From:   "Dik de Heer" 
Date:  Mon Apr 15, 2002  1:15 am
Subject:  Born To Be With You : Bessie Smith
 
BESSIE SMITH

Born 15 April 1894, Chattanooga, Tennessee
Died 26 September 1937, Clarkdale, Mississippi

The first major blues and jazz singer on record and one of the most powerful
of all time, Bessie Smith rightly earned the title of "The Empress of the
Blues." Even on her first records in 1923, her passionate voice overcame the
primitive recordinq quality of the day and still communicates easily to
today's listeners (which is not true of any other singer from that early
period). At a time when the blues were in and most vocalists (particularly
vaudevillians) were being dubbed "blues singers," Bessie Smith simply had no
competition.
Back in 1912, Bessie Smith sang in the same show as Ma Rainey who took her
under her wing and coached her. Although Rainey would achieve a measure of
fame throughout her career, she was soon surpassed by her protégé. In 1920
Bessie had her own show in Atlantic City and in 1923 she moved to New York.
She was soon signed by Columbia and her first recording (Alberta Hunter's
"Downhearted Blues") made her famous. Bessie worked and recorded steadily
throughout the decade, using many top musicians as sidemen on sessions
including Louis Armstrong, Joe Smith (her favorite cornetist), James P.
Johnson and Charlie Green. Her summer tent show Harlem Frolics was a big
success during 1925-27 and Mississippi Days in 1928 kept the momentum going.
However by 1929 the blues were out of fashion and Bessie Smith's career was
declining despite being at the peak of her powers (and still only 35!).
She appeared in St. Louis Blues that year (a low-budget movie short that
contains the only footage of her) but her hit recording of "Nobody Knows You
When You're Down and Out" predicted her leaner Depression years. Although
she was dropped by Columbia in 1931 and made her final recordings on a
four-song session in 1933, Bessie Smith kept on working. She played the
Apollo in 1935 and substituted for Billie Holiday in the show Stars Over
Broadway. The chances are very good that she would have made a comeback,
starting with a Carnegie Hall appearance at John Hammond's upcoming "From
Spirituals to Swing" concert, but she was killed in a car crash in
Mississippi.
She was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1989 (in the
category
"early influences"). "The Empress of the Blues", based on her recordings,
will
never have to abdicate her throne.

Biography: Chris Albertson and Gunther Schuller, Bessie Smith : Empress of
the Blues. New York, 1975.
More info: http://mathrisc1.lunet.edu/blues/Bessie_Smith.html
Columbia/Sony has reissued all of her recordings, first in five two-LP sets
and more recently (1991-96) on five 2-CD boxes that also contain her
alternate takes, the soundtrack of St. Louis Blues and an interview with her
niece Ruby Smith.