Ma Rainey
(born April 26, 1886, Columbus,
Georgia
, U.S.?died December 22, 1939, Columbus) was an American singer who was known as the “mother of the
blues
” and who was recognized as the first great professional blues vocalist.
While most sources state that she was born on April 26, 1886, in
Columbus
, Georgia, some suggest that her birth occurred in September 1882 in
Alabama
. Gertrude Pridgett made her first public appearance about the age of 14 in a local talent show called “Bunch of Blackberries” at the Springer
Opera
House in Columbus. Little else is known of her early years. In February 1904 she married William Rainey, a
vaudeville
performer known as Pa Rainey, and for several years they toured with African American
minstrel
groups as a song-and-dance team. In 1902, in a small
Missouri
town, she first heard the sort of
music
that was to become known as the blues.
Britannica Quiz
Pop Culture Quiz
Ma Rainey, as she was known, began
singing
blues songs and contributed greatly to the evolution of the form and to the growth of its popularity. In her travels she appeared with jazz and jug bands throughout the South. While with the Tolliver’s Circus and Musical Extravaganza troupe, she exerted a direct influence on young
Bessie Smith
. Her deep contralto voice, sometimes verging on harshness, was a powerful instrument with which to convey the depth of her songs of everyday life and emotion, and she was renowned for her
flamboyant
performances.
In 1923 Ma Rainey made her first phonograph recordings for the Paramount company. Over a five-year span she recorded some 92 songs for Paramount?including “See See Rider,” “Prove It on Me,” “Blues Oh Blues,” “Sleep Talking,” “Oh Papa Blues,” “Trust No Man,” “Slave to the Blues,” “New Boweavil Blues,” and “Slow Driving Moan”?that later became the only permanent record of one of the most influential popular musical artists of her time. She continued to sing in public into the 1930s.
In 2007 a small museum opened in a house that she had built in Columbus for her mother; she lived there herself from 1935 until her death. Ma Rainey was inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame (1983) and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame (1990), and in 2023 she received a
Grammy Award
for lifetime achievement. She was the subject of
August Wilson
’s play
Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom
(1984), which was later adapted into a film (2020) starring
Viola Davis
.