Elzadie Robinson (possibly April 24, 1897 – January 17, 1975) was an American

classic female blues Classic female blues was an early form of blues music, popular in the 1920s. An amalgam of traditional folk blues and urban theater music, the style is also known as vaudeville blues. Classic blues were performed by female singers accompanied by ...

singer and songwriter. She recorded 34 songs between 1926 and 1929. Unusually for the time, she composed or co-composed most of her work. Few details of her life outside the recording studio are known.

AllMusic AllMusic (previously known as All-Music Guide and AMG) is an American online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on musicians and bands. Initiated in 1991, the dat ...

noted that "Robinson was a second-level blues singer whose voice seemed to get stronger with time".

Biography

The music researchers Bob Eagle and Eric S. LeBlanc suggest that she was born Elzadie Wallace in Logansport,

DeSoto Parish, Louisiana DeSoto Parish (French: ''Paroisse DeSoto'') is a parish located in the U.S. state of Louisiana. The parish was formed in 1843. At the 2010 U.S. census, the population was 26,656; at the 2020 census, its population increased to 26,812. Its pari ...

, in 1897, but 1900 is also possible. She relocated to

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = List of sovereign states, Count ...

to make her recordings and remained in the city for some while thereafter. Her recordings were made between 1926 and 1929. Robinson had different piano accompanists over that period, including Bob Call and her most regular accompanist, William Ezell. Songs most associated with them are "Barrelhouse Man", "Sawmill Blues" and the Ezell-penned number, "Arkansas Mill Blues", which related the grim reality of lumber camp work and conditions. Robinson chiefly recorded for

Paramount Records Paramount Records was an American record label known for its recordings of jazz and blues in the 1920s and early 1930s, including such artists as Ma Rainey, Tommy Johnson and Blind Lemon Jefferson. Early years Paramount Records was formed in ...

but also cut several sides for

Broadway Records Broadway Records has been the name of three otherwise unrelated American record labels: * Broadway Records (1920s), founded in the early 1920s in Bridgeport, Connecticut * Broadway Records (1947), founded in 1947 in Los Angeles * Broadway Records ( ...

using the alias Bernice Drake. On two of her recordings, the pianist Bob Call or the guitarist Johnny St. Cyr replaced Ezell, and on two occasions in 1926, B. T. Wingfield or

Shirley Clay Shirley Clay (died February 7, 1951) was an American jazz trumpeter. Clay gained his early start in St. Louis, Missouri while a teenager, about 1920. He toured with John Williams's Synco Jazzers early in the decade and then moved to Chicago, wher ...

played the cornet, with either Tiny Parham or Richard M. Jones on the piano. In 1928, she was backed by the clarinetist

Johnny Dodds Johnny Dodds (; April 12, 1892 – August 8, 1940) was an American jazz clarinetist and alto saxophonist based in New Orleans, best known for his recordings under his own name and with bands such as those of Joe "King" Oliver, Jelly Roll Morton, ...

, the guitarist

Blind Blake Arthur Blake (1896 – December 1, 1934), known as Blind Blake, was an American blues and ragtime singer and guitarist. He is known for recordings he made for Paramount Records between 1926 and 1932. Early life Little is known of Blake's lif ...

and either the pianist Jimmy Blythe or Jimmy Bertrand on xylophone. To add to the variation, two of her sides ("Galveston Blues" and "2:16 Blues") were released under the name of Blanche Johnson, another pseudonym. Little is known of her life after her recording career ended. She is thought to have married Perry Henderson in Flint, Michigan, in 1928, and to have died there in 1975. In 1994,

Document Records Document Records is an independent record label, founded in Austria and now based in Scotland, that specializes in reissuing vintage blues and jazz. The company has been recognised by The Blues Foundation, being honoured with a Keeping the B ...

issued two anthologies incorporating all of her known recorded work.

Discography

78 rpm singles - Paramount Records 78 rpm singles - Broadway Records

References

External links

Robinson detailed discography
{{DEFAULTSORT:Robinson, Elzadie 1897 births 1975 deaths American blues singers 20th-century African-American women singers Classic female blues singers 20th-century American singers Paramount Records artists Songwriters from Louisiana Singers from Louisiana People from Logansport, Louisiana 20th-century American women singers African-American songwriters

Biography

Discography

See also

References

External links