People, Locations, Episodes

Wed, 06.18.1884

Sara Martin, Blues Singer born

*Sara Martin was born on this date in 1884.  She was a Black blues singer.  

She was born Sara Dunn in Louisville, Kentucky.  She was the daughter of William T. Dunn and Mary Katherine "Katie' Pope and was singing on the Black vaudeville circuit by 1915.  She was married three times, the first marriage to Christopher Wooden when she was 16. Christopher Wooden died in 1901. Her second marriage was to Abe Burton. At the time of her death, she was married to Hayes Buford Withers.  

She began a successful recording career when Okeh Records signed her in 1922.  Through the 1920s, she toured and recorded with such performers as Fats Waller, Clarence Williams, King Oliver, and Sylvester Weaver.  She was among the most recorded classic blues singers.  "Martin tended to use more swinging, danceable rhythms than some of her peers. When she sang traditional blues, her voice and styling had richer, deeper qualities that matched the content in sensitivity and mood: "Mean Tight Mama" and "Death Sting Me" approach an apex of blues singing."

Martin's stage work in the late 1920s took her to New York, Detroit, Pittsburgh and Cuba, Jamaica, and Puerto Rico.  She made one film appearance, in Hello Bill, with Bill "Bojangles" Robinson, in 1929.  Her last major stage appearance was in Darktown Scandals Review in 1930.  She performed with Thomas A. Dorsey as a gospel singer in 1932, after which she worked outside the music industry, running a nursing home in Louisville.  

In her time, Martin was one of the most popular classic blues singers. She was billed as "The Famous Moanin' Mama" and "The Colored Sophie Tucker." She made many recordings, including a few under the names Margaret Johnson and Sally Roberts.  Sara Martin died in Louisville of a stroke on May 24, 1955.   

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