[Dixielandjazz] Headstone for Mamie Smith

[Robert Ringwald]

Grammy Hall of Famer Mamie Smith Is in an Unmarked Staten Island Grave; Help Change
vThat Tonight at Killmeyer's Benefit Concert
by Michael J. Fressola
Staten Island Advance, July 20, 2014
Like other black musicians of her day, blues singer Mamie Smith (1883-1946) did not
get the respect she earned or the opportunities she deserved. No way to change that
now.
What can change is the legacy of the chart-topping Smith, crowned during her heyday
as the "Queen of the Blues" (her near-contemporary Bessie Smith was "Empress of the
Blues").
Reviving interest is part of the agenda for "Blues for Mamie," July 20 at Killmeyers
Old Bavaria Inn in Charleston, a six-hour fund-raising extravaganza headlined by
some of the metropolitan area's most celebrated bluespeople.
The proceeds will help pay for a headstone for the longtime Harlemite's unmarked
grave in Oakwood's African-American Frederick Douglass Memorial Park.
A campaign to commission the memorial was launched last year by veteran blues critic
and writer Michael Cala, a Grasmere resident, after he came across a reference to
Smith's interment in the Island graveyard. Cala recently expanded the campaign target
to $6,000 to encompass a maintenance fund.
The stone will be dedicated on Sept. 13.
Smith, the first African-American blues recording artist, broke a race barrier in
the music business at Okeh Records, opening the door for fellow artists such as Louis
Armstrong and the aforementioned Bessie Smith.
"She did so much," Cala says, "and yet was barely recognized beyond her own lifetime."
Smith's 1920 hit "Crazy Blues" may well have sold one million copies in the year
after its release. The record was officially inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame
in 1994. In 2005, it was selected for permanent preservation in the National Recording
Registry at the Library of Congress, commonly known as the "National Jukebox."
Among the blues headliners performing in "Blues for Mamie" -- Guitarist Michael Hill,
actor and singer Queen Esther, Rob "the Honeydripper" Paparozzi, guitarist Dave Fields,
guitarist Robert Ross, and singer Michael Packer. Also, Staten Island-based singer
Cat Cosmai, Big Frank Mirra, Regina Bonelli, Hot Monkey Love, Jim Koeppel and Cash
McCall, and Wayne Livingston.
WFDU DJ and singer Nikki Armstrong will host "Blues for Mamie" and spoken-word artist
Mo Beasley will deliver a tribute. Bassist/composer Pete Cummings will be musical
director
Mamie Robinson Smith was born in Cincinnati and began touring in vaudeville with
a local troupe at age 10. She recorded "Crazy Blues" in 1920 in Harlem, her home
for many years.
Although she did not have another million-seller, she continued to make records through
the 1920s.
The Great Depression cut into earnings and opportunities for most performing artists,
but she seems to have weathered it. As a actress, she worked in several films in
the 1930s. Still, she was reportedly impoverished when she died in 1946.
"Blues for Mamie" organizer Cala says he was amazed to discover he lives just a few
miles from her anonymous burial spot in an historic cemetery where other notable
people of color were similarly buried in donated plots.
"This is our way of acknowledging how one woman threw open the doors so that posterity
could enjoy the thousands of upon thousands of blues and jazz recordings that may
never have been made without Mamie," Cala says.
"Blues for Mamie" will run from 3 to 9 p.m. at Killmeyer's. Admission is $14 in advance,
$20 at the door. For more information about the campaign and concert visit
https://www.facebook.com/mamiespage
-30

-Bob Ringwald
Amateur (ham) Radio Operator K6YBV
916/ 806-9551

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