Ma Rainey › Similar Artists

Matt Molloy - 100% match to Ma Rainey

Thomas A. Dorsey - 76% match to Ma Rainey

1 July 1899, Villa Rica, Georgia, USA, d. 23 January 1993, Chicago, Illinois, USA. Often known as the founder of gospel music. Born into a religious family, Dorsey nevertheless shunned sacred music for many years, although it is in that idiom that he was to make the biggest impact. He learned to play piano in his youth, and when he settled in Chicago in 1916 he began to carv Read more

Kessinger Brothers - 74% match to Ma Rainey

As a child Clark Kessinger (27 July 1896, South Hills, Kanawha County, West Virginia, USA, d. 4 June 1975, USA) moved with his family to Lincoln County, Virginia, where his father worked as an agricultural and foundry labourer. Both his grandfather and uncle were fiddle players. On that account he took up an instrument at the age of five, inevitably gravitating from banjo to Read more

Tony Sheridan - 57% match to Ma Rainey

Anthony Sheridan McGinnity, 21 May 1940, Norwich, Norfolk, England. Sheridan formed his first band, the Saints, in 1955, before moving to London. There he joined Vince Taylor And The Playboys in early 1959, with whom he played a residency in Hamburg, Germany. A popular attraction at clubs such as the Kaiserkeller with the Jets, that group soon evolved into the Beat Brothers Read more

Boozoo Chavis - 56% match to Ma Rainey

Wilson Anthony Chavis, 23 October 1930, Lake Charles, Louisiana, USA, d. 5 May 2001, Austin, Texas, USA. This singer and accordionist was one of the first artists to popularise zydeco, the vernacular music of African-American Louisiana. Chavis had learned to play accordion and harmonica by the age of nine and performed around Lake Charles while in his teens. In 1954 he was s Read more

Willie "The Lion" Smith - 55% match to Ma Rainey

William Henry Joseph Bonaparte Bertholoff Smith, 25 November 1897, Goshen, New York, USA, d. 18 April 1973, New York City, New York, USA. Smith began playing piano at the age of six, encouraged by his mother. He continued with his informal musical education and by his mid-teenage years had established a formidable reputation in New York as a ragtime pianist. During World War Read more

Lonnie Donegan - 46% match to Ma Rainey

Anthony James Donegan, 29 April 1931, Glasgow, Scotland, d. 4 November 2002, Peterborough, Cambridgeshire, England. Donegan, as ‘The King Of Skiffle’, became a more homogeneous UK equivalent to Elvis Presley than Tommy Steele. Donegan’ s mother was Irish and his father Scottish, and from the age of two he was raised in East Ham, London. Steeped in traditional Read more

Albert Ammons - 44% match to Ma Rainey

23 September 1907, Chicago, Illinois, USA, d. 2 December 1949, Chicago, Illinois, USA. Ammons began playing piano as a small child and worked in Chicago clubs while still a youth. In the late 20s and early 30s he played in a number of small bands but his real forte was as a soloist. After establishing himself as an important blues piano player in Chicago in the mid-30s, a pe Read more

Bob Wills & His Texas Playboys - 44% match to Ma Rainey

The Almanac Singers - 44% match to Ma Rainey

This influential folk group was formed in 1940 by Pete Seeger (3 May 1919, New York City, New York, USA), Lee Hays (b. 14 March 1914 Little Rock, Arkansas, USA, d. 26 August 1981, Tarrytown, New York, USA) and Millard Lampell. Taking their name from ‘The Farmer’s Almanac’, the trio recorded a debut album prior to the arrival of a fourth member, Woody Guthrie ( Read more

Ida Cox - 43% match to Ma Rainey

Ida Prather, 25 February 1896, Toccoa, Georgia, USA, d. 10 November 1967, Knoxville, Tennessee, USA. Like many early blues vocalists, Cox’s origins are vague and details of the date and place of her birth vary widely. One of the classic blues singers, Cox began her career as a child, appearing on stage when barely in her teens. She made her first recordings in 1923 and Read more

General Echo - 41% match to Ma Rainey

d. 1980. Jamaican DJ Echo (aka Ranking Slackness) was one of the first to challenge the predominantly ‘cultural’ approach of the majority of mid- to late 70s DJs, and his influence on the new generation of DJs who made it in the 80s (in particular the UK MC school) was profound. He was one of the first DJs to be heard and fully appreciated on yard tapes, as he tore up Read more

Victoria Spivey - 41% match to Ma Rainey

15 October 1906, Houston, Texas, USA, d. 3 October 1976, New York City, New York, USA. Spivey was recording at the age of 19, and enjoyed early hits with ‘Black Snake Blues’, ‘Dope Head Blues’ and ‘T.B. Blues’, all sung in her unmistakable nasal, acidic tones. She worked as a songwriter for a St. Louis based publishing company in the late 20s, a Read more

Memphis Minnie - 38% match to Ma Rainey

Lizzie Douglas, 3 June 1897, Algiers, Louisiana, USA, d. 6 August 1973, Memphis, Tennessee, USA. Raised in Walls, Mississippi, Memphis Minnie learned banjo and guitar as a child, and ran away from home at the age of 13 to play music in Memphis; she worked for a time with Ringling Brothers Circus. When in Mississippi, she played guitar with Willie Brown, and in the 20s made a Read more

Pete Johnson - 38% match to Ma Rainey

25 March 1904, Kansas City, Missouri, USA, d. 23 March 1967, Buffalo, New York, USA. After playing drums when a teenager, Johnson switched to piano in 1926 and swiftly became a leading exponent of the blues. He was also an excellent accompanist to blues singers; especially Joe Turner, with whom he established a partnership that lasted for the rest of his life. In 1936 the ub Read more