"Stormy Monday Blues" is a jazz song first recorded in 1942 by Earl Hines

Earl Hines

Earl Kenneth Hines, universally known as Earl "Fatha" Hines, was an American jazz pianist. Hines was one of the most influential figures in the development of modern jazz piano and, according to one source, is "one of a small number of pianists whose playing shaped the history of jazz".-Early...

 and His Orchestra with Billy Eckstine

Billy Eckstine

William Clarence Eckstine was an American singer of ballads and a bandleader of the swing era. Eckstine's smooth baritone and distinctive vibrato broke down barriers throughout the 1940s, first as leader of the original bop big-band, then as the first romantic black male in popular...

 on vocals. The song was a hit, reaching number one in Billboard

Billboard (magazine)

Billboard is a weekly American magazine devoted to the music industry, and is one of the oldest trade magazines in the world. It maintains several internationally recognized music charts that track the most popular songs and albums in various categories on a weekly basis...

magazine's "Harlem Hit Parade

Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs

Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs, is a chart released weekly by Billboard in the United States.The chart, initiated in 1942, is used to track the success of popular music songs in urban, or primarily African American, venues. Dominated over the years at various times by jazz, rhythm and blues, doo-wop, soul,...

", making it Hines' only appearance in the charts.

"Stormy Monday Blues" is performed in the style of a slow blues that "starts with Hines' piano and a walking bass for the introduction". Billy Eckstine then enters with the vocal:

It's gone and started rainin', I'm as lonesome as a man can be

It's gone and started rainin', I'm as lonesome as a man can be

'Cause every time it rains, I realize what you mean to me

Of note, the lyrics "stormy" or "Monday" do not appear in the song. A trumpet solo by Maurice "Shorty" McConnell with big band backing is featured in the second half of the song.

The song has sometimes been confused with T-Bone Walker

T-Bone Walker

Aaron Thibeaux "T-Bone" Walker was a critically acclaimed American blues guitarist, singer, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist, who was one of the most influential pioneers and innovators of the jump blues and electric blues sound. He is the first musician recorded playing blues with the...

's 1945 song "Call It Stormy Monday (But Tuesday Is Just as Bad)

Call It Stormy Monday (But Tuesday Is Just as Bad)

"Call It Stormy Monday " is a blues song written by T-Bone Walker and first recorded in 1947. Confusingly, it is also sometimes referred to as "Stormy Monday Blues", although that is the title of a 1942 song by Earl Hines and Billy Eckstine...

", which is frequently shortened to "Stormy Monday" or "Stormy Monday Blues". When Eckstine later recorded "Stormy Monday Blues" in 1959 with Count Basie

Count Basie

William "Count" Basie was an American jazz pianist, organist, bandleader, and composer. Basie led his jazz orchestra almost continuously for nearly 50 years...

 for their Basie/Eckstine Incorporated

Basie and Eckstine, Inc.

Basie/Eckstine Incorporated is a 1959 album featuring Billy Eckstine and the Count Basie Orchestra. It was released by Roulette Records, then later reissued by Capital Records.- Track listing :# "Stormy Monday Blues" - 3:11...

album, the song was credited to T-Bone Walker, even though Eckstine is a cowriter of the original.