Piano RED (WP)

 PIANO & SPECKLED RED 

(William "Willie" Lee Perryman alias "Piano Red" or Dr. Feelgood)
(Rufus Perryman alias "Speckled Red")
DISCOGRAPHY 1956-2009 (14+4CD)

 BIOGRAPHY 
PIANO RED
        

William "Willie" Lee Perryman (October 19, 1911 – July 25, 1985), usually known professionally as Piano Red and later in life as Dr.Feelgood, was an American blues musician, the first to hit the pop music charts.

He was a self-taught pianist who played in the barrelhouse blues style (a loud percussive type of blues piano suitable for noisy bars or taverns). His performing and recording careers emerged during the period of transition from completely segregated "race music", to "rhythm and blues", which was marketed to white audiences.

Some music historians credit Perryman's 1950 recording "Rocking With Red" for the popularization of the term rock and roll in Atlanta. His simple, hard-pounding left hand and his percussive right hand, coupled with his cheerful shout, brought him considerable success over three decades.....

SPECKLED RED

On October 23, 1892 Rufus Perryman was born as the second of eight or nine children to Henry Perryman and his wife Ada in Monroe, Louisiana. His father was a sharecropper. During Rufus' early years his family moved to Hampton, Georgia.

The family itself had only little musical background. William Lee 'Willie' Perryman, who is better-known as 'Piano Red' was Rufus' nineteen years younger brother. Their nicknames 'Speckled Red' (Rufus) and 'Piano Red' (William Lee) derived from both men being albinos. Both brothers had very poor vision, an effect of their albinism. They could never take formal music lessons, because both were cross-eyed and extremely near-sighted since birth, so each of them was a self-taught piano player and developed his barrelhouse style through playing by ear. 

Rufus was influenced by his idol Charlie Spand, along with James Hemingway and Will Ezell and also he learned to play the organ at his local church in Hampton, Georgia. As a teenager Rufus was already playing house rent parties and juke joints.

In 1925 Speckled Red left Hampton. It should last 35 years until he saw his brother William again. Speckled Red moved to Detroit where he played anywhere he could, including various nightclubs and brothels. In 1929 he left for Memphis, Tennessee, where he cut his first recording sessions for Brunswick Records resulting in two classics in Wilkins Street Stomp and The Dirty Dozens which became a hit in late 1929.

In the following year he recorded a sequel, The Dirty Dozens, No.2 in Chicago, Illinois, but it failed to become a hit. After Speckled Red's second set of sessions failed to sell, the pianist spent the next few years without a contract or label. He simply played local Memphis venues and St. Louis bars. In 1938, he cut a few sides with slide guitar player Robert Nighthawk and mandolinist Willie Hatcher as 'Speckled Red Trio' for Bluebird Records, including St. Louis Stomp and Welfare Blues, but they were largely unsuccessful. In the early 1940s Speckled Red settled in St. Louis where he continued his career of playing taverns, local clubs and bars for the next decade and a half. (more ...)