J. Mayo Williams
Encyclopedia
Jay Mayo "Ink" Williams was a pioneering African-American producer of recorded blues
music. Ink Williams earned his nickname by his ability to get the signatures of talented African-American musicians on recording contracts. He was the most successful "race records" producer of his time breaking all previous "race record" sales.
, the son of Daniel and Millie Williams. At the age of 7, Williams' father was murder
ed, and the family returned to his mother's hometown of Monmouth, Illinois
, where he grew up.
Williams attended Brown University
, where he was a track
star and outstanding football
player. He also served in the First World War. During the 1920s, he played professional football with the Hammond (Ind.) Pros
, becoming one of three black athletes (along with Paul Robeson
) to play in the fledgling National Football League
during its first year. His playing career lasted until 1926. During that span he played for the Canton Bulldogs
, Dayton Triangles
, Hammond Pros and Cleveland Bulldogs
. But his primary focus at this time was not the gridiron but the music industry.
After graduating in 1921, he moved to Chicago. Although he continued to play football until 1926, his first love was music and in 1924 he joined Paramount Records
, which had recently begun to produce and market "race" records. Williams became a talent scout and supervisor of recording sessions in the Chicago area, becoming the most successful blues producer of his time. Two of his biggest discoveries as recording artists were singer Ma Rainey
- already a popular live performer - and Papa Charlie Jackson
, the first commercially successful self-accompanied blues singer. He recorded Blind Lemon Jefferson
, Tampa Red
, Thomas A. Dorsey
, Ida Cox
, Jimmy Blythe
, Jelly Roll Morton
, King Oliver, and Freddy Keppard. He also managed a crew of songwriters including Tiny Parham
.
In 1927, he left Paramount and started The Chicago Record Company, releasing jazz, blues and gospel records on the "Black Patti
" label. One of these releases was The Down Home Boys' "Original Stack O' Lee Blues", believed to be the first recorded version of the song better known as "Stagger Lee
", and of which only one copy is now known to exist. Black Patti soon failed, and Williams moved to Brunswick Records
and its subsidiary label Vocalion
, where he recorded Clarence "Pine Top" Smith
and Leroy Carr
, among others. However, after the Wall Street Crash of 1929
, record sales plummeted, and Williams found new work as a football coach at Morehouse College
in Atlanta.
In 1934, Williams was hired as head of the "race records" department at Decca
, where he recorded such musicians as Mahalia Jackson
, Alberta Hunter
, Blind Boy Fuller
, Roosevelt Sykes
, Sleepy John Estes
, Kokomo Arnold
, Peetie Wheatstraw
, Bill Gaither
, Bumble Bee Slim
, Georgia White
, Trixie Smith
, Monette Moore
, Sister Rosetta Tharpe
, Marie Knight
, Tab Smith
as well as pioneering the recording of the increasingly popular small group sound with such groups as The Harlem Hamfats.
Williams was accused by some black musicians of a "dicty" attitude - that is, acting as though he was a member of the white middle class. He acted as manager of many of the artists he recorded, and assumed at least some of the ownership of many of their songs. Songs on which he is credited as co-writer include "Corrine, Corrina", Nellie Lutcher
's "Fine Brown Frame", Louis Jordan
's "Mop Mop", and Stick McGhee
's "Drinkin' Wine Spo-Dee-O-Dee".
Williams set up the Chicago Music Publishing Company (CMPC) as publisher for all the titles he recorded. The CMPC collected all royalties generated by the materials it held copyrights on, and was responsible for passing on some of the profits to the composer or performer. However, many successful artists that Williams recorded, including Blind Blake
and Blind Lemon Jefferson
, probably never received any royalties. Race record entrepreneurs knew that rural blues musicians were unfamiliar with copyright laws, and they further played upon the musicians' vulnerability by providing free liquor at recording sessions, hoping they would get drunk and sign their rights away.
After leaving Decca in 1945, Williams worked freelance and ran several small, independent labels. From 1945 through 1949, he ran the Harlem label (based in New York City), and the Chicago, Southern, and Ebony label (based in Chicago); one of the artists he recorded was the young Muddy Waters
. After a period of freelance producing, he reopened the Ebony label in 1952 and kept it going through the early 1970s recording the likes of Lil Armstrong, Bonnie Lee
, Oscar Brown
and Hammie Nixon
As plans were being initiated to conduct full length interviews with Williams to gather his life story in 1980, he died in a Chicago nursing home.
