Video of the Week #21

The underrated Savannah Churchill is one of my favorite female vocalists. Here she is in a scene from the 1948 film Miracle in Harlem singing her #1 R&B hit, "I Want to Be Loved," accompanied by the Lynn Proctor Trio.

Ms. Churchill released about 20-25 records between 1942 and 1956, hitting the charts four times. She was usually backed by vocal groups, such as the Four Tunes. She also appeared in three "race movies"--low budget films with all-black casts.  She sang in two of them, but the third was a dramatic role.  She was the leading lady in 1949's Souls of Sin.

In 1956, she was the victim of a freak accident which effectively ended her career. While she was singing in a New York night club, a drunk fell out of the balcony and landed on her, breaking her pelvis. She spent most of the rest of her life in a wheelchair. She made an unsuccessful comeback attempt in 1961. She died of complications from pneumonia in 1974 at the age of 54.

Most of her best recordings can be found on a two CD set released on the British Acrobat label.