Singer, Songwriter. Known as Joe Sanders, he was the Sanders part of the well-known Coon-Sanders Orchestra of the 1920s and 1930s. He was the second child of Joseph Harrison Sanders and his wife Helena Soice. His older brother, Roy, became a professional baseball player with the Cincinnati Reds and Pittsburgh Pirates. The family moved from Thayer, Kans., to Belton, Mo., when Joe was a small child and then to Kansas City, Mo., when he was about 13. Trained as a classical pianist, he also had a beautiful tenor voice and gave solo concerts and sang in light opera even as a teenager. He and Carleton Coon met in a music store in Kansas City in 1918 and formed their musical partnership. It became one of the most popular regional jazz/orchestra bands and was soon heard coast-to-coast. Nicknamed the "Nighthawks" for their late night air time, they were the first band heard nationally on the fledgling NBC radio network. The online banter of Joe and Carleton made them hugely popular with their fans. Joe wrote and arranged most of their music and sang on many of their recordings. He collaborated with Gus Kahn who wrote the lyrics to some of his music, including "Beloved" which sold over 1 million copies. The Coon-Sanders Orchestra was the first band that featured a young performer by the name of Mel Torme. Joe married Madeline Baldwin (1897-1947) in Kansas City in 1922; after her death he married Gertrude Reeves (1917-1989) in 1950. There were no children from either marriages. A Coon-Sanders Orchestra fan club continues to exist. The Mann Sound Archives at the University of Missouri-Kansas City maintains masters of the band's recordings as well as some of the original musical manuscripts; it's online "ClubKC" jazz site features some of the Coon-Sanders Orchestra recordings. Joe Sanders' personal papers are housed at the Kansas City, Mo., Public Library.