Booker T. Laury
Encyclopedia
Booker T. Laury was an American
boogie-woogie
, blues
, gospel and jazz
pianist
and singer. Over his lengthy career, Laury worked with various musician
s including Memphis Slim
and Mose Vinson
. He appeared in two films, but did not record his debut album until he was almost eighty years of age.
, and grew up with his lifelong friend, Memphis Slim
. At the age of six, after helping his mother play the family's pump organ
, Laury learned to play the keyboards
. His barrelhouse
playing style, which he developed alongside Slim, was based on the influence gained from regular Memphis performers Roosevelt Sykes
, Sunnyland Slim
, and Speckled Red
. In the early 1930s, and in the company of the younger Mose Vinson
, Slim and Laury began playing in local clubs.
In 1935, Sykes suggested to Laury and Slim that they relocated to Chicago
, with a view of obtaining a recording contract
. Slim took up the advice, but Laury decided to remain in Memphis, where he played in gambling houses and clubs for decades. Laury had a large hand-width, which enabled him to span ten keys. His playing dexterity was such that, after losing one finger on his left hand following an accident with a circular saw
in the 1950s, he was still able to play well. Based around Memphis' Beale Street
, as that area started to degenerate, Laury traveled around Tennessee
, Arkansas
and Missouri
. Despite differing fortunes, the friendship with Slim did not diminish over the years, up to Slim's death in 1988.
In the 1989 Dennis Quaid
film
, Great Balls of Fire!
, the plot had a young Jerry Lee Lewis
and Jimmy Swaggart
, look into a juke joint
to see Laury playing "Big Legged Woman". This attention led to Laury having the opportunity to record later in his life.
Laury appeared in the 1991 documentary film
, Deep Blues: A Musical Pilgrimage to the Crossroads
. In the film, Laury played "Memphis Blues" in his own living room.
Laury finally recorded his debut album in his late seventies. In 1993, Bullseye Blues Records issued Nothin' But the Blues, which simply incorporated Laury's voice and piano playing his own compositions. The following year, Wolf Records released a live album
, containing concert
recordings made in 1987.
Booker T. Laury died of cancer
, in September 1995 in Memphis, at the age of 81. He has a brass note on Beale's Walk of Fame.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
boogie-woogie
Boogie-woogie
Boogie-woogie has the following meanings:*Boogie-woogie, a piano-based music style*Boogie-woogie , a swing dance or a dance that imitates the rock-n-roll dance of the 1950s*"Boogie Woogie" , a song by EuroGroove and Dannii Minogue...
, blues
Blues
Blues is the name given to both a musical form and a music genre that originated in African-American communities of primarily the "Deep South" of the United States at the end of the 19th century from spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts and chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads...
, gospel and jazz
Jazz
Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...
pianist
Pianist
A pianist is a musician who plays the piano. A professional pianist can perform solo pieces, play with an ensemble or orchestra, or accompany one or more singers, solo instrumentalists, or other performers.-Choice of genres:...
and singer. Over his lengthy career, Laury worked with various musician
Musician
A musician is an artist who plays a musical instrument. It may or may not be the person's profession. Musicians can be classified by their roles in performing music and writing music.Also....* A person who makes music a profession....
s including Memphis Slim
Memphis Slim
Memphis Slim was an American blues pianist, singer, and composer. He led a series of bands that, reflecting the popular appeal of jump blues, included saxophones, bass, drums, and piano. A song he first cut in 1947, "Every Day I Have the Blues", has become a blues standard, recorded by many other...
and Mose Vinson
Mose Vinson
Mose Vinson was an American boogie-woogie, blues and jazz pianist and singer. His best known recordings were "Blues With A Feeling" and "Sweet Root Man". Over his lengthy career, Vinson worked with various musicians including Booker T. Laury and James Cotton.-Biography:Vinson was born in Holly...
. He appeared in two films, but did not record his debut album until he was almost eighty years of age.
Biography
Lawrence Laury was born in Memphis, TennesseeTennessee
Tennessee is a U.S. state located in the Southeastern United States. It has a population of 6,346,105, making it the nation's 17th-largest state by population, and covers , making it the 36th-largest by total land area...