Williams was a member of the National Football Hall of Fame Association. In 2004, he was posthumously inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame
.
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...
music. Ink Williams earned his nickname by his ability to get the signatures of talented African-American musicians on recording contracts. He was the most successful "race records" producer of his time breaking all previous "race record" sales.
Career
Williams was born in Pine Bluff, ArkansasPine Bluff, Arkansas
Pine Bluff is the largest city and county seat of Jefferson County, Arkansas, United States. It is also the principal city of the Pine Bluff Metropolitan Statistical Area and part of the Little Rock-North Little Rock-Pine Bluff, Arkansas Combined Statistical Area...
, the son of Daniel and Millie Williams. At the age of 7, Williams' father was murder
Murder
Murder is the unlawful killing, with malice aforethought, of another human being, and generally this state of mind distinguishes murder from other forms of unlawful homicide...
ed, and the family returned to his mother's hometown of Monmouth, Illinois
Monmouth, Illinois
Monmouth is a city in and the county seat of Warren County in the U.S. state of Illinois. It is the home of Monmouth College and contains Monmouth Park, Harmon Park, North Park, Warfield Park, West Park, South Park, Garwood Park, Buster White Park and the Citizens Lake & Campground. It is the host...
, where he grew up.
Williams attended Brown University
Brown University
Brown University is a private, Ivy League university located in Providence, Rhode Island, United States. Founded in 1764 prior to American independence from the British Empire as the College in the English Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations early in the reign of King George III ,...
, where he was a track
Track and field
Track and field is a sport comprising various competitive athletic contests based around the activities of running, jumping and throwing. The name of the sport derives from the venue for the competitions: a stadium which features an oval running track surrounding a grassy area...
star and outstanding football
American football
American football is a sport played between two teams of eleven with the objective of scoring points by advancing the ball into the opposing team's end zone. Known in the United States simply as football, it may also be referred to informally as gridiron football. The ball can be advanced by...
player. He also served in the First World War. During the 1920s, he played professional football with the Hammond (Ind.) Pros
Hammond Pros
The Hammond Pros from Hammond, Indiana played in the National Football League from 1920 to 1926 as a traveling team.-History:The Pros were established by Paul Parduhn and Dr. Alva Young who was a boxing promoter, owner of a racing stable and a doctor and trainer for a semi-pro football team...
, becoming one of three black athletes (along with Paul Robeson
Paul Robeson
Paul Leroy Robeson was an American concert singer , recording artist, actor, athlete, scholar who was an advocate for the Civil Rights Movement in the first half of the twentieth century...
) to play in the fledgling National Football League
National Football League
The National Football League is the highest level of professional American football in the United States, and is considered the top professional American football league in the world. It was formed by eleven teams in 1920 as the American Professional Football Association, with the league changing...
during its first year. His playing career lasted until 1926. During that span he played for the Canton Bulldogs
Canton Bulldogs
The Canton Bulldogs were a professional American football team, based in Canton, Ohio. They played in the Ohio League from 1903 to 1906 and 1911 to 1919, and its successor, the National Football League, from 1920 to 1923 and again from 1925 to 1926. The Bulldogs would go on to win the 1917, 1918...
, Dayton Triangles
Dayton Triangles
The Dayton Triangles were an original franchise of the American Professional Football Association in 1920. The Triangles were based in Dayton, Ohio, and took their nickname from their home field, Triangle Park, which was located at the confluence of the Great Miami and Stillwater Rivers in north...
, Hammond Pros and Cleveland Bulldogs
Cleveland Bulldogs
The Cleveland Bulldogs was a team that played in Cleveland, Ohio in the National Football League. They were originally called the Indians in 1923, not to be confused with the Cleveland Indians NFL franchise in 1922...
. But his primary focus at this time was not the gridiron but the music industry.
