Legacy
One year after Rainey's death, blues singer and guitarist Memphis Minnie recorded a tribute. French singer/song writer Francis Cabrel refers to Rainey in the song "Cent Ans de Plus" on the 1998 album Hors-Saison. Cabrel cites the artist as one of a number of blues influences, including Charley Patton, Son House, Blind Lemon, Robert Johnson, Howlin' Wolf, Blind Blake, Willie Dixon, and Blues Boy Willie, whose father toured with Rainey.
American singer/songwriter Bob Dylan refers to Rainey in the song "Tombstone Blues" on his 1965 album, Highway 61 Revisited.
In 1981 Sandra Lieb wrote the first full-length book about Rainey, titled Mother of the Blues: a Study of Ma Rainey.
The 1982 August Wilson play Ma Rainey's Black Bottom took its title from her song of the same name recorded in December of 1927, which ostensibly refers to the Black Bottom dance of the time.
In 1994, the U.S. Post Office issued a Rainey 29-cent commemorative postage stamp.
In 2004, her song "See See Rider Blues" (1925) was inducted in the Grammy Hall of Fame, and was included by the National Recording Preservation Board in the Library of Congress' National Recording Registry in 2004. The board selects voices in an annual basis that are "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant."
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Famous quotes containing the word legacy:
“What is popularly called fame is nothing but an empty name and a legacy from paganism.”
—Desiderius Erasmus (c. 1466–1536)