Bo Diddley’s right-hand man, maracas player Jerome Green, was an essential component of the distinctively syncopated sound of Diddley’s singles in the 1950s. Mick Jagger was a fan of both men and was rarely without his maracas during early Rolling Stones performances.



Maracas:

The hustling shaking sound of the maracas is an essential part of Cuban music forms such as the rumba and mambo, although rattles go back to the Egyptians and beyond, in fact predating the drum. Many civilisations have believed that the sound of a rattle can ward off evil spirits or win over benevolent deities.



The sound of the maracas is multi-textured, but the technology is straightforward: a pair of round or egg-shaped containers, made from gourds, wood or plastic, mounted on the end of sticks and filled with anything from beans or pebbles to buttons or lead shot to provide the necessary sizzle. Various techniques are available, including twirling both maracas to create a kind of drumroll, banging one maraca into an open hand, or flicking the shot into the top side of the maracas before letting it fall back to the bottom for a double shuffle.



Cuban maracas maestro Alberto Valdés stands out on the Buena Vista Social Club’s ‘De Camino A La Vereda’; Jerome Green features on Bo Diddley’s ‘I’m A Man’ and ‘Bo Diddley’. In the Jeremiah Symphony Leonard Bernstein has a single maraca used like a stick to strike a drum.



Jerome Green's biography:

The year 1999 marked the 40th anniversary of the release of Bo Diddley's chart hits "Say Man" and "Say Man, Back Again", (arguably the first ever rap hit singles, hitting the charts a full 20 years ahead of The Sugarhill Gang's "Rapper's Delight" hit of 1979/1980), both of which heavily featured the voice of the much-loved and fondly-remembered musician Jerome Green, for so long an integral part of the Bo Diddley group sound from around 1950, when he joined The Langley Avenue Jive Cats, up until the end of 1964, when he married and quit the group.



The look and the sound of his double pair of maracas playing was to have a profound influence upon the young Mick Jagger (Rolling Stones), Paul Jones (Manfred Mann), Phil May (Pretty Things), Van Morrison (Them) and numerous other British groups in the early 1960s.



Born around 1934, Jerome was a jazz-loving tuba player who lived in Chicago in the apartment below Bo Diddley's 2nd wife Ethel "Tootsie" Smith. Recruited initially to pass the hat around whilst The Jive Cats played on street corners, he was soon taught to play the maracas by a Bo Diddley who was keen to fuel the rhythms of his group, but unwilling to have to carry a complete set of drums around the streets of Chicago.



His recording career with BO DIDDLEY lasted for almost a decade, from March 1955 until November 1964, and included the following memorable vocal contributions:



"Jerome's Greatest Hits":

Bring It To Jerome (July 1955)

Down Home Special (October 1956)

Say Man (January 1958)

Bo Meets The Monster (September 1958)

I Love You So (Spring 1959)

Say Man, Back Again (September 1959)

Signifying Blues (January 1960)

Bo's Vacation (February 1961)

Not Guilty (February 1961)

Background To A Music (June 1961)

Give Me A Break (Man) (January 1962)



Jerome's TV Appearances:

Toast of The Town (The Ed Sullivan Show) (CBS, November 1955)

Scene at 6.30 (Granada, UK, September 1963)

Thank Your Lucky Stars (ABC, UK, September 1963)



Jerome Green is believed to have died in New York, around 1973. In 2002, the popular Pittsburgh, PA-based rock & roll group The Hi-Frequencies paid their own lasting tribute to him when they wrote and recorded a track titled "Jerome Green".



(main sources: David Blakey, via http://members.tripod.com/~Originator_2/jerome.html and AZ of Instruments, via www.foundry.co.uk/musicfirebox/a-zofinstruments.html)