Umpeylia Marsema Balinton came into the world under that birth name, only to receive both her professional alias Sugar Pie DeSanto and her very first recording opportunity from the rhythm-and-blues powerhouse Johnny Otis. Though frequently pigeonholed as a blues performer, she demonstrated equal command over soul material and proved equally adept as a jazz vocalist. These abilities alone might have secured most vocalists a respectable measure of recognition, yet DeSanto further distinguished herself as a gifted comedienne, an electrifying dancer, and an exceptionally inventive songwriter whose pieces were interpreted by Fontella Bass, Billy Stewart, Little Milton, Bobby McClure, Minnie Riperton, Jesse James, the Dells, and the Whispers.
Otis first encountered her onstage at the Ellis Theater, the venue she later described as the formative cradle of her musical approach, after she claimed top honors at one of its recurring amateur contests. He immediately extended an offer that brought her to Los Angeles to make her inaugural record. Beginning in the late 1950s she appeared consistently at such rhythm-and-blues strongholds as New York’s Apollo, Chicago’s Regal, and Washington, D.C.’s Howard. Her Apollo appearances left a strong impression on James Brown, resulting in a two-year stint as his opening performer.
During 1964 she stood as the sole woman among the artists assembled for an American Folk Blues Festival tour whose roster included Willie Dixon, Sleepy John Estes, Clifton James, Sunnyland Slim, Hubert Sumlin, Lightnin’ Hopkins, and Sonny Boy Williamson II, also known as Rice Miller. Across a catalog of roughly one hundred compositions she favored delivering her own material; of the tracks featured on four strong Jasman compact discs, merely two fall outside her authorship. The 1997 release Classic Sugar Pie marked the first complete live document of her work, an album whose onstage energy surpassed the inventiveness and force found on her studio efforts. That recording also demonstrated that her advancing years posed no obstacle to further growth, as she began exploring country-and-western territory. DeSanto died on December 20, 2024, at the age of 89.
