Earl Hines New York City, 1947, Gottlieb Collection

Pittsburgh is a foundational city of this American music we call “jazz.”

Earl “Fatha” Hines” was a major jazz figure from Duquesne, PA who influenced the musical world. Called “Fatha” because he was, early in his career, considered the father of what became jazz piano.

Earl Hines is at long-last being recognized for his historical importance by the Pennsylvania Historical Commission with a marker to be located his hometown of Duquesne, which was approved and announced in March 2021. It has yet to be installed and unveiled. The marker for “Earl Kenneth "Fatha" Hines (1903 - 1983)” was nominated by the Phyllis Wheatley Literary Society of Duquesne.

The markers share a fabulous and broad array of stories from where we live, and the 2021 class included recognition for Earl Hines, Andy Warhol, Stan Musial and other people and places worthy of recognition.

We checked with the Pennsylvania Historical & Museum Commission on what the status was on the Earl Hines marker, and according to Howard Pollman at the commission, there had been delay since the pandemic, and things are moving forward. The marker to celebrate Earl Hines’ Duquesne roots is being manufactured and the unveiling will be set up by the City of Duquesne, soon. Mr. Pollman says the latest hope is the marker will be dedicated in Spring of 2024.

In our program, we also find a connection to black history month that goes well beyond jazz - famed black entrepreneur (and vocalist) Madam CJ Walker spent years in Pittsburgh as here businesses grew, and had an important role in the musical life of an Earl Hines mentor and onetime Pittsburgh musician, vocalist Lois Deppe.

WZUM has also made connections with the last singer to tour with Fatha, Marva Josie of Clairton, PA - her comments on how she came to spend 16 years on the road with Hines are worth hearing - as is her music with him from 1970.

Connections

We’ll look and listen into some of Earl Hines’ influences, and his own words about how he developed his performing style from a 1963 appearance on the early public television program, Jazz Casual. We’ll also hear from contemporary jazz experts on Hines - Tom Roberts and Dr. Nelson Harrison.

We’ll also hear music from another Pittsburgher who was very important in the career of Earl Hines - a gentleman singer named Lois Deppe. Lois Deppe performed widely with Earl Hines, including at the Leader House (precursor to Crawford’s Grill). In 1921, there are many reports of Deppe and Hines performing a duet on KDKA radio, which is considered the first live radio appearance by African American artists on radio in the US - a performance that was also heard over loudspeaker on Wylie Avenue in the Hill.

Deppe’s career later included work with notables like the influential McKinney’s Cotton Pickers from Detroit, bandleader/arranger Fletcher Henderson, and legendary players like tenor saxophonist Coleman Hawkins and bassist John Kirby (who would later marry another influential Pittsburgh native, vocalist Ernestine Anderson).

Earl “Fatha” Hines on Ralph Gleason’s Jazz Casual on National Educational Television (NET) (February 15, 1963)

Another fascinating connection to this story is the African American entrepreneur, Madam C. J. Walker. Her career in women’s hair products made her a multi-millionaire - and in 1908-1910, she lived and worked in Pittsburgh. In 1910, she moved to Indianapolis where she started a larger beauty products factory, but she still, apparently, had her eye on Pittsburgh. As a singer and a patron of the arts, Walker brought a young Lois Deppe to perform in Indianapolis in 1913 (when he was age 16). She later brought Deppe to New York City and had him study with Enrico Caruso's vocal coach, Buzzi Pecci. By 1917, back in Pittsburgh, Deppe recruited a very young Earl Hines as his pianist for solo recitals and for his band, Deppe’s Serenaders for several years. The Serenaders are considered the first “swing band” in the history of Pittsburgh cited as performing at Pittsburgh's Paramount Inn as early as 1919. Deppe and Hines also recorded other music beyond popular sounds of the day - including a 1924 Gannett recording of “Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child” which was featured in an episode of the HBO series “Boardwalk Empire.”

In an interview with Melody Maker in 1954, another Pittsburgh jazz legend, Mary Lou Williams, recalled Lois Deppe:

One of our local characters, one of the most famed was Lois Deppe, the popular baritone singer who had been around since 1918 or earlier. His band was the talk of Pennsylvania, and at that time included the great Earl Hines -- a local boy from nearby Carnegie -- and Vance Dixon on saxophone and clarinet. Wherever Deppe's band appeared, the kids from all around were sure to go -- and when Vance started to slap-tongue on that saxophone they really went wild. Numbers I remember the band doing were Milenberg Joys, Isabelle and Congaine. The last two were recorded by Deppe in the early Twenties.

Earl Hines moved on to Chicago around 1924 after the strong encouragement to Earl and his parents by Eubie Blake (a friend of Hines’ Aunt Sadie). In Chicago, by 1927-28, the connection of Earl Hines to Louis Armstrong became revolutionary. Combining these two innovative players in the late 1920’s changed the sound of jazz, popular music and America. Hines would influence Art Tatum, Erroll Garner, Nat “King” Cole and legions more.

