Known as the “Mother of the Blues,” Gertrude “Ma” Rainey was born on this date in 1886 in Columbus, Georgia.  She was the first popular female blues singer and had a great deal of influence on those who followed, including her friend Bessie Smith.

Rainey’s first known public performance was at a talent show in her hometown when she was 14 years old.  She married at 18 and toured with traveling minstrel and vaudeville shows for most of the first two decades of the twentieth century.  She and her husband often performed as a duo billed as “Rainey and Rainey, Assassinators of the Blues.”  Their act was not just music, but included comedic and dramatic routines, too.  In 1917, after their marriage ended, “Ma” Rainey continued to tour and perform with her own company called “Madame Gertrude Rainey and her Georgia Smart Sets.”

“Ma” Rainey signed a contract with Paramount Records in 1923 and made almost 100 records for them over the next five years.  These recordings included collaborations with many musicians including fellow Georgian Thomas Dorsey, guitarist Tampa Red and trumpeter Louis Armstrong.  As the 1920s came to a close and the Great Depression took hold of America, Rainey’s music was being replaced in popularity by new forms of jazz and, although she continued to tour the southern United States for several years, her audience was growing smaller.  In 1935, “Ma” Rainey retired to manage theaters in Rome and Columbus, Georgia until her death from heart failure in 1939.
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There is no doubt of the influence “Ma” Rainey had in the music world as both an entertainer and as a businesswoman.  Her legacy lives on in the blues singers that have followed in her footsteps for the next century.

Here is a link to one of "Ma" Rainey's most famous recordings:

"MA RAINEY'S BLACK BOTTOM"