On Christmas Eve 1952, a New York recording mini-mogul signed contracts with two young, female singers. One of these signatures was what might be called a "keeper," a deal that would bring this music business veteran both money and notoriety. One of these singers was only nine years old at the time. That was Leslie Uggams and this was the success story for none other than Joe Davis, a man who had been seeking out recording talent since the '20s. The other signature, on the other contract, belonged to Lizzie Baker. In the '80s, the Krazy Kat label came up with reissues of material produced by Davis and the Baker material wound up being received with surprising enthusiasm. The song titles themselves suggested a possible scenario for the label's decision to come up with yet another previously unissued Baker track four years and countless fan letters after the first. "I Got a Letter" was on the Rhythm and Blues From Joe Davis, Vol. 1 collection in 1984, "It Was So Good" on Piano Boogie and the Blues in 1988. Baker had finally found some fans more than three decades after the fact. It seems the original recording sessions didn't particularly fill Davis full of enthusiasm and none of the Baker sides were ever released at the time. This was also despite the presence of Harry Van Walls, a brilliant pianist and one of the top session men for Atlantic. Other players on the session were tenor saxophonist Al King, the inspired rhythm section of bassist Milt Hinton, and drummer Panama Francis. The level of activity on the New York recording scene during this era -- involving skilled players dabbling in mixtures of jazz, rhythm & blues, and blues -- must have been very strong for such a fine session to be denied any kind of release at all. As a result, Lizzie Baker was not heard of much after that. Perhaps something was lacking in terms of ambience in the original session, which from its description in Davis' biographical material, seems somewhat odd. The recording time was split up between Baker and a standup comedy duo named Stump and Stumpy. ~ Eugene Chadbourne