After graduating in 1921, he moved to Chicago. Although he continued to play football until 1926, his first love was music and in 1924 he joined Paramount Records
Paramount Records
Paramount Records was an American record label, best known for its recordings of African-American jazz and blues in the 1920s and early 1930s, including such artists as Ma Rainey and Blind Lemon Jefferson.-Early years:...
, which had recently begun to produce and market "race" records. Williams became a talent scout and supervisor of recording sessions in the Chicago area, becoming the most successful blues producer of his time. Two of his biggest discoveries as recording artists were singer Ma Rainey
Ma Rainey
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....
- already a popular live performer - and Papa Charlie Jackson
Papa Charlie Jackson
Papa Charlie Jackson was an early American bluesman and songster. He played a hybrid banjo guitar and ukulele, his recording career beginning in 1924...
, the first commercially successful self-accompanied blues singer. He recorded Blind Lemon Jefferson
Blind Lemon Jefferson
"Blind" Lemon Jefferson was an American blues singer and guitarist from Texas. He was one of the most popular blues singers of the 1920s, and has been titled "Father of the Texas Blues"....
, Tampa Red
Tampa Red
Tampa Red , born Hudson Woodbridge but known from childhood as Hudson Whittaker, was an American Chicago blues musician....
, Thomas A. Dorsey
Thomas A. Dorsey
Thomas Andrew Dorsey was known as "the father of black gospel music" and was at one time so closely associated with the field that songs written in the new style were sometimes known as "dorseys." Earlier in his life he was a leading blues pianist known as Georgia Tom.As formulated by Dorsey,...
, Ida Cox
Ida Cox
Ida Cox was an African American singer and vaudeville performer, best known for her blues performances and recordings...
, Jimmy Blythe
Jimmy Blythe
Jimmy Blythe was an influential American jazz and boogie-woogie pianist.-Life:He was born in Louisville, Kentucky, United States, and moved to Chicago, Illinois around 1916, studying with pianist Clarence Jones...
, Jelly Roll Morton
Jelly Roll Morton
Ferdinand Joseph LaMothe , known professionally as Jelly Roll Morton, was an American ragtime and early jazz pianist, bandleader and composer....
, King Oliver, and Freddy Keppard. He also managed a crew of songwriters including Tiny Parham
Tiny Parham
Hartzell Strathdene "Tiny" Parham was a Canadian-born American jazz bandleader and pianist of African-American descent....
.
In 1927, he left Paramount and started The Chicago Record Company, releasing jazz, blues and gospel records on the "Black Patti
Black Patti Records
Black Patti Records was a short-lived record label.The label was owned by The Chicago Record Company, which in turn was owned by promoter Mayo ‘Ink’ Williams...
" label. One of these releases was The Down Home Boys' "Original Stack O' Lee Blues", believed to be the first recorded version of the song better known as "Stagger Lee
Stagger Lee (song)
"Stagger Lee", also known as "Stagolee", "Stackerlee", "Stack O'Lee", "Stack-a-Lee" and several other variants, is a popular folk song based on the murder of William "Billy" Lyons by Stagger Lee Shelton...
", and of which only one copy is now known to exist. Black Patti soon failed, and Williams moved to Brunswick Records
Brunswick Records
Brunswick Records is a United States based record label. The label is currently distributed by E1 Entertainment.-From 1916:Records under the "Brunswick" label were first produced by the Brunswick-Balke-Collender Company...
and its subsidiary label Vocalion
Vocalion Records
Vocalion Records is a record label active for many years in the United States and in the United Kingdom.-History:Vocalion was founded in 1916 by the Aeolian Piano Company of New York City, which introduced a retail line of phonographs at the same time. The name was derived from one of their...
, where he recorded Clarence "Pine Top" Smith
Pinetop Smith
Clarence Smith, better known as Pinetop Smith or Pine Top Smith was an American boogie-woogie style blues pianist...
and Leroy Carr
Leroy Carr
Leroy Carr was an American blues singer, songwriter and pianist, who developed a laid-back, crooning technique and whose popularity and style influenced such artists as Nat King Cole and Ray Charles. He first became famous for "How Long, How Long Blues" on Vocalion Records in 1928.-Life and...
