Smith was barnstorming the South, performing her act under a canvas tent for Black audiences or in segregated theaters. One sweltering night in July, it took her to the heart of Concord’s Black ...

In her latest role, Queen Latifah adopts the persona of a 20th century legend. Our Mark Strassmann met up with her for some Questions-and-Answers: At 45, Queen Latifah is playing a part she was first ...

Here’s the way the blues, one of two original American music forms along with jazz, really works. First you get started trying to do something, maybe even something you like. Then comes the time when ...

"The Empress of the Blues" gave voice the listeners' tribulations and yearnings of the 1920s and '30s. A new 10-CD box set collects the complete... The Mythic Power Of Bessie Smith Vocalist Bessie ...

The Oscar-nominated actress will play Bessie Smith in the upcoming HBO Film Queen Latifah is bringing back the blues. The Oscar nominee, 45, will pay tribute to Bessie Smith – the so-called Empress of ...

If Bessie Smith were alive today, she’d likely be singing the blues about North Carolina. A state advisory panel has recommended against approval of a highway historical marker for the night the blues ...

‘’There are some people whose voices ring out across the centuries, who, even after they have gone, possess a strange ability to still be effortlessly here. Bessie’s voice has that quality. Unsettled ...

NEW YORKNEW YORK — “There’s some that calls the blues the devil’s music. Well, honey, I done danced to the devil’s music. So, I gotta give the devil his due.” So says blues icon Bessie Smith, to whom ...

The most popular female recording artist of the 1920s, singer Bessie Smith was nicknamed “Empress of the Blues” for good reason. Smith’s soulful contralto renditions of standards and her original ...