Iromeio "Romeo" Nelson (March 12, 1902 – May 17, 1974) was an American

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 pia ...

pianist whose recordings from 1929 are regarded as some of the finest, and certainly the fastest, boogie woogie showpieces on record. Born in

Springfield, Tennessee Springfield is a city in and the county seat of Robertson County, Tennessee, Robertson County, which is located in Middle Tennessee on the northern border of the state. As of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, the city's population was 18, ...

, he moved to

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...

at the age of six. For most of his life he played piano at rent parties in the city, although he also lived in

East St. Louis East or Orient is one of the four cardinal directions or points of the compass. It is the opposite direction from west and is the direction from which the Sun rises on the Earth. Etymology As in other languages, the word is formed from the f ...

for a while in the early 1920s. In 1929, he made his only series of recordings for

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 ...

. These included "Gettin' Dirty Just Shakin' That Thing", renowned for its raunchy "

signifying Signifyin' (sometimes written "signifyin(g)") (vernacular), is a wordplay. It is a practice in African-American culture involving a verbal strategy of indirection that exploits the gap between the denotative and figurative meanings of words. A sim ...

" lyrics, and "Head Rag Hop", featuring talking by

Tampa Red Hudson Whittaker (born Hudson Woodbridge; January 8, 1903March 19, 1981), known as Tampa Red, was a Chicago blues musician. His distinctive single-string slide guitar style, songwriting and bottleneck technique influenced other Chicago blues gui ...

and

Frankie Jaxon Frankie "Half-Pint" Jaxon, born Frank Devera Jackson (March 3, 1896 or 1897 – May 15, 1953),Legal name and birth/death dates from headstone application as a military veteran, reproduced in Brian BergerFrankie Jaxon Hilobrow, 2013-02-03. Access ...

.Peter J. Silvester, ''A Left Hand Like God : a history of boogie-woogie piano'' (1989), pp. 263-264, Da Capo, "Head Rag Hop" also was released on the Brunswick Collector Series label, which read: "Head Rag Hop", Romeo Nelson, recorded September 1929. On the

b-side The A-side and B-side are the two sides of phonograph records and cassettes; these terms have often been printed on the labels of two-sided music recordings. The A-side usually features a recording that its artist, producer, or record compan ...

of this 78 rpm record is "Wilkins Street Stomp", by

Speckled Red Rufus George Perryman (October 23, 1892 – January 2, 1973), known as Speckled Red, was an American blues and boogie-woogie piano player and singer noted for his recordings of "The Dirty Dozens", exchanges of insults and vulgar remarks that have ...

. The record was part of a Brunswick album titled: ''Boogie Woogie Piano, Historic Recordings by Pioneer Piano Men.'' Also featured were:

Montana Taylor Arthur "Montana" Taylor (1903 – c.1958) was an American boogie-woogie and piano blues pianist, best known for his recordings in the 1940s, and regarded as the leading exponent of the " barrelhouse" style of playing. Life and career Taylor was ...

, Speckled Red, and

Cow Cow Davenport Charles Edward "Cow Cow" Davenport (April 23, 1894 – December 3, 1955) was an American boogie-woogie and piano blues player as well as a vaudeville entertainer. He also played the organ and sang. Davenport, who also made recordings under the ...

.Brunswick Collector Series Album No. B-1005. Nelson died of

renal failure Kidney failure, also known as end-stage kidney disease, is a medical condition in which the kidneys can no longer adequately filter waste products from the blood, functioning at less than 15% of normal levels. Kidney failure is classified as eit ...

in May 1974.

References

External links

Illustrated Romeo Nelson discography
{{DEFAULTSORT:Nelson, Romeo 1902 births 1974 deaths American blues pianists American male pianists Boogie-woogie pianists Musicians from Tennessee Deaths from kidney failure 20th-century American pianists 20th-century American male musicians Burials at Restvale Cemetery