Kōrero: Popular music

Johnny Devlin jiving with Mabel Howard, 1959

Johnny Devlin jiving with Mabel Howard, 1959

Whanganui lad Johnny Devlin grew up listening to country singers, and country music was his first love, but it was supplanted by rock 'n' roll when he heard Bill Haley singing 'Rock around the clock' on the Lever hit parade. Devlin was an avid Elvis Presley fan, buying all Presley's records and studying his sound. He played gigs in Taranaki, Napier, Ohakune and Wellington, and ended up topping the bill at the Festival of Jazz in Wellington in 1957.

Devlin's big break came when he moved to Auckland in 1958 and secured a residency at the Jive Centre. His recording debut, 'Lawdy Miss Clawdy', was a New Zealand hit. During his national tour of 1958–59 he was greeted by hordes of young fans wherever he played. Even cabinet minister Mabel Howard got in on the act. 

Te whakamahi i tēnei tūemi

Alexander Turnbull Library, Lou Clauson Collection
Reference: PAColl-5679-01

Permission of the Alexander Turnbull Library, National Library of New Zealand, Te Puna Mātauranga o Aotearoa, must be obtained before any re-use of this image.

Ngā whakaahua me ngā rauemi katoa o tēnei kōrero

Te tuhi tohutoro mō tēnei whārangi:

Chris Bourke, 'Popular music - Rock ’n’ roll and the Howard Morrison Quartet', Te Ara - the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, http://www.TeAra.govt.nz/mi/photograph/42638/johnny-devlin-jiving-with-mabel-howard-1959 (accessed 29 March 2024)

He kōrero nā Chris Bourke, i tāngia i te 22 Oct 2014