Biography
A Valentine's Day special on the well-known blues program Blues Before Sunrise focused on pianist and vocalist Laura Rucker, prompting the presenter to marvel at her recordings alongside both country blues performer Blind Blake and the sophisticated, innovative, city-oriented keyboardist Earl Hines. The host remarked, "Anyone who makes that stretch gets my attention."
Inspection of surviving recording logs indicates that Rucker and her fellow blues artists frequently attempted to escape scrutiny by issuing material under assumed names and copying one another's mannerisms to mislead record-company attorneys. Devotees of classic female blues singers recognize performances issued as Jane Lucas and Hannah May as the work of Laura Rucker herself, concealed on the labels. Even so, the discography that follows omits all releases by Lucas and May, since the identification has proved to be an unsubstantiated blues rumor. Whether Jane Lucas, also known as Kansas City Kitty, was actually Mozelle Alderson lies outside the present discussion. Ruth Johnson, however, functioned as a pseudonym for Rucker.
Further complications arise. George Ramsey, who recorded vocal duets with Rucker, was in fact Thomas A. Dorsey, better known as Georgia Tom. Dorsey also used the Ramsey name for vocal duets with Lucas, yet this does not establish that Lucas was Rucker. Such identity games commenced in the studios in 1931, by which time she had already become a seasoned participant in Chicago's club and recording worlds. She had worked with bandleader and trumpeter Big Ed Lewis on the Kansas City jazz scene in 1926. Her earliest sessions took place during Paramount's final days and produced four sides, one of them a duet with Georgia Tom Dorsey.
A denser cluster of releases appeared in the middle of the decade for Vocalion and Decca. Her 1935 reading of "I'm Gonna Sit Right Down and Write Myself a Letter" was withheld because it was judged too close an imitation of Fats Waller. One of her signature pieces at the time was "Something's Wrong," whose lyric "If there's too much tenor in his talk, something's wrong" was certain to offend gay activists. In 1939 she recorded for Bluebird as vocalist with the Hines band, where her keyboard abilities were evidently not required. Record guides that had previously listed her as a blues singer on earlier sides now described her as a jazz singer, marking an official recognition of her range. Whatever the label, she maintained steady employment in Chicago clubs, where she willingly performed popular-song requests and maintained a regal stage presence. Her central role on the Chicago club circuit extended through the 1940s.
Vocalist Peggy Lee has recounted hearing Rucker sing with drummer Baby Dodds and has credited Rucker as the source of her celebrated interpretation of Cole Porter's "Let's Do It." In 1949 the singer gave legendary Chicago pianist Claude McLin his first recording opportunity, a collaboration whose effect was comparable to a pebble dropped into Lake Superior. The session of ballads and blues numbers was made for Aristocrat, the label that later became the Chess brothers' domain. As a result, the tracks by Rucker with the Claude McLin Combo have surfaced on various anthologies devoted to that imprint. Rucker clearly preserved her pianistic fluency while working behind Hines, and she is credited with the swinging, fluent keyboard work on these late-1940s dates. Versatility is certainly present in the artist, though perhaps not to the degree implied by associations with both Blake and Hines. A clearer picture of her relationship with the former appears on the Austrian Wolf collection entitled Blind Blake: The Accompanist. It was Blake who adjusted his style to the singer on what proved to be the great blind blues guitarist's final sessions in 1931, rather than the reverse.
Inspection of surviving recording logs indicates that Rucker and her fellow blues artists frequently attempted to escape scrutiny by issuing material under assumed names and copying one another's mannerisms to mislead record-company attorneys. Devotees of classic female blues singers recognize performances issued as Jane Lucas and Hannah May as the work of Laura Rucker herself, concealed on the labels. Even so, the discography that follows omits all releases by Lucas and May, since the identification has proved to be an unsubstantiated blues rumor. Whether Jane Lucas, also known as Kansas City Kitty, was actually Mozelle Alderson lies outside the present discussion. Ruth Johnson, however, functioned as a pseudonym for Rucker.
Further complications arise. George Ramsey, who recorded vocal duets with Rucker, was in fact Thomas A. Dorsey, better known as Georgia Tom. Dorsey also used the Ramsey name for vocal duets with Lucas, yet this does not establish that Lucas was Rucker. Such identity games commenced in the studios in 1931, by which time she had already become a seasoned participant in Chicago's club and recording worlds. She had worked with bandleader and trumpeter Big Ed Lewis on the Kansas City jazz scene in 1926. Her earliest sessions took place during Paramount's final days and produced four sides, one of them a duet with Georgia Tom Dorsey.
A denser cluster of releases appeared in the middle of the decade for Vocalion and Decca. Her 1935 reading of "I'm Gonna Sit Right Down and Write Myself a Letter" was withheld because it was judged too close an imitation of Fats Waller. One of her signature pieces at the time was "Something's Wrong," whose lyric "If there's too much tenor in his talk, something's wrong" was certain to offend gay activists. In 1939 she recorded for Bluebird as vocalist with the Hines band, where her keyboard abilities were evidently not required. Record guides that had previously listed her as a blues singer on earlier sides now described her as a jazz singer, marking an official recognition of her range. Whatever the label, she maintained steady employment in Chicago clubs, where she willingly performed popular-song requests and maintained a regal stage presence. Her central role on the Chicago club circuit extended through the 1940s.
Vocalist Peggy Lee has recounted hearing Rucker sing with drummer Baby Dodds and has credited Rucker as the source of her celebrated interpretation of Cole Porter's "Let's Do It." In 1949 the singer gave legendary Chicago pianist Claude McLin his first recording opportunity, a collaboration whose effect was comparable to a pebble dropped into Lake Superior. The session of ballads and blues numbers was made for Aristocrat, the label that later became the Chess brothers' domain. As a result, the tracks by Rucker with the Claude McLin Combo have surfaced on various anthologies devoted to that imprint. Rucker clearly preserved her pianistic fluency while working behind Hines, and she is credited with the swinging, fluent keyboard work on these late-1940s dates. Versatility is certainly present in the artist, though perhaps not to the degree implied by associations with both Blake and Hines. A clearer picture of her relationship with the former appears on the Austrian Wolf collection entitled Blind Blake: The Accompanist. It was Blake who adjusted his style to the singer on what proved to be the great blind blues guitarist's final sessions in 1931, rather than the reverse.