, among others. However, after the Wall Street Crash of 1929
Wall Street Crash of 1929
The Wall Street Crash of 1929 , also known as the Great Crash, and the Stock Market Crash of 1929, was the most devastating stock market crash in the history of the United States, taking into consideration the full extent and duration of its fallout...
, record sales plummeted, and Williams found new work as a football coach at Morehouse College
Morehouse College
Morehouse College is a private, all-male, liberal arts, historically black college located in Atlanta, Georgia. Along with Hampden-Sydney College and Wabash College, Morehouse is one of three remaining traditional men's colleges in the United States....
in Atlanta.
In 1934, Williams was hired as head of the "race records" department at Decca
Decca Records
Decca Records began as a British record label established in 1929 by Edward Lewis. Its U.S. label was established in late 1934; however, owing to World War II, the link with the British company was broken for several decades....
, where he recorded such musicians as Mahalia Jackson
Mahalia Jackson
Mahalia Jackson – January 27, 1972) was an African-American gospel singer. Possessing a powerful contralto voice, she was referred to as "The Queen of Gospel"...
, Alberta Hunter
Alberta Hunter
Alberta Hunter was an American blues singer, songwriter, and nurse. Her career had started back in the early 1920s, and from there on, she became a successful jazz and blues recording artist, being critically acclaimed to the ranks of Ethel Waters and Bessie Smith...
, Blind Boy Fuller
Blind Boy Fuller
Blind Boy Fuller was an American blues guitarist and vocalist. He was one of the most popular of the recorded Piedmont blues artists with rural Black Americans, a group that also included Blind Blake, Josh White, and Buddy Moss.-Life and career:Fulton Allen was born in Wadesboro, North Carolina,...
, 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...
, Sleepy John Estes
Sleepy John Estes
John Adam Estes , best known as Sleepy John Estes or Sleepy John, was a American blues guitarist, songwriter and vocalist, born in Ripley, Lauderdale County, Tennessee.-Career:...
, Kokomo Arnold
Kokomo Arnold
Kokomo Arnold was an American blues musician.Born as James Arnold in Lovejoy's Station, Georgia, he got his nickname in 1934 after releasing "Old Original Kokomo Blues" for the Decca label; it was a cover of the Scrapper Blackwell blues song about the city of Kokomo, Indiana...
, Peetie Wheatstraw
Peetie Wheatstraw
Peetie Wheatstraw was the name adopted by the singer William Bunch, an influential figure among 1930s blues singers...
, Bill Gaither
Bill Gaither
William J. Gaither is an American singer and songwriter of southern gospel and Contemporary Christian music. Besides having written numerous popular Christian songs with his wife, Gloria, he is also known for performing as part of the Bill Gaither Trio, and the Gaither Vocal Band...
, Bumble Bee Slim
Bumble Bee Slim
Amos Easton , better known by the stage name Bumble Bee Slim, was an American Piedmont blues musician.-Biography:Easton was born in Brunswick, Georgia, United States...
, Georgia White
Georgia White
Georgia White was an African American blues singer, most prolific in the 1930s and 1940s.Little is known of her early life. By the late 1920s she was singing in clubs in Chicago, and she made her first recording, "When You're Smiling, the Whole World Smiles With You," with Jimmie Noone's...
, Trixie Smith
Trixie Smith
Trixie Smith was an African American blues singer, recording artist, vaudeville entertainer, and actress. She made four dozen recordings.-Biography:...
, Monette Moore
Monette Moore
Monette Moore was an American jazz and blues singer.Moore was raised in Kansas City and then moved to New York City early in the 1920s; she moved often in that decade, working in Chicago, Dallas and Oklahoma City...
, Sister Rosetta Tharpe
Sister Rosetta Tharpe
Sister Rosetta Tharpe was an Amercian pioneering gospel singer, songwriter and recording artist who attained great popularity in the 1930s and 1940s with a unique mixture of spiritual lyrics and early rock and roll accompaniment...
, Marie Knight
Marie Knight
Marie Knight was an American gospel and R&B singer.-Life and career:She was born Marie Roach in Sanford, Florida but grew up in Newark, New Jersey. Her father was a construction worker and the family were members of the Church of God in Christ. She first toured as a singer in 1939 with Frances...
