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Nobody Knows You When You're Down And Out
"Nobody Knows You When You're Down and Out" is a blues standard written by pianist Jimmie Cox in 1923 and originally performed in a Vaudeville-blues style. The lyrics in the popular 1929 recording by Bessie Smith are told from the point of view of somebody who was once wealthy during the Prohibition era and reflect on the fleeting nature of material wealth and the friendships that come and go with it. Since her 1929 recording, the song has been interpreted by numerous musicians in a variety of styles. Lyrics and composition When the song was composed in 1923, the "Roaring Twenties" were coming into full swing. Cox's publisher Clarence Williams Music filed a copyright registration on December 17, 1923 listing the title as "Nobody knows you when you are down and out" (no contraction). After the post-World War I recession, a new era of prosperity was experienced in the U.S. and elsewhere. However, in the face of all the optimism, the known lyrics form a cautionary tale about the f ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bessie Smith
Bessie Smith (April 15, 1894 – September 26, 1937) was an American blues singer widely renowned during the Jazz Age. Nicknamed the " Empress of the Blues", she was the most popular female blues singer of the 1930s. Inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1989, she is often regarded as one of the greatest singers of her era and was a major influence on fellow blues singers, as well as jazz vocalists. Born in Chattanooga, Tennessee, Smith was young when her parents died, and she and her six siblings survived by performing on street corners. She began touring and performed in a group that included Ma Rainey, and then went out on her own. Her successful recording career with Columbia Records began in 1923, but her performing career was cut short by a car crash that killed her at the age of 43. Biography Early life The 1900 census indicates that her family reported that Bessie Smith was born in Chattanooga, Tennessee, in July 1892. The 1910 census gives her age as ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Fats Waller
Thomas Wright "Fats" Waller (May 21, 1904 – December 15, 1943) was an American jazz pianist, organist, composer, violinist, singer, and comedic entertainer. His innovations in the Harlem stride style laid much of the basis for modern jazz piano. His best-known compositions, " Ain't Misbehavin'" and " Honeysuckle Rose", were inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1984 and 1999. Waller copyrighted over 400 songs, many of them co-written with his closest collaborator, Andy Razaf. Razaf described his partner as "the soul of melody... a man who made the piano sing... both big in body and in mind... known for his generosity... a bubbling bundle of joy". It is likely that he composed many more popular songs than he has been credited with: when in financial difficulties he had a habit of selling songs to other writers and performers who claimed them as their own. Waller started playing the piano at the age of six, and became a professional organist at 15. By the age of 18, he was ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Nina Simone
Eunice Kathleen Waymon (February 21, 1933 – April 21, 2003), known professionally as Nina Simone (), was an American singer, songwriter, pianist, and civil rights activist. Her music spanned styles including classical, folk, gospel, blues, jazz, R&B, and pop. The sixth of eight children born from a poor family in Tryon, North Carolina, Simone initially aspired to be a concert pianist. With the help of a few supporters in her hometown, she enrolled in the Juilliard School of Music in New York City. She then applied for a scholarship to study at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, where, despite a well received audition, she was denied admission,Liz Garbus, 2015 documentary film, ''What Happened, Miss Simone?'' which she attributed to racism. In 2003, just days before her death, the Institute awarded her an honorary degree. To make a living, Simone started playing piano at a nightclub in Atlantic City. She changed her name to "Nina Simone" to disguise herself ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
American Folk Music Revival
The American folk music revival began during the 1940s and peaked in popularity in the mid-1960s. Its roots went earlier, and performers like Josh White, Burl Ives, Woody Guthrie, Lead Belly, Big Bill Broonzy, Billie Holiday, Richard Dyer-Bennet, Oscar Brand, Jean Ritchie, John Jacob Niles, Susan Reed, Paul Robeson, Bessie Smith, Ma Rainey and Cisco Houston had enjoyed a limited general popularity in the 1930s and 1940s. The revival brought forward styles of American folk music that had in earlier times contributed to the development of country and western, blues, jazz, and rock and roll music. Overview Early years The folk revival in New York City was rooted in the resurgent interest in square dancing and folk dancing there in the 1940s as espoused by instructors such as Margot Mayo, which gave musicians such as Pete Seeger popular exposure. The folk revival more generally as a popular and commercial phenomenon begins with the career of The Weavers, formed in November 194 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Billboard (magazine)
''Billboard'' (stylized as ''billboard'') is an American music and entertainment magazine published weekly by Penske Media Corporation. The magazine provides music charts, news, video, opinion, reviews, events, and style related to the music industry. Its music charts include the Hot 100, the 200, and the Global 200, tracking the most popular albums and songs in different genres of music. It also hosts events, owns a publishing firm, and operates several TV shows. ''Billboard'' was founded in 1894 by William Donaldson and James Hennegan as a trade publication for bill posters. Donaldson later acquired Hennegan's interest in 1900 for $500. In the early years of the 20th century, it covered the entertainment industry, such as circuses, fairs, and burlesque shows, and also created a mail service for travelling entertainers. ''Billboard'' began focusing more on the music industry as the jukebox, phonograph, and radio became commonplace. Many topics it covered were spun-off ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Race Records
