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- Duration: 4:04
- Published: 04 May 2010
- Uploaded: 27 Jun 2011
- Author: dnworks
Name | Eubie Blake |
---|---|
Background | non_vocal_instrumentalist |
Birth name | James Hubert Blake |
Born | February 07, 1887Baltimore, Maryland, USA |
Died | February 12, 1983Brooklyn, New York, USA |
Genre | Jazz, popular, ragtime |
Occupation | Composer, pianist |
Label | Emerson |
Associated acts | Noble Sissle |
James Hubert Blake (February 7, 1887 – February 12, 1983) was an American composer, lyricist, and pianist of ragtime, jazz, and popular music. In 1921, Blake and long-time collaborator Noble Sissle wrote the Broadway musical Shuffle Along, one of the first Broadway musicals to be written and directed by African Americans. Blake's compositions included such hits as, "Bandana Days", "Charleston Rag", "Love Will Find A Way", "Memories of You", and "I'm Just Wild About Harry". The musical Eubie! featured the works of Blake and opened on Broadway in 1978.
Blake said he first composed the melody to the "Charleston Rag" in 1899, which would have made him 12 years old, but he did not commit it to paper until 1915, when he learned to write in musical notation.
In 1912, Blake began playing in vaudeville with James Reese Europe's "Society Orchestra" which accompanied Vernon and Irene Castle's ballroom dance act. The band played ragtime music which was still quite popular at the time. Shortly after World War I, Blake joined forces with performer Noble Sissle to form a vaudeville music duo, the "Dixie Duo." After vaudeville, the pair began work on a musical revue, Shuffle Along, which incorporated many songs they had written, and had a book written by F. E. Miller and Aubrey Lyles. When it premiered in June 1921, Shuffle Along became the first hit musical on Broadway written by and about African-Americans. The musicals also introduced hit songs such as "I'm Just Wild About Harry" and "Love Will Find a Way."
In 1923, Blake made three films for Lee DeForest in DeForest's Phonofilm sound-on-film process. They were Noble Sissle and Eubie Blake featuring their song "Affectionate Dan", Sissle and Blake Sing Snappy Songs featuring "Sons of Old Black Joe" and "My Swanee Home", and Eubie Blake Plays His Fantasy on Swanee River featuring Blake performing his "Fantasy on Swanee River". These films are preserved in the Maurice Zouary film collection in the Library of Congress collection.
In 1938 Avis was diagnosed with tuberculosis and died later that year at 58. Of his loss, Blake is on record saying, "In my life I never knew what it was to be alone. At first when Avis got sick, I thought she just had a cold, but when time passed and she didn’t get better, I made her go to a doctor and we found out she had TB … I suppose I knew from when we found out she had the TB, I understood that it was just a matter of time." and a U.S. Library of Congress biography, incorrectly list his birth year as 1883. Every official document issued by the government, however, records his birthday as February 7, 1887. This includes the 1900 Census, Peter Hanley writes: "In the final analysis, however, the fact that he was only ninety-six years of age and not one hundred when he died does not in any way detract from his extraordinary achievements. Eubie will always remain among the finest popular composers and songwriters of his era."
Category:African American musicians Category:American buskers Category:American musical theatre composers Category:American Theatre Hall of Fame inductees Category:Burials at Cypress Hills National Cemetery Category:George Peabody Medal winners Category:Musicians from Maryland Category:People from Baltimore, Maryland Category:Ragtime composers Category:Vaudeville performers Category:1887 births Category:1983 deaths
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