Nii-lante Augustus Kwamlah Quaye (3 September 1921 – 13 March 2000), known professionally as Cab Kaye, was an English jazz singer and pianist of Ghanaian descent.

[1] His Ghanaian great-grandfather was an asafo warrior drummer and his grandfather, Henry Quaye, was an organist for the Methodist Mission church in the former Gold Coast, now called Ghana.

Cab's mother, Doris Balderson, sang in English music halls and his father, Caleb Jonas Quaye (born 1895 in Accra, Ghana), performed under the name Ernest Mope Desmond as musician, band leader, pianist and percussionist.

[1] With his blues piano style, Caleb Jonas Quaye became popular around 1920 in London and Brighton with his band The Five Musical Dragons in Murray's Club with, among others, Arthur Briggs, Sidney Bechet and George "Bobo" Hines.

[2] Kaye, his mother, and his sister Norma moved to Portsmouth, where a life insurance policy provided temporary financial support.

At fourteen, Kaye began to visit nightclubs where black musicians were welcome, such as The Shim Sham and The Nest; he won first prize in a song contest, a tour with the Billy Cotton band.

Engaged as a tap dancer with Billy Cotton's show band in 1936, Kaye recorded his first song, "Shoe Shine Boy", under the name Cab Quay.

Until 1940, he sang and drummed with the Ivor Kirchin Band,[1] with Steve Race on piano, in the Paramount Dance Hall on Tottenham Court Road, London, where he was one of the only black people around.

The incident led to the regular acceptance of black people, and the Paramount Dance Hall grew into a sort of "Harlem of London".

[4] After a short period with Britain's first black swing band leader, Ken Snakehips Johnson (and His Rhythm Swingers), Kaye played in several radio broadcasts.

Three days after Kaye enlisted, Ken "Snakehips" Johnson and saxophonist David Williams were killed on 8 March 1941, when a bomb fell on the Café de Paris nightclub in London's West End where they were performing.

While recuperating in New York, he went to concerts and played in clubs in Harlem and Greenwich Village with Roy Eldridge, Sandy Williams, Slam Stewart, Pete Brown, Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, and Willie "The Lion" Smith.

In this period he also led Cab Kaye and his Coloured Orchestra and co-led The Cabinettes with Ronnie Ball, featuring "blues singer" Mona Baptiste from Trinidad.

With his All Coloured Band,[7] featuring Dave Wilkins, Henry Shalofsky (Hank Shaw) and Sam Walker, Cab Kaye then toured in France, Belgium, Germany, and the Netherlands in 1950 and 1951.

The Ringside was frequented by such jazz musicians as Art Simmons, Annie Ross, James Moody, Pierre Michelot, and Babs Gonzales.

[1] In the Netherlands, Kaye played in the newly opened Avifauna in Alphen aan den Rijn, the world's first bird park.

Van Rees had the idea to form a big band with twelve band leaders who were rarely heard on Dutch radio, including Wil Hensbergen, Max Woiski Sr., vibraphonist Eddy Sanchez, Johnny Kraaykamp, and Wessel Ilcken Also in 1956, Kaye played at the Sheherazade jazz club in Amsterdam's with his All Star Quintet consisting of Rob Pronk (piano), Toon van Vliet (tenor sax), Dub Dubois (bass) and drummer Wally Bishop.

In 1959, he joined the ensemble of Humphrey Lyttelton in London, which led to the recording of the album Humph Meets Cab (March 1960),[1] with his characteristic witty vocals on pieces such as "Let Love Lie Sleeping".

[15] The Manchester Evening News announced on 25 August 1960 that the next day's BBC TV Jazz Session was to feature the Dill Quintet, the Bob Wallis Storyville Jazzmen, and singer Cab Kaye.

Two family members in high government positions, Tawia Adamafio and C. T. Nylander, had brought Kaye into contact with Ghanaian politics.

Before leaving for Ghana, Kaye and his Kwamlah Quaye Sextetto Africana recorded "Everything Is Go", the song he had written with William "Bill" Davis.

At the Star Hotel in 1963, he joined drummer Guy Warren (later known as "Kofi Ghanaba") and folk singer Pete Seeger who was on a world tour and popular in Ghana.

Kaye played in Accra (including the Tip-Toe Gardens) and in Lagos, alternating with performances in New York (at the Village Door in Long Island).

In the early 1960s the Ghanaian Ramblers Dance Band covered Kaye's highlife song "Beautiful Ghana" under the title "Work and Happiness".

The song was released by Decca (West Africa) frequently played during Kwame Nkrumah's regime as part of the "Work and Happiness" political program.

In 1996 Kaye played again in Lagos at the Federal Palace Hotel in a program including Fela Kuti and highlife bandleader Bobby Benson.

[1] He began his second London career in Mike Leroy's Chez Club Cleo in Knightsbridge accompanied by Clive Cooper (bass) and Cecil "Flash" Winston (drums).

He opened Cab Kaye's Jazz Piano Bar[1] in the centre of Amsterdam on 1 October 1979 at Beulingstraat 9, with his Dutch wife Jeannette.

When not touring Poland, Portugal, and Iceland, he performed five nights a week in his Piano Bar, a meeting place for jazz musicians.

Kaye gave many concerts in the Netherlands, including several with Max "Teawhistle" Teeuwisse in Den Oever and four times at the North Sea Jazz Festival.