Jackie Shane

Jackie Shane (May 15, 1940 – February 21, 2019) was an American soul and rhythm and blues singer, who was most prominent in the local music scene of Toronto, Ontario, Canada, in the 1960s. Considered to be a pioneer transgender performer, she was a contributor to the Toronto Sound and is best known for the single "Any Other Way", which was a regional Top 10 hit in Toronto in 1963 and a modest national chart hit across Canada in 1967.

Background
Originally from Nashville, Tennessee, she was born on May 15, 1940. She began performing locally in the 1950s wearing long hair, make-up, and jewelry.

Childhood
From a young age, Jackie Shane knew that she was different from other children her age. Shane was fairly confident, quickly developing a self identity that would later influence her individuality, emphasizing her personal uniqueness. Femininity was one of the ways that Shane expressed herself, wearing dresses and growing out her hair. Makeup was also prominent in her appearance. To embody femininity, Shane also mimicked mannerisms and posture cues, drawing inspiration from a popular actress, Mae West. Unlike many children, and even adults, Jackie Shane was sure of herself and her outward expression of femininity that she presented within her physical appearance. Shane does not take recognition for her self assuredness, but credits her mother, Jackie Shane, and her grandmother, as they both accepted, as well as supported Shane through her early self discovery.

In the late 1940s into the 1950s, the American South was not only unaccepting of African Americans, but also of queerness. It was easier for Shane to associate with her femininity and receive support from close family, but there was still judgment from peers and adults. While Shane describes that there were very few conflicts at a young age, she does recall another young boy verbally accosting her while also throwing things at her. Shane was not one to cower away from conflict, so to solve this act of discrimination, she took a jump rope and whipped him. Jackie Shane’s ability to effectively defend herself from discrimination at a young age demonstrates not only her confidence, but resilience.

While Jackie Shane’s trans identity was a distinguishing aspect of her persona, she was primarily known for her contribution to the music industry, specifically for Rhythm and Blues. Early exposure to music was vital for Shane’s later music career. Her grandmother’s beautiful melodies that she sang around the house had an influence on Shane’s vocal development. Further encouragement from her grandmother allowed her to display her vocal talents as she progressed in age.

Music in early life
Jackie Shane began her music career as a young teen. Along with her remarkable vocal ability, she also had incredible rhythm. This was particularly noticed by Louis Lavelle, observing her rhythm as she tapped on chairs. Lavelle recruited Shane, as well as Les Monday, to form a musical trio. Shane and her band performed at a variety of small gigs, including at local fair grounds and on radio stations. Initially a drummer as well as a vocalist, Shane would play drums standing up while singing. Shane's drumming talent led to studio session work as a drummer, including on Lillian Offitt's "Miss You So", a track which hit #66 pop and #8 R&B on Billboard's US charts in the summer of 1957. Working in Nashville regularly as a stage performer during the late 1950s, Shane also worked in the studio as a drummer on tracks by Larry Williams, Big Maybelle, Gatemouth Brown, Little Willie John, Joe Tex, and numerous other R&B performers. After gaining some recognition, Jackie Shane began to work with record labels, including Excello Records, while also drawing attention from Motown and Atlantic Records. She was not signed by big record labels, however.

Vowing to escape the "Jim Crow South", in the late 1950s, Shane joined a traveling carnival and arrived in Cornwall, Ontario, in 1959, where she said she felt free for the first time.

In 1960, Shane moved to Montreal, Quebec, where saxophonist "King" Herbert Whitaker invited her along to watch the popular band Frank Motley and his Motley Crew at the Esquire Show Bar. Shane showed up and sat down near the front. When Motley said, "Get that kid up here and let's see what he can do," pianist Curley Bridges invited Shane, then still presenting as a man, onstage for the next set, where she performed songs by Ray Charles and Bobby "Blue" Bland.

She was soon the band's lead vocalist, and relocated to Toronto with them in late 1961. She returned several times to the United States, on tour with the Motley Crew (to Boston, for example, where they recorded), to New York to record, to visit her family and old friends and perform on a TV show in Nashville, or to live and work in Los Angeles where she played drums in recording sessions. A fan mythology linked her to Little Richard, including claims that she had been Richard's backing vocalist before moving to Canada or even that she was Richard's cousin, although no verification of either claim has ever been found and no evidence exists that Shane ever made either claim herself. Music critic Carl Wilson has speculated that, while Shane had deep and identifiable roots in the traditions of the Southern US Chitlin Circuit, the mythology about a connection to Little Richard emerged because that scene's traditions were not known to Torontonians in the 1960s, and thus Little Richard was the only antecedent for Shane's performing style that most of her local fan base could identify.

