Frank Frost(III)
Musician/singer Frank Frost was born in Augusta, AR, in 1936. He
learned to play piano as a youth, and in 1951 he moved to St. Louis,
where he got a job playing with harmonica player
Willie Foster. He soon ran into drummer
Sam Carr (the son of bluesman
Robert Nighthawk), who invited Frost to
play in his band. The band played gigs backing up bluesman
Sonny Boy Williamson, and by the
late 1950s Wiliamson had asked Frost to join his band. It was with
Williamson that Frost, who had learned the basics of harmonica playing
from Foster, picked up the finer points of the instrument. He soon
became quite proficient at it, and it wasn't long before he was playing
harmonica--along with piano and guitar--in a variety of blues bands. In
1962 Frost and Foster returned to their Mississippi Delta roots and
started their own trio with guitarist
Big Jack Johnson, calling themselves
Frank Frost and the Nighthawks. They recorded a few albums and backed
up Robert Highthawk whenever he played in the area. In 1978 they signed
with Earwig Records and changed their name to the Jelly Roll Kings. In
addition to recording, they traveled the Delta area, playing mainly in
juke joints, and even toured The Netherlands twice in the 1980s,
gaining new fans. In 1990 Frost released his own solo album, "Midnight
Prowler", but continued to tour and record with the Jelly Roll Kings.
In 2010 he appeared in the documentary
Song Written on the Heart (2010).