Estelle Yancey

Please note that the content of this book primarily consists of articles available from Wikipedia or other free sources online. Estelle "Mama" Yancey (January 1, 1896-April 19, 1986) was an American blues vocalist. She was nominated four times for the Blues Foundation: Blues Music Awards, "Traditional Blues Female Artist." Yancey, born Estella Harris in Cairo, Illinois, grew up in Chicago, where she sang in church choirs and learned how to play the guitar. In 1917, when she was 21, she married Jimmy Yancey, who had traveled the U.S. and Europe as a vaudeville dancer. She often sang with him at informal get-togethers and house parties in the 1930s and 1940s and performed with him at Carnegie Hall, New York in 1948. Because Jimmy Yancey was a great boogie-woogie/blues piano player, Estelle recorded frequently with her husband. In 1943, the Yanceys recorded for Session Records, and went back into the studio to record the album Pure Blues for Atlantic Records. The session was just a few months before Jimmy Yancey's death that same year.