The Hearts

The Hearts

The Hearts are a US doo wop and R&B vocal group from The Bronx, New York. The name also applies to a fictional group in the 1976 film Sparkle, but the group associated with the Bronx is the one identified here.

Early line-up and first recordings

The group is first assembled by Bronx-based Zelma Sanders, who recruits high school singers Louise Harris, Joyce West, Hazel Crutchfield and Forestine Barnes to rehearse songs she writes. Sanders’ neighbour Rex Garvin plays piano on their early recording, and the group cuts Lonely Nights for the small Baton label. The single becomes one of the earliest girl group hits when it reaches the R&B Top Ten in 1955.

Later chart activity and related names

The Hearts return to the charts in 1963 with Dear Abby, although none of the original singers remain by that point. By then Sanders runs J&S Records, and the same five vocalists — Johnnie Louise Richardson, Ethel Davis, Mary Sue Wells, Yvonne Bushnell and Ada Ray — record for the label under several names, including the Hearts, the Poppies, the Z-Debs and the Jaynetts. Their best-known credit under one of those names is the Jaynetts’ 1963 single Sally Go 'Round the Roses.

Related projects

Rex Garvin later records a series of underground soul tracks with his group the Mighty Cravers. In Sparkle, the fictional Hearts are played by Irene Cara, Lonette McKee, Philip Michael Thomas, Dwan Smith and Dorian Harewood, and they perform the song Jump.