Throughout her active musical career and for many years thereafter, Shane was written about by nearly all sources as a man who performed in ambiguous clothing that strongly suggested femininity, with some sources even directly labeling her as a drag queen. The few sources that actually sought out her own words on the matter of her own gender identification were more ambiguous, however. She identified herself as male in two early quotes to the Toronto Star, but more often appeared to simply dodge questions about her gender altogether. Her identity as a trans woman was not confirmed on the record until music journalist Elio Iannacci interviewed her for The Globe and Mail in 2017.

According to filmmaker Lucah Rosenberg-Lee, who co-directed a documentary on Shane, “She identified as 'she' behind closed doors and to her mother and herself, but in the public eye there was no opportunity to do that, and no one would have understood.”

Shane’s gender and sexuality
While today Jackie Shane can be labeled as a trans woman, throughout her early life, language surrounding transgender people was not commonly discussed. From the young age of thirteen, Shane identified herself as a girl, even though she was constantly being misgendered. The question of whether she was a transgender woman, a drag queen, a masculine lesbian, or a gay man was consistently discussed, but Shane never publicly addressed her gender identity or sexual orientation until the last years of her life. The confusion over Shane’s identity more than likely stemmed from the fact that while she wore very feminine clothing during her performances, her clothes were considered more androgynous. Many claim this is where Shane resembled a masculine or butch lesbian, as she wore glittering suits on stage and wore her hair up. Shane never crumbled to public scrutiny about her gender identity and physical appearance, avoiding conformity to choose either masculine or feminine societal norms and choosing how she presents herself to the public in her own way. Her ability to ignore labels about her sexuality allowed her to be considered ahead of her time.

Fleeing Jim Crow
Jackie Shane was born in Nashville, which was considered a part of the Jim Crow South. This region of the United States was not safe for either a Black American, or any queer individual. In the beginning of her career, Shane explains that very few acts of harassment or violence occurred with her. The absence of racial and transphobic conflict did not mean that she was unaware of the dangers of her home state.

There were several horrific stories that could have scared Shane out of Nashville, but one incident that stuck with her was when she witnessed a group of white men chase a black man down near the bus stop where she and a friend were waiting. She witnessed this man violently beaten and then carelessly thrown into a dumpster nearby. Escaping the horrific dangers of Jim Crow, while also leaving her mother behind, was a decision that was difficult for her to make, but her best chance at survival. Jackie Shane left the Jim Crow South, migrating north out of the United States to Canada, with the belief that the racial tensions would be left within the States and that Canada would bring on a new environment.

Encounters with violence and harassment
Jackie Shane constantly reiterated the fact that her experience as a black, trans woman was not as most expected, not filled with violence and verbal threats. This, however, did not protect her from harassment in her early childhood, sexual harassment from her band members, and avoiding local gangs.

One of the first encounters with verbal and physical harassment was when she was just a young school girl. While playing on the playground, she was verbally attacked by a boy, who screamed directly at Shane regarding her gender appearance, and eventually began to throw objects at her as well. Shane was not an individual to shy away from conflict, so to put an end to the harassment, she found a jump rope and whipped it in his direction. Shane's ability to handle conflict and actively protect herself carried on throughout her life, helping her survive.

When Jackie Shane became involved within bands, she found sexual harassment to be one of the obstacles she had to face. She was known to be an overly flirtatious individual, which could have possibly led her band members to make sexual advances. She expressed to many of them that she had no personal interest in having any sexual relationships, yet they persisted. In one specific incident, a band member threatened Shane after refusing any type of sexual advancement, pulling a knife to her. Just as when she was a child, Shane was able to successfully handle the situation by making a snarky joke and maturely walking away.

After her relocation to Canada, Shane could not entirely escape endangerment, finding herself in conflict with the local mob. The mob was not welcoming to Shane and her bandmates, kidnapping them. This was not the only near death kidnapping that she had experienced, but this particular instance forced her bandmates to be sent back to the United States. Jackie Shane continued with her career, not letting the violent acts determine her career within the music industry. This mentality eventually changed within her, as years later she would disappear from entertainment because she was tired of the transgender discrimination throughout the entire industry.

Recording career
Shane recorded several tracks in 1960, including a cover of Barrett Strong's "Money (That's What I Want)" and a version of Lloyd Price's "I've Really Got the Blues". However, none of the tracks were issued at the time; they eventually came out in 1965.

