The Dixie Cups
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The Dixie Cups are an American pop music girl group of the 1960s.
The group hit the top of the charts in 1964 with "Chapel of Love," a song that Phil Spector, Jeff Barry and Ellie Greenwich had originally written for the Ronettes. The trio consisted of sisters Barbara and Rosa Hawkins and their cousin Joan Johnson, from the Calliope housing project in New Orleans. They first sang together in grade school. Originally they were to be called Little Miss and the Muffets, but were named The Dixie Cups just prior to their first release.
By 1963 the trio had decided to pursue a career in music and began singing locally as the Meltones. Within a year Joe Jones, a successful singer in his own right with the Top Five 1960 record "You Talk Too Much," became their manager. After working with them for five months, Jones took them to New York, where producers/songwriters Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller signed them to their new Red Bird Records.
Their first release, "Chapel of Love," proved to be their biggest hit, although they had other hits with "People Say" (#12, 1964), "You Should Have Seen the Way He Looked at Me" (#39, 1964), "Iko Iko" (#20, 1965), and "Little Bell" (#51, 1965).
"Iko Iko," a New Orleans standard, was recorded early in 1965. Barbara had heard her grandmother sing the song, an Indian chant first recorded in the mid-Forties.
Barbara Hawkins: "We were just clowning around with it during a session using drumsticks on ashtrays. We didn't realize that Jerry and Mike had the tapes running."
Leiber and Stoller overdubbed a bass and percussion, and released it. It was The Dixie Cups' fifth and last hit.
In 1966, the Dixie Cups were moved to the ABC-Paramount label and later temporarily retired from the recording business.
In 1969 the Hawkins sisters moved from New York to New Orleans, where Rosa Hawkins began a successful modeling career. Both Rosa and Barbara also worked as makeup artists. They continued to tour and make personal appearances, with Dale Mickle replacing Joan Johnson who became a Jehovah's Witness and abandoned her music career.
On August 29, 2005, Hurricane Katrina swept through Louisiana, flooding and flattening most of New Orleans and displacing Barbara and Rosa Hawkins, who subsequently relocated to Florida. Joan Johnson relocated to Texas.
The Dixie Cups continue to perform and make personal appearances. The current lineup consists of the Hawkins sisters along with Athelgra Neville, sister of the singing Neville Brothers.
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