Jack Judge was a local club vocalist. In 1957 Disc Jockey Jack Gale returned to Baltimore on WITH radio and bought a recording studio on W. Biddle Street. Judge performed acapella style at many of Gale’s talent contests and record hops. He was contracted to record demos of songs written by local songwriters. Many of these demos were pressed as singles and distributed locally. Many of the records were released on Gale’s Town label using different alias’s such as Bob Cosgrove, Jerry Lang, and Sonny Long. This was done so that the writers would think they were getting an exclusive artist on each release.
Judge also recorded as Jack Winston & the Hi-Jacks on Jerry Schwing’s Jay Wing label in Stevenson, MD, and released a single on Jubilee Records as Jack Judge & the Jury.
The song “Yea De Ay Hey” written by Gale was sold to Columbia Records and released as by Jack Judge. Subsequent singles were also released on the Columbia label.
Jack continued performing throughout the ‘60s as lead vocalist of his group Judge & the Jury. In the late ‘60s due to a name conflict the group became known as Jay & the Jury. The 1968-69 lineup started out with Jack on lead vocals until he developed throat problems and was forced to quit singing. Jack then became road manager and sound man. Jay & the jury featured John Trotter (guitar, bass ex-Progressions), Johnny Poteat (bass ex-Wrecking Crew), Billy Davis (keyboards), Tommy Helms (drums ex-Nomads), also stints by keyboardists Stan Dulski (ex-Nomads), and Dwight Culler. The group performed soul, Motown and rock covers locally at Judge’s, Sweeney’s… while also traveling extensively throughout the Eastern and Mid-western states.
Trotter later auditioned for the 5th Dimension… He and Helms went on to join Sticky Leaf… Poteat played for Jay Granger’s Persuasions, Libra, J.D. Frye… Davis was later with Good Grief, Flow, Please…
Record releases by Jack Judge:
As Bob Cosgrove – Songs written by Joe LaMendola:
19** Town 1970 Hold Back the Dawn / It’s You, Only You That I Love
19** Town 1971 Coney Island / Alone
As Sonny Long:
19** Town 1975 A Rainbow for You / What D’ya Say
As Jerry Lang – Both sides written by Furman W. Snyder:
19** Town 1990 Hooknose Brown / Modern Times
As Jack Judge & the Jury
1959 Jubilee 5378 I Just Wanna Be Happy / Will You Always Be My Darling?
As Jack Judge:
1961 Columbia 41917 Yea-De-A-Hey / Wholeheartedly
