(Organ, piano, 1925–2005) Jimmy Smith, a fluent and inventive jazz improviser, is regarded as the greatest of the soul jazz organists; he essentially defined the form in his performances and recordings for Blue Note in the 1950s. His adoption of the Hammond organ to soul jazz’s combination of jazz improvisation over blues-rooted grooves opened up a new ...
The last of the triumvirate of guitar legends who played with The Yardbirds, Jimmy Page became an icon of rock guitarists in the 1970s with Led Zeppelin. Elements of his playing style have been copied to the point of cliché in the years since Led Zeppelin dominated the rock world, but as the originator, Page developed the heavy-metal ...
With the exception of Judas Priest, no metal band has been more influential than Iron Maiden. And it is no coincidence that Maiden first took flight when guitarist Adrian Smith joined the band one month into recording their second album, Killers, in 1981. Adrian Frederik ‘H’ Smith was born in Hackney, East London, in February 1957. ...
Bessie Smith was one of the greatest vocalists of the twentieth century; her emotional delivery and exquisite phrasing has been an influence on instrumentalists as well as innumerable singers, both male and female. Many of her records, including ‘Gimmie a Pigfoot’, ‘Woman’s Trouble Blues’, ‘St. Louis Blues’ and the song that became an anthem of the Great Depression, ...
(Trumpet, 1907–91) Part of the Chicago-based Austin High School Gang, along with Bud Freeman, Frank Teschemacher, Jim Lannigan and Dave Tough, McPartland was inspired by recordings of the New Orleans Rhythm Kings and Bix Beiderbecke, who he replaced in the Wolverines in 1925. He joined Ben Pollack’s band in 1927 and recorded with the McKenzie-Condon ...
(Trumpet, 1908–91) This Georgia-born trumpeter (real name Cladys Smith) was on the New York scene by the age of 17 in 1925, working with Charlie Johnson’s house band at Small’s Paradise. In 1927 he played on Duke Ellington’s ‘Black And Tan Fantasy’ and later that year joined James P. Johnson and Fats Waller in Chicago for a production of ...
(Vocals, 1883–1946) Mamie Smith’s first recording session, for OKeh in 1920, resulted in a pair of nondescript pop songs, but her manager Perry Bradford then talked the label into recording her as a blues singer. On 10 August 1920, fronting a band dubbed the Jazz Hounds – featuring stride pianist Willie ‘The Lion’ Smith (no relation) ...
(Piano, vocals, 1904–29) A seminal figure in the development of boogie-woogie piano, self-taught Clarence ‘Pine Top’ Smith was raised in Birmingham, Alabama and worked the southern club and vaudeville circuit during the early 1920s. In 1928 he relocated to Chicago, where he roomed with fellow boogie-woogie piano pioneers Meade ‘Lux’ Lewis and Albert Ammons. Smith recorded ...
(Vocals, 1895–1943) Atlanta-born Trixie Smith was a vaudeville trouper when, in 1922, she cut her first records on Black Swan. Although she did not have the vocal prowess of front-line blues stars like Bessie Smith (no relation), she recorded steadily until 1926 – often with top-flight jazz orchestras such as Fletcher Henderson’s – and sporadically thereafter. In the ...
(Bandleader, alto saxophone, clarinet, 1904–57) Thoroughly educated in music as a child, Jimmy Dorsey freelanced in New York in the early 1930s, recording frequently with brother Tommy as the Dorsey Brothers Orchestra. They formed a working band in 1934 but split up in 1935. Jimmy carried on, backing Bing Crosby on radio and recording prolifically ...
(Vocals, 1899–1972) James Andrew Rushing was born in Oklahoma City into a musical family. He worked in California in the mid-1920s as a pianist and vocalist, joined Walter Page’s Blue Devils in Oklahoma City in 1927 and made his recording debut with the band in 1929. He played with the Bennie Moten Band in Kansas City from 1929, ...
(Violin, 1909–67) Inspired by Joe Venuti in the 1920s, Joe Hezekiah Leroy Smith and his sextet (with Jonah Jones) became a sensation on 52nd Street early in 1936. In contrast to the polish of Venuti, Smith turned the violin in a more barrelhouse direction, making it swing with an unremitting swagger. He was also the first to ...
(Piano, 1897–1973) In the 1920s Willie ‘The Lion’ Smith was an obscure master of Harlem stride (a virtuoso style that evolved out of ragtime after 1919) whose brilliant technique influenced countless young pianists who heard him in person. His legend began to emerge in 1935 as stride was fading into nostalgia and he started to record regularly. For the next ...
(Piano, 1898–1951) James Edward Yancey was born in Chicago and toured the vaudeville circuit as a dancer in his childhood. He learned piano from his brother Alonzo in 1915 and was soon working rent parties and small clubs around Chicago. He made his recording debut in 1939 for Solo Art and continued to record intermittently, often in the company ...
(Vocals, 1922–97) Jimmy John Witherspoon was born in Gurdon, Arkansas. He joined the Jay McShann group in California in 1945. He recorded his own records in late 1947 and among them was ‘Ain’t Nobody’s Business Parts 1 & 2’, a huge Race Records hit. Witherspoon toured with his own group until 1952 and had another big hit with ‘No ...
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An extensive music information resource, bringing together the talents and expertise of a wide range of editors and musicologists, including Stanley Sadie, Charles Wilson, Paul Du Noyer, Tony Byworth, Bob Allen, Howard Mandel, Cliff Douse, William Schafer, John Wilson...
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Classical, Rock, Blues, Jazz, Country and more. Flame Tree has been making encyclopaedias and guides about music for over 20 years. Now Flame Tree Pro brings together a huge canon of carefully curated information on genres, styles, artists and instruments. It's a perfect tool for study, and entertaining too, a great companion to our music books.
David Bowie
Fantastic new, unofficial biography covers
his life, music, art and movies, with a
sweep of incredible photographs.