Ina Ray Hutton was the band leader of the Melodears, one of
the first all-female swing bands ever to be recorded and filmed. She passed as white for her entire musical
career during the 1930s through the 1960s.
She was recorded as mulatto on her census records as a
child, back when her name was Odessa Cowan.
Growing up in Chicago's South side she was first acquainted with music
and performing at an early age. Her
mother was a piano player in dance halls and hotel ballrooms. Odessa studied dance with Hazel Thompson
Davis, a very prominent black teacher and choreographer. Her first taste of fame was when she was
published in the Defender at the age of seven.
Around the age of fourteen she made her Broadway debut and at sixteen
she was a featured singer and dancer in George White's "Melody". She began touring with the Melodears around
eighteen years old and was known for doing several costume changes, something
extremely unusual at that time. She
conducted the band with her whole body, making broad gestures and dancing all
over the stage. In the 1940s she dyed
her hair brown and lead an all-male band.
Her sister known as bot Elaine Merritt and June Hutton, was
also a singer and member of the Melodears.