Earl “Fatha” HInes, December 28, 1903 – April 22, 1983. When not on the road, he spent the last three decades of his life in Oakland, California. After his passing, his estate donated to the University of California, Berkley for the Earl "Fatha" Hines Young Musicians Development Fund for the campus' Young Musicians Program, which provides year-round, individualized instruction to musically gifted low-income students in grades four to 12 at no cost to their families. Paricipants in the program have included saxophonist Joshua Redman, pianist Benny Green, and drummer Will Kennedy.

Take a dip into the history of jazz piano with Earl “Fatha” Hines on WZUM

The Scene - Thursday at 6pm, Sundays at 5pm, Friday and Saturday at noon on WZUM.

A 1975 documentary on the pianist Earl Hines. Filmed at Blues Alley in Washington DC, produced by Britain's ITV television.

Lois Deppe in 1931, sings with the Fletcher Henderson Orchestra, “My Pretty Girl.” New York City. Also in the band: Russel Smith, Bobby Stark, and Rex Stewart trumpets; Jimmy Harrison and Claude Jones trombones; Benny Carter and Harvey Boone alto sax; Coleman Hawkins tenor sax; Fletcher Henderson piano & director; Clarence Holiday banjo & guitar; John Kirby, tuba; and Walter Johnson drums. Solos by Coleman Hawkins, ts; Bobby Stark, tp; Harvey Boone, cl obligato

Earl Hines and Lois Depp backstage at the Syria Mosque, Pittsburgh - “Night of Stars” August 4, 1947; Heinz Family Fund © Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh

Interview with Marva Josie about working with Earl Hines

Scott Hanley, WZUM
You grew up around Pittsburgh, in Clairton, and then somehow looped back around with another native of the Pittsburgh region, Earl Hines.
Marva Josie
Well, that's another story. I got a little disappointed in Detroit because the one guy opened up a company there for me, but it was too too much for him. I got flimflam. So I called my mother and I said, Mom, what do you think? She said. You've got more. You're young. Come on home if you want to. So I went home, and while I was there, I went to I can't remember the agency, but they were from Broadway in New York. And I met one of the agents. And he said, Well, let me tell you what's going on. There's a wonderful jazz pianist who's looking for vocalists. His name is Earl Hines. And I said, I know that because I had seen him on television on a Merv Griffin show.
And so I don't know why I said this, but I said to my mother, can I suggest she said, You better hurry up. Sing it if you if you think you can. So I had an audition with Earl Hines at the Village Vanguard, and they said, Oh, you sing pretty good. I said, Thank you. You know, I was very nervous. So I went and I sang. And he could you sing another number for me? And I said, I can't remember what I sang the first. I said, What about Misty? Because everybody knows it. And you can tell if I made a mess of it. And he laughed. And he asked me about my favorite singers. And of course, I mentioned Sarah (Vaughan). I sang. And he said, Are you able to travel? And I said, Yes, I am if I if I want to. So I said, We're going to Russia, I think was one of their first gigs there.
WZUM
You were on the road with Earl, Father Hines for 16 years. Earl managed to maintain quite a rigorous schedule, but also work with some of the best in the business all through his career.
Marva Josie
And he had some of the greatest in the groups. There were, I think over a period of 16 years, there were like 80 some different guys because what happened? Some of them had family issues, some of them had deaths, and they'd want to leave and they want to come back. And sometimes they were able to and sometimes they weren't. But it was quite an experience to just meet everybody. You know, some of the old guys like Billy Eckstine and Cab Calloway, all those people. I just I'm blessed because I did have a chance to meet 'em and he'd say, "I know. He'd say, I know how old you are, but I think, But how old are you?" That's that's not nice to ask, ladies. I said, You be telling everybody later you
So a lot of Billy Eckstine used to say, "What do you think of me?" I said, I think you're like everybody else. I thought you were a really handsome guy, but I think that kind of bothered you, didn't it? He said, "No." I said, Well, you're very fortunate because if I looked like you, I would just I don't know if I could stand myself,
but we used to kid around like that and I used to tell jokes and leave out the punch lines because they thought I didn't know what they were saying, you know? And I'd sit there and laugh and said, "What are you laughing about?" Nothing.
But I had a great time on the road with the guys. Sometimes I was the only woman there. And it was quite it was kind of hard because they expect girl singers to be, you know, kind of out there. Never was. My mother said, Be a lady and be quiet. Sometimes you want a laugh or you want to cry or whatever. Just think of home and your parents and how you were raised. So that's what I went through in my life.
WZUM
What were the most important things you learned in working with Earl Hines?
Marva Josie
Be a lady. Sing your heart out every night. And if he'd say, "If you forget the words, don't worry about it. Just put another word in like I do."
Sometimes you turn around to the guys and say, It wasn't just words and the guys. Everybody laugh because some of them I had worked together for with for a long time and they knew he was going to forget it. And it was it became a part of the act, you know, especially in small clubs and stuff like that. So it was fun, was always fun.
WZUM
And he ended up settling in Oakland, California.
Marva Josie
Well, that's where his family was. You know, he had two beautiful girls. I got in his wife and I get a chance to meet. Fatha became very ill. And I can remember all of us getting together, going to a concert one night, and they called on him and he wouldn't get up and perform,
But he still would tell jokes and, you know, be funny because he had some good jokes and we all knew the punch line because they were the same ones, but we still laughed!