[msb-alumni] Joan Marie Johnson Faust, founding member of The Dixie Cups, dies at 72
- From: Steve <pipeguy920@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: <msb-alumni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Mon, 10 Oct 2016 15:42:42 -0400
BlankJoan Marie Johnson Faust, founding member of The Dixie Cups, dies
Dominic Massa, WWL 1:55 PM. CDT October 05, 2016
Joan Marie Johnson Faust, one of the founding members of The Dixie Cups, the
New
Orleans singing group who reached the top of the national charts in the
1960s with “Chapel of Love” and “Iko Iko,” has died. She was 72.
One of the group’s co-founders, Barbara Ann Hawkins, said Faust died in New
Orleans earlier this week of congestive heart failure.
Faust, Hawkins and her sister Rosa Lee Hawkins were the three original members
of The Dixie Cups, who famously knocked The Beatles out of the top spot
on the recording charts in 1964 with their hit “Chapel of Love” and went on to
become New Orleans music legends.
“Joan brought a lot of joy to the group and had us laughing all the time,”
Barbara Hawkins said of Faust, who was only with the group for its first few
years. “She was a really kind-hearted person.”
Growing up in the Calliope Housing Project in the 1950s and 60s, the Hawkins
sisters had never met Faust, though it turns out they were cousins, Barbara
Hawkins said Wednesday. Faust somehow knew Hawkins was a singer and in 1963
encouraged her to join up with a group Faust had organized with her brother
to compete in a St. Augustine High School talent show a few weeks later. "I was
on my way to the store," Hawkins said. "And she said, 'Hey, I heard you
can sing. You want to be in the group?’"
The group rehearsed that night at Hawkins’ house but after a few rehearsals
the
bass singer had to drop out, so Hawkins’ sister Rosa Lee joined the group.
They competed in the talent show a few weeks later, but as the Mel-Tones, not
the Dixie Cups. “Everybody talked about our outfits, which I made. They were
green, iridescent dresses and tuxedo pants for the guys with a tie and
cummerbund I made from the same fabric,” Barbara Hawkins said.
Though they didn’t win the talent show, they did catch the eye of local singer
and promoter Joe Jones, who was in the audience that night and later signed
the group to a management contract. “He remembered our green dresses from that
night and had circled our names in the program,” Barbara Hawkins remembered.
Juke, Jump & Jive with the Dixie Cups
Start playback
The rest is music history. Once Jones (with the help of singer Sylvia
Vanderpool Robinson of "Mickey and Sylvia" fame) got the three harmonizing
teenagers
to New York they auditioned frequently, in hopes of a record contract. After
they sang for famed songwriters Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller, the pair
immediately
signed the group but told them change their name. Rosa Hawkins recounted
in a WWNO interview aired on National Public Radio
that a weeks went by before the group even knew the record had been produced.
"The first time I heard "Chapel of Love" on the radio, it was on a Saturday
morning and I was doing my chores," Rosa Hawkins
said to WWNO. "This record came on and it was like, 'Oh, that record sounds
familiar. Oh, I know that song.' And then I realized, 'Hey! That's my voice
there!'
"And I ran up the steps and I was screaming, and my mom came down. She said,
'What's the matter? What's the matter?' And I said, 'Our song is on the air!
It's being played on the radio.' Then we got the call from Mike and Jerry to
come back to New York, so that was the beginning of our career, basically,”
Hawkins said.
"Chapel of Love" stayed at Number 1 for three weeks. The follow-up, “Iko Iko,”
cracked the Top 20 in 1965. Another hit was "People Say," also from 1964.
Hawkins said Faust had lived with sickle cell anemia all her life and left the
group sometime after 1966. “When we started traveling, it was really hard
on her health,” said Barbara Hawkins.
Beverly Brown replaced Faust in the group, but also left and was replaced in
the 1980s by Dale Mickle. The current group consists of the Hawkins sisters
(who have lived in Tampa, Florida since being displaced by Hurricane Katrina)
and Athelgra Neville Gabrile, a member of the famous Neville family.
The group returns to New Orleans frequently to perform. Barbara Hawkins said
she and her sister were able to visit with Faust last week for one last goodbye.
The group has a local performance Wednesday night at a benefit for the St. Jude
Community Center.
Faust had been married but had no children, Hawkins said. She is survived by
several cousins, nieces and nephews.
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