Edith Wilson (singer)
Edith Wilson ( born September 2, 1896 in Louisville ( Kentucky) as Edith Goodall, † March 30, 1981 in Chicago) was an American blues singer and actress. She was one of the early stars of African-American musical theater.
Life and work
Edith Wilson was from an African-American family of the middle class; to their ancestors belonged to the former Vice President John C. Breckinridge. She began her career in vaudeville performances in the Park Theatre of Louisville, where she worked with the blues singer Lena Wilson and her brother, pianist Danny Wilson, appeared, whom she married soon afterwards; the three then toured successfully throughout Baltimore and toured together on the east coast of the USA.
In 1921 she became famous when she replaced Mamie Smith in Perry Bradford's musical revue Put And Take. Bradford also arranged in 1921 the first disk recordings for Columbia with Johnny Dunn's Jazz Hounds ( Nervous Blues, Vampin ' Liza Jane ); 1921-1922 created 17 plate sides for OKeh Records. She then toured with the Lew Leslie 's Plantation Revue ( the first in the Lafayette Theater in Harlem concerted, later From Dover Street To Dixie ), with whom she has performed in London in 1923. Upon her return to New York she has performed with Florence Mills on in the musical revue Dixie To Broadway. Until 1926, she appeared in various theaters and cabarets (including Club Alabama ) in the New York, before she was a vocalist in Sam Wooding Orchestra, with whom she performed in the show Chocolate Kiddies with Louis Armstrong and Fats Waller ( The Thousand Pounds of Harmony), toured and toured until 1929 in Western Europe, Turkey, Russia and Argentina. Other recordings were made for Columbia 1924725 ( How Come You Do Me Like You Do ), 1929 for Brunswick and 1930 for Victor.
In the 1930s, she continued her concert tours with various musical revues and also appeared with the orchestras of Fess Williams, Cab Calloway, Jimmie Lunceford, Noble Sissle and Lucky Millinder. During the Second World War, she often toured in USO shows for the troops entertainment and had minor speaking roles in feature films, as in the Humphrey Bogart / Lauren Bacall classic To Have and Have Not (1944).
In the early 1940s she appeared in Amos N ' Andy radio show and stepped further into musical theater. In the 1950s, they had radio shows and toured as Aunt Jemima in the promotional tours of the Quaker Oats Company. For the stereotypical representation of an African American woman she also garnered criticism. Wilson remained active until 1963 in show business before she finished her performances and from then on worked for the Negro Actors Guild. In the 1970s, she was again active in the music business and went with Eubie Blake ( 1972), Little Brother Montgomery and Terry Waldo on tour. With Montgomery, the Banjoisten Ikey Robinson and the winds Francis and Preston Jackson, they recorded the album He May Be Your Man but He Comes to See Me Sometimes for Delmark on; 1974 was yet another album for the label Wolverine and even individual pieces in 1976. Their last appearance was in 1980 at the Newport Jazz Festival. She died in early March 1981 an intracerebral hemorrhage.
Appreciation
Edith Wilson was one of the series of female singers of the 1920s, the recordings also blues songs in their repertoire, but mainly consisted of theater -and show - pieces. Although she lacked the emotional depth of artists like Bessie Smith, Ma Rainey and Ida Cox, it was their merit to have brought closer to the classic blues song form a white audience in the U.S. and in Europe.
Disco Graphical Notes
- Lena Wilson & Edith Wilson: Complete Recorded Works in Chronological Order, Volume 2 ( 1924-31 ) (Document )
Sources / Links
- Edith Wilson at Redhotjazz
- Discography: Edith Wilson & Johnny Dunn 's Jazz Hounds 1921/22,
- Edith Wilson at Allmusic (English)
- Edith Wilson ( singer ) at the Internet Movie Database (English)
Lexical entry
- Lawrence Cohn ( Ed. ): Nothing But the Blues The Music and the Musicians, 1993, Abbeville Publishing Group, New York ISBN 1-55859-271-7