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November 25
Born Bertholoff William Henry Joseph Bonaparte, Smith grew up in Newark, New Jersey with his mother and Stepfather. He began studying piano at the age of six, Smith was inspired by his grandmother who played organ and banjo and by the Christian and Jewish music he heard in Harlem and Newark. Smith was playing clubs in the same area by the age of fifteen, married to Blanch Merrill in 1916, and served a two-year enlistment in World War I by 1918. He was not as well known as his peers at the time, James P. Johnson and “Fats” Waller. In the 1930s and 1940s Smith did not record much, but in the 1950s his material took an upsurge. At this time he made a number of records with different labels showcasing his playing, singing and in some cases talking. Noted as a force in music by many of the great jazz artist of the twentieth century, Duke Ellington paid tribute to him with his composition Portrait of the Lion. Smith, whose father was Jewish, claimed inspiration from the music he heard in synagogues as a child. He had his bar mitzvah in 1910 and in the 1940s became cantor of the African-American synagogue in Harlem. Willie the Lion Smith died in New York City on April 18, 1973. Reference: Jazz: A History of the New York Scene Samuel Charters and Leonard Kunstadt (Doubleday, Garden City, N.Y., 1962)
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The African American Registry®, The African American Registry® Copyright 2005, 2006
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