Sammy Price (October 6, 1908 – April 14, 1992) was an American jazz, boogie-woogie and jump blues pianist and bandleader. He was born Samuel Blythe Price, in Honey Grove, Texas, United States. Price was most noteworthy for his work on Decca Records with his own band, known as the Texas Bluesicians, that included fellow musicians Don Stovall and Emmett Berry. The artist was equally notable for his decade-long partnership with Henry "Red" Allen.
During his early career, Price was a singer and dancer in local venues in the Dallas area. Price lived and played jazz in Kansas City, Chicago and Detroit. In 1938 he was hired by Decca Records as a session sideman on piano, assisting singers such as Trixie Smith and Sister Rosetta Tharpe.
Later in his life, he partnered with the Roosevelt Hotel in New York, and was the headline entertainment at the Crawdaddy Restaurant, a New Orleans themed restaurant in New York in the mid 1970s. Both Benny Goodman and Buddy Rich played with Price at this venue. in the 1980s he switched to playing in the bar of Boston's Copley Plaza.
He died in April 1992, in New York, at the age of 83.
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Price's autobiography, What Do They Want? (1989), provided a fascinating account of a man whose history was almost as long as jazz itself. The book also contained a 60 page discography showing the remarkably wide range of artists with whom he had recorded.
ReplyDeleteThanks Alan! Great info! Bman
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