Performance · Other credits

Bessie Smith

Tennessee blues singer

Chattanooga, United States • 1894-04-15 – 1937-09-26

Bessie Smith is credited on 824 releases across 249 albums tracked on Gatefold, active 1951–2023 — the collector-built map of who actually made the music.

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824

Pressings credited

249

Albums

Decades active

111

In collections

Biography

Bessie Smith (April 15, 1892 – September 26, 1937) was an African-American blues singer widely renowned during the Jazz Age. Nicknamed the "Empress of the Blues" and formerly Queen of the Blues, she was the most popular female blues singer of the 1930s. Inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1989, she is often regarded as one of the greatest singers of her era and was a major influence on fellow blues singers, as well as jazz vocalists. Born in Chattanooga, Tennessee, Smith was young when her parents died, and she and her six siblings survived by performing on street corners. She began touring and performed in a group that included Ma Rainey, and then went out on her own. Her successful recording career with Columbia Records began in 1923, but her performing career was cut short by a car crash that killed her at the age of 45.

Bio from Wikipedia