His Eye Is On the Sparrow

urn:iso:std:iso:639:ed-3:eng

135

text excerpt

Many famous performers, both colored and white, who'd heard about the reputation I'd won in Harlem came to see me in Atlantic City. Bert Williams, the Negro star of Ziegfeld Follies, came three times because friends had told him I was a girl singer with his droll quality. After listening to me he sent word for me to come to his table. "Young lady," he said, "you have the makings of a great artist." Sophie Tucker was playing at the Beaux Arts that year and she, too, came several times to catch my act. This Last of the Red-Hot Mammas was then called a "coon shouter," an expression whose passing from the common language none of us laments. Miss Tucker paid me a little money to come to her hotel suite and sing there for her privately. She explained that she wanted to study my style of delivery.

excerpt from 'His Eye Is On the Sparrow' pp. 135 (148 words)

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1429104752879