Biography
Bea Foote’s moniker evokes the hesitant utterances of someone just starting to learn English, and her modest body of work inevitably invites wordplay that positions her as little more than a footnote in blues annals. Her recorded output centered chiefly on themes of marijuana and carnal pleasure, rendering her the sort of performer one would hesitate to introduce to family—except perhaps if the family in question featured Bessie Smith. That iconic figure stands as the preeminent exponent of the same idiom that also encompasses Alberta Hunter and Ethel Waters. Although Foote never approached the commercial stature of those peers, she ranked among the more accomplished vocalists within the idiom, deploying a notably robust vibrato to striking effect on her sessions alongside pianist Sammy Price. Reissue programs devoted to risqué blues material have kept a selection of her performances in circulation across multiple imprints, yet even this niche has faced encroachment from a surge of interest in cannabis-themed recordings that gathered momentum in the mid-1990s, partly in reaction to the era’s War on Drugs. Among those pieces, her composition “Weed” has consistently been ranked among the finest examples, prompting both fresh editions of her original Stash-label version and a subsequent interpretation by the marijuana-fixated band Exit 13.