Shane's first issued recording was "Any Other Way" (b/w "Sticks and Stones"), recorded and issued in the fall of 1962; the song became her biggest chart hit, reaching #2 on Toronto's CHUM Chart in 1963. It was also a hit in several US markets (including St. Louis, and Washington, D.C.), allowing it to place at #124 on Billboard's "Bubbling Under" charts in the U.S. A cover of a song previously recorded and released by William Bell in summer 1962, Shane's version of "Any Other Way" was noted for adding a different spin to the lyric "Tell her that I'm happy/tell her that I'm gay"; while the original lyric intended the word "gay" in its older meaning as a synonym of "happy", Shane played on the word's double meaning, which was not yet in mainstream usage.

The follow-up single to "Any Other Way" was "In My Tenement" b/w "Comin' Down". It received some airplay in upstate New York, but did not chart elsewhere in the US or Canada, and Shane did not record again for several years.

In 1962, Shane was performing at Toronto's Saphire Tavern, specializing in covers of songs by Ray Charles and Bobby Bland. In 1965, she made a television appearance in Nashville on WLAC-TV's Night Train, performing Rufus Thomas' "Walking the Dog". Around the same time, she was offered an appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show, but refused as the booking was made conditional on her presenting as male. Also in 1965, the tracks from Shane's 1960 recording session were issued -- without Shane's prior knowledge. Two tracks popped up on a 1965 compilation LP entitled The Original Blues Sound Of Charles Brown & Amos Milburn With Jackie Shane - Bob Marshall & The Crystals, while two others (billed to "Little Jackie Shane") were issued as a single. Neither the single nor the album (both issued on very small, obscure labels) received much attention.

In 1967, "Any Other Way" was reissued and became a modest hit across Canada, peaking at #68 on the national RPM chart in March. Shane subsequently returned to recording later that year, issuing the studio single "Stand Up Straight and Tall" b/w "You Are My Sunshine" (which peaked at #87 on RPM), and the live album Jackie Shane Live. Two singles were also pulled from the live album (covers of "Knock On Wood" and "Don't Play That Song"), but none of the live material charted. A final studio single ("Cruel Cruel World" b/w "New Way of Lovin'") was released in 1970, which also failed to chart.

In addition to her own recordings, Shane also appeared on Motley's album Honkin' at Midnight, performing live versions of some of the singles she had released under her own name.

Shane faded in prominence after 1970–71, with even her own former bandmates losing touch with her; soon after returning to Los Angeles, she turned down an offer to be a part of George Clinton's band Funkadelic. She began caring for her mother, Jessie Shane, who lived in Los Angeles, before relocating to Nashville around 1996 after the death of her mother.

For a time she was rumoured to have died by suicide or to have been stabbed to death in the 1990s, but in fact she had retired from music, and moved home to Nashville from Los Angeles. She kept in touch with Frank Motley, who put a Toronto record collector in touch with her in the mid 1990s. This news was relayed to a small number of her old musician friends, a couple of whom contacted her. One, Steve Kennedy, discussed with Shane the possibility of organizing and staging a reunion concert, but this never materialized — the next time Kennedy called the same phone number, it had been reassigned to somebody else who had never heard of Shane.

Transgender representation in the entertainment industry
With the gay liberation movement's emergence in the 1960s, transgender individuals, as well gender non-conforming people, created a sense of voice that provided strength and unification. While trans visibility was becoming more common, many transgender people were difficult to identify within society, due to active discrimination that could endanger their lives. Isolation in the early years of the Gay Liberation Movement for transgender individuals was the result of not only discrimination from people outside of the movement, but from inside the movement as well. Following the Stonewall riots in the 1970s, several popular queer movements, such as the Gay Liberation Front and the Gay Activist Alliance excluded transgender individuals, which led to the creation of trans inclusive organizations, such as Street Transvestite Action Revolutionaries, Transvestite and Transsexual Activist Organization, and Queens’ Liberation Front.

These organizations emerged in the 1970s, however, which was before Jackie Shane’s presence in the entertainment industry was recognized. Shane was never one to hide, nor label her sexuality, freely expressing herself throughout the 1950s and 60s. Her ability and confidence to place herself within the public eye while openly expressing femininity, emphasizes Shane’s overall importance in transgender visibility. Shane was not directly a part of the Gay Liberation Movement, or any transgender movements, but her presence and silent activism prior to the emergence of these movements paved the way for many transgender individuals.

There were little to no transgender musicians throughout this era of queer history. Significant trans women in this industry, such as Wendy Carlos and Jayne County, were pioneers for the transgender community in this career field, but they were not openly transgender within the media until the mid 1970s. Shane’s impact on the transgender music industry, combined with the various movements that included transgender visibility and expression, guided several artists to break societal barriers regarding their sexual and gender identity.

