#WomanCrushWednesday 9/15
It’s time for #WomanCrushWednesday! This week, we talk about a musician from our hometown of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Ms. Mary Lou Williams! Mary Lou Williams was a revolutionary pianist whose pieces would feature “sounds like Kansas City in the ’30s, and sounds like the early funk influences from the ’70s, all in the same tune.”
Born in Atlanta Georgia, Ms. Williams and her family moved to the East Liberty neighborhood of Pittsburgh soon after she was born. By the age of 6, Ms. Williams was performing and supporting her ten half-brothers and sisters. At the age of 7, she began to perform publicly and became known in Pittsburgh as “The Little Piano Girl”. From there, Ms. Williams popularity soared; at age 12 she performed on stage with Duke Ellington. During a late-night performance in Detroit, Louis Armstrong listened to Ms. Williams perform and then, as Ms. Williams put it, “Louis picked me up and kissed me.”
After marrying Jazz legend John Overton Williams, she moved to Oklahoma City as John had accepted an invitation to become part of Andy Kirk’s Twelve Clouds of Joy band. As the band moved to Tulsa, Ms. Williams continued to work as a musician (and while she wasn’t working as a musician, she worked as an assistant to an undertaker). Ms. Williams finally joined the Twelve Clouds of Joy as their pianist, as well as their composer and arranger. Years passed as Ms. Williams popularity grew, until 1942. After divorcing her husband John, Ms. Williams returned briefly to Pittsburgh before joining Duke Ellington’s orchestra in New York. For some time, she hosted a weekly radio show called the Mary Lou Williams’s Piano Workshop. Here, she would mentor up and coming musicians such as Dizzy Gillespie and Thelonious Monk.
In 1954, Williams stepped away from music entirely and converted to Catholicism. During these years, Mary Lou Williams was eventually coaxed back into performing professionally by local priests and her longtime friend Dizzy Gillespie. She would go on to found new jazz venues, her own record label and publishing company , and even founded the Pittsburgh Jazz Fesitval. While teaching at Seton (LaSalle) High School, Ms. Williams would pen her first Mass, entitled, “The Pittsburgh Mass.” She would go on to become the first jazz composered commissioned by the church. All of these events would lead her to create her most acclaimed work: Mary Lou’s Mass. She would rise to fame again throughout the 70’s by releasing numerous albums, as well as her multiple performances including a nightly performance in Greenwich Village at The Cookery, a new club run by her old boss from her Café Society days, Barney Josephson.
She would go on to work at Duke University as artist-in-residence from 1877 to 1981, where she taught the History of Jazz alongside her longtime manager and friend, Father Peter O’Brien. She would also direct the Duke Jazz Ensemble. And in 1978, Ms. Mary Lou Williams performed at the White House for President Jimmy Carter and his guests.
Mary Lou Williams would pass away in Durham North Carolina at the age of 71. She was buried in the Calvary Catholic Cemetery in Pittsburgh. As she reflected on her life, she famously said: “”I did it, didn’t I? Through muck and mud.”
To learn more about Mary Lou Williams, be sure to read this article on nextpittsburgh.com about Mary Lou Williams from her official biographer, Deanna Witkowski, and be sure to listen to the video below of Mary Lou William’s Greatest Hits Album: