow records. They played the southwest and East Texas from the Lakeshore Club outside of Port Arthur to the Rodair Club in Port Acres, Tx. In 1963 Joe Bonsall and the Orange playboys were one of the most popular bands in East Texas.
"Petite Ou Grosse" originates from Joe Falcon's 1929 recording of Arcadian One Step and Dennis McGee's "Adieu Rosa". Leo Soileau reworked the tune into, "Petite Ou Gros" for his Bluebird recordings in the mid 1930's.
Joe Bonsall and the Orange Playboys's 1965 version of "Petite Ou Grosse" was recorded at Gulf Coast Studio in Beaumont, Tx. Playing with Joe on the recording is Bobby Caswell, Russell Quebodeaux, Wilson LeJeune, Ivy Dugas and Cliff Newman.
Joe described his music:
"We were originally classified as a French band..but I was pretty aggressive in my style. I like to play country/western, rock and roll- even played some German and Bohemian music in my time."
His music reflects this theme. In 1965, Joe started recording for T-Bruce's Cajun Jamboree label until the 1970's. Most of the Cajun Jamboree releases were re-issued by Swallow in 1971. In 1975, Joe had heart surgery and quit for a while. He played off and on until the 1990's. He passed away in 1996 at the age of 75, but left behind many contributions to the Cajun music heritage.
Resources
John Broven- South to Louisiana
Ron Yule- Cajun Dancehall Heyday
My dad, Floyd LeBlanc, played fiddle for Joe Bonsall in the 1960's. He is on the album cover, above. The one with the cowboy hat.
ReplyDeleteJeanne, Im a big fan of your dad's music as well. I'd like to get ahold of ou to talk to you about your dad as theres not much info on him.
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