All rights reserved. "Birthplace of Boogie Woogie" was registered by the Marshall Convention and Visitors on June 21, 2011 (registration number 3,980,563; Ser. [2] The lyrics of one of the earliest hits, "Pinetop's Boogie Woogie", consist entirely of instructions to dancers: Now, when I tell you to hold yourself, don't you move a peg. With that in mind… How about a sample of classic boogie woogie by Bob Seeley, considered by many to be the world’s greatest player (even at age 91, yup, ninety one years old). They were inexpensive social gatherings that traveled from house to house every month allowing friends to help one another out, because all they needed was access to a piano. While standard blues traditionally expresses a variety of emotions, boogie-woogie is mainly associated with dancing. Also, "In Houston, Dallas, and Galveston—all Negro piano players played that way. In 1948 Arthur Smith achieved Top 10 US country chart success with his MGM Records recordings of "Guitar Boogie" and "Banjo Boogie", with the former crossing over to the US pop chart, introducing many people to the potential of the electric guitar. Some of the most well-known songs came from greats such as child prodigy Frankie 'Sugar Chile' Robinson. {{courseNav.course.topics.length}} chapters | After the Carnegie Hall concerts, it was only natural for swing bands to incorporate the boogie-woogie beat into some of their music. Charles 'Cow Cow' Davenport got his start in music when his mother, a church organist, taught him to play the organ. The boogie woogie music movement was popular in America from the 1920s to the mid-1940s. The popularity of the Carnegie Hall concerts meant work for many of the fellow boogie players and also led to the adaptation of boogie-woogie sounds to many other forms of music. It would not be surprising if there was as yet undiscovered evidence of the earliest boogie-woogie performances buried (metaphorically or literally) in Northeast Texas. In 1943, Morton Gould composed Boogie-Woogie Etude for classical pianist José Iturbi, who premiered and recorded it that year. The performance emulated a railroad trip, perhaps lending credence to the "train theory". Sullivan said that "Fast Western" and "Fast Texas" were terms that derived from the "Texas Western" Railroad Company of Harrison County. Boogie woogie was popular among the poorer African American communities, especially in Chicago, New York, and Detroit. Davenport's most famous song was 'Cow Cow Blues.' 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Cohan: Biography, Music & Songs, Hair the Musical: Synopsis, Songs & Characters, Hard Rock Music: History, Artists & Bands, Hello, Dolly! However, it returned with a vengeance in the late '30s, popularized by a smart Deane Kincaide arrangement for Tommy Dorsey’s band of the 1929 composition "Boogie Woogie" written by Clarence "Pine Top" Smith, a Chicago pianist who is also credited with coining the term. The music of the boogie woogie era was all about telling a story, one that was sometimes made up on the spot. [7] Jefferson may have heard the term from Huddie "Lead Belly" Ledbetter, who played frequently with Jefferson. 85-064,442, Filed 6-16-2010). Boogie-woogie is a music genre of blues that became popular during the late 1920s, developed in African-American communities in the 1870s. {{courseNav.course.mDynamicIntFields.lessonCount}} lessons Log in or sign up to add this lesson to a Custom Course. Yancey's style was more delicate than other boogie woogie pianists of his time. The music was most popular in the poorer African American communities, where musicians and their friends gathered for house rent parties to help their neighbors raise their rent money during tough economic times. The money they raised would go to pay the host's rent on their house. Musical scholars and researchers have traced the origins of boogie-woogie to the piney woods of East Texas, where itinerant Afro-American piano players used to travel among the turpentine camps entertaining the workers with Barrel house blues at make-shift bars and dance halls. It was brought by people like George W. Thomas, an early pianist who was already living in New Orleans by about 1910 and writing "New Orleans Hop Scop Blues", which really has some of the characteristics of the music that we came to know as Boogie. In sheet music literature prior to 1900, there are at least three examples of the word "boogie" in music titles in the archives of the Library of Congress. 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