, and grew up with his lifelong friend, Memphis Slim
Memphis Slim
Memphis Slim was an American blues pianist, singer, and composer. He led a series of bands that, reflecting the popular appeal of jump blues, included saxophones, bass, drums, and piano. A song he first cut in 1947, "Every Day I Have the Blues", has become a blues standard, recorded by many other...
. At the age of six, after helping his mother play the family's pump organ
Reed organ
A reed organ, also called a parlor organ, pump organ, cabinet organ, cottage organ, is an organ that generates its sounds using free metal reeds...
, Laury learned to play the keyboards
Keyboard instrument
A keyboard instrument is a musical instrument which is played using a musical keyboard. The most common of these is the piano. Other widely used keyboard instruments include organs of various types as well as other mechanical, electromechanical and electronic instruments...
. His barrelhouse
Barrelhouse
Barrelhouse can refer to:*A "juke joint", a bar or saloon. Originates from the storage of barrels of alcohol.*An early form of jazz with wild, improvised piano, and an accented two-beat rhythm ....
playing style, which he developed alongside Slim, was based on the influence gained from regular Memphis performers Roosevelt Sykes
Roosevelt Sykes
Roosevelt Sykes was an American blues musician, also known as "The Honeydripper". He was a successful and prolific cigar-chomping blues piano player, whose rollicking thundering boogie-woogie was highly influential.-Career:Born in Elmar, Arkansas, Sykes grew up near Helena but at age 15, went on...
, Sunnyland Slim
Sunnyland Slim
Albert "Sunnyland Slim" Luandrew was an American blues pianist, who was born in the Mississippi Delta, and later moved to Chicago, Illinois, to contribute to that city's post-war scene as a center for blues music...
, and Speckled Red
Speckled Red
Speckled Red was born Rufus Perryman in Monroe, Louisiana. He was an American blues and boogie-woogie piano player and singer, most noted for his recordings of "The Dirty Dozens", with exchanges of insults and vulgar remarks that have long been a part of African American folklore.The family moved...
. In the early 1930s, and in the company of the younger Mose Vinson
Mose Vinson
Mose Vinson was an American boogie-woogie, blues and jazz pianist and singer. His best known recordings were "Blues With A Feeling" and "Sweet Root Man". Over his lengthy career, Vinson worked with various musicians including Booker T. Laury and James Cotton.-Biography:Vinson was born in Holly...
, Slim and Laury began playing in local clubs.
In 1935, Sykes suggested to Laury and Slim that they relocated to Chicago
Chicago
Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...
, with a view of obtaining a recording contract
Recording contract
A recording contract is a legal agreement between a record label and a recording artist , where the artist makes a record for the label to sell and promote...
. Slim took up the advice, but Laury decided to remain in Memphis, where he played in gambling houses and clubs for decades. Laury had a large hand-width, which enabled him to span ten keys. His playing dexterity was such that, after losing one finger on his left hand following an accident with a circular saw
Circular saw
The circular saw is a machine using a toothed metal cutting disc or blade. The term is also loosely used for the blade itself. The blade is a tool for cutting wood or other materials and may be hand-held or table-mounted. It can also be used to make narrow slots...
in the 1950s, he was still able to play well. Based around Memphis' Beale Street
Beale Street
Beale Street is a street in Downtown Memphis, Tennessee, which runs from the Mississippi River to East Street, a distance of approximately . It is a significant location in the city's history, as well as in the history of the blues. Today, the blues clubs and restaurants that line Beale Street are...
, as that area started to degenerate, Laury traveled around Tennessee
Tennessee
Tennessee is a U.S. state located in the Southeastern United States. It has a population of 6,346,105, making it the nation's 17th-largest state by population, and covers , making it the 36th-largest by total land area...
, Arkansas
Arkansas
Arkansas is a state located in the southern region of the United States. Its name is an Algonquian name of the Quapaw Indians. Arkansas shares borders with six states , and its eastern border is largely defined by the Mississippi River...
and Missouri
Missouri
Missouri is a US state located in the Midwestern United States, bordered by Iowa, Illinois, Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Kansas and Nebraska. With a 2010 population of 5,988,927, Missouri is the 18th most populous state in the nation and the fifth most populous in the Midwest. It...
