WILL EZELL

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Will Ezell was considered to be one of the best boogie woogie piano players of the era, comparable with the great Cow Cow Davenport. In fact Ezell and Davenport might have both claimed to have been the originators of boogie-woogie on record, Ezell's "Pitchin' Boogie" competing with Davenport's "Cow Cow Blues", (although it was Pinetop Smith's "Pinetop's Boogie Woogie" that first used the term on record). It had long been cited that he was born in Fullerton, Louisiana, but recent research has confirmed that he was born in 1892 in Brenham, Texas. Ezell's early career was spent as an itinerant musician playing dances, labour camps and logging mills in Texas and Arkansas, and also settling for a while in New Orleans. Ezell had a recording career that lasted for four years beginning in 1927 and he produced total of 17 tracks (including alternative takes) for Paramount Records.  It was in his role as "house pianist" for Paramount that he supported artists such as Blind Roosevelt Graves, Bertha Henderson and was rumoured to have worked for Bessie Smith. It was also whilst supporting Lucille Bogan in 1927 that the two began an affair that almost led to the break up of Bogan's marriage. Although his records sold reasonably well, and he was well respected by contemporaries such as Little Brother Montgomery and Cripple Clarence Lofton, his success disappeared during the Depression and nothing is known of his musical career after his last recording session in 1931. Recent research has confirmed that Will Ezell died in 1963 in Chicago.