(Digitally remastered two-fer containing a pair of super r...)
Digitally remastered two-fer containing a pair of super rare classic Blues and Boogie albums from the 1950s, both originally released as 10-inch platters. Blues And Boogie is a vintage set of piano blues and boogie playing from the Chicago-born Jimmy Yancey, who inspired Albert Ammons and many more with his distinctive playing style and cool arrangements. Freddie Mitchell's Boogie Bash album continues the keyboard theme featuring the precocious Florida-born pianist who moved to New York and became a respected session man with Ray Charles among others. Cherry Red. 2010.
James Edwards Yancey was an American boogie-woogie pianist, composer, and lyricist.
Background
Yancey was born on February 20, 1894 in Chicago, Illinois. Little is known of his family background and early years; even the year of his birth is questionable. It is known, however, that Yancey had two sisters and four brothers, one of whom, Alonzo, was also a pianist, and that his father was a singer and guitarist.
Education
Yancey had no formal education.
Career
At the age of six, Yancey began touring with a vaudeville troupe as a singer and tap dancer, an occupation he continued into adolescence. He was a member of the Bert Earle, Cozy Smith, and Jeanette Adler organizations; traveled the Orpheum circuit; and worked under the direction of the Theater Owners' Booking Association. In 1910, during one of several trips to Europe, he appeared in a command performance before the British royal family.
In 1913 Yancey returned to Chicago, where he became interested in baseball and for several years played with a team known as the All-Americans. At the same time he continued his musical activities and, as a self-taught pianist, began to perform regularly at "rent parties" and in barrelhouses on the city's South Side. In developing his musical style, Yancey specialized in the blues. Instead of attempting to use the piano in the customary way, in imitation of an orchestra, he played it as a percussion instrument capable of producing both melody and rhythm.
He became much in demand as an entertainer. His first number to gain wide acceptance, "Five o'Clock Blues" (better known as "The Fives"), dates from 1913. Although it was not then called boogie-woogie, the piece had the characteristic slow-rolling bass patterns that later came to be associated with this piano style. In addition to his jobs at private parties, Yancey played at such Chicago clubs as Bear Trap No. 1 and Moonlight Inn.
In 1925, however, he ceased trying to earn a living from music and became a grounds keeper for the Chicago White Sox baseball club at Comiskey Park, a position he held for twenty-five years. Despite his importance as the originator of boogie-woogie, it is noteworthy that Yancey made no recordings when he was at the height of his popularity in the 1920's. During that period Chicago was a center for recording jazz, and nearly every black piano player in the city was immortalized on so-called race records, which were produced primarily for blacks. Possibly there were no early recordings by Yancey because the record companies believed that his style would not have a sufficiently wide sales appeal to merit production. An equally likely reason may be that since he was a shy, retiring man, he was reluctant to go to the recording studio and may not have considered himself "professional" enough to seek a contract.
Although no longer active as a performing musician, Yancey did teach his piano style to his friends Meade Lux Lewis and Albert Ammons, both of whom achieved fame as players of boogie-woogie. In the mid-1930's he suffered a stroke that partially paralyzed his fingers and made playing temporarily impossible. Lewis made his mentor's name known, however, with a 1936 recording of "Yancey Special" and the Bob Crosby band recorded another version of the number. These, together with records by Ammons, Lewis, and other stars of the boogie-woogie idiom, were responsible for the pre-World War II interest in this musical form.
With the rise in popularity of boogie-woogie, Yancey, until then virtually unknown, was sought out and induced to record for the first time. In 1939 and 1940 his output included the piano solo "The Fives" and two vocals, "Death Letter Blues" and "Cryin' in My Sleep. " Although he recorded periodically throughout the decade, it was in February 1948 that Yancey began his first steady playing job in twenty-five years, as featured soloist at the Beehive in Chicago. He and his wife also performed together at Carnegie Hall in New York as part of a concert tour by jazz trombonist Edward ("Kid") Ory in April of that year. Toward the end of his life, Yancey's activities were seriously impeded by diabetes and he shunned interviews, although he hosted rent parties and jam sessions at his apartment on Chicago's South Side. These affairs, sponsored by the Hot Club of Chicago, were well-attended by both musicians and jazz fans. Yancey died in Chicago on September 17, 1951. At his funeral friends honored his memory by forming a Dixieland jazz band and playing such traditional numbers as "Just a Closer Walk With Thee" and "Nearer My God to Thee. "
Yancey was a man who never had a bad word to say about anyone, and, having had much of his music and style pirated for the benefit of others, was never vindictive.
Connections
Yancey married Estella Harris, later known as Mama Yancey, in 1925.