Show 39: W.C. Handy's Legacy

I'd like to welcome you all back to the very first show of this year and the 39th episode overall. For today's episode, we're going to be taking it back to the beginning of orchestrated blues music. Now, there exists a mighty list of blues-based monikers, like Willie Dixon as the poet of the blues, Koko Taylor as the queen of the blues, and, heck, there are even three or more kings of the blues, with Freddie, Albert, and B.B., of course. But who, you might ask, is the father of the blues? Throughout the two-hour blues odyssey upon which we are about to embark, I will prove why this title belongs to none other than W.C., William Christopher Handy, out of Florence, Alabama. Handy was a stunning composer and virtuoso and drafted some of the earliest and most influential blues songs ever etched into wax. We're going to start off the show with a handful of ladies singing his blues. Handy's most enduring tune, "The Beale Street Blues," sung by the mesmerizing Ella Fitzgerald, here it is.