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Document Records
Document Records is an independent record label, founded in Austria and now based in Scotland, that specializes in reissuing vintage blues and jazz. The company has been recognised by The Blues Foundation, being honoured with a Keeping the Blues Alive Award. Document Records is the only UK-based recipient of the award in 2018. History Document was established in 1986 by Johnny Parth, the former owner of Roots Records, in Austria to make previously unreleased blues and gospel records from before the 1942–44 musicians' strike available on a number of European labels. In 1990, Parth felt obliged to switch production from LP to CD. With this change, he consolidated the catalogue into complete reissues in chronological order, increasingly on the Document label as other label names were dropped. The new policy was to reissue as many as possible of the recordings listed in the book, ''Blues and Gospel Records: 1890–1943''. The scope was expanded to include bluegrass, spiritu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Johnny Parth
Johann Ferdinand "Johnny" Parth (born 11 January 1930), is an Austrian record producer, retired club owner, musician and artist, who founded Document Records, the leading record label in the reissue of early jazz and blues recordings. Biography Born in the Ottakring district of Vienna, Parth grew up listening to traditional Viennese folk music, but was attracted to jazz records played by friends who were active in the Austrian resistance movement in the Second World War. After studying art he became a portrait painter and restorer of old paintings. He also started acquiring a library of old jazz and blues 78 rpm records, and became keen to share them among fellow collectors and aficionados. "The History of Document Records - Part 1", ''Document Records'' Retrieved 20 Se ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Edison Records
Edison Records was one of the early record labels that pioneered sound recording and reproduction, and was an important player in the early recording industry. The first phonograph cylinders were manufactured in 1888, followed by Edison's foundation of the Edison Phonograph Company in the same year. The recorded wax cylinders, later replaced by Blue Amberol cylinders, and vertical-cut Diamond Discs, were manufactured by Edison's National Phonograph Company from 1896 on, reorganized as Thomas A. Edison, Inc. in 1911. Until 1910 the recordings did not carry the names of the artists. The company began to lag behind its rivals in the 1920s, both technically and in the popularity of its artists, and halted production of recordings in 1929. Before commercial mass-produced records Thomas A. Edison invented the phonograph, the first device for recording and playing back sound, in 1877. After patenting the invention and benefiting from the publicity and acclaim it received, Edison and h ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Esther Bigeou
Esther Bigeou (1892 – November 15, 1936) was an American vaudeville and blues singer. Billed as "The Girl with the Million Dollar Smile", she was one of the classic female blues singers popular in the 1920s. Biography She was born in New Orleans, Louisiana in about 1892. Several members of her extended family were musicians; the drummer Paul Barbarin was her cousin. Harris, Sheldon (1994). ''Blues Who's Who''. (Rev. ed.). New York: Da Capo Press. p. 48. . In 1913 she began touring in vaudeville with the performer and playwright Irvin C. Miller; they later married. In 1917 Bigeou appeared as a singer, dancer, and recitalist in the revue ''Broadway Rastus'', written by Miller, at the Standard Theater in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the Lafayette Theater in New York City, and the Orpheum Theater in Baltimore, Maryland. She recorded for OKeh Records in 1921 and 1923 and toured the Theater Owners Booking Association vaudeville circuit with the Billy King Company in 1923. From 1923 to ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Big Maceo Merriweather