Race records were 78 rpm, 78-rpm phonograph records marketed to African Americans between the 1920s and 1940s.Oliver, Paul. "Race record." Grove Music Online. Oxford Music Online. 13 Feb. 2015. They primarily contained race music, comprising various African-American musical genres, blues, jazz, and gospel music, Rhythm and blues and also comedy. These records were, at the time, the majority of commercial recordings of African American artists in the U.S., and few African American artists were marketed to white audiences. Race records were marketed by Okeh Records, Emerson Records, Vocalion Records, Victor Talking Machine Company, Paramount Records, and several other companies. History Before the rise of the record industry in America, the cost of phonographs prevented most African Americans from listening to recorded music. At the turn of the twentieth century, the cost of listening to music went down, providing a majority of Americans with the ability to afford records. The pri ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Great Depression
The Great Depression (19291939) was an economic shock that impacted most countries across the world. It was a period of economic depression that became evident after a major fall in stock prices in the United States. The economic contagion began around September and led to the Wall Street stock market crash of October 24 (Black Thursday). It was the longest, deepest, and most widespread depression of the 20th century. Between 1929 and 1932, worldwide gross domestic product (GDP) fell by an estimated 15%. By comparison, worldwide GDP fell by less than 1% from 2008 to 2009 during the Great Recession. Some economies started to recover by the mid-1930s. However, in many countries, the negative effects of the Great Depression lasted until the beginning of World War II. Devastating effects were seen in both rich and poor countries with falling personal income, prices, tax revenues, and profits. International trade fell by more than 50%, unemployment in the U.S. rose to 23% and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Wall Street Crash Of 1929
The Wall Street Crash of 1929, also known as the Great Crash, was a major American stock market crash that occurred in the autumn of 1929. It started in September and ended late in October, when share prices on the New York Stock Exchange collapsed. It was the most devastating stock market crash in the history of the United States, when taking into consideration the full extent and duration of its aftereffects. The Great Crash is mostly associated with October 24, 1929, called ''Black Thursday'', the day of the largest sell-off of shares in U.S. history, and October 29, 1929, called ''Black Tuesday'', when investors traded some 16 million shares on the New York Stock Exchange in a single day. The crash, which followed the London Stock Exchange's crash of September, signaled the beginning of the Great Depression. Background The "Roaring Twenties", the decade following World War I that led to the crash, was a time of wealth and excess. Building on post-war optimism, rural Amer ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Vocalion Records
Vocalion Records is an American record company and label. History The label was founded in 1916 by the Aeolian Company, a maker of pianos and organs, as Aeolian-Vocalion; the company also sold phonographs under the Vocalion name. "Aeolian" was later dropped from the label's name. In late 1924, the label was acquired by Brunswick Records. During the 1920s, Vocalion also began the 1000 race series, records recorded by and marketed to African Americans. Jim Jackson recorded "Jim Jackson's Kansas City Blues" for Vocalion in 1927. It sold exceptionally well, and the song became a blues standard for musicians from Memphis and Mississippi. The label issued Robert Johnson's "Cross Road Blues" The name Vocalion was resurrected in the late 1950s by American Decca as a budget label for back-catalog reissues. This incarnation of Vocalion ceased operations in 1973; however, its replacement as MCA's budget imprint, Coral Records Coral Records was a subsidiary of Decca Records that was fo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pinetop Smith
Clarence Smith (June 11, 1904 – March 15, 1929), better known as Pinetop Smith or Pine Top Smith, was an American boogie-woogie style blues pianist. His hit tune "Pine Top's Boogie Woogie" featured rhythmic "breaks" that were an essential ingredient of ragtime music, but also a fundamental foreshadowing of rock & roll. The song was also the first known use of the term "boogie woogie" on a record, and cemented that term as the moniker for the genre. Career Smith was born to an African American family in Troy, Alabama and raised in Birmingham, Alabama. He received his nickname as a child from his liking for climbing trees. In 1920 he moved to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where he worked as an entertainer before touring on the Theatre Owners Booking Association (T.O.B.A.) vaudeville circuit, performing as a singer and comedian as well as a pianist. For a time, he worked as accompanist for blues singer Ma Rainey and Butterbeans and Susie. In the mid-1920s, he was recommended b ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Boogie-woogie
Boogie-woogie is a genre of blues music that became popular during the late 1920s, developed in African-American communities since 1870s.Paul, Elliot, ''That Crazy American Music'' (1957), Chapter 10, p. 229. It was eventually extended from piano, to piano duo and trio, guitar, big band, country and western music, and gospel. While standard blues traditionally expresses a variety of emotions, boogie-woogie is mainly associated with dancing (although not the competitive dance known as boogie-woogie, a term of convenience in that sport). The genre had a significant influence on rhythm and blues and rock and roll. Musical features Boogie-woogie is characterized by a regular left-hand bass figure, which is transposed following the chord changes. : : Boogie-woogie is not strictly a solo piano style; it can accompany singers and be featured in orchestras and small combos. It is sometimes called ''"eight to the bar"'', as much of it is written in common time () time using eighth notes ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pathé Records
Pathé Records was an international record company and label and producer of phonographs, based in France, and active from the 1890s through the 1930s. Early years The Pathé record business was founded by brothers Charles and Émile Pathé, then owners of a successful bistro in Paris. In the mid-1890s, they began selling Edison and Columbia phonographs and accompanying cylinder records. Shortly thereafter, the brothers designed and sold their own phonographs. These incorporated elements of other brands. Soon after, they also started marketing pre-recorded cylinder records. By 1896 the Pathé brothers had offices and recording studios not only in Paris, but also in London, Milan, and St. Petersburg. Pathé cylinders and discs In 1894, the Pathé brothers started selling their own phonographs. The earliest Pathé offerings were phonograph cylinders. Pathé manufactured cylinder records until approximately 1914. In addition to standard size cylinder records (), Pathé produc ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
