BIS Secondary Composer of the Month

Bessie Smith

(born 1894, died 1937)

Bessie Smith was an American blues singer and songwriter.  Nicknamed the Empress of the Blues, Smith is often regarded as one of the greatest jazz musicians of the 1920s and 1930s.

BIOGRAPHY

Born in Tennessee in 1892, Smith grew up in poverty and obscurity. For several years, the young Smith travelled through the South singing in bars and theatres in small towns.  In 1920 she settled in Philadelphia, and made her first recordings, including the classic Down Hearted Blues which became an enormous success, selling more than two million copies.

Smith’s subject matter was the classic material of the blues: poverty and oppression, unrequited love, and stoic acceptance of defeat at the hands of a cruel and indifferent world.

Smith's career was cut short by the Great Depression, which nearly put the recording industry out of business. She never stopped performing, however, continuing touring and singing in clubs. In 1929, she appeared in a Broadway musical Pansy and the motion picture St. Louis Blues.

Smith died in 1937 from injuries sustained in a road accident.  It has been said that, had she been white, she would have received medical treatment that would have saved her life.

SELECTED WORKS

Jail House Blues (1923)

Pinch Back Blues (1924)

He's Gone Blues (1925)

You've Been a Good Ole Wagon (1925)

Back-Water Blues (1927)

Young Woman's Blues (1927)

Sweet Potato Blues (1928)

Dirty No-Gooder's Blues (1929)