1930s
Johnny
Mercer had his first hit, "Lazy Bones," in 1933. He published
701 songs, had 90 film credits, starred in 6 Broadway Musicals, received
4 Academy Awards from 15 nominations, had 37 Hit Parade songs of which
13 were #1, and he founded Capitol Records. Mercer is Georgia's
undisputed premier musician of all time.
Blues man "Georgia
Tom" Dorsey turned to religious music during the Great Depression.
Dorsey became the first publisher of black gospel music with the establishment
of the Dorsey House of Music.
Gene Autry’s career spanned some
70 years in the entertainment industry and he became famous in film, radio,
television, and live theater and rodeo performances. Autry made 635 recordings,
including more than 300 songs written or co-written by him. His records
sold more than 100 million copies and he has more than a dozen gold and
platinum records, including the first record ever certified gold.
In terms of his musical skill, the sheer size
of his repertoire, the length and variety of his career, and his influence
on contemporaries and musicians who would follow, Big
Bill Broonzy is among a select few of the most important figures in
recorded blues history.
Folklorist John
Lomax discovered and recorded Leadbelly
at the Angola Prison Farm in Louisiana in 1934.
Ella
Fitzgerald made her singing debut at seventeen on November 21, 1934
at the Apollo Theater in Harlem, New York.
Mahalia
Jackson made her first Gospel recordings in 1935.
In 1935, T-Bone
Walker began experimenting with a prototype electric guitar and was
one of the first guitarists anywhere to to play the instrument in public.
In 1936, Robert
Johnson ,"King of the Delta Blues", made his first recordings in San
Antonio, Texas. His second and last recording session was held in
Dallas, Texas in 1937.
In 1938, Bill
Monroe made his first appearance on WSM radio in Nashville, and Roy
Acuff joined the Grand Ole Opry.
Charlie
Christian's lively, inventive single-note playing helped popularize
the electric guitar as a solo instrument and ushered in the era of bop.
By 1939, two hundred and twenty-five thousand
jukeboxes
were in operation and were said to be responsible for the sale of thirteen
million records a year.
