Women like Mary Lou Williams awakened or at least reminded the world of the fact that women weren’t merely singers but superb musicians, writers and arrangers. World War II wrought immense changes in America. All the changes were so radical that one is hard pressed to guess which was the most important. First of all, conscription began to empty out the swing orchestras and big bands. Bandleaders found themselves with a strange irony—they had to hire lesser musicians to take the place of their top-notch players and yet had to pay these novices more! Increasingly, the jazz orchestras started recruiting female musicians. Because so many traditionally male bands refused to recruit female musicians (even though a great many had female singers fronting for them), the all-girl band became a rising phenomenon during the war. There were all-girl bands before then and probably always had been but certainly not in swing. These all-girl bands were also more likely to be integrated simply because of the dearth of experienced female jazz musicians. If a trumpet-player from an all-black female band got pregnant or sick and had to take time off, the band had to find another female trumpeter quickly and nearest one was as likely to be white as black and she was likely to be in need of a gig so the band would offer her the gig and she would accept.
The newspapers during World War II were full of female musicians looking for work or all-female bands looking for female musicians. Often these bands could get hired entertaining troops. With so many men in uniform away from their wives and girlfriends and stuck in situations were they had little opportunities to even see women much less meet them, all-female swing groups were in great demand much to the chagrin of the all-male swing bands in need of gigs. Female jazz musicians saw an opportunity and made the most of it. For instance, the August 1, 1944 edition of Down Beat Magazine carried the following classifieds amidst ten other ads by or for male musicians:
“GIRL VOCALIST”
“GIRL ALTO SAX AND CLARINET”
“GIRL DRUMMER”
“EIGHT PIECE GIRL BAND”
“GIRL TRIO”
“GIRL TENOR SAX”
Not that these “girl” musicians were new to performing in jazz bands, they were not. Most had cut their teeth performing in the many all-female jazz and dance band ensembles that paraded through the vaudeville venues in city after city for a couple of decades now.
So women had long established themselves in the American popular music scene. Many were veteran performers who played in every kind of situation paying their dues and honing their skills no differently then their male counterparts. Many played just as well if not better. In the following clip, the ladies display their multi-talented musical skills:
The Ingenues from 1928:
The Ingenues - Band Beautiful (1928) - YouTube