Still out of sight
James Brown’s backing singer for 32 years, now Martha High has a bag of her own…
“James Brown taught me how to entertain. The man was phenomenal on stage”
MARTHA High vividly recalls the night James Brown dropped by, some time in 1965. She and her all-girl R&B group, The Jewels, had just performed at the Howard Theatre in Washington DC when there was a knock at the dressing room door. “We asked who it was and he went, ‘It’s me, James Brown – how y’all doin’?’” says High, doing an uncannily gruff approximation of Brown’s voice. “We were all speechless. He came in, started checking his hair in the mirror and told us how much he’d enjoyed our show. Four months later, at the Apollo Theatre in Harlem, he turned up again and said he wanted us to join his live revue. From then on it was amazing.”
The other Jewels returned home 18 months later, but High remained with Brown for 32 years, becoming the longest-serving female member of his backing troupe and eventually doubling up as his personal hairdresser. She sang on a heap of Brown recordings – perhaps most memorably on 1973 funk classic, The Payback – as well as appearing with him at landmark events like Ali and Foreman’s Rumble In The Jungle in Zaire and the Boston Garden gig of April 1968, when Brown famously helped ease tensions after Martin Luther King’s assassination the previous night. “To see one man being able to calm people who were on the verge of rioting was just an incredible thing,” she remembers. “He knew what the people in the audience were going through and gave them so much hope. Above all, he taught me how to entertain. The man was phenomenal on stage.”
The Godfather of Soul wasn’t the first star to take High under his wing. She and Zeola Gaye, Marvin Gaye’s sister, had formed their first group while still at school in Washington DC. Quickly making their reputation at local talent shows, they were introduced to Bo Diddley, who offered guidance and a rehearsal studio. “Bo Diddley ended up introducing me to The Jewels,” explains High. “He said, ‘One of the girls is leaving and they need someone to replace her. I told them all about you and I think you should audition.’”
By 1964, The Jewels were in a New York studio, recording for the Dimension label. They soon found themselves on the Billboard charts with “Opportunity”, featuring a young George Clinton. “The Parliaments used to work at the same rehearsal hall,” High says. “George was gorgeous back then, so handsome and sharp-dressed. He taught us the song and played piano on it too. We did a lot of shows with The Parliaments after that. When he formed Funkadelic some years later, I didn’t recognise him!”
Learning from the hardest-working men in showbusiness has clearly paid dividends for High. She’s shown no let up in recent times, touring regularly with fellow Brown associate Maceo Parker and releasing a steady stream of solo albums. Latest effort Nothing’s Going Wrong is a continuation of her creative union with Italian producer and songwriter Luca Sapio, with whom she first worked in 2016. The album is a powerful expression of timeless soul and R&B, driven by thoughtful arrangements and the emotive majesty of High’s voice. The new album also emphatically proves that High, now resident in southern Spain, has stepped out of her former employer’s formidable shadow. “Luca really wanted me to find myself. The album still has that ’60s sound, but it’s not a James Brown feel, it’s what I feel. My music is finally me now.”