It was the introduction of the third person in this story, an illiterate black vaudeville [musicalnotes.thm]performer, that finally put the Paramount Records label in the spotlight.
Her name was Gertrude Pridgett. When she was discovered in 1923, performing in Chicago, she was part of an act called Ma & Pa Rainey and Assassinators of the Blues. Blues aficionados will recognize her as Ma Rainey.
New York Recording Laboratories of Port Washington, Wisconsin, recorded four record labels: Paramount, Broadway, Famous, and Puritan. The company was active from about 1917 - 1932, and Paramount was clearly its premiere label. Paramount has received the most attention because of its series devoted to blues and jazz, particularly label numbers 12000 - 13000. Collectors and jazz enthusiasts know the Paramount Record label for its roll in documenting the first generation of jazz and blues musicians.
Ma Rainey, Paramount's biggest star, influenced the legendary Bessie Smith. From "the Bottoms" of Georgia, Ma Rainey sang beautiful and sad songs that expressed the heart of the south. In the 1920s women dominated the blues, an area that has been mainly male ever since. The women tended to be entertainers whose lyrics and delivery told about the lives of African-American women in that time following World War I. Paramount issued recordings by women blues singers such as; Elzadie Robinson, Ida Cox, Irene Scruggs, and Edmonia Henderson. Ida Cox, know as the "Queen of the Blues" began singing on stage as a child in Knoxville, Tennessee. By the age of twelve, Elzadie Robinson of Shreveport, Louisiana, was already a popular entertainer. She played engagements in the southern centers before coming north to Chicago.
Paramount found no shortage of male blues singers, who tended to be folk artists, whose music was developed entertaining their isolated rural communities. From Blues in Wisconsin: The Paramount Records Story, by David Luhrssen:
- These included the singers and guitarists Charlie Patton (an influence on Robert Johnson, whose recordings have become the touchstone for the Mississippi Delta blues sound), Blind Lemon Jefferson (for whom the 1960s rock band Jefferson Airplane was named), Blind Blake, and Charlie Spand. Blues piano records were made for Paramount by Henry Brown, Will Ezell, Cow Cow Davenport, Jimmy Blythe, and Blind Leroy Garnett. The great pianist Meade Lux Lewis helped introduce the world to the rowdy, upbeat music known as boogie-woogie with a 1927 disc for Paramount, "Honky Tonk Train Blues." Some jazz recordings were issued by Paramount, including discs by King Oliver's Dixie Syncopators, Lovie Austin's Blues Serenaders, Jimmie O'Bryant's Famous Original Washboard Band, and John Williams's Synco Jazzers.
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