Everything about Ma Rainey totally explained
Gertrude Malissa Nix Pridgett Rainey, better known as
Ma Rainey (
April 26,
1886 –
December 22,
1939), was one of the earliest known
American professional
blues singers and one of the first generation of such singers to record. She was billed as
The Mother of the Blues. She did much to develop and popularize the form and was an important influence on younger blues women, such as
Bessie Smith, and their careers.
Career
Rainey was born in
Columbus, Georgia. She first appeared on stage in Columbus in "A Bunch of Blackberries" at fourteen. She then joined a traveling
vaudeville troupe, the
Rabbit Foot Minstrels. After hearing a blues song at a theater in
St. Louis, Missouri, sung by a local girl in
1902, she started performing in a blues style. She claimed at that time that she was the one who coined the name "blues" for the style that she specialized in.
In the one known interview she did, Rainey told the following story, In 1902 "a girl from town... came to the tent one morning and began to sing about the "man" who left her. The song was so strange and poignanat that it attracted much attention,and Rainey learned the song fron the visitor, and used it soon afterwards in her "act"." Audiences reacted strongly to the song.
She married fellow vaudeville singer William "Pa" Rainey in 1904, billing herself from that point as "Ma" Rainey. The pair toured with the Rabbit Foot Minstrels as "Rainey & Rainey, Assassinators of the Blues", singing a mix of blues and popular songs. In 1912, she took the young
Bessie Smith into the Rabbit Foot Minstrels, trained her, and worked with her until Smith left in 1915.
Also known, though less discussed, is the fact that she was
bisexual. She was arrested in Chicago in 1925 for hosting an ‘indecent party’ with a room full of semi-naked women. Rainey celebrated the lesbian lifestyle in "Prove It On Me Blues", but hid behind a cross-dressing man-hating persona that was quite distinct from her regular public image:
» Went out last night with a crowd of my friends,
They must have been women, 'cause I don't like no men. » It's true I wear a collar and a tie, Make the wind blow all the time
They say I do it, ain't nobody caught me, Sure got to prove it on me. |
In most of her songs, Ma projected herself as a passionate and often mistreated lover of men. In private, her preference was for young men. The poet
Sterling Brown tells of approaching her as a fan with the musicologist John Work. She immediately propositioned them as she was having trouble with her young musicians. Brown wrote a moving poem about Ma Rainey and her huge popularity with Southern audiences.
Ma Rainey was already a veteran performer with decades of touring in
African-American shows in the
U.S. Southern States when she made her first recordings in
1923. Rainey signed with
Paramount Records and, between
1923 and
1928, she recorded 100 songs, including the classics "C.C. Rider" (aka "
See See Rider") and "Jelly Bean Blues", the humorous "Ma Rainey's Black Bottom", and the deep blues "Bo Weavil Blues". In her career, Rainey was backed by such noted jazz musicians as cornet players
Louis Armstrong and
Tommy Ladnier, pianists
Fletcher Henderson and
Lovie Austin, saxophonist
Coleman Hawkins, and clarinetist
Buster Bailey. Rainey recorded two vocal duets with
Papa Charlie Jackson in 1928, which proved to be her last recordings; Paramount terminated her contract soon afterwards, claiming that her material had gone out of fashion.
Rainey's career dried up in the
1930s--as did the career of just about every other classic female blues singers of the previous decade. But her earnings were enough that she was able to retire from performing in
1933.
Death
Rainey returned to her hometown,
Columbus, Georgia, where she ran two theaters, "The Lyric" and "The Airdrome", until her death from a
heart attack in
1939. She was inducted into the
Blues Foundation's Hall of Fame in
1983, and the
Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in
1990.
Legacy
One year after Rainey's death, blues singer and guitarist
Memphis Minnie recorded a tribute.
French singer/song writer
Francis Cabrel refers to Ma Rainey in the song "Cent Ans de Plus" on the 1999 album
Hors-Saison. Cabrel cites the artist as one of a number of blues influences, including
Charley Patton,
Son House,
Blind Lemon,
Robert Johnson,
Howlin' Wolf,
Blind Blake,
Willie Dixon, and
Blues Boy Willie, whose father toured with Rainey.
American singer/songwriter
Bob Dylan refers to Ma Rainey in the song "Tombstone Blues" on his
1965 album,
Highway 61 Revisited.
The
1982 August Wilson play
Ma Rainey's Black Bottom took its title from her song of the same name recorded before 1928, which ostensibly refers to the
Black Bottom dance of the time.
In
1994, the
U.S. Post Office issued a Ma Rainey 29-cent commemorative postage stamp.
In
2004, her song "
See See Rider Blues" (
1925) was inducted in the
Grammy Hall of Fame, and was included by the
National Recording Preservation Board in the
Library of Congress'
National Recording Registry in
2004. The board selects songs in an annual basis that are "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".
Footnotes
Further Information
Get more info on 'Ma Rainey'.
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