Major Merriweather (March 31, 1905 – February 23, 1953), better known as Big Maceo Merriweather, was an American pianist and blues singer. He was mainly active in Chicago through the 1940s. Career Born in Newnan, Georgia, he was a self-taught pianist. In the 1920s, he moved to Detroit, Michigan, to begin his music career. He moved to Chicago in 1941, where he made the acquaintance of Tampa Red. Red introduced him to Lester Melrose of RCA Victor and its subsidiary label Bluebird Records, who signed Merriweather to a recording contract. His first record was "" (1941), which became a blues |
Gladys Bentley
Gladys Alberta Bentley (August 12, 1907 – January 18, 1960) was an American blues singer, pianist, and entertainer during the Harlem Renaissance. Her career skyrocketed when she appeared at Harry Hansberry's Clam House in New York in the 1920s, as a black, lesbian, cross-dressing performer. She headlined in the early 1930s at Harlem's Ubangi Club, where she was backed up by a chorus line of drag queens. She dressed in men's clothes (including a signature tail coat and top hat), played piano, and sang her own raunchy lyrics to popular tunes of the day in a deep, growling voice while flirting with women in the audience. On the decline of the Harlem speakeasies with the repeal of Prohibition, she relocated to southern California, where she was billed as "America's Greatest Sepia Piano Player" and the "Brown Bomber of Sophisticated Songs". She was frequently harassed for wearing men's clothing. She tried to continue her musical career but did not achieve as much success as ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ed Bell (musician)
Ed Bell (born May 1905, died 1960, 1965 or 1966) was an American Piedmont blues and country blues singer, guitarist and songwriter whose identity has only recently been verified by historians. Some of his records were released under the pseudonyms Sluefoot Joe and Barefoot Bill from Alabama. His best-remembered recording is "Mamlish Blues". Colin Larkin noted in the ''Encyclopedia of Popular Music'' that "Bell stands as the most influential Alabama artist in pre-war blues recordings." Biography Bell was born on the Davis Plantation, near Fort Deposit, Alabama. As a child he moved with his family to Greenville, Alabama. An older cousin, Joe Pat Dean, took Bell to Muscle Shoals, Alabama, in 1919, where he learned to play the blues. In the early 1920s, Bell worked in agriculture and performed as a blues musician, often with his friend Pillie Bolling. He performed many times in Philadelphia and Ohio. His debut recording, of his own songs "Mamlish Blues" and "The Hambone Blues," was ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Blue Lu Barker
Louisa "Blue Lu" Barker (née Louise Dupont) (November 13, 1913 – May 7, 1998) was an American jazz and blues singer. Her better-known recordings include "Don't You Feel My Leg" (1938), which she wrote with her husband, "Georgia Grind" and "Look What Baby's Got for You." She was born in New Orleans, Louisiana, and often sang and performed with her husband, guitarist Danny Barker, a regular of the New Orleans music scene. Barker's recording of " A Little Bird Told Me" was released by Capitol Records as catalogue number 15308 in 1948. It first reached the ''Billboard'' chart on December 18, 1948, and lasted 14 weeks on the chart, peaking at number 4. Barker was inducted into the Louisiana Blues Hall of Fame in 1997, one year before she died in New Orleans, at the age of 84. See also *List of classic female blues singers *List of people from New Orleans, Louisiana This is a list of notable individuals who are or were natives, or notable as residents of, or in association ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Barbecue Bob
Robert Hicks, better known as Barbecue Bob (September 11, 1902 – October 21, 1931), was an early American Piedmont blues musician. His nickname was derived from his working as a cook in a barbecue restaurant. One of the three extant photographs of him show him playing a guitar and wearing a full-length white apron and cook's hat. Early life Hicks was born in Walnut Grove, Georgia. His parents, Charlie and Mary Hicks, were farmers. He and his brother, Charlie Hicks, together with Curley Weaver, were taught how to play the guitar by Curley's mother, Savannah "Dip" Weaver.Barlow, William (1989). ''"Looking Up at Down": The Emergence of Blues Culture''. Temple University Press. pp. 195–96. . Bob began playing the 6-string guitar but picked up the 12-string guitar after moving to Atlanta, Georgia, in 1924. He became one of the prominent performers of the newly developing Atlanta blues style. In Atlanta, Hicks worked at various jobs, playing music on the side. While working at Ti ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kid Bailey
