W.C. HANDY, WHO MADE THE BLUES POPULAR Celebrating the birth of the father of the blues, W.C. Handy who born on Nov 16, 1873 in Florence, Alabama. In 1909, Handy wrote what was to become a campaign song called Mr. Crump, named after Memphis mayoral candidate Edward H. Boss Crump (Crump won the election, although the lyrics of the song werent the most flattering). The song was later reworked and became Memphis Blues. Handy made a deal to get the song published in 1912, and henceforth became a trailblazer in bringing the forms song structures to large audiences. Memphis Blues was a big hit, but Handy didnt get to reap the financial rewards of its success because he had sold the rights to the song, falling prey to exploitative business practices. He then decided to set up a structure to retain ownership of his songs and create his own publishing venture. He released his next hit, St. Louis Blues outlining the hardships hed experienced years before in the titular city in 1914, under the Pace & Handy Music Company, which later became known as the Handy Brothers Music Company, after Pace left the venture. St. Louis Blues became a massive success, and would be recorded many times over the next several years. Other Handy hits include Yellow Dog Blues (1914) and Beale Street Blues (1916); he would eventually be credited with composing dozens of songs. In 1918, Handy moved his business to New York to escape Southern racial hostilities, and later scored success with the composition Aunt Hagars Blues. He continued to promote blues to large audiences in the 1920s, editing Blues: An Anthology (1926), a book containing blues arrangements for vocals and piano, and organizing the first blues performance in New York Citys Carnegie Hall in 1928. The genre of the blues was a hallmark of American society and culture in the 1920s and 1930s. Handy continued working steadily throughout the 1930s, publishing Negro Authors and Composers of the United States in 1935 and W.C. Handys Collection of Negro Spirituals in 1938. A few years later, in 1941, he published an autobiography, Father of the Blues. The blues composer died of pneumonia in New York City on March 29, 1958, at the age of 84. Over 25,000 people attended his funeral in Harlems Abyssinian Baptist Church. Over 150,000 people gathered in the streets near the church to pay their respects. He was buried in the Woodlawn Cemetery in Bronx, New York. Only months after his death, his life story played on the silver screen in theaters across the country in the film St. Louis Blues, which starred singer Nat King Cole as the legendary composer. Handys legacy continues to shine in the annals of music, with his songs continually reinterpreted in idioms of blues, jazz, pop and classical music.
Posted on: Sun, 16 Nov 2014 15:29:24 +0000
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