, Tab Smith
Tab Smith
Talmadge "Tab" Smith , was an American swing and rhythm and blues alto saxophonist. He is best known for the tracks, "Because Of You" and "Pretend". He variously worked with Count Basie, the Mills Rhythm Boys and Lucky Millinder.-Biography:Smith was born in Kinston, North Carolina, United States...
as well as pioneering the recording of the increasingly popular small group sound with such groups as The Harlem Hamfats.
Williams was accused by some black musicians of a "dicty" attitude - that is, acting as though he was a member of the white middle class. He acted as manager of many of the artists he recorded, and assumed at least some of the ownership of many of their songs. Songs on which he is credited as co-writer include "Corrine, Corrina", Nellie Lutcher
Nellie Lutcher
Nellie Lutcher was an African-American R&B and jazz singer and pianist, who gained prominence in the late 1940s and early 1950s...
's "Fine Brown Frame", Louis Jordan
Louis Jordan
Louis Thomas Jordan was a pioneering American jazz, blues and rhythm & blues musician, songwriter and bandleader who enjoyed his greatest popularity from the late 1930s to the early 1950s. Known as "The King of the Jukebox", Jordan was highly popular with both black and white audiences in the...
's "Mop Mop", and Stick McGhee
Stick McGhee
Granville Henry McGhee, also known as Stick McGhee, was an African-American jump blues guitarist, singer and songwriter, best known for his blues song, "Drinkin' Wine, Spo-Dee-O-Dee".-Early life:...
's "Drinkin' Wine Spo-Dee-O-Dee".
Williams set up the Chicago Music Publishing Company (CMPC) as publisher for all the titles he recorded. The CMPC collected all royalties generated by the materials it held copyrights on, and was responsible for passing on some of the profits to the composer or performer. However, many successful artists that Williams recorded, including Blind Blake
Blind Blake
"Blind" Blake was an American blues and ragtime singer and guitarist.-Biography:...
and Blind Lemon Jefferson
Blind Lemon Jefferson
"Blind" Lemon Jefferson was an American blues singer and guitarist from Texas. He was one of the most popular blues singers of the 1920s, and has been titled "Father of the Texas Blues"....
, probably never received any royalties. Race record entrepreneurs knew that rural blues musicians were unfamiliar with copyright laws, and they further played upon the musicians' vulnerability by providing free liquor at recording sessions, hoping they would get drunk and sign their rights away.
After leaving Decca in 1945, Williams worked freelance and ran several small, independent labels. From 1945 through 1949, he ran the Harlem label (based in New York City), and the Chicago, Southern, and Ebony label (based in Chicago); one of the artists he recorded was the young Muddy Waters
Muddy Waters
McKinley Morganfield , known as Muddy Waters, was an American blues musician, generally considered the "father of modern Chicago blues"...
. After a period of freelance producing, he reopened the Ebony label in 1952 and kept it going through the early 1970s recording the likes of Lil Armstrong, Bonnie Lee
Bonnie Lee
Bonnie Lee was an American Chicago blues singer. Known as 'Sweetheart of the Blues', she is best remembered for her lengthy working relationships with Sunnyland Slim and Willie Kent...
, Oscar Brown
Oscar Brown
Oscar Brown, Jr was an American singer, songwriter, playwright, poet, civil rights activist, and actor.He ran for office in the Illinois state legislature and U.S...
and Hammie Nixon
Hammie Nixon
Hammie Nixon was an American harmonica player.-Life and career:Born Hammie Nickerson in Brownsville, Tennessee, he began his music career with jug bands in the 1920s and is best known as a country blues harmonica player, but also played the kazoo, guitar and jug...
As plans were being initiated to conduct full length interviews with Williams to gather his life story in 1980, he died in a Chicago nursing home.
Williams was a member of the National Football Hall of Fame Association. In 2004, he was posthumously inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame
Blues Hall of Fame
The Blues Hall of Fame is a listing of people who have significantly contributed to blues music. Started in 1980 by the Blues Foundation, it honors those who have performed, recorded, or documented blues.-1980:*Big Bill Broonzy*Willie Dixon*John Lee Hooker...
.
External links
- Biography
- http://www.charliegillett.com/bb/viewtopic.php?f=34&t=11087 (Special Tribute to his life)