Carol Fran And Clarence Hollimon

Just call <a href="spotify:artist:1w2HbBmPElTtEY69Xth6OW">Carol Fran</a> and her husband <a href="spotify:artist:1w2HbBmPElTtEY69Xth6OW">Clarence Hollimon</a> the new sweethearts of the blues. Not only are they a coosome twosome off-stage, the pair share uncommon empathy on-stage as well.

The couple first met in 1957 in New Orleans. <a href="spotify:artist:1w2HbBmPElTtEY69Xth6OW">Fran</a> was a winsome Louisiana chanteuse with a Gulf Coast hit on Excello, "Emmitt Lee," to her credit; <a href="spotify:artist:1w2HbBmPElTtEY69Xth6OW">Hollimon</a> was a fiery young guitar slinger who had backed <a href="spotify:artist:6bR0cgMtkCVpm0I5yrDNzO">Big Mama Thornton</a> on the road before playing sizzling solos on many of <a href="spotify:artist:48nwxUvPJZkm8uPa7xMzmj">Bobby "Blue" Bland</a>'s classic waxings for Duke. But love wasn't in the cards just then. In 1983, fate brought the pair back together at a Houston nightclub, and they've been a romantic item ever since. Two albums on Black Top, Soul Sensation in 1992 and See There! two years later, have cemented their musical bonds. <a href="spotify:artist:1w2HbBmPElTtEY69Xth6OW">Fran</a> toured with bandleader <a href="spotify:artist:3dK3Go6Fg31c6LxbDHJ6zY">Joe Lutcher</a> when she was a mere 15 years old in 1949. Famed producer J.D. Miller was behind the board when <a href="spotify:artist:1w2HbBmPElTtEY69Xth6OW">Carol Fran</a> cut "Emmitt Lee" in Crowley, LA, in 1957. Her later waxings for Port and other diskeries tended toward the R&B side of the stylistic tracks. <a href="spotify:artist:1w2HbBmPElTtEY69Xth6OW">Fran</a>'s soulful 1965 reading of "Crying in the Chapel" was crushed by <a href="spotify:artist:43ZHCT0cAZBISjO8DG9PnE">Elvis Presley</a>'s competing version. Meanwhile, <a href="spotify:artist:1w2HbBmPElTtEY69Xth6OW">Hollimon</a> became a studio stalwart, playing on sides by <a href="spotify:artist:4mDEpwlcBham5q1dmykSG0">Bland</a>, <a href="spotify:artist:6XYy5PbBFvsABSY2ZS6R8u">Junior Parker</a>, <a href="spotify:artist:2KjHHegzN6WkxpPGvkdU4c">Joe Hinton</a>, and a host of others.

Nothing substantial had been heard from <a href="spotify:artist:1w2HbBmPElTtEY69Xth6OW">Fran</a> or <a href="spotify:artist:1w2HbBmPElTtEY69Xth6OW">Hollimon</a> prior to their hooking up with Black Top only a few years ago. Lucky in music and in love, they are a versatile duo. She sings jazzy ballads as convincingly as swinging R&B, and <a href="spotify:artist:1w2HbBmPElTtEY69Xth6OW">Hollimon</a>'s fleet fingers are conversant with virtually any chord progression known to man. ~ Bill Dahl, Rovi