Mary Lou Williams

One of the greatest Jazz musicians to ever exist is someone you’ve never heard of.  Why? Well, she was a black woman living in the 1900s.

Mary Lou Williams was a musical prodigy born in Atlanta, but she grew up in Pittsburgh, PA—that’s where I’m from!! Unfortunately, this story does not shine a good light on my beloved hometown. You see, Mary Lou’s music career was kickstarted at age 6 by her desire to keep her family safe from her hateful neighbors. 

CW: racism and violence—skip to next paragraph to avoid. Let me explain—Mary Lou’s family was African American in the early 1900s, so life was pretty rough for them. Their new neighbors were far from happy about a black family moving into their white neighborhood, and greeted them with bricks and hateful slurs. But once the heard Mary Lou play the piano, they stopped. Mary Lou, at age 6 (!!), was able to keep the harassment at bay by performing private concerts for her neighbor, and they even gave her a nickname—“The Little Piano Girl of East Liberty”.

Mary Lou started learning the piano from her mother when she was 4 years old, and it was clear from then that she was going to be something special. By the age of 15 she was touring with a small band and performing around the country. 

She was an incredible performer, but her true talent was composition. You may not have heard her name before, but you’ve definitely heard her music. Mary Lou shaped jazz into what it is today, with her unique orchestrations and harmonies. Famous jazz musicians like Duke Ellington, Benny Goodman, and Louis Armstrong were practically lining up to get her to write songs for them. 

“One week I was called on for twelve arrangements, including a couple for Louis Armstrong and Earl Hines, and I was beginning to get telegrams from Gus Arnheim, Glen Gray, Tommy Dorsey and many more like them. As we were making perhaps 500 miles per night, I used to write in the car by flashlight between engagements. The band parts too... Whenever musicians listened to the band they would ask who made a certain arrangement. Nearly always it was one of mine.”

- Mary Lou Williams

As successful as she was, she was never financially stable due to her gender and race. She was a black woman trying to make it in a male dominated career in a country that saw her as a second class citizen. She met resentment and prejudice everywhere she went, but even at her breaking point, she never gave up.

Later in life, Mary Lou became an advocate for jazz, and taught its history at Duke University. After the civil rights era, jazz was being whitewashed by revisionists, and she was determined to preserve its roots. She used a drawing of what she called The Tree of Jazz to illustrate where it comes from—the suffering of slavery. 

 
 
Kavita ShankarComment