Fats Waller › Similar Artists

Jimmie Lunceford - 100% match to Fats Waller

Cab Calloway - 83% match to Fats Waller

Cabell Calloway, 25 December 1907, Rochester, New York, USA, d. 18 November 1994, Cokesbury Village, Hockessin, Delaware, USA. Involved in showbusiness from an early age, vocalist Calloway was an occasional drummer and MC, working mostly in Baltimore, where he was raised, and Chicago, where he relocated in the late 20s. He worked with his sister Blanche, and then, in 1929, h Read more

Chick Webb - 69% match to Fats Waller

William Henry Webb, 10 February 1909, Baltimore, Maryland, USA, d. 19 June 1939, Baltimore, Maryland, USA. Although crippled soon after his birth, Webb’s determination to be a drummer overcame his physical infirmities. After playing in local bands, he travelled to New York while still a teenager and soon formed his own band there. By 1927 he had played at the Savoy Ball Read more

Bix Beiderbecke - 66% match to Fats Waller

Leon Bix Beiderbecke, 10 March 1903, Davenport, Iowa, USA, d. 6 August 1931, New York City, New York, USA. One of the legends of jazz, a role he would doubtless have found wryly amusing had he lived to know of it, Bix Beiderbecke entered music when he began picking out tunes on piano and cornet at the age of 15. Inspired by records of the Original Dixieland Jazz Band and by Read more

Earl Hines - 66% match to Fats Waller

Fletcher Henderson - 65% match to Fats Waller

Fletcher Hamilton Henderson, 18 December 1897, Cuthbert, Georgia, USA, d. 28 December 1952, New York City, New York, USA. One of the most important figures in the development of big band music, in the early 30s Henderson set the standards by which early big band jazz was measured. He did this through a combination of selecting leading jazz players for his band and, together Read more

Slim Gaillard - 63% match to Fats Waller

Bulee Gaillard, 4 January 1916, Detroit, Michigan, USA, d. 26 February 1991, London, England. Other sources including Gaillard himself have claimed he was born on 1 January 1916 in Santa Clara, Cuba. Gaillard led an adventurous childhood. On one occasion, while travelling on board a ship on which his father was steward, he was left behind in Crete when the ship sailed. His a Read more

Jelly Roll Morton - 62% match to Fats Waller

Ferdinand Joseph Lemott, 20 October 1890, New Orleans, Louisiana, USA, d. 10 July 1941, Los Angeles, California, USA. A gifted musician, Morton played various instruments before deciding to concentrate on piano. In the early years of the twentieth century he was a popular figure on the seamier side of New Orleans night life. He played in brothels, hustled pool and generally Read more

Lionel Hampton - 61% match to Fats Waller

20 April 1908 (some claim 1909 and 1914), Louisville, Kentucky, USA, d. 31 August 2002, New York, USA. After living briefly in Louisville and Birmingham, Alabama, Hampton was taken to Chicago where he lived with his grandparents. They sent him to Holy Rosary Academy at Collins, Wisconsin, where he was taught the rudiments of military band drumming by a Dominican nun. Followi Read more

Lucky Millinder - 60% match to Fats Waller

Teddy Wilson - 59% match to Fats Waller

Theodore Shaw Wilson, 24 November 1912, Austin, Texas, USA, d. 31 July 1986, New Britain, Connecticut, USA. Born into a middle-class family, Wilson grew up in Tuskegee where his parents moved to take up teaching posts at the university. He studied violin and piano at Tuskegee and later extended his studies at college in Alabama. In 1929, by now concentrating on piano, he bec Read more

James P. Johnson - 58% match to Fats Waller

James Price Johnson, 1 February 1894, New Brunswick, New Jersey, USA, d. 17 November 1955, New York City, New York, USA. Taught piano by his mother, Johnson assimilated a wide range of musical styles. In the years following his family’s relocation to New York, he continued his studies and by his late teens was working in clubs in the Hell’s Kitchen district. Johnso Read more

Count Basie - 57% match to Fats Waller

Benny Goodman - 54% match to Fats Waller

Benjamin David Goodman, 30 May 1909, Chicago, Illinois, USA, d. 20 June 1986, New York City, New York, USA. Born into a large, impoverished family of immigrants, Goodman experienced hard times while growing up. Encouraged by his father to learn a musical instrument, Goodman and two of his brothers took lessons; as the youngest and smallest he learned to play the clarinet. Th Read more

Artie Shaw - 50% match to Fats Waller

Arthur Jacob Arshawsky, 23 May 1910, East Manhattan, New York City, New York, USA, d. 30 December 2004, Newbury Park, California, USA. The son of an Austrian mother and a Russian father, Arshawsky was born in New York but relocated with his family to New Haven, Connecticut while still a child. He learned to play the ukulele before taking up the alto saxophone at the age of 1 Read more