Post-career attention
CBC Radio's Inside the Music aired a documentary feature, "I Got Mine: The Story of Jackie Shane", in 2010. At the time, nobody involved in the documentary, the executive producer of which was Steve Kennedy's wife, had been able to determine whether Shane was still alive; but she was subsequently found, still living in Nashville.

Footage of Shane in performance also appeared in Bruce McDonald's 2011 documentary television series Yonge Street: Toronto Rock & Roll Stories.

Jackie Shane Live was reissued as a bootleg in 2011 on Vintage Music as Live at the Saphire Tavern, although the reissue was inaccurately labelled as being from 1963. Several of the original songs covered in the set list were release much later in the 1960s. A compilation bootleg of the studio singles and rarities, Soul Singles Classics, was released the same year. OPM subsequently reissued the album under its original title.

In 2015, the Polaris Music Prize committee shortlisted Jackie Shane Live as one of the nominees for the 1960s–1970s component of its inaugural Heritage Award to honour classic Canadian albums. It did not win, but has been renominated in subsequent years.

In 2017, a group of Toronto writers published the essay anthology Any Other Way: How Toronto Got Queer, a history of LGBT culture in Toronto; in addition to taking its title from Shane's 1962 single, the book includes an essay devoted specifically to Shane.

In the summer of 2017, the reissue label Numero Group announced that they would be releasing a double-LP/CD compilation of Shane's music, Any Other Way, on October 20, 2017. The album marked the first time since her final single in 1969 that Shane was directly involved in the production and release of a reissue of her music. The album was nominated for a Grammy Award in the Best Historical Album category. In a revealing interview with Elio Iannacci of The Globe and Mail, Shane stated she was planning to return to Toronto to perform live for the first time in nearly five decades.

In 2019, Shane granted a broadcast interview to CBC Radio One's Q. The interview was conducted by Elaine Banks, who had been the producer and host of "I Got Mine", and was Shane's first broadcast interview since the end of her performing career. In the interview, she confirmed that she returned home to the United States to take care of her ailing mother, but stated that she regretted not having chosen to bring her mother to Toronto instead.

Posthumous recognition
In 2022, Shane was the subject of a Heritage Minute segment, in which she was portrayed by transgender activist Ravyn Wngz.

In 2023, a fundraising campaign was launched on JustGiving to fund a commemorative Heritage Toronto plaque honoring Shane, at a location to be determined in downtown Toronto. She had been previously featured in their 2021 Sounds Like Toronto digital exhibit. A plaque was unveiled on June 23, 2023, the start of Pride weekend in the city, at the Victoria and Richmond location of the former Saphire Tavern. A public mural on the side of a building on Yonge Street, south of the intersection with College and Carlton Streets, also includes a portrait of Shane as one of several images commemorating the street's live music scene of the 1960s.

In 2023, a GoFundMe campaign was launched by Nashville Queer History to purchase a historical marker honoring Jackie Shane that would be installed in Nashville, Tennessee. Enough money was raised and the historical marker was officially ordered in August 2023. Nashville Queer History announced on their Instagram page that the historical marker will be unveiled sometime in 2024.

A documentary of her life, Any Other Way: The Jackie Shane Story, directed by Michael Mabbott and Lucah Rosenberg-Lee and co-produced by Elliot Page, premiered at the South by Southwest Festival in March 2024.

Death
Shane died in her sleep, at her home in Nashville, on February 21, 2019. Her death was reported to media the following day.

Singles

 * "Any Other Way" b/w "Sticks and Stones" (1962)
 * "In My Tenement" b/w "Comin' Down" (1963)
 * "Money (That's What I Want)" b/w "I've Really Got the Blues" (1965)
 * "Stand Up Straight and Tall" b/w "You Are My Sunshine" (1967)
 * "Knock On Wood" b/w "You're The One" (1967)
 * "Don't Play That Song" b/w "Barefootin'" (1968)
 * "Cruel Cruel World" b/w "New Way of Lovin'" (1970)

Albums

 * Jackie Shane Live (Caravan Records, 1967)
 * Honkin' at Midnight (2000, bootleg, with Frank Motley and his Motley Crew)
 * Live at the Saphire Tavern (2011, bootleg)
 * Soul Singles Classics (2011, bootleg)
 * Jackie Shane Live (2015, reissue)

Compilations

 * "Slave for You Baby" and "Chickadee" on The Original Blues Sound of Charles Brown & Amos Milburn with Jackie Shane-Bob Marshall & The Crystals (Grand Prix/Pickwick, 1965)
 * Any Other Way (Numero Group, 2017)