Ma Rainey was one of the earliest known American professional blues singers and one of the first generation of such singers to record. She was billed as The Mother of the Blues.
She began performing as a young teenager, and performed under the name Ma Rainey after she and Will Rainey were married in 1904. They toured with F.S. Wolcott's Rabbit Foot Minstrels and later formed their own group called Rainey and Rainey, Assassinators of the Blues. From the time of her first recording in 1923 to five...
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