. Despite differing fortunes, the friendship with Slim did not diminish over the years, up to Slim's death in 1988.
In the 1989 Dennis Quaid
Dennis Quaid
Dennis William Quaid is an American actor known for his comedic and dramatic roles. First gaining widespread attention in the 1980s, his career rebounded in the 1990s after he overcame an addiction to drugs and an eating disorder...
film
Film
A film, also called a movie or motion picture, is a series of still or moving images. It is produced by recording photographic images with cameras, or by creating images using animation techniques or visual effects...
, Great Balls of Fire!
Great Balls of Fire! (film)
Great Balls of Fire! is a 1989 American biographical film directed by Jim McBride and starring Dennis Quaid as Jerry Lee Lewis. Based on a biography by Myra Lewis and Murray M. Silver Jr., the screenplay is written by McBride and Jack Baran...
, the plot had a young Jerry Lee Lewis
Jerry Lee Lewis
Jerry Lee Lewis is an American rock and roll and country music singer-songwriter and pianist. An early pioneer of rock and roll music, Lewis's career faltered after he married his young cousin, and he afterwards made a career extension to country and western music. He is known by the nickname 'The...
and Jimmy Swaggart
Jimmy Swaggart
Jimmy Lee Swaggart is a Pentecostal American pastor, teacher, musician, television host, and televangelist. He has preached to crowds around the world through his weekly telecast...
, look into a juke joint
Juke joint
Juke joint is the vernacular term for an informal establishment featuring music, dancing, gambling, and drinking, primarily operated by African American people in the southeastern United States. The term "juke" is believed to derive from the Gullah word joog, meaning rowdy or disorderly...
to see Laury playing "Big Legged Woman". This attention led to Laury having the opportunity to record later in his life.
Laury appeared in the 1991 documentary film
Documentary film
Documentary films constitute a broad category of nonfictional motion pictures intended to document some aspect of reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction or maintaining a historical record...
, Deep Blues: A Musical Pilgrimage to the Crossroads
Deep Blues: A Musical Pilgrimage to the Crossroads
Deep Blues: A Musical Pilgrimage to the Crossroads is a documentary film, released in 1992, and made by David A. Stewart in conjunction with his brother John J. Stewart, in collaboration with music critic and author Robert Palmer and documentary film maker Robert Mugge. The film provided insight...
. In the film, Laury played "Memphis Blues" in his own living room.
Laury finally recorded his debut album in his late seventies. In 1993, Bullseye Blues Records issued Nothin' But the Blues, which simply incorporated Laury's voice and piano playing his own compositions. The following year, Wolf Records released a live album
Live album
A live album is a recording consisting of material recorded during stage performances using remote recording techniques, commonly contrasted with a studio album...
, containing concert
Concert
A concert is a live performance before an audience. The performance may be by a single musician, sometimes then called a recital, or by a musical ensemble, such as an orchestra, a choir, or a musical band...
recordings made in 1987.
Booker T. Laury died of cancer
Cancer
Cancer , known medically as a malignant neoplasm, is a large group of different diseases, all involving unregulated cell growth. In cancer, cells divide and grow uncontrollably, forming malignant tumors, and invade nearby parts of the body. The cancer may also spread to more distant parts of the...
, in September 1995 in Memphis, at the age of 81. He has a brass note on Beale's Walk of Fame.
Discography
| Album title | Record label | Year of release |
|---|---|---|
| Nothing But the Blues | Bullseye Blues Records | 1993 |
| Live | Wolf Records | 1994 |
See also
- List of blues musicians
- List of Memphis blues musicians
- List of boogie woogie musicians
- List of gospel blues musicians
- Piano bluesPiano bluesPiano blues refers to a variety of blues styles, sharing only the characteristic that they use the piano as the primary musical instrument. Boogie woogie is the best known kind of piano blues, though barrelhouse, swing, R&B, rock and roll and jazz are strongly influenced by early pianists who...