Kid Bailey (Date of birth unknown - after 1960) was a Mississippi Delta bluesman. His one known recording session occurred on September 25, 1929, in Memphis, Tennessee. Little is known about Bailey. His voice had a distinctly coarse yet youthful quality. Two of his recordings have survived: "Rowdy Blues" and "Mississippi Bottom Blues". In most digital releases, the tracks are attributed to Willie Brown yet are evidently the same artist credited as Kid Bailey on the original 78-rpm recordings. It has been remarked that "Although it's almost a cliché to say this about a blues musician from the American South, Kid Bailey was one of the most enigmatic musicians of the era." There has been some speculation that Kid Bailey was a pseudonym of the blues singer Willie Brown. Bailey's songs have been covered by Ian A. Anderson, Rory Block, Doug Cox, the Be Good Tanyas, and Thomasina Winslow with Nick Katzman. His song "Rowdy Blues" is included on the compilation album ''Masters ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Josephine Baker
Josephine Baker (born Freda Josephine McDonald; naturalised French Joséphine Baker; 3 June 1906 – 12 April 1975) was an American-born French dancer, singer and actress. Her career was centered primarily in Europe, mostly in her adopted France. She was the first black woman to star in a major motion picture, the 1927 silent film '' Siren of the Tropics'', directed by and . During her early career, Baker was among the most celebrated performers to headline the revues of the in Paris. Her performance in the revue in 1927 caused a sensation in the city. Her costume, consisting of only a short skirt of artificial bananas and a beaded necklace, became an iconic image and a symbol both of the Jazz Age and the Roaring Twenties. Baker was celebrated by artists and intellectuals of the era, who variously dubbed her the "Black Venus", the "Black Pearl", the "Bronze Venus", and the "Creole Goddess". Born in St. Louis, Missouri, she renounced her U.S. citizenship and became a Frenc ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kokomo Arnold
James "Kokomo" Arnold (February 15, 1896 or 1901 – November 8, 1968) was an American blues musician. A left-handed slide guitarist, his intense style of playing and rapid-fire vocal delivery set him apart from his contemporaries. He got his nickname in 1934 after releasing "Old Original Kokomo Blues" for Decca Records, a cover version of Scrapper Blackwell's blues song about the city of Kokomo, Indiana. Early life Arnold was born in Lovejoy's Station, Georgia. Most sources give the date his birth as 1901, but the researchers Bob Eagle and Eric LeBlanc give the date as 1896, on the basis of information in the 1900 census. He learned the basics of playing the guitar from his cousin, John Wiggs.Briggs, Keith (1991). ''Kokomo Arnold, Complete Recorded Works, Vol. 1 (May 17, 1930 to March 15, 1935)''. Document Records. Career Arnold began playing in the early 1920s as a sideline, when he was working as a farmhand in Buffalo, New York, and as a steelworker in Pittsburgh, Pennsyl ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pink Anderson
Pinkney "Pink" Anderson (February 12, 1900 – October 12, 1974) was an American blues singer and guitarist. Life and career Anderson was born in Laurens, South Carolina, and raised in nearby Greenville and Spartanburg. He joined Dr. William R. Kerr of the Indian Remedy Company in 1914 to entertain the crowds, while Kerr tried to sell a concoction purported to have medicinal qualities. During this time Anderson occasionally worked with Blind Simmie Dooley in the Spartanburg area, recording with him in 1928 for the Columbia label. In the 1950s Anderson toured with Leo "Chief Thundercloud" Kahdot and his medicine show, often with the harmonica player Arthur " Peg Leg Sam" Jackson, who was based in Jonesville, South Carolina. Anderson was recorded by the folklorist Paul Clayton at the Virginia State Fair in May 1950. He recorded an album in the early 1960s and performed at some live venues.Unterberger, Richie. Pink Anderson: Biography AllMusic. He appeared in the 1963 film ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
_at_Burr_Oak_Cemetery.jpg "Click for more on -> Kokomo Arnold")
