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http://www.cnn.com/2003/SHOWBIZ/Music/0 ... index.html

Singer Little Eva of 'Loco-Motion' fame dies at 59

Friday, April 11, 2003 Posted: 4:22 PM EDT (2022 GMT)

MIAMI, Florida (Reuters) -- Singer Little Eva, who as a teen-ager recorded the hit 1960s dance song "The Loco-Motion," has died after a long battle with cervical cancer, her manager said Friday. She was 59.

Eva Narcissus Boyd died Thursday at Lenoir Memorial Hospital in Kinston, North Carolina, manager Brenda Cape said.

"She had cancer. She fought it for a long time," Cape said.

Boyd was working as a baby sitter for songwriters Carole King and Gerry Goffin when they asked her to record a song they had written called "The Loco-Motion" in 1962.

The song was a hit for Little Eva that year and again for Grand Funk Railroad in 1974.

Boyd had other minor hits including "Keep Your Hands Off My Baby" in 1962 and "Old Smokey Loco-Motion" in 1963. She sang background for The Drifters, Ben E. King and others.

Cape said Boyd continued to work until October 2001 when she became too weak from her illness to perform.

Boyd is survived by two daughters, a son, 15 grandchildren and nine great-grandchildren.

Very sad, as always; another early exit. Like so many other hitmakers of her time who didn't get good financial advice(or didn't seek it out), never got the financial due she was entitled to, and probably spent most of her days working menial jobs to make ends meet, while millions were being made on her music.

I remember "Let's Turkey Trot," which was fairly awful, but did make the national Top Twenty and can be heard briefly in the film EASY RIDER. It didn't make the soundtrack Lp on ABC/Dunhill(it wasn't the only one), but likely just as well, as she probably wouldn't have seen a nickel in royalties anyway.

Typical of Dimension label material, the sound quality will never be much beyond mediocre; for that reason, the Collectables comp will suffice for anyone needing her hits. The first Little Eva CD I found was a UK import reissue of her LOCO-MOTION Lp, with single sides as bonus cuts. These days, whenever I come across an album with her greatest hit on it, I wonder if I'm going to hear the version with handclaps, or the same take without them.

R.I.P., Eva; you were alright.

ED

Whenever Little Eva's name comes up, I'm always reminded of what my dad said when we happened to see her on TV back when: "That's one stacked little Shwartza." We were both rather impressed, but me being an adolescent at the time I suppose that was only natural. Can't speak for my dad, though.

I prefer Kylie Minogue.