Big Mama Thornton

Willie Mae "Big Mama" Thornton (November 12, 1926, Montgomery, Alabama – July 25, 1984 in Los Angeles, California) was an American blues singer, harp player and songwriter. 

Thornton was the first who recorded "Hound Dog" by Leiber and Stoller. Another song which is often covered is "Ball ´n Chain". It is included in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame list of the "500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll".  It is one of her best-known songs because of being performed and recorded by Janis Joplin.

Career
She was born in Montgomery, Alabama. She got her musical education in a Baptist church, where her father was a minister and her mother a choir singer. At the age of 14 she joined Sammy Green's Georgia-based Hot Harlem Revue and toured the south. She was also a self-taught drummer and harmonica player. She often played each instrument onstage.

Thornton settled in Houston in 1948. In 1951, she signed a recording contract with Peacock Records. For this label, she recorded "Hound Dog" which became #1 in the Rhythm and Blues charts. Then she toured with Junior Parker and Esther Phillips. At the end of the 1950s, her career faded. She relocated to the San Francisco Bay Area, where she mostly played local blues clubs.

In 1966 she recorded Big Mama Thornton With The Muddy Waters Blues Band featuring Muddy Waters (guitar), Sammy Lawhorn (guitar), James Cotton (harmonica), Otis Spann (piano), Luther Johnson (bass guitar), and Francis Clay (drums). Her Ball 'n' Chain album in 1968 with Lightnin' Hopkins (guitar) and Larry Williams (vocals), included the songs "Hound Dog", "Wade in the Water", "Little Red Rooster", "Ball 'n' Chain", "Money Taker", and "Prison Blues".

One of Thornton's last albums was Jail (1975) for Vanguard Records.The album was recorded in the mid-1970s at two prisons. She became the leader of a blues ensemble. Thornton performed at the Monterey Jazz Festival in 1966 and 1968, and at the San Francisco Blues Festival in 1979. In 1965 she performed with the American Folk Blues Festival package in Europe where she recorded her album Big Mama Thornton in Europe and followed it up the next year in San Francisco with Big Mama Thornton with the Chicago Blues Band. Both albums came out on the Arhoolie label. Thornton continued to record for Vanguard, Mercury, and other small labels in the 1970s and to work the blues festival circuit until her death in 1984. She was inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame in 1984.

Thornton died of a heart attack in Los Angeles on 25 July 1984 at the age of 57.

Selected discography
 1965  Big Mama Thornton in Europe  Arhoolie
 1967  Big Mama the Queen at Monterey  MCA
 1968  She's Back
 1969  Stronger Than Dirt
 1970  Maybe  Roulette Records
 1970  The Way It Is  Mercury
 1973  Saved  Pentagram Records
 1975  Jail  Vanguard
 1975  Sassy Mama!
 1978  Mama's Pride  VanguardAll Music Guide Discography

References

Other websites


Category:1926 births
Category:1984 deaths
Category:American blues musicians
Category:American blues singers
Category:Blues harp players
Category:Musicians from Montgomery, Alabama
Category:Singers from Montgomery, Alabama