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W. C. Handy

William Christopher Handy (November 16, 1873 – March 28, 1958) was an American composer and musician who referred to himself as the Father of the Blues.[1][2] He was one of the most influential songwriters in the United States.[3] One of many musicians who played the distinctively American blues music, Handy did not create the blues genre but was the one of the first to publish music in the blues form, thereby taking the blues from a regional music style (Delta blues) with a limited audience to a new level of popularity.[3]

W. C. Handy

William Christopher Handy

Father of the Blues

(1873-11-16)November 16, 1873
Florence, Alabama, U.S.

Memphis, Tennessee, U.S.

March 28, 1958(1958-03-28) (aged 84)
New York City, U.S.

  • Composer
  • musician
  • bandleader

Trumpet

1893–1948

Handy used elements of folk music in his compositions. He was scrupulous in documenting the sources of his works, which frequently combined stylistic influences from various performers.[2]

"Memphis Blues", written 1909, published 1912. Although usually subtitled "Boss Crump", it is a distinct song from Handy's campaign satire, "Boss Crump don't 'low no easy riders around here", which was based on the good-time song "Mamma Don't Allow It."

"Yellow Dog Blues" (1912), "Your easy rider's gone where the Southern cross the Yellow Dog." The reference is to the crossing at Moorhead, Mississippi, of the and the local Yazoo and Mississippi Valley Railroad, called the Yellow Dog. By Handy's telling locals assigned the words "Yellow Dog" to the letters Y.D. (for Yazoo Delta) on the freight trains that they saw.[40]

Southern Railway

"" (1914), "the jazzman's Hamlet."

Saint Louis Blues

"Loveless Love", based in part on the classic "". Possibly the first song to complain of modern synthetics, "with milkless milk and silkless silk, we're growing used to soulless soul."

Careless Love

"Aunt Hagar's Blues", the biblical , handmaiden to Abraham and Sarah, was considered the "mother" of African Americans

Hagar

"" (1916), written as a farewell to Beale Street of Memphis, which was named Beale Avenue until the song's popularity caused it to be changed

Beale Street Blues

"Long Gone John (from Bowling Green)", about a famous bank robber

"Chantez-Les-Bas (Sing 'Em Low)", a tribute to the culture of New Orleans

Creole

"Atlanta Blues", which includes the song "Make Me a Pallet on your Floor" as its chorus.

"Ole Miss Rag" (1917), a ragtime composition, recorded by Handy's Orchestra of Memphis

[41]

Handy's music does not always follow the classic 12-bar pattern, often having 8- or 16-bar bridges between 12-bar verses.

In 1931, Handy Park, public park with a stage for live musical performances, was opened by the City of Memphis at 200 Beale St.[43] The statue in the park honoring him was erected in 1960.[44]

[42]

In 1947, the was opened in Memphis.[45] The building was demolished in 2012.[46]

W.C. Handy Theatre

The mayor of Yonkers, New York designated December 8-14, 1957 as W.C. Handy Week.

[47]

Handy was the subject of (1958), a heavily fictionalized biographical film starring Nat King Cole with Eartha Kitt and Ruby Dee.

St. Louis Blues

After Handy's death in 1958, the Domino Lounge in Memphis was renamed .[48]

Club Handy

W.C. Handy Place in New York City is the honorary name for 52nd Street between and Seventh Avenue.

Avenue of the Americas

On May 17, 1969, the United States Postal Service issued a commemorative stamp in his honor.

Handy was inducted in the National Academy of Popular Music in 1970.

Songwriters Hall of Fame

He was inducted into the in 1983.

Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame

He was inducted into the in 1985, and was a 1993 inductee into the Alabama Music Hall of Fame, with the Lifework Award for Performing Achievement.

Alabama Jazz Hall of Fame

He received a for lifetime achievement in 1993.

Grammy Trustees Award

Citing 2003 as "the centennial anniversary of when W.C. Handy composed the first blues music" the United States Senate in 2002 passed a resolution declaring the year beginning February 1, 2003, as the "Year of the Blues".

[49]

Handy was honored with two markers on the , the "Enlightenment of W.C. Handy" in Clarksdale, Mississippi and a marker at his birthplace in Florence, Alabama.[50][51]

Mississippi Blues Trail

was known as the W. C. Handy Award until the name change in 2006.

Blues Music Award

is held annually in Florence, Alabama.[52]

W. C. Handy Music Festival

Another is held annually in Henderson, Kentucky in June.[53]

W.C. Handy Music Festival

In 2017, his autobiography Father of the Blues was inducted in to the in the category of Classics of Blues Literature.[54]

Blues Hall of Fame

Brooks, Tim (2004). . Urbana, Illinois: University of Illinois Press. pp. 410–436. ISBN 978-0-252-07307-6.

Lost Sounds: Blacks and the Birth of the Recording Industry, 1890–1919

Dunkel, Mario (2015). . Popular Music and Society. 38 (2): 122–139. doi:10.1080/03007766.2014.994320. S2CID 191480580.

"W. C. Handy, Abbe Niles, and (Auto)biographical Positioning in the Whiteman Era"

Robertson, David (2009). . New York: Alfred A. Knopf. ISBN 978-0-307-26609-5.

W. C. Handy: The Life and Times of the Man Who Made the Blues

Archived November 21, 2018, at the Wayback Machine

W.C. Handy website at the University of North Alabama

W.C. Handy's 1993 Lifework Award for Performing Achievement; Induction into the Alabama Music Hall of Fame

The Blues Foundation's W.C. Handy Blues Awards

Book excerpt on Handy by Tom Morgan

Rare American Sheet Music Collection at Duke University

Interview with W. C. Handy by folklorist

Sheet music for "Joe Turner Blues"

Sheet music for "The Memphis Blues: A Southern Rag"

Sheet music for "Saint Louis Blues"

at Project Gutenberg

Works by W. C. Handy

at Internet Archive

Works by or about W. C. Handy

at the International Music Score Library Project (IMSLP)

Free scores by William Christopher Handy

at the Discography of American Historical Recordings

W. C. Handy recordings

Part of his life is retold in the 1948 radio drama "", a presentation from Destination Freedom, written by Richard Durham

The Father of the Blues