Fats Waller was born 110 years ago today. Born as Thomas Wright Waller, Fats was a jazz pianist, organist, composer, singer and comedic entertainer. Waller was the youngest of four children born to Adeline Locket Waller and Reverend Edward Martin Waller. He started playing the piano when he was six and graduated to the organ of his fathers church four years later. At the age of fourteen he was playing the organ at Harlems Lincoln Theater and within twelve months he had composed his first rag. Wallers first piano solos (Muscle Shoals Blues and Birmingham Blues) were recorded in October, 1922 when he was 18 years old. He was the prize pupil, and later friend and colleague, of stride pianist James P. Johnson. Fats Waller was the son of a preacher and learned to play the organ in church with his mother. Overcoming opposition from his clergyman father, Waller became a professional pianist at 15, working in cabarets and theaters. In 1918, he won a talent contest playing Johnsons Carolina Shout, a song he learned from watching a player piano play it. Waller was one of the most popular performers of his era, finding critical and commercial success in his homeland and in Europe. He was also a prolific songwriter and many songs he wrote or co-wrote are still popular, such as Honeysuckle Rose, Aint Misbehavin and Squeeze Me. Fellow pianist and composer Oscar Levant dubbed Waller the black Horowitz. Waller composed many novelty tunes in the 1920s and 1930s and sold them for relatively small sums. When the compositions became hits, other songwriters claimed them as their own. Many standards are alternatively and sometimes controversially attributed to Waller. Wallers son Maurice wrote in his 1977 biography of his father, that once he was playing I Cant Give You Anything but Love, Baby when he heard his father complaining from upstairs and came down and admonished him never to play that song in his hearing, saying that he had to sell that song when he needed some money. He even made a recording of it in 1938 with Adelaide Hall who, coincidentally, had introduced the song to the world (at Les Ambassadeurs Club in New York in 1928), in which he played the tune but made fun of the lyrics. Likewise, Maurice noted his fathers objections whenever he heard On the Sunny Side of the Street played on the radio. The anonymous sleeve notes on the 1960 RCA (UK) album Handful of Keys state that Waller copyrighted over 400 new songs, many of which 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.“ Gene Sedric, a clarinetist who played with Waller on some of his 1930s recordings, is quoted in these same sleeve notes recalling Wallers recording technique with considerable admiration: Fats was the most relaxed man I ever saw in a studio, and so he made everybody else relaxed. After a balance had been taken, wed just need one take to make a side, unless it was a kind of difficult number. His playing once put him at risk of injury. Waller was kidnapped in Chicago leaving a performance in 1926. Four men bundled him into a car and took him to the Hawthorne Inn, owned by Al Capone. Waller was ordered inside the building, and found a party in full swing. Gun to his back, he was pushed towards a piano, and told to play. A terrified Waller realized he was the surprise guest at Capones birthday party, and took comfort that the gangsters did not intend to kill him. According to rumor, Waller played for three days. When he left the Hawthorne Inn, he was very drunk, extremely tired and had earned thousands of dollars in cash from Capone and other party-goers as tips. In 1926, Waller began his recording association with Victor Records, his principal record company for the rest of his life, with the organ solos St. Louis Blues and his own composition, Lenox Avenue Blues. Although he recorded with various groups, including Morriss Hot Babes (1927), Fats Wallers Buddies (1929) (one of the earliest interracial groups to record), and McKinneys Cotton Pickers (1929), his most important contribution to the Harlem stride piano tradition was a series of solo recordings of his own compositions: Handful of Keys. Smashing Thirds, Numb Fumblin and Valentine Stomp (1929). Waller contracted pneumonia and died at age 39 on a cross country train trip near Kansas City on December 15, 1943, after making a final recording session with an interracial group in Detroit that included white trumpeter Don Hirleman. He was on his way back to Hollywood for more film work, after the smash success of Stormy Weather. Coincidentally, as the train with the body of Waller stopped in Kansas City, so stopped a train with his dear friend Louis Armstrong on board. Here, Waller performs “Honeysuckle Rose.”
Posted on: Wed, 21 May 2014 04:26:49 +0000
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