biography
| name: |
Handy, W(illiam) C(hristopher)
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| sex:
| male
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| lived:
| (1873–1958)
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| biography:
| Blues composer, born in Florence, Alabama, USA. He studied at Teachers Agricultural and Mechanical College, Huntsville, AL, became a schoolteacher, then joined a minstrel show as a cornet player. In 1903, despite becoming blind, he formed his own band in Memphis, subsequently moving to Chicago and to New York City, where he formed his own publishing company. He was the first to introduce the ‘blues’ style to printed music, his most famous work being the ‘St Louis Blues’ (1914). He wrote Father of the Blues (1958). |
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