Lena Horne

Lena Mary Calhoun Horne (June 30, 1917 – May 9, 2010) was born in Bedford-Stuyvesant, and raised largely by her grandparents. Her family, with roots African, European and Native American, was part of the "Black Bourgeoisie" a stratum of well-to-do people of color. Horne's own parents were looked down upon by the extended family, her father a numbers runner and her mother a traveling actress.

She spent time in the South with her mother, and later with her uncle Frank who became an advisor to FDR. Returning to New York she attended a public high school before leaving school without a diploma. At age 16 she joined the chorus of the Cotton Club, yes she did, and by 1934 had a featured role in the Cotton Club Parade. The next year she began touring with Noble Sissle and his orchestra.

According to BlackClassicMovies.com she headlined with Sissle under the name Helena Horne because he thought Helena sounded "classier" than Lena. However, when they played The Palace in early October, she was billed as Leona Horne.

Clevelanders on Palace Stage
The Cleveland News, October 1, 1936

Noble Sissle, who left Central High back in 1912 for the war and later success down the dance lanes, isn’t the only local-boy-makes-good at the Palace tomorrow.

The habitues of the Cedar and Central Avenue hot spots will remember Billy Banks. They swore by this lad a few years back as he danced and sang his way up and down the town’s Harlem.

Included in Sissle’s “Savoy Stompers” revue are the dancing stars of the Harlem Cotton club, “Pops and Louie”, Leona Horne, songstress, and Buddy Doyle, who comes out of the band to clown, figure prominently in the show.

Sources:
Wikipedia
BlackClassicMovies.com
The Cleveland News

Noble Sissle

Noble Sissle (July 10, 1889 – December 17, 1975) was born in Indianapolis, and moved with his family to Cleveland in 1906 when his father became minister of Cory Methodist Church at E. 35th & Scovill. At the age of seventeen he attended Central High where he played baseball and football, and sang with the glee club.

During World War I, Sissle entered the Army and became the drum major of an Army band that caused a sensation in France by playing a form of ragtime music. The 369th Infantry Band, led by Lt. James Reese Europe, began calling itself a "jazz band." Reese’s Army band not only helped popularize the new music among U.S. soldiers, but it was the first exportation of jazz, America’s new art form. Sissle said at the time, "The jazz germ hit France and it spread everywhere" they went. 

- Joe Mosbrook, Jazzed in History

Mosbrook also credits Sissle with discovering Sidney Bechet, and being part of a vaudeville act with Eubie Blake. Sissle composed the classic tune I'm Just Wild About Harry, and three years before The Jazz Singer created a short film with Blake called A Phonofilm that was first shown at the Palace Theatre in December, 1923. He had a history of breaking racial barriers, working clubs that had previously hired only all-white ensembles.

In 1935 Sissle hired a young chorus girl from the Cotton Club to sing with his Franco-Harlem Revue, and she was singing for them when they played in Cleveland for a week in October, 1936. Her name was Lena Horne.